Winery: Penfolds
Region: Barossa Valley
Variety: Mourvèdre, Shiraz, Grenache
Vintage: NV
Your Wine Guy says:
Only the free run wine is used for Penfolds Grandfather Rare Tawny and they use a low strength fortifying spirit which is selected specifically for the Penfolds style.
The delicious and rich Penfolds Grandfather is deep amber with slight gold hues at the edge of the glass. The nose shows pronounced sweet rancio characters showing extended wood age underpinned by toffee, spice and ripe, complex fruit. The palate is full and rich with layers of well integrated fruit supported smooth spirit, fine tannins and finishes very long.
95 Points YWG
Critics say:
“The colour almost indistinguishable from Great Grandfather, but on the one hand has more power, yet on the other, less of the silky smoothness of the older wine.”
94 Points James Halliday Wine Companion
“The Tawny style doesn’t really grab me but this deluxe version from Penfolds is a pretty special drop.
It’s a light mahogany colour and it doesn’t come across as all that rich or treacle-like – though its flavours pack plenty of power. Intense rancio, intense brandy, dust and Xmas cake and toffee. Extreme length. No doubting its quality, balance, lightness-on-its-feet or ability to impress.”
94 Points Campbell Mattinson The Wine Front
The winemaker says:
Colour: Deep amber - mahogany in colour with the green gold tinges indicative of great age.
Nose: The nose is extremely complex and fragrant, possessing an array of nutty, vanillin, aged characters melding seamlessly with hints of raisined fruit, malt and lifted spirit.
Palate: The palate effortlessly displays the famed attributes of great Tawny; luscious, rich and full flavoured with mouthfilling viscosity and a slightly dry finish. Intense raisined fruit, walnut and toffee flavours harmonise with subtle vanillin oak. Peter Gago - Penfolds Chief Winemaker
Winery/Label Information:
Penfolds has a long tradition of fortified wine production, dating back to its origins in the mid-1800s. Many of these beautifully concentrated and complex Tawnies are now living history, with material stretching back decades.
Since 2009 Penfolds Tawnies have been named in accordance with the Australian Wine Industry’s Fortified Wine Code of Practice. This code provides a framework for winemakers to benchmark their styles against defined descriptors and to describe their wines using industry-wide classifications. Penfolds Great Grandfather and Grandfather carry the ‘Rare’ designation, meaning their average age is in excess of fifteen years. Bluestone Grand has an average age greater than ten years, whilst Club Reserve has an average age greater than five years.
Penfolds Grandfather Rare Tawny is batch-aged in old oak hogsheads for approximately eight years. After this stage it enters the six-stack ‘Grandfather Solera’, a fractional blending system utilised to maintain consistency in style.
Each year winemakers draw one-twelfth of each barrel from the lowest level of the Solera. The barrel is then topped up from the barrel sitting above it and the process is complete when the barrels on the highest level are one-twelfth empty.
The top barrels then receive the blended eight-year-old Grandfather Tawny. Theoretically, the wine drawn from the lowest level of the Solera is now at least twenty years of age, having been in the fractional blending system for twelve years.
During the maturation process, the wines become more concentrated and complex; opulence, weight and sweetness is intertwined and balanced by the alcohol, acidity, oak nuances and volatility. – Penfolds Wines
A trade agreement with the EU has been reached that will phase out the use of the terms ‘Port’ and ‘Tokay’ from Australian wine labels as they are now protected designation of origin trademarks specific to the countries of Portugal (exclusive to the Douro Valley in the north) and Hungary (exclusive to Tokaji east of Budapest) respectively.– YWG
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