Giles Cooke at Alliance wine is the dude behind this wine from Thistledown, which is a really beautiful expression of old vine McLaren Vale Grenache. It’s not showy, but just really elegant and with potential for development.

The Vagabond Old Vine Grenache 2016 Blewitt Springs, McLaren Vale, Australia
14.5% alcohol. Single site, 80 year old dry grown vines on sandy soils. 35% whole bunches layered alternately between crushed fruit in concrete eggs, with no mechanical extraction at all. This is a lovely, vibrant expression of McLaren Vale Grenache, showing juicy raspberry and red cherry fruit, with some orange peel notes and faint hints of tar and rubber. Bright and with nice structure, melding in well to the fruit to create a really expressive, youthful and elegant wine. Pinot Noir of the south, Grenache, is responding well here to sympathetic winemaking, expressing the brightness of the sandy soils of Blewitt Springs. I’d love to see this in five years’ time. 93/100 (£23.99 Virgin Wines)