98 POINTS
Sam Kim - Wine Orbit
The stunning bouquet reveals blackcurrant, dark plum, almond, cocoa, cake spice, and rich floral aromas with a hint of tobacco. It’s engaging and captivating and draws you in. The palate exhibits immense concentration and presence, superbly enhanced by silky texture and layers of chalky tannins. The acidity is perfectly pitched and provides freshness to this long-living wine. A wine of meticulous precision and undeniable sophistication.
98 POINTS
Erin Larkin - Robert Parker Wine Advocate
The 2023 Coleraine comprises 80% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot and 5% Cabernet Franc. This cuvée is not made to a recipe, rather as a selection of the best from each vintage. In 2023, due to the weather induced by Cyclone Gabrielle, which landed in early February (the second or third), the strongest performer was the Cabernet Sauvignon due to bunch architecture, small berries, thick skins and, in this case, the low-vigor rootstocks and the chicory in between the rows. Te Mata invests heavily into research and development in the vineyards, which really assists in a vintage like 2023, which imposes challenges. The elevation in all aspects of this wine from the already tremendously impressive Awatea is significant. Here, the tannins have a finer grain, the fruit is more persistent and the package is far more integrated and seamless. With raspberry, iodine, crushed shells, nori, pressed flowers, new lead pencil, tobacco, bramble and cassis, it is magnificent. Raw cocoa and the gentle and subtle creep of game/gristle/blood and sweet marrow indicate its direction later in life. I love this wine. I think I write that every time I taste it. 13.5% alcohol, sealed under natural cork.
97 POINTS
Christina Pickard - Wine Enthusiast
2023 will forever be remembered in the North Island as the year of Cyclone Gabrielle. Fortunately, Te Mata's vineyards escaped relatively unscathed. In fact, Coleraine, the historic estate's top wine, is singing. Unmistakably Cab aromas of blackcurrant, dried mint, pencil lead and rhubarb are out in full force from first sniff. The palate shows precision and balance with a beautiful rush of tangy, current-y acidity tempered by fine, dusty tannins. It's perfumed and svelte with charm and appeal now, but a promise of even greater things to come.
95 POINTS
Gary Walsh - The Wine Front
80% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot, 5% Cabernet Franc. This was bottled last week, so, it comes to me in kind of a more frisky form. 70% new oak, and they’ve worked with a French cooper to create a Coleraine barrel, which is all part of the attention to detail that’s a hallmark of this estate, although most of the effort goes into vineyard management, which is as it should be. I come to this wine as someone who’s tasted every vintage of Coleraine ever made, and while that could be considered boastful (well, that’s me!), it’s intended to provide context. The acid line in this wine puts me in mind of the 2021, which was a very tight and firm Coleraine, and while it does not carry the same intensity of fruit, it’s maybe not dissimilar in character. Release date is March 2025.
Blackcurrant, essence of Cabernet thing here, dried herbs (thyme) and nori, tobacco, pencil, liquorice/aniseed. Medium-bodied, bright acid line, ripe tomato, black and red fruit, lots of pulverized rock stuff to tannin, with a very long finish. Wonderful perfume, crisp with kind of a porcini mushroom umami-laced character about it, more of a cool and bony feel, but a great wine all the same. I’m spending a lot of time thinking about this wine, about where it will go, and where it sits in the pantheon of Te Mata Coleraine, and the upshot it is ‘up’. It’s either 95+ or 96 points.
94 POINTS
Rebecca Gibb MW - Vinous
The 2023 Coleraine is a young yet ageworthy Cabernet-dominant blend that shows layer of flavor, concentration, integration and length in the face of the wrath of nature. Despite a cyclone that swept through the region in the second week of February, these late-picked varieties have demonstrated incredible resilience. It is a massive surprise to see how good the 2023 is. Expect plenty of nuance here: initially the nose offers up pure cassis fruit and tapenade, smoky tobacco and bay leaf, while flavors of integrated cedar oak and the merest hint of violet follows on the long, elegant finish. Richness of substance and fine gravelly tannins currently require a decent hunk of meat, but you'd be better off laying this down for at least five years.
92 POINTS
Neal Martin - Vinous
The 2023 Coleraine comes from the longest ever growing season and the second hottest on record. Unsurprisingly it has a very concentrated nose with dense blackberry, cassis, espresso and star anis, just a touch of pencil box with time. The palate is medium-bodied with a fine bead of acidity, silky tannins, very harmonious with just the right amount of sapidity on the finish. Fans out beautifully, though it just needs a little more persistence that may well manifest with time. Tasted from a bottle shipped directly from the estate at the Coleraine vertical in London.
Michael Cooper MW
Breed, rather than brute power, is the hallmark of Coleraine, estate-grown in the Havelock North Hills and matured in French oak barriques, predominantly new. This notably graceful red is a blend of cabernet sauvignon (80%), merlot (15%) and cabernet franc (5%). Dark and purple-flushed, it is mouthfilling with dense, well-ripened blackcurrent, plum and spice flavours, oak complexity, and a finely structured, very harmonious finish. Best drinking 2030+
