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  • About Me – Andrew Graham
  • Scoring
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  • Beer

Flametree Cabernet Merlot 2007

January 19, 2009

Flametree Cabernet Merlot 2007 (Margaret River, WA)
Screwcap, $27

You can’t see it in this picture, but the bottle is weighed down with gold stickers – 3 trophies & 2 gold medals on the bottle alone. Perhaps most surprising is the missing sticker – that of the 2008 Jimmy Watson trophy. With that weight of gold hanging around its neck, its quite surprising that this stuff is still available – though I have noticed the price creeping over $30 on some sites, in a blatant attempt to cash in on its show successes.

Purple edged with a medium colour intensity it looks youthful and bright in the glass. The nose is a lovely, varietally correct, modern concoction of Blackcurrant, a little formic acid and cedar, all caressed by ‘McDonalds Chocolate Thickshake’ toasted vanilla French Oak. It smells polished, sweet & very very new world and I think its the nose that won this wine its bling.

On the palate however its a bit of a disappointment, the sweet sweet fruit is swamped by oak, the tail end a sour acid & oak tannin drenched beast. The sappy astringency of oak marring the finish, branding this wine as oak driven, with that oak lingering as a bad taste long after the wine has gone.

In the washup, I only wish that the decadence of the nose could match the palate. Time will do this wine even more favours, but in the meantime it will remain nothing more than a show wine.
I think that I have scored this right, though its pretty easy to fall into the Tall Poppy trap. The finish killed the gold medal chances that the nose setup however. 16.5+

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  • About me – Andrew Graham


    At 18 I started working in a small suburban bottleshop, largely to buy cheap beer. It was my first year of university, doing a degree that I didn't really like, and a liquor shop seemed like fun. Needless to say I discovered wine, my uni degree morphed into something completely different and wine/beer took over my life.

    Almost twenty years later and I currently spend my days wearing many (wine) hats, mostly as a writer, presenter and marketer.

    While wearing my writer cap I write features for the likes of National Liquor News, Gourmet Traveller WINE and the RAS plus I'm a Lifestyle FOOD channel wine expert. Read more about me here or get in touch to book your next wine event with me here.

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