DAOU Estate Collection Cabernet Sauvignon 2022

Bottle of Daou Estate Collection Cabernet Sauvignon 2022.

DAOU Estate Collection Cabernet Sauvignon 2022

I tasted this on a visit to Paso Robles/California, from which this wine hails. DAOU is owned now by Treasury Wine Estates.

This wine is made with 80% Cabernet Sauvignon, 16% Petit Verdot, and 4% Cabernet Franc. It sees 80% new French oak according to the winery website though my notes – from sitting next to the winemaker at dinner – were that it saw 50% new French. Not that it matters, and I'm probably wrong.

It's a sinewy, tannic wine. It tastes of currants and cherries, peanuts and pencils, graphite and leather, along with aromatic herbs. "Approachable luxury experience", is how it was described by the winemaker. And sitting there as the sun faded over the hills that's pretty much how it felt. It's an overdone style – too much oak – but it's also quite surprisingly tannic, and for all of its oak and ambition it remains drinkable, and enjoyable, and seductive.

92 points – Campbell Mattinson.

See also [Inside the Soul of a Lion: Treasury’s controversial AU$1.6 Billion bet on DAOU Vineyards]

Campbell Mattinson

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.

More about Campbell Mattinson

Mattinson is also the founder of the Mattinson Photography business.

https://www.campbellmattinson.com
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DAOU Soul of a Lion 2021