Winemaker Notes
Blend: 86% Cabernet Sauvignon, 12 % Petit Verdot, 2% Malbec
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Aromas of red and black cherry, milk chocolate and sweet paprika. Medium-bodied with fine, slightly tight tannins. Juicy and fresh, with subtle nutmeg and clove notes adding welcome complexity. I like the classic structure here.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Stellenbosch is fresh and ripe with layers of blackberry and juicy plum aromas. It is full-bodied, offering notes of pencil shavings with a hint of graphite before swinging back to show juicy fruit flavors emanating in layers of complexity. The palate is balanced with a beam of energetic acidity that races to the long-lasting, juicy finish with persistent blackberry and dark cherry skin essences. Bravo! This is fantastic juice.
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Wine Spectator
A fresh, focused red, with black currant and black raspberry fruit showing lovely purity. Offers sculpted tannins that create a sleek frame, while accents of violet, iron, milled pepper and black tea leaves provide fine detail and linger on the racy finish.
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Wine Enthusiast
Firmly structured and balanced, this Cabernet Sauvignon opens with subtle notes of dried fruit and plums. It has nice chocolate nib flavors mixed with cranberry and blueberry. Additional flavors include a potpourri of herbs that lend savory notes to the aftertaste.
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.
South Africa’s most famous wine-producing district, Stellenbosch, surrounds the historic town with the same name; fine winemaking here dates back to the late 1600s. Its valleys of granite, sandstone and alluvial loam soils between the towering blue-grey mountains of Stellenbosch, Simonsberg and Helderberg have the capacity to produce beautiful wines from many varieties. The climate is warm Mediterranean, tempered by the cool Atlantic air of nearby False Bay.
Perhaps most well-known for its Pinotage and Bordeaux blends, Stellenbosch also produces noteworthy wines from Syrah, Chenin blanc, Chardonnay and Sauvignon blanc. The district’s wards—Banghoek, Bottelary, Devon Valley, Jonkershoek Valley, Papegaaiberg, Polkadraai Hills and Simonsberg-Stellenbosch—all produce distinctive wines from vines with relatively low yields.