Quintessa (3 Liter Bottle) 2011
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Wong
Wilfred -
Suckling
James -
Enthusiast
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Connoisseurs'
Product Details
Your Rating
Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
Blend: 94% Cabernet Sauvignon, 4% Merlot, 1% Cabernet Franc and 1% Petit Verdot
Professional Ratings
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
COMMENTARY: An absolute phenomenal effort from a vintage with only a handful of stars. I tasted this wine blind against some of the world's top wines and this wine performed remarkably. TASTING NOTES: The 2011 Quintessa Red wine shows beautiful, elegant, and persistent aromas and flavors similar to the Right Bank of Bordeaux and the best from the top microclimates in Sonoma County. The wine exhibits red fruit and stony earth aromas and flavors. Pair it with a succulent ribeye and your palate will be singing a happy tune. (Tasted: February 22, 2018, St. Helena, CA)
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James Suckling
This is fresh and vivid with blackberries, dark chocolate and fresh mushrooms, as well as bark and dark, trumpet mushroom-like notes. Medium to full body with fine tannins and a creamy, fine texture. More savory notes come through. Subtle and complex. From biodynamically grown grapes. So delicious now.
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Wine Enthusiast
For the 2011 vintage, Winemaker Charles Thomas blended Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot from the winery’s 280-acre biodynamic and organically farmed estate in the heart of Rutherford. The effect is memorable, the wine pungent in red plum and cherry. Light, layered and elegantly smooth on the palate, it has a backdrop of black pepper and clove. Cellar through 2025.
Cellar Selection -
Connoisseurs' Guide
Deep, beautifully focused, ripe currant fruit teams with lovely oak sweetness from beginning to end here, and, while the two are stunning and as neatly fit as can be, the wine goes beyond fruit and the barrel with layers of dusty soil and mineral complexities running its length. It is both substantial and uncannily sleek and light on its feet, and it is structured as to age famously. Its tannins are ample yet fine enough to allow mid-term drinking, but we have every reason to believe that this outstanding offering will only grow better and better over the course of the next ten years.
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A noble variety bestowed with both power and concentration, Cabernet Sauvignon enjoys success all over the globe, its best examples showing potential to age beautifully for decades. Cabernet Sauvignon flourishes in Bordeaux's Medoc where it is often blended with Merlot and smaller amounts of some combination of Cabernet Franc, Malbecand Petit Verdot. In the Napa Valley, ‘Cab’ is responsible for some of the world’s most prestigious, age-worthy and sought-after “cult” wines. Somm Secret—DNA profiling in 1997 revealed that Cabernet Sauvignon was born from a spontaneous crossing of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc in 17th century southwest France.
The Rutherford sub-region of Napa Valley centers on the town of Rutherford and covers some of Napa Valley’s finest vineyard real estate, spanning from the Mayacamas in the west, to the Vaca Mountains on the other side of the valley.
Inside of the Rutherford AVA, bordering the Mayacamas, is a stretch of uplands called the Rutherford Bench. (These bench lands technically run the length of Oakville as well). Mountain runoff creates deep, well-drained, alluvial soils on the bench, giving vine roots plenty of reason to permeate deep into the ground. The result is wine with great structure and complexity.
Rutherford Cabernet Sauvingons and Bordeaux Blends garner substantial attention for their enticing fragrances of dusty earth and dried herbs, broad and juicy mid-palates and lush and fine-grained tannins. The sub-appellation claims some of the valley’s most prized vineyards today, namely Caymus, Rubicon and Beckstoffer Georges III.
It is also home to Napa’s most influential and historic personalities. Thomas Rutherford, responsible for the appellation's name, made serious investments here in grape growing and wine production between the years of 1850 to 1880. Gustave Niebaum purchased a large swath of land and completed his winery in 1887, calling it “Inglenook.” Today this remains the oldest bonded winery in California. Georges Latour founded Beaulieu Vineyard in 1900, making it the oldest continuous winery in the state. Latour also hired the famous enologist, André Tchelistcheff, a man credited for single-handedly defining the modern Napa winemaking style.