Oliver’s Taranga Vine Dried Cabernet 2021

Winemaker, Corrina Wright, is getting her Italian winemaking skills on to produce an Amarone-method style of Cabernet in the Vale. She has borrowed from Amarone della Valpolicella where grapes are picked, dried for an extended period until they have lost a lot of liquid and then slowly pressed and fermented. Corrina has embraced similar methods and produced one wild vinous ride: 15.5% in alcohol, super rich, dark and savoury. Earth, leather, dark spices, truffle and mushroom fill the senses on the first sniff. This is Cabernet as you rarely taste it. Flavours of fruitcake with slivers of sweet cherry nougat before the grape’s herbals and ripe tannins come into play. The finish arrives in a flurry of chocolatey, woodsy spice. You might say there’s a lot happening in this wine.

Jeni Port

Wine critic at Winepilot

Jeni Port is one of Australia’s top wine communicators. Based in Melbourne, Jeni created the first wine column in the (then) Sun News-Pictorial before moving over to The Age and becoming that paper’s longest-serving wine writer. Over the years she has written for most Australian wine magazines and these days calls WinePilot home. She is also a Tasting Panel member on the Halliday Wine Companion. She was named Wine Communicator of the Year and Legend of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival in 2014 and in 2018 Legend of the Vine. She is a founding board member of Australian Women In Wine and is the co-deputy chair of Australia’s Wine List of the Year Awards and China’s Wine List of the Year Awards.

Wine writer and critic