2022 Single Vineyard Spring Lane Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

From the Spring Lane Vineyard in Coldstream, planted in '98. Matured for 17 months in seasoned barriques. A discreet bouquet featuring perfectly ripened black cherries, boysenberries, light cedar scents, fennel seeds and just a hint of lavender. Elegant, persistent and finely structured, this should age gracefully over the next seven to 10 years.

Impressive cabernet, this. The colour is bright crimson and red. The nose has a beguiling combination of red currant and plummy mulberry with a very subtle hint of tobacco leaf. The palate is thoroughly beautiful. Bright red fruits with a slightly oyster shell minerality that speaks cabernet. It’s all laced together with a fine eave of tannin and fine-grained oak. Impressive.

Matured for 15 months in 9%new French oak barriques. A transparent wine with blackberries, briar and Davidson plum skin. There is a thicket of thyme and rosemary, it's wild and adds pools of complexity. Some nigella seeds, black sesame and clove. The intensity of fruit lights up once again on the palate delivering bursts of mulberry and crimson berry juice. This transports you into the vineyard, the minimal use of new oak, keeps the winemaking efforts far off in the distance. Totally divine. Drink now or in a decade's time. This is calling for roasted pork loin and black pepper jus, to really show it off.

Right on the target for luncheon Claret styling, succulent, medium bodied, sleek with fine grained tannins, all the perfume, a sense of class. And then some. It’s a complex, layered and inwardly concentrated wine that finds compactness holding in cassis, choc-mint, graphite and tobacco notes. A serious wine with pedigree writ large.