Ministry of Clouds Silk + Stone Single Vineyard Grenache 2023

100 % Grenache from a Clarendon vineyard planted in 1922 (bush vines) in dark loam over ironstone and clay. Hand picked with a little whole-bunch in the ferment and kept on skins for 3 and a half weeks with daily hand plunging and aged on gross lees for 7 months in old French oak puncheons before bottling in December 2023.

‘The 2023 Silk & Stone Single Site Grenache is from the Smart vineyard, picked across two different picks (a week apart), and only five hundred liters was made. The vines are the 1922 plantings, the oldest part of the vineyard. This is the highest-elevation Grenache vineyard in Clarendon, right up against the Adelaide Hills. Aromatically, the wine is loaded is baking spices: cinnamon cassia, fresh grated nutmeg, distant clove and star anise, ash, incense and lavender. The soils up in Clarendon are heavier than down in Blewitt Springs, for example, yet the elevation allows for a distinct perfume. In the mouth, the wine is full of raspberry and strawberry, redcurrants and red apple skins. The tannins are of course the highlight here for me: lacy, gently gritty and profuse. It's chewy, and I like that. This is a lovely, wispy wine. 14.5% alcohol, sealed under screw cap. Drink 2024-2038.’ 95 points, Erin Larkin, The Wine Advocate, September 2024.