Vandenberg King Willem II Cabernet Sauvignon 2021
$35, 14.5% alcohol, screwcap, Coonawarra.
This is a minty, tannic cabernet with red licorice, boysenberry and blackcurrant flavours rippling throughout. It offers plenty in the way of flavour and then puts a wrench on it all via thick, assertive tannin. Serve this alongside appropriate protein and it would perform handsomely. 92 points.
Campbell Mattinson has been an independent journalist, wine critic and photographer for forty years. He founded The Winefront, is a former chief editor of the Halliday Wine Companion (and former editor of Halliday magazine), and is the only Australian to have won the Australian Wine Communicator of the Year Award more than once. He is 100% independent, and tastes between 5,000 and 10,000 wines each year, blind and in comparative brackets as often as is practicable.
Mattinson is also the founder of the Mattinson Photography business.
