Wantirna Estate ‘Amelia’ Cabernet Merlot 2017

"Those who have been buying our wine for a while will remember the impetus for the making of the Hannah - there was simply the need to make a fourth wine to name after the fourth granddaughter! It so happened that among the family there was a love of the wines of St Emilion, where the overwhelming majority of estates make their wines from varying proportions of Merlot and Cabernet Franc (some have a little bit of Cabernet Sauvignon too). So of course the occasional trip needs to be taken to the region of Bordeaux and to spend a few days tasting the wines of the area.

It had been a few years since I’d been to Saint Emilion, and despite its popularity these days, it is still a slice of heaven. And the Bordelais certainly know how to impress with their gorgeous châteaux. The wines too were pretty fabulous, albeit at an eye-watering cost. Interestingly many have moved to bottle these Cabernet Franc and Merlot wines a little earlier than the Cabernet Sauvignon-dominant wines. We adopted this practice 10 years ago with the 2008 Hannah. Certainly the odd museum tasting that we do of the Hannah shows the wine develops beautifully while maintaining the lovely fruit flavours and fragrance that Cabernet Franc in particular gives.

Also interesting from the trip, which also included Piedmont and Burgundy, was the intense interest from other winemakers in our experience with using screwcaps. We got the impression that many would love to be adopting these as their closure but don’t have the confidence or appellation regulations to just do it! Certainly we are more than happy with screwcap, especially when the dreaded ‘It’s corked!’ words are heard. As usual, just the one barrel made." - Maryann Egan