Heitz Cabernet Sauvignon

Almost as if to prove that this hasn't become Jamie's Australian Wine Blog, I'm switching my attention to a Californian wine tonight.

But before I continue, a quick note about one of the wines Quantas was serving on my flight home last night/this morning. It was the Clonakilla Hilltops Shiraz 2006, and it was fantastic. I drank a fair bit of it, as I tried to understand what the film I was watching was about (Synedoche New York).

Back to tonight's wine. I'm pretty jet-lagged, but determined to stay up until I reach a sensible bed time. You can't cheat your body clock, but you can try to help it resynchronize as fast as possible (light, food and excercise at the right time are all beneficial).

Heitz Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon 2003 Napa Valley, California
This wine spends three years in oak - one in large casks made of American oak, and two in French oak barriques. That's a lot of time, and it shows in the wine, which displays an attractive spicy, cedary edge to the plum and blackcurrant fruit. The palate has a strongly savoury, spicy woody character which meshes pretty well with the sweet fruit. There are notes of herbs and tar adding complexity, as well as hints of iodine and medicine. While my initial thought that this is a wine that has spent just a bit too much time in oak, there's no doubting that it does have a very attractive savoury, spicy complexity, too. This distinctive wine may age well into a mellow spicy warmth with another five years in bottle, but it is starting to dry out a bit on the palate. Whether or not this is for you depends on how much you like oak character in your wine. 88/100 (UK retail c. £30)