Moss Wood Cabernet 2001 (review)

90 points

Margaret River, Western Australia. 14.5%

One of Australia's very best cabernets. In a great vintage for WA. Bottled with screwcap (stelvin).

This is a sumptuous sexy polished smooth cabernet. Bold but not dull or dumb. It's a sleek big fruited wine. Warm rich palate but with a substantial Australian mintyness.

Extremely refined wine making, yet ultimately a wine reflects its terrior and this doesn't have that austerity with richness that great bordeaux has - indeed it just doesn't seem to have the same physiological ripeness. It reminds me of the statement that the French make wine while New World winemakers bottle fruit.

Tasted against the similarly priced ($70) Chateau Grand-Puy-Lacoste 2001 and after one gulp everyone wanted to drink the GPL rather than the Moss Wood.

To drink alone the Moss Wood has the edge (soft and sexy), but with food it isn't a contest. Indeed with food the Moss Wood is overpowering. Even with a tomato and blue cheese pasta it competed rather than complemented. And it is one dimensional compared with the GPL.

There are far cheaper wines, like Grant Burge 2001 Coonawarra (a Melbourne St Wine Cellars cleanskin - and extraordinary value) that provide some of this sumptuousness and mintyness, but at a one tenth of the price.

The Moss Wood has its place, and it is really excellent in its way, but it has a way to go before it becomes really serious fine wine.