Random joys of keeping inexpensive wine

Ferngrove has long been one of my favourite Western Australian makers. I’ve long respected the integrity and value its wines typically deliver. The other day I found – to my surprise – a bottle of its Frankland River Malbec 2018 in a box I hadn’t opened for a while. The wine was a gold and perhaps even trophy winner at the Perth Show, which I won’t hold against it, and it opened into a charmingly smooth, flavoursome and polished red of medium to fullish weight that massively over-delivered on the $20 investment it would have represented. You absolutely do not have to spend a lot of money to appreciate keeping wine for a few years after release.