Briar Ridge Cold Soaked Cabernet Sauvignon Orange, 2018

The 2018 Cold Soaked Cabernet Sauvignon is outstanding – the best vintage I’ve tasted of this wine. Deep in colour, it has earth, dark fruits, graphite, floral violet and sweet fruit aromas. It is smooth and round with nice bitter cherry flavours. This is a really ripe style, at the same time it is reminiscent of Bordeaux. It is well balanced, elegant and with great depth. Grapes were grown at Briar Ridge’s vineyard in Orange in New South Wales. The region is at altitude with vines cultivated some 750 metres above sea level benefitting from cool-climate conditions and soils derived from volcanic basalt rock. 2018 was a drought year, with the region also experiencing some unusually hot days during harvest. “Cold soak” refers to the practice of crushing the grapes and allowing the juices to steep on skins prior to the onset of fermentation: this was done for three days to enhance colour and flavour extraction.