Colour:
TKX2 is deep purple in colour with a fine mousse.
Aroma:
The inviting aroma expresses a bold, classy wine awaits. There’s black forest fruits, cedar, chocolate, cherry, liquorice, olive, and savoury spice
Palate:
The palate is rich, lively and full-bodied. Dark, juicy fruits abound together with subtle oak complexity. Natural tannins are fine adding structure and depth. The mousse is creamy, tying everything together, as well as giving dimension and length. Gentle residual sweetness is balanced perfectly, providing fullness and rounding out the generous palate. A long persistent finish completes an exquisite sparkling Shiraz.
Recommended Drinking:
TKX2 can be enjoyed now but will cellar gracefully for 10- 20 years.
NOTE: You may find a signature staining or crust on the inside of your bottle of TKX2. This is common in sparkling red wines that are traditionally and naturally bottle fermented and then aged on lees prior to disgorging.
Vintage 2021 was an exemplary year with fine wines and good yields. Growing season rainfall was marginally below average and temperatures were mild ensuring vine canopies remained healthy. Vintage weather was absolutely perfect throughout, with dry mild-warm days and cool nights ensuring even and steady ripening across all varieties. There is strong colour and flavour across all the reds along with excellent structure and balance whilst the whites are bright, fresh and elegant.
The Kalleske vineyard is a diverse mix of 120 acres of vines spread over the 500-acre farm. Shiraz dominates the plantings and multiple Shiraz blocks spanning from 1973 to 1999 were blended to make this wine. Shiraz from these blocks go into the usual Kalleske Eduard, Greenock and Moppa wines. Together with the Shiraz a fraction (8%) of Durif was blended for added complexity. All vines are low yielding and soils are typically shallow sand with excellent clay subsoil.
Following harvest from early March to early April, grapes were destemmed into open-top fermenters. The musts were fermented using native yeast, with twice daily pump-overs for colour and flavor extraction throughout the 7–14-day fermentations. The musts were then traditionally pressed and filled to barrel. The wines were matured in French and American oak hogsheads for a year prior to barrel selection and blending. At bottling, liqueur de tirage (a wine solution of sugar and yeast) was added and Méthode Traditionnelle was employed whereby the wine underwent secondary fermentation in bottle, capturing the natural carbon dioxide in the bottle to create pris de mousse (effervescence). The wine was then cellared in the bottle on yeast lees for two years, where autolysis occurred; the yeast cells (lees) slowly broke down, imparting flavour and complexity to the wine as well as refining the bubble size. Next the wine underwent riddling, whereby the bottle is delicately and gradually rotated with tilted neck down over six weeks to move the sediment into the neck of the bottle. Then the wine was disgorged, where the neck was frozen, the crown seal removed, and the ‘plug’ of sediment was ejected from the bottle. Finally, each bottle was topped with a finishing dosage of bespoke estate liqueur Shiraz and capped with a new crown seal
96 Points
“TKX2 sounds like the Kalleske Bros’ Greenock-based drift racing car but it is in fact their sparkling shiraz, produced in the traditional method and disgorged in 2024; two year on lees and dosed with liqueur shiraz. And geez it’s a great drink with its bright purple-y spume and energetic bead. Deep blackberry, dark plum and blueberry fruit tones with hints of spice, berry flan, dark fruit crumble, cherry clafoutis and crushed stone. Great depth of fruit and finishing with bright, stony acidity and a dry, sucking-on-a-pebble savoury exit. It is just lovely.”
Dave Brookes, Halliday Wine Companion, December 2024
95 Points
“The 2021 Kalleske TKX2 Sparkling Shiraz is from the Barossa Valley in South Australia. It is a deeply crimson-coloured wine with a super fine, vibrant pink mousse. Served chilled, the coolness of the wine coils the aromas, releasing them in waves; plums, cherries, lifted perfume, chocolate, liquorice, and savoury elements spring from the glass. The palate is where the magic happens. There is a convergence of creaminess, dustiness, and savouriness that oozes bold dark fruits, liquorice, and spices. Each wrapped in tiny effervescent bubbles that pop a million times over and oh so pleasingly across the palate with a dreamy persistence. This is so much more than what a soda stream can achieve. Magnificent!”
James Keneally, The Unexpurgated Wine Code, 9 August 2024