2018 Coeur de Vallee Cabernet Sauvignon
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Tasting notes
97% Cabernet Sauvignon, 3% Cabernet Franc. The 2018 growing season was ‘remarkably steady and gentle’. Harvest 11–18 October. Aged for 16 months in French oak barrels. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. Exceptionally a mature vintage (their first with their own grapes 100%) ‘because people no longer want to store wine’. NB determinedly French cuvée name from Frenchman Luc Morlet! Rich and polished and ready. Pure pleasure with only a hint of heat on the end. Could only be Napa. (JR)
Critic scores
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Jancis Robinson MW
Jeb Dunnuck
More reviews and scores
Bitter black chocolate, powerful, concentrated, red pepper spices, tapenade, red liquorice, baking spice, cassis. Always an extremely impressive wine that has real uplift and power, and a ton of Napa generosity. Mature and ready to drink, but will easily hold for another decade or more. 100% new oak in 600l casks. Unfiltered and unfined. Harvest October 11 to 18, from a season that allowed for long, slow ripening. Daughter Clare Morlet is now joining the estate, fresh from her masters in science and business and has been working with them for past 12 months. Released in the States previously, this is the first release in Europe.
The first vintage to come entirely from Morlet's own vineyard, the 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon Coeur de Vallee features loads of mixed red and blue fruit. A blend of 97% Cabernet Sauvignon and 3% Cabernet Franc, it's full-bodied and plush yet nicely balanced and bright, with fine freshness and verve, framed by soft tannins. Perhaps it's a touch less concentrated than some other vintages, but it's absolutely charming and delicious.
Bursting with damson, black cherry, mocha, coffee bean, mint, violet, velvety but linear tannins, growing slowly in power through the glass. At this point fully estate grown from 10ha of vines (planted in 2007) on the Oakville bench, with To Kalon creek running right through the estate, planted to Cabernet Franc (2 blocks) and Cabernet Sauvingon (4 blocks). Native yeast, unfined unfiltered. 85% new oak, 600l oak casks for 2/3 of ageing, with the rest in stainless steel. To be released through the Place de Bordeaux in 2023.