Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
The 2022 Cariad is based on 68% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Cabernet Franc, 6% Merlot, and 6% Petit Verdot. It's one of the wines of the vintage and offers an incredible array of darker, black fruits, crushed stone, graphite, woodsmoke, and leather. Full-bodied, beautifully concentrated, and incredibly polished, with just about flawless balance, it has fine tannins, plenty of mid-palate depth, and a great finish.
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Decanter
Cariad is fermented in stainless steel and aged for approximately 20 months in 66% new French oak. A powerful, muscular wine with balletic grace, it is darker-fruited than Tychson Hill and crafted in a Bordeaux-style blend. The ripe, generous tannins have a velvet texture with pinpoint precision, seamlessly integrated with cocoa nib freshness that lifts the aromas and flavours. Garrigue and sagebrush add further nuance, deepening the wine’s complexity. The finish carries a wet slate coolness and tension, reflecting the vintage’s early-season freshness before the September heatwave. Sourced from northwest St. Helena, at the base of Spring Mountain, Cariad is a masterfully structured and deeply expressive wine. The blend includes 72% Cabernet Sauvignon, 13% Cabernet Franc, 8% Merlot, and 7% Petit Verdot.
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James Suckling
Such pure fruit on the nose, with lots of flowers, pine needles, menthol and bay leaves. Full-bodied with a fruity but not overpowering character and pretty fluidity in the finish. Wet rock and peach stone undertones. Exotic and sappy. A bland of cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, merlot and petit verdot. This needs three to four years to come together. Better after 2029.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Sourced primarily from David Abreu's Madrona Ranch on the western side of Saint Helena, Colgin's 2022 Cariad is more than half Cabernet Sauvignon, with the balance a blend of Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Petit Verdot. Marked by ripe cherries and raspberries and accented by hints of dried spices and gentle leafy overtones, it's compellingly complex on the nose, while the full-bodied palate is silky in feel but with tensile strength from front to back, finishing dusty and long.
Rating: 97+ -
Wine Spectator
Warmed cassis, plum reduction and fig preserves are all wrapped together and then liberally coated in a warm ganache blanket. Black licorice, alder, bay leaf and warm cast iron emerge steadily on the finish, though the fruit manages to keep up. Impressively manages to stay in proportion in this vintage, though the overtly brooding aspect makes this for fans of the style only.
Undoubtedly proving its merit over and over, Napa Valley is a now a leading force in the world of prestigious red wine regions. Though Cabernet Sauvignon dominates Napa Valley, other red varieties certainly thrive here. Important but often overlooked include Merlot and other Bordeaux varieties well-regarded on their own as well as for their blending capacities. Very old vine Zinfandel represents an important historical stronghold for the region and Pinot noir is produced in the cooler southern parts, close to the San Pablo Bay.
Perfectly situated running north to south, the valley acts as a corridor, pulling cool, moist air up from the San Pablo Bay in the evenings during the hot days of the growing season, which leads to even and slow grape ripening. Furthermore the valley claims over 100 soil variations including layers of volcanic, gravel, sand and silt—a combination excellent for world-class red wine production.