Price: $10
Maker: Lindemans Wines, Australia
Varietal: Shiraz
Packaging: 750 ml bottle, artificial cork
Alcohol: 14%
Our Rating: 8 out of 10
Lindemans Reserve South Australia Shiraz 2003 is one of the Lindemans “Reserve” line, apparently a somewhat more upscale selection than their lower-end “Bin” series. We enjoyed Lindemans Bin 50 Shiraz, so we decided to try the Reserve. For starters, the vintage was a couple of years older than the Bin 50. The nose featured pepper and berry notes, and the flavor favors juicy currants. There’s a bit of oak there, too, but surprisingly little spice for a Shiraz. The Lindemans website refers to the tannins in this wine as “soft”, though we found a bit of a sharp edge in this bottle.
Opinions vary on the Lindemans Reserve Shiraz. Banzai’s Brain Dump tasted it, and found it to be overwhelmingly spicy. El Catavinos tried the 2002 vintage, and said “not especially spicy or terribly deep but it has a good clean dry finish.”
Based on our limited number of samples, we think the cheaper Bin 50 Shiraz is the better buy – we actually liked it a bit better than the Reserve. This bottle was sealed with the artificial cork we expect from Lindemans, but I noticed that they are adopting screw caps for their entire Bin series. They announced this switch earlier this year, so we can probably expect to see them in the not too distant future.