Yalumba The Menzies Cabernet Sauvignon 2018 (6x 750mL).

Another beautiful release.

95 Points

Another beautiful release. Mint, mulberry and blackcurrant flavours drift with tobacco and forest herbs. It's a cooling cabernet but a ripe one, fluid and refreshing but firm and solid. This wine needs to be stashed in a cool, dark place for at least a handful of years to start showing its best.

2024 Halliday Wine Companion, 06 Jul 2023

Another excellent release

95 Points

Coonawarra Cabernet 101. This Yalumba Menzies never seems to miss a beat. Another excellent release that will age gracefully. Although being five years young, tuck it away just a little more. The oak is prominent early and it needs to mesh. In some respects, it seems a bit bitsy but a few days of tasting demonstrated its capability and that patience will reward. All the usual Cabernet suspects are here to play: tobacco, blackcurrants, twigs and bay leaf. Licks of coffee grounds and a slight mintiness slide in. The generosity of the dark berries and mulberries hook coats the mouth gracefully. Puffy, cocoa like tannins draw moisture from the mouth finishing with those drying and powdery feels. It's an excellent wine when given its chance to show its best form. Drink to ten years+

Q Wine Reviews, 09 Jul 2023Fullness and immediate approachability

95 Points

Deep garnet. Freshness and clean lines with pure blackberry compote, torn bay, grated salted chocolate, floral violet, kisses of mint and rammed earth floor. Medium-full and structured. Fruit balance exceptional to the shy, elegant tannins that frame this so well and push the flavour long. Bittersweet blackberry fruit and creamy oak giving fullness and immediate approachability. Displaying more than an easy sense of being.

Vinonotebook, 26 Jul 2023

A seriously structured cabernet

95 Points

Wine of the Week - Climate change induced warmer seasons are having a positive effect on colder wine regions, and this excellent cabernet is a prime example. Deep ruby colour with a hint of purple in the rim; the bouquet is cedary, briary as well as and toasty and vanillan from liberal oak, with blackberry and cassis in the background but little sign of the greener spectrum of cabernet aromas. Intense, full-bodied and driving along the palate. Firm and grippy, impressively powerful and persistent. A seriously structured cabernet that should age long and well. It’s quite firm now, so either cellaring or a hearty protein meal are recommended. (Cork).

The Real Review, 28 Sep 2023

Beautifully constructed

94 Points

I’ve looked at this wine from a couple of bottles and have sat on the glass that I have in front of me for quite some time. Some wines take me a while to really see. There’s a strictness to this wine. I thought it was a bit awkward at first but I think that the tannin is just taking its time to properly roll out. The roads of Rome weren’t laid smooth, but boy did they last. This wine is medium in weight, it carries some floral perfumes, it has a creaminess to its texture but there’s some race to the acidity too; a friskiness; a cool refreshment to the power of the blackcurrant-driven fruit. Peppermint and cedar are in play here too, and tobacco, the latter with an earthen almost-dryness to it. Forest berries; deserved of a mention. Hold back on this; give it some time. I’ve come to see it as beautifully constructed.

The Wine Front, 25 May 2023