Winemaker Notes
Blend: 95% Cabernet Sauvignon, 5% Petit Verdot
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
This is shows wonderful aromas of tar, asphalt, wet earth and pure cherries. Full-bodied, yet soft and velvety with a fine dusty texture to the finish. Fresh and austere. Dignified. This has no cabernet franc in it this year. Normally there is 3% to 5%.
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Wine Enthusiast
A blend of 95% Cabernet Sauvignon and 5% Petit Verdot, this soft, approachable wine from a storied producer is meant to enjoy young and yet exudes plenty of complexity. Luscious aromas of graham cracker and blueberry jam belie a classically balanced measure of integrated tannins and dark chocolate.
Cellar Selection -
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2012 Napanook (a 3,000-case blend of 95% Cabernet Sauvignon and 5% Petit Verdot) is one of the strongest second wines Moueix has produced to date. Made in a sexy, open-knit, opulent style very much in keeping with the vintage’s signature, it offers up luscious notes of bay leaf, lavender, red and blackcurrants, plum sauce, licorice and Christmas fruitcake. This is a gorgeous, opulent, medium to full-bodied 2012 that is already revealing considerable complexity. Drink it over the next 10-15 years.
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
The 2012 Napanook is a multi-dimensional wine as it brings all of the elements together; black fruit and sweet earth run throughout as the ends with a firm grip on the palate, this one is well-suited for grilled, well-marbled rib-eye of beef. Deep dark ruby color; black fruit and sweet earth in the nose, just a bit brooding at the moment, fine richness; medium bodied, firm and built on the palate; dry, good acidity, well balanced; earth and ripe fruit and joined nicely in the flavors; long finish, sweet tannins in the aftertaste. (Tasted: August 12, 2015, San Francisco, CA)
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Connoisseurs' Guide
By Dominus. Easily among the better, if not the best, Napanook bottlings that we can recall, the 2012 is a solid, sturdy, classically structured Cabernet that, although claimed by Dominus to be designed for drinking while young, strikes us as being anything but. It is deep, it is tough and it is unabashedly tannic, yet it is also deep in distinctly curranty fruit, and, if in no ways a lavish wine, it is a composed and complex one that will age famously. Five years seems the minimal wait, but it will grow and gain in interest for two or three times as long.
In the late 1960s, while attending the University of California at Davis, Christian Moueix fell in love with the Napa Valley and its wines. Son of Jean-Pierre Moueix, the famed wine merchant and producer from Libourne, France, Moueix returned home in 1970 to manage the family vineyards, including Chateaux Petrus, La Fleur-Petrus, Trotanoy in Pomerol and Magdelaine in Saint Emilion.
His love of Napa Valley lingered and in 1981, he discovered the historic Napanook vineyard, a 124-acre site west of Yountville that had been the source of fruit for some of the finest Napa Valley wines of the 1940s and 1950s. In 1982, Moueix entered into a partnership to develop the vineyard and, in 1995, became its sole owner. He chose the name 'Dominus' or 'Lord of the Estate' in Latin to underscore his longstanding commitment to stewardship of the land.
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.