Nose
A wine that achieves the balancing act of being perfectly ripe and rich but with lovely vibrancy and life in the aroma and palate.
Palate
Violets, blood plum, wine gum and a touch of peaty earthiness are found at this youthful stage of the wine, which will further complex and add intrigue over time. The palate texture is, and will always be, soft and fine. A world-class example of this rarely seen straight varietal.
Harvest
The 2019 vintage in the Margaret River region can be summarised as late, (mainly due to the cool spring and summer), low yielding, and with some disease pressure. The blocks required careful management and those that received early and careful leaf and shoot removal thrived. The low red yields and very good ripening month of April meant we achieved soft, ripe tannins and full long flavours in our red wine styles.
Winemaking
The fruit was picked cool in the early morning of 18 April 2019 before being cold soaked on skins for 5 days. The must was partially wild fermented in a small open fermenter with gentle handling on skins to extract colour and structure without any harsh tannins. When the decision was made to press the ferment off skins, the pressings component was blended back into the free-run to give the ideal body and structure to the final wine – something we did more so for our red wines from the cooler and longer 2019 vintage.
The wine went straight into French oak puncheons (500L barrels) with 12% being new. These larger puncheon barrels ensure perfume and freshness is retained whilst achieving a silky and refined palate along with textural complexity – a difficult goal to achieve in red winemaking. The result is a world-class Malbec wine rarely seen as a straight varietal in Australia, let alone Margaret River.
Appearance
Stunning depth and intensity typical of the Malbec variety – black iodine core with a dark purple rim.
Food Pairing
Grilled sirloin steak with mushroom cream sauce.
