2023 Suckfizzle Cabernet Sauvignon, Margaret River

Trophy for Best Cabernet Sauvignon at the 2025 Royal Adelaide Wine Show

Gold at the 2025 Sydney Royal Wine Show

Silver at the 2025 Melbourne Royal Wine Awards

Love the energy in this Suckfizzle. There's plenty of definition, which cabernet requires to be classy. A heady mix of cassis and mulberries with bay leaves, menthol, cedary, spicy oak and even a whiff of turmeric. Fuller bodied, with beautifully shaped tannins, the finish long and detailed. This is a beautiful drink today and for some time hence. Drink to 2036.

96 points Jane Faulkner for Halliday Wine Companion, February 2026

The 2023 Suckfizzle Cabernet Sauvignon is from the Suckfizzle vineyard down in Augusta. At a minuscule six meters above sea level, it is cold, owing to the Antarctic winds blowing off the Southern Ocean. Paired with the cooler/mild year that was 2023, this combination almost doubles down on the tension, leafiness and delicacy. Having said that, the wine is balanced and ripe, with supple, chalky, resolved tannins that shape the fruit through the finish. It's been a great wine in most years, especially so here. Drink to 2043.

96 points Erin Larkin for The Wine Advocate, September 2025

Deep purple colour, youthful and bright. Intense, bright cassis and mulberry aromas, very cabernet and very regional. Resonant cabernet fruit throughout the long palate. Elegant wine, stylish and powerful, all the pieces of the puzzle in their place. It just needs a bit more time. Drink to 2043.

96 points Huon Hooke for The Real Review, June 2025

A big price tag, a top vintage and a wine that comes finely layered and complex. It’s a youngster, that much is also sure, and will blossom with more time in bottle cementing itself as a serious and seriously good Margaret River Cabernet. Pristine fruit fills the scent in blackberry, cassis with blueberry, violet florals, leaf and briar. The palate is built on a core of super fine tannins, running dry and gossamer fine. How does the winemaker do that? Acidity is equally just as focused aiding to the tautness of the wine’s structure. Dried leaves, Aussie bush notes, bay leaf, anise and integrated oak are cloaked in juicy black fruits and blackcurrant pastille notes. Can still be considered a bit of a sleeper with its best moments yet to come. Drink to 2043.

95 points Jeni Port for Wine Pilot, June 2025

Perfumed and brooding with aromas of blackcurrants, violets, graphite, bay leaves, dark cherries, cedar and tobacco. The palate is full-bodied with finely integrated tannins and bright acidity, giving a layered, textural mouthfeel with a long, savory finish. Powerful yet composed. Drink or hold.

94 points James Suckling, July 2024

Stella Bella is the creation of Stuart Pym and Janice McDonald, established in 1996 with their purchase of the 1988 planted Suckfizzle vineyard. Today the five estate vineyards stretch over 60 hectares of well-draining gravelly soils of the southern half of the Margaret River wine region and are managed by a talented team led by viticulturist James Hayward. His winemaking counterpart at the winery is Margaret River local Jarrad Olsen, who’s been with Stella Bella since 2018.

The Suckfizzle vineyard is the southernmost reach of the Margaret River wine region. Located in Augusta, close to Cape Leeuwin, the unique site is strongly influenced by both the Southern and Indian Oceans and often a good five degrees cooler in the growing season than the town of Margaret River, while the maritime influence keeps the average nighttime temperatures a few degrees warmer.

The 2023 includes a small 10% component of Merlot, with both varieties handpicked, destemmed, sorted by berries and fermented in small batches. The components matured for ten months in French oak barrels from the Taransaud and Boutes coopers, with a third of the barrels new for this vintage.