Top 100 Wines: Cabernet Sauvignon
Top 100 Wines: Cabernet Sauvignon
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The glorious aromatics and meat-compatible structure of the cabernet sauvignon variety are best celebrated mid winter when slow cooked braises and big roasts are favourite dinner options.
Anvers 2013 Brabo
Cabernet designed to reveal its primary fruit spectrum early, not overwhelmed by the variety’s often blocky tannins or oak heaviness. Here its classic cabernet cassis, black currant and berry fruits, a touch of herbal lift, some sweetish oak spice and woodiness as you taste with easily negotiated tannins. Good, everyday cabernet.
★★★ 1/2
SA various
Food: Barbecued lamb chops
$14
Common Ground 2012
Another great little bargain cabernet for those after a dandy weekday pour, this from Jim Brand wines, fresh and friendly, easy going medium to fuller bodied in style with smart cabernet aromatics in black berry and cassis mode, juicy, sticky, well clipped through the mouth, enough grip to prove its table worthiness.
★★★★
Coonawarra
Food: Meatball stroganoff
$17
Lindeman’s Regional Series 2012
This series chooses one variety from two regions to bring elements of each into the final mix. The result here is a prettily fragrant cabernet with all its berries and violet notes out front, the fruit flavours with a pure tone, medium to full-bodied, with just enough grip to be considered more seriously than the price suggests.
★★★★
Clare/Padthaway
Food: Lamb and potato moussaka
$19
Rosemount 2012 ‘MV Collection’
A brightly polished expression of what cabernet sauvignon is capable of in McLaren Vale. It’s tightly packed with plush cassis drenched fruit, shows the benefits of sensitively-deployed oak and offers some lovely savoury elements like cedar and a smear of olive tapenade. An impressive look at cabernet from a different regional perspective.
★★★★
McLaren Vale
Food: Beef & Mushroom pie
$24
Lake Breeze 2012
Cabernet is considered king in a Langhorne Creek context, and as this is a current regional champion it’s worth noting just how this highlights all its varietal best, its blackcurrant notes never herbal or green but more with licorice spice, and subtle oak adding lead pencil and graphite to a fine, powder-like feel. All class.
★★★★1/2
Langhorne Creek
Food: Spice crusted beef fillet
$25
Grant Burge Cameron Vale 2012
From parts of the Barossa that in such a good year can do wonders for more tailored cabernet, this one grown in the region’s cooler, southern foothills between Lyndoch and Williamstown, the fruit showing terrific varietal character of bright blackcurrant and berries with easygoing drinking appeal.
★★★★
Barossa
Food: Spice-coated leg of lamb
$28
Bowen Estate 2012
The Bowen reds have long been regional benchmarks and the 2012 releases are among the best in years. Cassis, cedar and a gentle whiff of eucalypt, the signature scents of Coonawarra, swirl up from the glass and lead to a layered, finely etched palate that finishes dusty and fine.
★★★★
Coonawarra
Food: Roast lamb and mint sauce
$32
Ottelia 2012
An exciting new venture from Coonawarra stalwart John Innes that clearly shows the benefits of all his experience. Classic cassis characters are comingled with hints of cordite, bracken and dried herbs and bundled up in a lean, savoury and fine-framed package that finishes with a gentle, perfectly pitched tannin grip.
★★★★
Coonawarra
Food: Steak Frites
$35
Terre á Terre 2012
Here’s a wine that blessed with the twin virtues of elegance and finesse. It opens with a fragrant swirl of red and black currants before drawing you in to a lithe and detailed palate unencumbered by a single extraneous ounce of flab or fat. A really lovely example of the ‘luncheon claret’ style.
★★★★1/2
Wrattonbully
Food : A wedge of hard cheese
$40
Zema Estate Family Selection 2008
A big up in power and concentration from the standard Estate, to become one of the most glorious cabernets of the region, six years mature, two of them in French oak yet without the wood overpowering any of the intense black fruits and dark chocolate flavours, rather adding harmony and complex depth. Wow.
★★★★★
Coonawarra
Food: Roast rib eye with mushroom sauce
$45
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