Winemaker Notes
Pairs well with oysters, fresh crab, basil pesto, or goat cheese with honey.
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
Beautifully vibrant, succulent tropical guava with lime, green apple and a hint of gooseberry. Superbly textured with a touch of richness to complement the fruit flavours.
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
COMMENTARY: The 2018 Long Meadow Ranch Sauvignon Blanc is beautiful and juicy. TASTING NOTES: This wine brings fresh and ripe citrus aromas and flavors front and center. Pair it with steamed clams and mussels over al dente linguine, and add an accent of mild chiles. (Tasted: June 27, 2020, San Francisco, CA)
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Wine Enthusiast
This is an appealing white wine that’s high toned from start to finish in complex yet refreshing layers of peach, melon and lime. The light-bodied approach keeps it energetic and lively, with a finish of dried herb and cut grass.
Capable of a vast array of styles, Sauvignon Blanc is a crisp, refreshing variety that equally reflects both terroir and varietal character. Though it can vary depending on where it is grown, a couple of commonalities always exist—namely, zesty acidity and intense aromatics. This variety is of French provenance. Somm Secret—Along with Cabernet Franc, Sauvignon Blanc is a proud parent of Cabernet Sauvignon. That green bell pepper aroma that all three varieties share is no coincidence—it comes from a high concentration of pyrazines (herbaceous aromatic compounds) inherent to each member of the family.
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.