Friday, January 15, 2016

Two Hands: Ares

Shiraz Worthy of Your Glass


2006 Ares Takes a Breather Before we are Even Seated

2006 Two Hands, Ares
McLaren Vale, Barossa Valley
WS: 96 points

Enjoyed at: 
Lonesome Dove

2406 N. Main Street

Fort Worth, Texas  76164

(817) 740-8810


On a little side trip to Dallas for a friend's 40th birthday, I found myself in the safe arms of a Kindly Southern Gentleman Friend from Vermont who summarily announced that we (Mr. Frank came too) would be headed off to Tim Love’s Lonesome Dove restaurant in Ft. Worth.

The magic of downtown Ft. Worth over by the stockyards is the music scene and street scene that revolves around terrifically oddball buskers and other assorted folks in Wrangler jeans and very up-to-date cowboy boots. Perhaps the most memorable site was of an elderly couple on oxygen tanks singing vintage country songs from the Patsy Cline/Hank Williams periods.


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I was at a winery in Temecula, California, at Christmas time with my big sister, and a couple who had joined us on the horseback ride through the vineyards had video of these buskers. So they are very special souls indeed! What a hoot to run into wine folks with similar experiences. More and more I get the impression that people who are into wine really like to sit back, watch, and soak up the sensations when they travel. I may just be flattering myself, but when I travel, I do notice how important the little things that make a place special are.

For example, in Paris, it’s not the Eiffel Tower that excites me, it’s the journey to get to the Tower. It’s the crazy efforts that tourists go to to cut in line. It’s the feel of the fresh air that you enjoy in line, but then as you ascend, how damnably cold it gets and makes the experience one you want to end faster than you had intended. And how impressive the structure is when you are on the ground, having a picnic at the foot of the Tower in the parkland below. That's what drinking the 2006 Ares Shiraz is like...it's less the wine—although that is exceptional—it's the journey from the cellar and into the bottle that sticks.


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At any rate, back to Ft. Worth…my Kindly Southern Gentleman Friend from Vermont was particularly excited about bringing Frankie and me to Lonesome Dove. We were thrilled because he’d been threatening to purchase a particularly expensive bottle of Aussie Shiraz to treat us for coming to visit him in Dallas.  I mean, sheeeeesh!, we’d been to South Africa and Argentina together, but we’d never come travel together on his home turf in Dallas!? The time had come. And so out came the 2006 Two Hands Ares.

It’s a graphite and cherry Syrah grape bomb whose silky mouth-feel remains memorable and exciting even as I blog this. Wine Spectator says, “Polished and generous. A plush mouthful of cherry, blackberry and creamy spice flavors that linger effortlessly on the long, open-textured finish. There’s power in this wine, but it lurks below the glassy, seamless surface, ready to grow and get more complex with aging.”

What I enjoyed was the "seamless surface" ready to drink after an hour of decanting. I couldn’t believe how privileged I was to have our Dallas host willing to splurge with such a bottle.

Thank you so much, again, Kindly Southern Gentleman Friend from Vermont, for a palette-pleaser of this magnitude! Can’t wait to dive into the next fine wine with you guys…I believe I owe you a Melville Pinot Noir sometime very soon before you head off back to Mozambique.



Let 'er Breathe

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