Winemaker Notes
The growing season and harvest of 2019 provided even tempered conditions to help create a wine very indicative of Cabernet Franc’s best attributes. Aromatically, the wine has an abundance of brambly berry fruits, rose hips, and savory herbs. It’s a luscious wine on the palate that shows clarity and tension with an encore of the deep berry flavors with complementing hints of dried herbs. The fruit acids and tannin combined with the rich vanilla notes all come together in a long, satisfying finish that maintains the clarity and freshness in this wine.
Blend: 100% Cabernet Franc
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Named for the clone, and sourced from the Sugarloaf Vineyard in South Napa, Long & Reed's 2019 Cabernet Franc Two-Fourteen boasts exotic florals and dramatic aromas of ripe raspberries. It's medium to full-bodied, with a soft, caressing mouthfeel and ripe tannins, finishing long and elegant. What a beauty.
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Wine Enthusiast
Abundant, ripe black-fruit aromas and generous oak spices lead to a mouthfilling richness of dried plums and dried cherries accented in vanilla and cedar. The wine feels broad and full, backed by moderate tannins that don't get in the way. Best through 2029.
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Jeb Dunnuck
The 2019 Cabernet Franc Two-Fourteen is all varietal and was brought up in 15% new barrels. It offers a juicy, forward, incredibly floral style as well as red and blue fruits, some mint and orange blossom nuances, medium body, silky tannins, and a great finish. It’s moderately concentrated and ready to go, but I love its balance as well as it’s purity of fruit. I’d plan on drinking bottles over the coming decade.
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Wine Spectator
A forward, juicy style, offering cherry and blackberry notes mixed with tobacco and floral hints through the friendly finish. This shows a nice underlying structure and so might be fun to cellar a touch.
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.