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Tasting Notes: This wine spent 18 months in a mixture of half American and French oak barrels. It is softer wine than the ’07 Mike Press Shiraz and that extra time in oak is more noticeable. There are loads of cigar box and cinnamon aromas, and the palate has dusty fruit characters and red currant sweetness running through.

Background Information: The Gourmet Traveller Wine magazine broke with tradition and gathered together a range of exciting wines that had more to do with star quality than regions or varieties.
Panelists Peter Bourne, Nick Bullied MW, Andrew Caillard MW, Peter Forrstal, Huon Hooke and Sophie Ottens set out on a journey of discovery to assemble a collection of terrific, high – quality reds for winter consumption. Each member of the panel presented several exciting wines they’d encounted in their travels, wines they believed deserved group assessment and discussion.
The panel sampled 80 wines, grouped by variety and presented in masked flights of 10. The field was narrowed to some 32 labels, presenting a cross – section of wines. As you could imagine there were some serious collector’s wines in the final 32. Names like 2006 John Duval Wine Plexis SGM ($38), 2006 Kalleske Johann Georg Old Vine Shiraz ($125) & 2006 Shaw & Smith Shiraz ($40) to name a few were listed next to the 2006 Mike Press Cabernet Sauvignon ($14).
Out of the 32 wines given STAR QUALITY there were only 6 wines under $30 and the only wine under $20 was the Mike Press. This is what they wrote:
2006 Mike Press Adelaide Hills Cabernet Sauvignon
“This wine is a beauty, with delicate aromas, good ripeness and poise, pitched in a light elegant style. Bourne liked its pleasant leafy notes and gentle palate. Caillard described black olive cassis, dark chocolate, ripe, loose tannins with sweet fruit flavour length”.

Five years ago we were selling a range of cleanskin Adelaide Hills reds (Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz, Merlot and Pinot Noir) through our Prahran Market store. They were priced at around $9.00 a bottle and we were claiming they were from a well known and respected winemaker, with fruit off his own vineyard. We had an arrangement where he would make us these wines and we would not mention his name to promote them. The wines were simply stunning for the price and the allocated stock never really lasted long on our shelves.

Back then it worked well for the winery to sell off most of the estate fruit and make a small amount for us, to sell as a cleanskin. Things changed however when Mike Press winemaker / owner decided to enter two of these wines, the 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon & 2005 Shiraz into the Melbourne Wine Show, To his surprise low and behold they both won gold medals in their respective Jimmy Watson Classes. Five wines were short listed for a taste off to win the coveted Jimmy Watson Trophy in that year, including Mike’s two. Bare in mid these wines were destined for 6J’s to be sold as cleanskins.

As it ends up Mike did not win the Trophy but the show success made him think that he should start selling some of the 2005 and starting 2006 all of the wines, under his own Mike Press brand. So we did receive some, but not all of the 2005 we hoped for and what was a loss for us (not receiving cleanskins after the 2005 vintage) has been a complete success for this industry veteran. At least we can say we helped build a modern legend.

Many were wondering was the success at the Royal Melbourne Show a fluke or was there really something special about these wines? Well their answer came fast and swift in the form of the 2006 Adelaide Hills Wine Show. Mike submitted his 2005 Merlot, 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon and 2005 Shiraz. Not only did all three wines win gold medals, but all three topped their classes. This success was unprecedented and Mike became talk of the town and Mike Press Wines were well and truly put on the map.

So here we are now in 2008 and the 2005 Merlot is still current whilst the Cabernet Sauvignon has moved onto 2006 and the 2007 Shiraz has just been released.

Vintage: 2006

State: South Australia

Country: Australia

Alcohol Content: 13.8%

Standard Drinks: 8.4

Preservatives: 220 added

Bottle Top: Screwcap

Bottle Size: 750ml

Red/White Wine: Red