Wine Review Paternoster 'Heavens Door' Merlot 2001

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Ferreting around in the cellar and looking for a nice bottle to share with my father I found a bottle of Paternoster ‘Heaven’s Door Merlot’ sitting on a bottom shelf, it was a 2001 vintage. I vaguely remembered buying the wine from Cloud Wine in South Melbourne after one of Geoffrey’s wine tasting nights and my notes had rated the wine highly but that was at least 5 years ago, so how was it tasting now?

Removing the foil there was a little crud around the lip of the bottle and when my corkscrew pushed the cork into the bottle I was worried that this was definitely going to be past its best. An initial taste was quite funky, it needed a 30 minute decant before it lost that sourness and the wine opened up, but wow.

A twenty two year old wine that was just perfect, gentle silky tannins that brought body to the layers of plum, dark cherries, spice, tobacco and chocolate. The colour while starting to get a little brown was still strong and clear, the nose (once the funk had blown off) was fragrant and rich and the palate was concentrated but also integrated, there were no nasty rough edges or faults, rather this was a smooth transition from front to back, sweet to sour, rounded and unctuous. This wine was absolutely delicious.

Merlot is not a very respected grape in Australia, largely we tend to blend it with Cabernet for its smooth tannins and mellow characteristics. As a result most many Australians only drink premium Merlot from Bordeaux in France with the most famous being ‘Petrus’ which incidentally if you happen to be searching for a bottle of 2001 Petrus, it will set you back about $7,000 making the Paternoster something of a bargain.

There are not a lot of notes about the wine making and the winery given this is a review of a bottle from the cellar but according to wine maker and vintner Philip Hession the ‘Heavens Door’ moniker is given to the super premium releases (only released in good years) akin to a Grand Cru.

credit Paternoster Wines
credit Paternoster Wines
credit Paternoster Wines
credit Paternoster Wines

The Vineyard

Phil Hession credit Paternoster — Wine Maker – Philip Hession

The vineyard which was established in 1985 sits just an hour out of Melbourne in the rolling blue hills of the Dandenong Ranges just out of Emerald an area better known for strawberry jam and apples than for fine wine. They have just 5 acres of vines on a steep site 300 meters above sea level densely planted non irrigated site with pinot noir (60%) and chardonnay (40%). It is unclear where the Merlot grapes are sourced from.

Wines are all hand picked and cropped at 1-1.5 tones per acre, the wines are matured in French oak barrels with minimal racking to maintain a soft and subtle influence and then bottled without fining.

I really should take better notes because as noted I don’t recall when the bottle was purchased or how much I paid for it other than I recall purchasing from Cloud Wine and it was well before covid. The good news for you is I checked the Paternoster website and they still have a few museum release bottles for sale at $120, so if you love an excellent aged merlot, this one is hard to go past.

I was unable to find other ratings but was an excellent wine which I rated 96/100 points.

Editors note – I reached out to Wine Maker Philip Hession to find out about where the Merlot grapes came from, he explained that the grapes for the 2001 Merlot came from a small vineyard just east of Gembrook, and Philip was also the vineyard consultant and winemaker for their wines.