An elegant wine with a velvety texture. Aromas and flavors of black cherry, plum, strawberry, cola, nutmeg and orange peel. Firm tannins. Balanced. Long finish.

concentrated, spicy

Yangarra is becoming synonymous with excellent wines at fair prices. Nose is a little hot at first, but later reveals pastry flour and black pepper aromas. Ripe red plums and vanilla accents unfold in the mouth. Not a huge, rich wine, but certainly a class one.

Edmeades' Zins are not noted for modest alcohol, and this one, at 15.6% is hot, but oh so good. You can taste the sun in every sip of black currant and sweetened espresso. It's balanced, though, with good acidity and is totally dry.

Berry, chocolate, and Porty flavors and firm tannins.

Edmeades is a natural for a dessert wine.

From old vines inland in the Redwood Valley, a wine that smells rich in peppery cherry.

This clean, balanced, moderately extracted offering comes through in the mouth with plenty of ripe red-cherry flavors laced with a good dose of vanillin oak. It has a fine sense of substance and has enough spine to stand up to the rich sauces and savory flavors we enjoy so much.

Light and delicately flavored with subtle cherry, tobacco and spice flavors, this pleasant wine is suitable for everyday dinners. Has some real length through the finish.

very clean and decently balanced wine

Long on sweet oak and colored by an atypical element of mint as well as the usual themes of pepper and spice, this robust and big-bodied youngster trades heavily on ripeness but comes up a winner by dint of its richness and depth. It is tough enough to dissuade early drinking even by fans of the style, but it will easily take four or five years of age.

Aromas, flavors of cherry, currant, cedar, fennel. Toasty oak. Medium-bodied. Integrated tannins. Good structure.

Best of the Year Issue Dec. 6, 2004

Pleasant, solid, ripe apple flavors. Pronounced oak, with a note of coffee bean. Medium-bodied, with a silky texture.

The best wine yet from Yangarra, the Australian winery owned by Kendall-Jackson of California, is its debut Yangarra Estate Grenache McLaren Vale Old Vine 2002 (93, $25), a real thoroughbred made from 80-year-old vines growing along the top contours of the home vineyard, the old Norman's Estate. Yangarra also made a wonderfully juicy Grenache-Shiraz Mourvèdre McLaren Vale 2002 (91, $25).

This estate-grown syrah is vibrant from the color- a beautiful violet edge to black - right through to the expressive finish - red edges to black fruit, scents of flint, orange zest, rosewater. The complex layers form an aromatic density, all built on a bright berry and deeper, beefier flavor. Decant a bottle for lamb with couscous and Provencal herbs.

Quite simply put, this is a sturdy, deeply extracted Pinot that you can sink your teeth into. It has plenty of mass and the structure to go with it, but it happily manages to be fruity from beginning to end. Almost brooding and with lots of potential, it is some years away from polish. It might work in the near-term with hearty roast meats, but it's greatest gifts will only be seen with age. Set aside for at least three or four years and expect to grow for more.

A conserve of blueberry and orange zest, this wine is pure fruit up front, then a wallop of tannin in the end. Potent, wild syrah, you could tame that power and make use of the wine's acidity with marlin in a red wine sauce.

Noticeably hazy and filled with inviting aromas of apple pulp, sweet lemons and creamy oak, this solid and unreservedly rich wine is equally generous with its fruit on the palate. It may be just a touch simple and juicy at for the moment, but it should round out and broaden with a few years of bottle aging. Try it with sea bass or halibut in lightly creamed or buttery sauces.

Here is a straightforward wine that features sweet cherries and berries and always evokes Pinot's friendlier side. It is consistently focused on well-defined fruit, and it is both smooth and supple without veering to softness. Age will not hurt it, but it is ready to go and should show particularly well with juicy pork roasts or a simple rack of lamb.

Well-ripened cherries are the main motif of this uncomplicated but nicely focused youngster, and, while never especially deep or thought- provoking, the wine gets it right when it comes to fruit. More rounded than firm, yet never slipping to softness, it calls for drinking comparatively soon while its fruity charms are at their height.