Reviews

One of Australia’s top wines with a very elegant vintage in 2014. Very good quality colour starts, fresh red fruits with excellent high quality oak all are important elements that help this well balanced and restrained style show it is intense but not heavy.

The fruit aroma is concentrated with finesse showing fruits, minerals, blackcurrant  aromas. The palate is youthful, tight, refined and elegant sweet fruits, soft tannins, red and black fruits fine oak spices very even length of tannins and flavours and has harmony as a young wine with serious aging potential.

Wine pairing with five “bizarre” Chinese dishes

‘Century eggs’ or ‘thousand-year eggs’ or simply ‘Pidan’ in Chinese are in fact not aged for a century or a thousand years. They are preserved eggs made in a saline solution mixed with clay and rice husks for a few months that changes yolk into grey/black colour and egg white into transparent brown/grey jelly. The dish is notorious because of the colour and its pungent smell that compelled Thais to give it another moniker – ‘horse urine eggs’.

Seasoned with soy sauce, chili and spicy green peppers, the dish is often served as a starter to work up your appetite, believe it or not.

Cindy Chan from Summergate opted for a Moss Wood Ribbon Vale Cabernet Sauvignon 2013 .

“Century egg with spicy green pepper is a dish with strong taste, with a bit of spiciness. This pairs well with a red wine that also has strong flavours to balance all the exciting flavours on the palate. Also Cabernet Sauvignon tastes a bit like the green pepper, with the peppery taste,” she commented.

There’s no wonder the Mona Lisa has this bottle carefully cosseted under her arm in this newsletter. It has the classical drying tannic grip of a great red, the inherent blackcurrant and gum leaf of a Margaret River cabernet blend, good length and the finish of a patient master painter. Puts a smile on your face, whoever or whatever you drink it with.

My favourite vintages of Moss Wood Cabernet since 1996, are 2001, 2005, and 2012: I think this is also right up there.

Boysenberry, blackberry, violets, fennel seed, and that earthy/ferrous thing that Moss Wood often shows. Oak feels pared back and adds a layer of cedar and toast. Medium to full bodied, earthy and savoury, with some new leather too, along with black fruits, mint and spicy toasted oak. Tannin is ripe and sure, acidity fresh and well settled, and the finish shows glimmers of red fruit in with the black, with fleshy tannin shaping and extending the finish. It’s a very strong release from Moss Wood, beautifully balanced, and it feels particularly age-worthy too. Yep.

94+ points

Classic blackberry and leafy aromas and flavours with a savoury freshness from a touch of cabernet franc and petit verdot, elegantly structured with smooth, subtle oak and gentle, ripe tannins. Built to last.

Back with a bang, 2015 Amy ’s is a Cabernet, Merlot, Malbec, Petit Verdot blend and it shows firm tannins and impressive structure in this vintage. Perhaps the days of forward-drinking Amy’s are long gone but this is not a problem because it still offers awesome value for money and if you have to cellar it for a year or two then what’s the problem?

The Grand Vin is a very imposing wine with a flavour that drills down deep into the soul of this noble grape variety. Texturally, this is one of the most satisfying Moss Wood Cabernets I can recall. The traction on the palate, made up of sooty tannins and epic skins, is thrilling. The finish is certainly youthful but in no way astringent. The nose heralds the way and points to the future for this wine. It will be a slow-burner, with a long life and along this path it will chant the never-ending song of Cabernet.

This Margaret River red is among Australia’s finest and the 2014 vintage does not disappoint. It has concentrated blackcurrant and cassis fruit on the nose and palate, with a touch of floral character in the background, finishing with firm tannins. Try it now with roast lamb but another five years will see it approach its peak.

Another cracking merlot from this now very mature vineyard acquired by Moss Wood a few years ago. This has presence and poise, and shows a structure you often don’t see in Aussie merlots. Firmish tannins with a minerally thread through the smooth, silky fruit. Beautiful oak judgment completes this classy merlot. 96/100 (Best drinking: Now to 2027. Alc: 14%)

The colour is deep and there are blackberry and dark-olive aromas with a patina of toasty oak, while the palate is medium to full-bodied with good intensity of red and blue fruits, spices and the barest herbal note. Good richness and fleshy extract. It really satisfies. (Screwcap)

Ageing: drink now to 12 years

Food: drink with thin grilled wagyu steak, with soy sauce and wasabi

Ranked #3 of 39 2014 Merlot tasted from Australia

This exquisite wine from Margaret River is as close to perfect as any Margaret River has produced – and it gets my highest-ever score.

Ray Jordan has had almost as many wines as waters but he can still be impressed, today bestowing on a couple of married Margaret River vignerons his highest-ever score of 99 out of 100.

Wilyabrup is a warmer district, famous for its cabernet, so tends to produce a bigger style of chardonnay. This is somewhat old-fashioned and shows plenty of oak and malolactic (butter; butterscotch) characters, full-body and forward-development in its medium yellow colour and rich palate. There are honey, butterscotch and toasty oak aromas and flavours. It has a broad, bulky palate with richness and grip. It’s what winemakers call a more ‘worked’ style, thanks to malolactic, a high proportion of new oak (nearly 50%) and what seems like an oxidative approach to winemaking and maturation.

This style goes well with hearty food, such as richly-sauced roast chicken or chicken satays.

A SUMPTUOUS CABERNET

This Moss Wood 2014 Cabernet Sauvignon comes from a superb Margaret River vintage, has 14 per cent alcohol, deep purple hues and scents of cassis and violets.The front palate has sumptuous blackcurrant flavour, the middle palate adds ripe mulberry, Turkish delight chocolate, mint and cedary oak and the finish shows leathery tannins.

DRINK WITH: fillet mignon.

AGEING: 15 years.

5.5 stars

Indulge yourself

The colour is deep and there are blackberry and dark-olive aromas with a pati­na of toasty oak, while the palate is medium-full bodied with good intensity of red and blue fruits, spices and the barest herbal note. Good richness and fleshy extract. It really satisfies. It’s not in retail just yet, but the 2013 is also very good.

Ageing? Drink now to 12 years. Food idea Thin grilled wagyu steak with soy sauce and wasabi.

Moss Wood recently celebrated the 40th anniversary of their first cabernet vintage with the release of 2013 Moss Wood Cabernet Sauvignon. We spoke to owners and winemakers Keith and Clare Mugford about the past, present and future of their winery.

A blend of cabernet merlot malbec and petit verdot that just might be the best yet under this sub-brand. Generous and supple.

“A Guide to Australia’s Best Semillons”

Winemaker Keith Mugford ferments in stainless steel and bottles early to enshrine the fresh quince, honeysuckle and pink grapefruit aromas of this semillon. Its lanolin-like texture and lemon pith flavours are just right to pair with baked snapper

Impressively rich, creamy-textured Chardonnay with quite intense and tantalisingly complex fruit and savoury flavours including citrus, white peach, brioche and bran biscuit characters. Powerful wine with an impeccable pedigree 17/4/2014