Dutschke - Barossa Valley - Willowbend

2002 Willowbend

88 points – The Wine Advocate, Robert Parker – October 2004

The WillowBend blend of Merlot, Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon commenced in 1990 and has been a consistently produced round, soft and flavoursome wine over the years. Produced by blending those varieties that perform best in our vineyard.

The Merlot (45%) and Shiraz (32%) provide the full ripe sweet spicy fruit palate and the Cabernet Sauvignon (23%) gives the firm tannin structure.

With time in the bottle the older “WillowBend’s” have also showed great complexing characters while still maintaining their fresh fruit flavours. Typically good wines to lay down.

The 2002 WillowBend Merlot Shiraz Cabernet has plenty of big generous fruit both on the nose and palate, and the combination of both American and French oak have married well with these fruit characters to provide some underlying chocolate flavour with sweet vanillin oak.