Mount Langi Ghiran Cliff Edge Shiraz 2008

Established in 1969, now home to one of Australia’s most iconic cool climate wines, Langi Shiraz. Mount Langi Ghiran – Aboriginal for home of the yellow tailed black cockatoo – is set amongst the dramatic backdrop of the Great Dividing Range in the Grampians region of Victoria, producing iconic cool climate wines. The first vines were planted on the property in the late 1800s at the site which is now our ‘Contour Block’, but it’s when the Fratin family replanted in 1969 that Mount Langi Ghiran really came to be.

Cliff Edge is a savoury, spicy Victorian Shiraz that rates among the very best, for both quality and value. As veteran commentator Chris Shanahan says, Cliff Edge is ‘about as sexy as Shiraz gets at the price – beautifully, sweetly aromatic with a vibrant, fruity palate to match’. Since 2008, Cliff Edge has been made entirely from estate-grown fruit, mostly from a 1981 vineyard established using cuttings from the original 1967 plantings, which are themselves from the 140-year-old Concongella vine nursery at Great Western.

This is the famous pre-phylloxera ‘Swiss clone’, introduced by Swiss immigrants on their way to the goldfields, and representing some of the oldest Shiraz clonal material in the world. It is perfectly matched to the cool Grampians climate and consequently long autumn ripening period. This fruit makes a wine that is supple, fine and long, already showing complex and layered aromas and flavours – it is another legacy of (and tribute to) the late Trevor Mast, Mount Langi Ghiran’s visionary founding winemaker.

"It’s the first Cliff Edge Shiraz to be entirely estate grown. It’s hand picked, is made
with “a large proportion of whole bunches”, is matured for 18 months in French oak
barriques “with all the barriques used being made by Burgundian coopers”. The wine
finishes its fermentation in barrel and is kept on its lees “for considerable time before
one gentle racking”. Winemaker Dan Buckle and his team really have it going on at
Mount Langi nowadays. For all its outstanding history – and the tremendous work
Trevor Mast put in over so many years – the winery is now in the form of its life.
What an elegant shiraz this is. I’m most taken by it. It’s peppery, sappy, black cherried
and blueberried. The oak has been consumed by the fruit and spice. It’s terrifically
well structured – complex chains of tannin – with meaty, menthol-like characters
giving the finish a touch of fanfare. It’s both unashamedly cool climate and ripe and
warm. It’s going to be a long termer. ‘Rating 94 points Campbell Mattinson

"Typical Mount Langi crimson colour; a deliciously complex wine, the
bouquet and palate singing the same song, with a precocious display of spice and
black pepper the soprano, rich plummy/velvety fruit the bass.’ Rating 94 points
James Halliday Australian Wine Companion 2012"