2021 Akeringa Cabernet: selection, maturation and a McLaren Vale tasting
After a day in the winery, I walked past a pallet of 2021 Akeringa Cabernet and decided to open a bottle. I hadn’t tasted it for a little while, so it was a chance to see how it was coming along.
A good 2021 vintage
The yields in 2021 were solid and the ripening conditions were near perfect. With a bigger crop, too much heat or a cold season can create problems. That year, the conditions came together well.
How the wine is selected
I normally classify our red wines later in the year, assessing each barrel individually. A particular vineyard isn’t automatically earmarked for a particular wine. Oak is a natural product, so there are differences between barrels. Even the position in the stack can make a subtle difference, with the top a little warmer than the bottom over time.
Akeringa has a particular selection process. At the end of vintage, while the Cabernet batches are still in tank, I look for a batch that I think is worthy of filling two brand new French oak barrels. We don’t make it every year.
For this 2021 wine, the maturation was about two and a half years in barrel, followed by roughly two and a half years in bottle, a little longer by the time of this tasting.
Fruit, herbs and integrated oak
The colour is a lovely dense, dark red. On the nose, I find red fruits, cherries and raspberries, with violets and a herbal edge. It’s dried herbs and bay leaf rather than cut grass. The nose is distinctly Cabernet.
When we first bottled it, the oak was a little dominant. In this tasting it has settled down and integrated with the rest of the wine. There are spicy, celery-like notes, dark fruit and a lifted character in the background.
The palate is bright, with good acidity. Red and black fruit come through, followed by that herbal note, a little oak and firm tannins. The fruit keeps going through the finish. There’s good length and a lovely fleshiness, without the wine drying out too much.
McLaren Vale Cabernet texture
I often find young Cabernet from a warmer region such as McLaren Vale a little more approachable than examples from cooler regions. In wines from Margaret River, Coonawarra or the Yarra Valley, the tannins can be more apparent and take longer to soften. That is an observation about texture and maturation, with plenty of variation between wines.
Here, the tannins are present but rounded, with the fruit and herbal detail carrying through. The 2021 Akeringa was looking good on this check-in.