Penfolds Bin 407 Cabernet Sauvignon 2023
Style: Red Wine
Variety: Cabernet Sauvignon
Closure: Cork and Screwcap
Penfolds Bin 407 Cabernet Sauvignon 2023
Warehouse
34 Redland Drive
Vermont VIC 3133
Australia
Critic Score: 95
Alcohol: 14.5%
Size: 750 ml
Drink by: 2045
Launched with the 1990 vintage in 1993, Bin 407 was developed in response to the increasing availability of high quality Cabernet Sauvignon fruit. Inspired by Bin 707, Bin 407 offers varietal definition and approachability, yet still with structure and depth of flavour. Textbook Cabernet Sauvignon, the varietally expressive Bin 407 highlights the rewards of Penfolds multi-region, multi-vineyard blending, with a core of ripe fruit supported by sensitive use of French and American oak.
"There is a beautiful combination of mint and blackcurrant, olives and cedar, woodsmoke and violets, with bay leaf and redder berried fruit notes pushing through as it breathes. Tannin here has both a presence and an air of effortlessness. This is an elegant wine, well flavoured, beautifully crafted and perfectly presented. Loved this wine. Penfolds at its best. So beautifully persistent." Campbell Mattinson
The 2023 Bin 407 Cabernet Sauvignon was sourced from vineyards in Padthaway, Coonawarra, McLaren Vale, Barossa Valley and Wrattonbully. The wine was aged for 12 months in French (21% new) and American (11% new) oak hogsheads.
"Dark plum, purple rim. First, the savoury allure of pimento olives and the herbal freshness of bay leaf, blending with the scent of cedar wood. The earthy fragrance of forest floor and bramble fruits are present, while warm toasted spices and Szechuan pepper add complexity. Subtle notes of capsicum and radicchio are balanced by the ripe sweetness of plum and a mix of red fruits. On the palate a burst of red fruit delivers a vibrant and lively mouthfeel. Steely tannins provide a structured backbone, complementing the darker tones of ripe forest fruit and a savoury hint of olives. A minerality, reminiscent of blue slate and ironstone, enhances the wine’s complexity. The acidity ensures a balance that keeps the palate focused and cohesive, and its interplay with the tannins is expertly managed, allowing the wine to remain poised while delivering an abundance of flavoursome fruit. Subtle notes of tobacco lend a rich, earthy quality, contributing to a tightly-coiled palate. A young Bin 407 Cabernet Sauvignon certainly requires a decant to open up. It is not one to be hurried along. The biggest reward will come to those willing to subject their bottles to a long spell in the cellar. Peak drinking: 2027-2047." Penfolds
Expert reviews
"Sports a super-vibrant magenta-tinged crimson in the glass. Deep blackberry, black cherry and boysenberry fruits along with hints of baking spices, earth, cedar, olive tapenade, a light bramble note, black pepper and a beautiful floral top note sitting in the background at low volume. Silky and creamy in the mouth with impressive fruit weight and flow. The tannins are superfine and powdery, and the finish is long and true. Drink by 2046." Dave Brookes, Halliday Wine Companion - 95 points
"The grapes for this release were sourced from Padthaway, Coonawarra, McLaren Vale, Barossa Valley and Wrattonbully. 12 months in French (21% new) and American (11% new) oak hogsheads. Price is unchanged at $130 RRP. 100% cabernet sauvignon. That beautiful combination of mint and blackcurrant, olives and cedar, woodsmoke and violets, with bay leaf and redder berried fruit notes pushing through as it breathes. Tannin here has both a presence and an air of effortlessness. This is an elegant wine, well flavoured, beautifully crafted and perfectly presented. Loved this wine. Penfolds at its best. So beautifully persistent. Drink: 2029 - 2040+." Campbell Mattinson, The Wine Front - 95 points
"You get the sense that the French and American oak regime on 407 has been ever so slowly evolving, changing and refining into something that is less about power and more about character building, working to varietal character enhancement. The ‘23 vintage is led by fruit from Padthaway with Coonawarra, McLaren Vale and the Barossa Valley. Bountiful red fruits, cassis, a touch of forest floor and earth, herbal tea, lapsang souchong, bay leaf, salt bush and dark spices. It’s a potent, complex mix delivered on a taut and well composed palate fashioned in fine, dense tannins. And being 407 and with those tannins in place, it’s got time definitely on its side. Drink:2025-2043." Jeni Port, Wine Pilot - 94 points
"This is made from declassified vineyards for the famed Bin 707 due to a challenging cool vintage. Aromas of blackcurrants, violets, bitter chocolate, baking spices and scorched earth. The palate is full-bodied with a textural yet refined palate and finely integrated tannins. Great balance of freshness and power. Drink or hold." James Suckling, jamessuckling.com - 94 points
"This captures the multiregional blending of Penfolds. A good deal of the fruit has come from the southern regions of Wrattonbully, Coonawarra and Padthaway, leading to a wine of some finesse and poise while being slightly lighter in body and richness than some previously. Has a light leaf aroma with underlying red and black fruits. It’s a most poised and polished wine with a focused precision as it extends through to the long finish. This is still very tight, as you might imagine, and it will certainly repay patience in the cellar. Cellar 20 years." Ray Jordan – 94 points
"A mild growing season and moderately warm harvest saw Padthaway take the lead in this vintage that produced no Coonawarra cabernet worthy of Bin 169 or Bin 707. This is a season that highlights the green capsicum and leaf mood of cabernet, lifted with rose hip aromatics and confidently supported by fine, al dente tannins and vibrant acidity. Dark chocolate French and American oak provides well-gauged support. It holds good persistence and cellaring potential. Drink: 2033-2048." Tyson Stelzer - 93 points
The story of bin 407
Launched with the 1990 vintage in 1993, and inspired by Bin 707, Bin 407 was developed in response to the increasing availability of high quality Cabernet Sauvignon fruit. Bin 407 is a multi-regional South Australian wine. In warmer vintages the wine is predominately sourced from the Limestone Coast including Coonawarra, Robe, Wrattonbully and Bordertown. In cooler years, the sourcing goes further north into McLaren Vale, Barossa Valley and Clare Valley.
The overall winemaking style is based on the Penfolds method and oak maturation is generally for 12 months in new French and American (approximately 30 percent) oak hogsheads, some of which were used for previous vintages of Bin 707. The wine has evolved in style over the last 30 years with the fruit gaining more prominence and the oak increasingly moving into the background. Since 2004, Bin 407 has been bottled under screwcap, but is available under cork for specific markets.
Peter Gago
The following text is taken from an article by Ken Gargett in Quill & Pad, https://quillandpad.com
Peter Gago has what many people in the wine world think is the best job on the planet. He is chief winemaker for Penfolds, based in South Australia and one of Australia’s oldest wine producers.
Max Schubert created Grange with the experimental first wine, the 1951, after he returned from Bordeaux and wanted to establish an Aussie First Growth. The story of Grange has been told many times, and as fascinating as it is I won’t rehash it again. Schubert ruled at Penfolds right through to the 1976 vintage, when he handed the reins to Don Ditter. Ditter made the wines right through to the 1986 vintage when John Duval stepped up. Duval was chief winemaker until the 2002 vintage, when he left to do his own thing, very successfully.
Since that time, Peter Gago has been the chief winemaker. It should be noted that although the role of chief winemaker at Penfolds will always be inextricably linked with Grange, there are a great many other wines in the portfolio for which this position assumes ultimate responsibility.
Alongside the winemaking, in which he is still heavily involved, a usual week in non-Covid times sees Gago flying around the world to tastings, dinners, events, festivals, and promotions. I suspect that only David Attenborough (outside of pilots and crew) has racked up more flying miles. I remember seeing him one day when he seemed even more pleased with the world than usual. Turns out he’d just run into his wife, Gail, now retired but a long-term and highly regarded member of the South Australian parliament, at the airport. Gago had not been aware that they would both be in the same country that week, let alone cross paths, such is his usual peripatetic lifestyle.
Gago has friends and admirers all around the globe, from the rich and famous to young, aspiring wine lovers, and will spend time talking to them all. I suspect that if he wanted to start dropping names, the din would reverberate for days, but you could not find a humbler man. Gago is a serious music buff and you’d be amazed at the number of rock stars who revere him, much in the way their fans might do for them (for instance, after crawling over broken glass to get a ticket to a Bruce Springsteen concert I saw Gago sitting in prime seats with Springsteen’s family, after which they went for dinner and knocked off a few bottles of Grange).
Gago is probably as close to a rock star himself in the world of wine, although perhaps more modest rather than flamboyant. And I have no idea if he can sing.
The thing that most amazes me with Gago is that every time you talk to him, he is bubbling with genuine enthusiasm, not just for Grange but for all his wines. He just loves what he is doing. One gets the feeling that every morning he wakes up and pinches himself to make sure it is real.
Among his many attributes, Gago has the gift of the gab like few others. Only once have I ever seen him lost for words and caught off guard. Many years ago, at the annual release – held in a very fancy location near the shores of Sydney Harbor; it is always a fancy location somewhere and also always includes great champagne to kick off the day as Gago is fanatical about the world’s best bubbles – the then current chairman or CEO of whichever corporate entity was then the owner of Penfolds attended the day. Forgive me for my failure to remember just where the corporate snakes and ladders left Penfolds that day and for failing to remember the relevant gentleman’s name. He had only been appointed as a temporary executive while the search for a more permanent one was ongoing, but unlike any of the CEOs before and after, this man had a genuine interest and came to a couple of tastings to learn.
Anyway, as we sipped our champagne on the lawns overlooking Sydney Harbor and chatted, our friend suddenly posed a question to Gago. He had been meaning to ask, he said, just how much Grange the company made. There were five or six writers in this little group and suddenly, every single one of us had pad and pen poised. The production of Grange is a national secret that is not to be disclosed under pain of death (general consensus puts it at, depending on the vintage, between 5,000 and 15,000 cases, with most releases in the mid range, but this is pure speculation).
Gago was at a loss. The boss of bosses had just asked him a direct question and Gago is far too polite not to answer but knew he couldn’t give that information out in public. He managed a fair bit of mumbling and generalizations and I think he suggested they meet later. Pads and pens all went back into bags, and we could not help grinning while Gago looked like he’d just swallowed a bad oyster.
Gago was born in England in 1957, but his family moved to Melbourne when he was only six years of age. Originally a math teacher (teaching is still a passion), he undertook a science degree at the University of Melbourne and then attended Roseworthy College, a famous Australian winemaking college, graduating as Dux (the highest ranking academic performance -ed), which will surprise no one.
In 1989 he joined Penfolds as a sparkling winemaker, working with Ed Carr, who has established a career in sparkling wine (now with Arras) as successful as Gago’s is with table wines. He moved to reds and quickly rose through the ranks until succeeding Duval in 2002. In the 73 years since Schubert was first appointed, Gago is only the fourth chief winemaker.
During his tenure, he has stacked up an extraordinary array of bling, as has Penfolds under his stewardship (Gago heads a team of eight winemakers for table wines and a couple more for fortifieds). He has several “Winemaker of the Year” awards from different entities and publications, both from Australia and abroad, but the accolades go well beyond that.
In 2017, in what is termed “the Queen’s Birthday Honors List,” he was awarded the highly prestigious Companion of the Order of Australia (AC) for service to the wine industry. For non-Aussies, that is a big one! A year later, he received an honorary doctorate from the University of South Australia and named the Great Wine Capitals Ambassador for South Australia.
Very recently, Gago was awarded perhaps the most prestigious honor of all in the wine world: admission to the Decanter Hall of Fame (previously they honored the Decanter Man – or Woman – of the Year, but that changed). Decanter is a highly respected English wine magazine that established its hall of fame in 1984 with Serge Hochar from Château Musar in Lebanon the first recipient. There is only a single addition per year. Gago is the fourth Australian following Max Schubert in 1988, Len Evans in 1997, and Brian Croser in 2004. That two of the four chief winemakers from a single producer have made this list (Schubert and Gago) is unprecedented but shows just where Penfolds sits in the pantheon of wine producers around the globe.
And should you still remain unconvinced then take a moment to look at some of the names Gago has joined: Parker, Spurrier, Tchelistcheff, Robinson, Moueix, de Villaine, Antinori, Lichine, Gaja, Symington, Loosen, Guigal, Torres, Draper, Peynaud, Mondavi, and so many more. There is no question that the name Peter Gago sits very comfortably alongside them all.
What is most important is that across the board the Penfolds wines have never been better, and while it is a team effort, in the end we can thank Gago.
About the winery
After the success of early sherries and fortified wines, founders Dr Christopher and Mary Penfold planted the vine cuttings they had carried on their voyage over to Australia. In 1844 the fledging vineyard was officially established as the Penfolds wine company at Magill Estate.
As the company grew, so too did Dr Penfold's medical reputation, leaving much of the running of the winery to Mary Penfold. Early forays into Clarets and Rieslings proved increasingly popular, and on Christopher's death in 1870, Mary assumed total responsibility for the winery. Mary's reign at the helm of Penfolds saw years of determination and endeavour.
By the time Mary Penfold retired in 1884 (ceding management to her daughter, Georgina) Penfolds was producing 1/3 of all South Australia's wine. She'd set an agenda that continues today, experimenting with new methods in wine production. By Mary's death in 1896, the Penfolds legacy was well on its way to fruition. By 1907, Penfolds had become South Australia's largest winery.
In 1948, history was made again as Max Schubert became the company's first Chief Winemaker. A loyal company man and true innovator, Schubert would propel Penfolds onto the global stage with his experimentation of long-lasting wines - the creation of Penfolds Grange in the 1950s.
In 1959 (while Schubert was perfecting his Grange experiment in secret), the tradition of ‘bin wines' began. The first, a Shiraz wine with the grapes of the company's own Barossa Valley vineyards was simply named after the storage area of the cellars where it is aged. And so Kalimna Bin 28 becomes the first official Penfolds Bin number wine.
In 1960, the Penfolds board instructed Max Schubert to officially re-start production on Grange. His determination and the quality of the aged wine had won them over.
Soon, the medals began flowing and Grange quickly became one of the most revered wines around the world. In 1988 Schubert was named Decanter Magazine's Man of the Year, and on the 50th anniversary of its birth, Penfolds Grange was given a heritage listing in South Australia.
Despite great success, Penfolds never rests on its laurels. In 2012 Penfolds released its most innovative project to date - 12 handcrafted ampoules of the rare 2004 Kalimna Block Cabernet Sauvignon.
Two years later, Penfolds celebrated the 170th anniversary – having just picked up a perfect score of 100 for the 2008 Grange in two of the world's most influential wine magazines. Today, Penfolds continues to hold dear the philosophies and legends – '1844 to evermore!'.
South Australia
South Australian is responsible for more than half the production of all Australian wine. It is home to more than 900 wineries across 18 wine regions. The regions are Adelaide Hills, Adelaide Plains, Barossa Valley, Clare Valley, Coonawarra, Currency Creek, Eden Valley, Kangaroo Island, Langhorne Creek, McLaren Vale, Mount Benson, Mount Gambier, Padthaway, Riverland, Robe, Southern Fleurieu, Southern Flinders Ranges and Wrattonbully.
Many of the well-known names in the South Australian wine industry established their first vineyards in the late 1830s and early 1840s. The first vines in McLaren Vale were planted at Reynella in 1839 and Penfold's established Magill Estate on the outskirts of Adelaide in 1844.
South Australia has a vast diversity in geography and climate which allows the State to be able to produce a range of grape varieties - from cool climate Riesling in the Clare and Eden Vallies to the big, full bodied Shiraz wines of the Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale. Two of Australia's best-known wines, Penfolds Grange and Henschke Hill of Grace, are produced here. There is much to discover in South Australia for the wine lover.