Penfolds Collection 2023: Global ambitions underlined

The Penfolds Collection 2023 includes 25 new releases, retaining a strong international focus, with wines sourced from three countries in two hemispheres.

Last year’s rumours of a Chinese wine launching this July were founded, although with limited quantities of the wine – Chinese Penfolds Winemaking Trial 521 Cabernet Sauvignon Marselan 2021 – produced, it will not be available in the UK/Europe initially and was therefore not included with the other new releases tasted for this article.

At an exclusive preview launch in Melbourne on 21 June and then in London six days later, Penfolds’ chief winemaker Peter Gago presented an expanded suite of five wines featuring California grapes and two experimental blends with Bordeaux fruit.

Scroll down for Tina Gellie’s tasting notes and scores of the 25 wines in The Penfolds Collection 2023

It represents a powerful positioning statement that underlines Penfolds’ expansive global winemaking view.

‘These wines show that the Penfolds house style can be consistent across many viticultural regions around the world,’ said Gago at the Melbourne preview tasting. ‘When people try these wines, we want them to think immediately of Penfolds, but we also want them to recognise that they are significantly different.’

The third vintage release of Penfolds’ California wines has seen noticeable tweaks and refinements. The 2020 vintages of the Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon and Bin 704 Napa Cabernet Sauvignon are more seamlessly bound, while the 2020 Bin 600 Cabernet-Shiraz blend has a much warmer mid-palate embrace. The ambitious ‘Wine of the World’ blends – 2019 Quantum and 2020 Bin 149, fusing Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley and South Australia – are surprisingly lifted yet remain powerfully structured.

There are greater curiosities among the French duo. Penfolds II is a multi-vintage meld of Bordeaux Merlot (sourced from Dourthe vineyards) with South Australian Cabernet Sauvignon, while the 2020 FWT 585 is Gago’s vision of a Bordeaux blend, using Cabernet Sauvignon, Petit Verdot and Merlot sourced in Bordeaux but shaped with a familiar Penfolds tannin profile and matured in a mix of French and American oak.

Outside the Collection, Penfolds also has a collaboration with Champagne house Thienot, and attendees at the London preview tasting were treated to the new 2013 vintages of the Blanc de Blancs and Blanc de Noirs (released in February earlier this year). Preview tastings were also held in Bordeaux, California and, for the first time in three years, China.

Classic Australian releases

True gems were found among classic Australian releases from noble varieties. This included an exemplary 2021 Yattarna Chardonnay and a highly approachable 2019 Grange Shiraz. But it was the Cabernet Sauvignons that stood out: a supremely elegant 2021 Bin 169 from Coonawarra and the 2021 Bin 407 multi-region Cabernet which punches well above its weight compared to big brother Bin 707 (also impressive), and is arguably the best buy of this year’s range.

Aware that the 2019 Grange follows gushing accolades for the acclaimed 2018, Gago presented the new release alongside three decades of other ‘9 vintages’ – the 1989, 1999 and 2009 – which had each been overshadowed by dominant prior vintages. On tasting the magnificent 1999 Grange, it certainly suggests that the quality of the handsome 2019 vintage will endure.

‘Nothing stands still,’ says Gago, so yet again Penfolds has spread its wings with a new addition to the already sizeable portfolio, as well as making significant adjustments to several existing Bin Series wines.

A new style of Grenache – Bin 21 – was introduced for the first time, so called because it marks 21 years since Penfolds released its first Cellar Reserve Barossa Grenache. The new wine is significantly different in style, with haughty tannins framing a concentrated fruit profile.

The source region for Bin 23 Pinot Noir has moved from the Adelaide Hills to Tasmania, with the resulting wine shifting from a blocky, dry red palate to a more slender, nuanced style. Also notable is the vibrant 2021 Magill Estate Shiraz, revitalised thanks in part to the Magill Estate vineyard being partly grubbed in 1996 and replanted with superior heritage vines from Penfolds sites.

The Penfolds Collection 2023 wines will be released globally on Thursday, 3 August.

The new Penfolds Chinese wine, Trial 521, combines Cabernet Sauvignon grapes from Shangri-La in Yunnan Province and Marselan grapes from Ningxia region. The initial release, later this month (July 2023), will be small and have limited distribution.

The Penfolds Collection 2023: Tina Gellie’s assessment of Grange 2019 and 24 others

Wines are listed in score order white then red by country; Australia, California, Wines of the World then Bordeaux

Related articles

• Penfolds Collection 2022: $1,000 Grange and new Bordeaux wines
• Henschke 2018: single-vineyard releases
• Barossa fine wine auction raises A$295,000 to support mental health services