Cullen Diana Madeline Cabernet Blend 2023

Ranked #1 of 15 2023 Cabernet blends from Western Australia
Put bluntly, this is perhaps the finest young Australian Cabernet I can recall seeing. It is simply brilliant... There is immaculate balance and amazing intensity and yet the wine dances with freshness and energy. Surely one of the greatest Cabernets made in this country, perhaps Vanya’s best ever, and it confirms that 2023 in Margaret River, a region of seemingly endless fine vintages – is truly special. Why not 100? I do feel it deserves it, but I simply do not trust Vanya not to come up with something even better next vintage. 99PTS Ken Gargett, Wine Pilot

The 2023 Diana Madeline is an exciting wine. The 2023 season was mild, dry and quite spectacular. There was some rain at the very end of the red harvest, and this was a very site-specific thing, not widespread over the region. Aromatically, the wine is intensely perfumed: graphite and pressed lavender, wet rose petals, raspberry pip, licorice, concrete and summer rain. This gives everything that I could hope for in an early-release Cabernet: dark fruit and exotic spice, mineral detail and more. The chalky and fine tannins shape the palate and spool out long over the finish. Is this the finest and best Diana Madeline made to date? Perhaps! What a wine. Highly recommended. It's the perfect example of great Australian Cabernet: power without weight. Look no further. Drink 2025-2055. 98PTS Erin Larkin, Wine Advocate