Bondar Rayner Vineyard Shiraz 2022 (12 Bottles) McLaren Vale

Combines fruit from the two oldest Shiraz blocks in Bondar’s Rayner Vineyard (Blewitt Springs): a 1947 planting on deep sandy soils with ironstone rocks (75%) and a 1950 planting on shallow clay over limestone (25%).

Andre tells us that the former portion provides “fragrance and elegant structure,” while the latter “gives the bones.” Hand-picked and fermented with roughly 20% whole bunches, the wine was aged for 18 months in mostly used French hogsheads (5% new) and was hand-bottled, in September 2019, without fining or filtration.