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Winery: Mount MaryÂ
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Region: Yarra Valley
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Variety: Cabernet BlendÂ
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Vintage: 2012
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Drinking Window: 2019-2060
Australia's premier cool climate Cabernet. It was John Middleton's dream to create such a wine and purchased the Mount Mary property in the Yarra Valley in 1971 to persue this dream. Quintet is his dream realised and is a blend of the classic Bordeaux varieties of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot and Malbec.
Quintet is a classically proportioned style based on five classic Bordeaux varieties; Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Malbec, Merlot and Petit Verdot. The wine exhibits a purity of fruit, poise, elegance and structure found in few Australian Cabernets with cedar and blackcurrant "small fruit" aromas, fine-grained savoury tannins, superb vinosity and flavour length. Naturally balanced, well-concentrated and classically proportioned, the wine has a great reputation for longevity.
The grapes are hand harvested, lightly crushed, totally destemmed, fermented in both open and closed fermenters with careful temperature control and frequent pumping over. Malolactic fermentation takes place once primary fermentation is completed. After the lees have settled, the wine is de-vatted to 30% new French oak barriques and 70% large format oak casks in its first year. In its second year, the wine is racked into seasoned two to six-year-old barriques for 10 months.
"The 2012 Quintet is balanced and bloody on the nose; it's not as overtly savory perhaps as the 2014 tasted next to it, but certainly, there are gamey inflections entrenched in the red fruit. It has hints of clove and cardamom pod, roast beef crust and hints of asphalt/roadbase, moving in the more mineral/ozone/petrichor space. There are also notes of lead pencil and graphite. This is an intriguing wine. It finishes clean and mineral and cool. It's as tight as it is persistent. I find this to be quite a zen/placid wine, like the surface of a still body of waterâunbroken and seamless. I like it a lot. It may be more polarizing than some others in this lineup, but for me, this is the picture of elegance. "A foot in the old-school Mount Mary camp, I feel like my grandpa would really take his hat off to that, in the context of the 1970s and 1980s." 12.9% alcohol, sealed under natural cork."
97+ Points
Erin Larkin, The Wine Advocate
"Bright crimson; the bouquet swarms with aromas of red and black fruits and quality oak; the medium-bodied palate is supremely elegant, yet boasts all the intensity one could wish for, with vibrant cassis and redcurrant fruit on a non-stop trip in a very fast train; of course there are tannins and French oak, but these characters are largely passive observers."
97 Points
James Halliday, The Wine Companion
"Classic Yarra Valley blend of cabernet sauvignon (42%), cabernet franc (17%), merlot (33%), malbec (4%) and petit verdot. It spends 22 months in French oak, with â25% of the blend in large format oak (1500L or larger), and 30% in new barriques (225L)â. Essence of blackcurrant. Bay leaves, licorice, tobacco and musky oak. One of those wines that seems to cascade through the mouth. Tremendous purity, freshness, elegance. Great release. Not much need be said. Pure velvet. Pure length."
96 Points
Campbell Mattinson, The Wine Front
