Great wines are made by the weather of an exceptional vintage. An important step is deciding when to pick and about this the opinions of winemakers differ. Too early and the full flavours have not developed, though many like the wines, and picking too late highlights the concentration of overripe characters to the wine, think of dried fruit characters. Such flavours however appeal to another set of drinkers. And so it is that Italian makers create wines from bunches of grapes which are dried out on racks after harvest to create such fuller concentrated flavours.
In a district like the Barossa Valley the long summer never ends and grapes can be left hanging well into April or May and you can watch the berries shrivel in the heat. Vintage 2021 was favourable for the development of flavours and is as close to 10/10 as is possible. The grapes for this Glug Cabernet were harvested for full ripeness in the Glug style. We prefer drinking wines when younger though this wine will hand around in a good cellar for a long time.
