Ripe supple and seamless this is marked by delicious pepper and dark chocolate nuances to the focused cherry plum and fresh orange peel flavors making for a lush mouthful that lasts and lasts on the creamy-textured finish. Shiraz. Drink now through 2020. 45 cases imported. -HS

Excellent vintage. Ample warm baking spice fragrance and sweet plum pie, cherry, sage and pomegranate. Really alluring and youthful complexity here. The acidity is assertive, and there are dark boysenberry and pastry flavors here. Dense. Dark juicy, lively fruit drive, and tannins that roll through with a wealth of energy. Some coffee to close. Try from 2028.

Deep garnet-colored, the 2004 Hill of Grace presents warm black fruits, black plums and cassis with underlying Mediterranean herb, spice box and truffles nuances. Full-bodied and rich, it has plenty of acid lift alongside medium to firm, rounded tannins. It is still quite taut on the long, peppery and earthy finish. Still very youthful, this wine should age very well and can drink now to 2030+. - Lisa Perrotti-Brown

The 2004 Shiraz Hill of Grace is beautifully composed as it radiates mulberry, blackberry, dried mint and sage, plus hints of charcuterie. The surprisingly decadent palate takes it up a notch with deep wells of flavor and chalky tannins, all beautifully balanced before descending into a savory, refined finish. This is a classic Hill of Grace vintage. -- Angus Hughson

This stellar wine takes a little time in the glass to show its true class but once it's properly aerated the aromas go from rather vague and lifted to plummy and spice laden. In the mouth it's rich creamy-textured and lush offering the flavors of plum pudding without the excessive weight that the words suggest plus hints of grilled meat. Again with airing it gets even better piling on more red fruit notes and turning more elegant. A great example of Shiraz but how many people will be able to justify the $25/ounce expenditure? - J.C.

The texture is where this wine shows its breed, a fine tannin brocade woven from the fruit of generations of vines at the Henschke's most coveted vineyard. It's a restrained vintage, from a generous crop that ripened through extreme heat in February until the season mellowed into March with cool nights and some resuscitating rains. The exceptional fruit quality reveals little of the fragrant cherry and dark earthiness that will come with time. For now, it's more an elegant, sensual pleasure, notable for its length and for the incipient complexity layered into the tannins.