Virgin Hills Cabernet Shiraz Merlot
$5499each
$659DOZEN
WineryVirgin Hills
Fruit CabernetSauv Shiraz Merlot Malbec
Regions Macedon
  Victoria
Each $54.99
$659.00
Currently out of stock
Established 1968 by the legendary Melbourne restaurateur Tom Lazar, Virgin Hills is the gem of the Macedon Ranges, one of Australia's iconic vineyards. He planted Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz, Malbec, Merlot and Pinot Noir, with a view to creating an Australian first growth to rival the great Bordeaux he had grown to love while working as a sculptor in Paris. Only one wine is bottled under the Virgin Hills label each year. From inaugural release, the cepage of varietals has varied subtly each vintage, adding to the mystique and complexity of Virgin Hills.
The Virgin Hills property suffers from frosts and occasional snow at both ends of the season, budburst and harvest time. The site has always delivered low yields of half to 1½ tonnes per acre, due to the tough climactic conditions and dry grown grapes. To this day, it bears the viticultural classification of marginal vineyard. After spending a vintage in the Coonawarra with Owen Redman, Tommy Lazar produced the first Virgin Hills vintage. A blend of all his varieties, it stood out among Australian wines as being uncharacteristically subtle. Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz, Merlot and Malbec grapes are picked off vines over forty years of age, to be vinified and aged in a selection of exclusively French oak barrels.
TASTING NOTES
Dark red with a cherry hue. Blackcurrant, chocolate, black cherries and sweet French oak on the bouquet. Red and black berry fruit flavours on the palate, layered over aged mocha and tobacco characters. Subtle cool climate mint and eucalyptus. Spicy oak imparting soft, velvety tannins. A long lived wine, remarkably approachable on release.
Wines by Virgin Hills
More About Virgin Hills Wines
It is a wonder that Virgin Hills exists at all. It certainly should never have become what some of Australia's most respected wine critics have nominated as their desert island wine
Virgin Hills was the creation of eccentric Hungarian Australian sculptor restaurateur Tom Lazar. Arriving from Paris in the mid 1960s, he found a new country with a food and wine industry, very different to the one we know today. Lazar was determined to change all that. He established the renowned Little Reata restaurant in Melbourne. Then in 1968, came his grand vision of Virgin Hills. Inspired, he bought 300 acres of rugged bushland high in the Macedon Ranges. Lazar saw an opportunity to expose Australian palates to something very different; black cherries. After laborious clearing, the soil revealed itself to be quite poor for the purpose. Swiftly, Lazar had another grand vision. Virgin Hills»