98 Points - Ken Gargett
Cullen's Diana Madeline is undoubtedly one of Australia's greatest red wines and one of our most in-demand releases of the year. The 2022 release of Diana Madeline is another world class wine by Vanya Cullen and the team at Cullen Wines, which will only enhance the reputation of this wine.
The 2022 Cullen Diana Madeline delivers all the classic Diana Madeline characters; a fruit-driven, silky palate with layer upon layer of dark fruit, chocolate bitterness and a touch of subtle spice. A wine with impeccable structure, as with all great Diana Madelines, this has a very long life ahead of it.
"98 Points. Needless to say, Margaret River enjoyed another superb vintage with the 2022 season. Slightly cooler, Cullen report that it was a vintage of “immense perfume and texture”. This wine will be released early February to coincide with Diana’s 101st birthday. The wine is a wonderfully vibrant purple in colour. The nose gives up plums, cassis, spices including nutmeg, chocolate, mocha, bay leaves, cigar box notes - think a freshly opened box of Cohiba Siglo VI - and near perfect oak integration. This is finely balanced and exhibiting immense length on a palate that sees the emergence of aniseed, mulberries and coffee beans. An alluringly supple texture with the silkiest of tannins, though plenty of them - there really is some grip here. This will easily sail through fifteen to twenty years in a good cellar. Drink: 2023-2043"- Ken Gargett, winepilot.com.
"98 Points. Really delivers as you might expect from this excellent concentrated and powerfully frame vintage in Margaret River. It’s dominant cabernet with smaller portions of merlot, cabernet franc and malbec. Typical of this wine since switching to biodynamics, it is bright and brilliant with a nervy tense energy to drive the palate. The succulent fruit is harness by fine chalky tannins and neatly played oak of which 55% was new. A wine if extraordinary elegance and poise with a few of many decades."- Ray Jordan, rayjordanwine.com.au.
"97 Points. The best wines are distinctive with a clear DNA link to place. Diana Madeline is one such wine. An excellent deep purple hue with an ever-changing array of aromas: one minute spice, mulberries and cocoa when first poured, and next full of savoury notes of black olive tapenade, nori and menthol. As usual, it’s beautifully framed yet the fuller-bodied palate is plumped up by textural, expansive tannins and finishes long. Get a spot ready in the cellar, this has time on its side. Drink: 2025 - 2045. $160. 13.5% alc. Screwcap"- Jane Faulkner, Halliday Wine Companion 2025.
