Winemaker Notes
This dark and mysterious beauty introduces itself with a massive, forward black fruit profile supported by black tea, sweet pipe tobacco, sandalwood and diverse savory notes. On the palate there is an active interplay between the wine’s fruit, acid and structure, with each element taking a turn as the star.
A great vintage yielded a spectacular wine worthy of superlatives. While every year we can count on the oldest vineyard block on our property, our Rock Arch cabernet, to produce a concentrated wine with big tannins and great acidity, this wine shines most brightly when it is able to achieve balance through the ripening and attenuation of the tannins during an extended hang time. This was certainly the case in 2019, where cool fall weather allowed us to delay harvesting this block until well into November. The result is an intense, structured, blue-black wine loaded with complexity that has decades of life ahead of it.
Blend: 92% Cabernet Sauvignon, 8% Petit Verdot
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Coming mostly from the Sonoma side of the line, the 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve is 78% Sonoma County and 22% Napa County, all from the same vineyard located high atop Spring Mountain. Another beautiful wine from this estate, it sports a dense ruby/purple hue, notes of pure cassis and black raspberry fruits, some tobacco, lead pencil, and pretty, perfumed herbal and spice box-like notes, nicely integrated background oak, medium to full body, supple tannins, and a great finish. It's one of those wines that grows on you with time in the glass, and nothing is out of place. Perfectly balanced and already hard to resist, nevertheless, I see no reason this won't continue to evolve gracefully over the coming two decades or more.
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Vinous
The 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve is a total knock-out. Dark and mysterious, the 2019 offers up an exciting mélange of blackberry jam, spice, licorice, lavender, cloves, sage, menthol and coffee. There is a bit more extraction and oak influence here than in the other wines, but it's a style that works so well. This deep, potent Cabernet Sauvignon has a ton to offer. It's another gorgeous wine from Pride.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Interestingly, while the Vintner's Select bottling is drawn from Napa, the 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve is a blend of 78% Sonoma grapes and 22% Napa fruit that includes 8% Petit Verdot. It's all from the same property, so it's academic really, but the result is a wine marked by dark, earthy aromas, intense cassis fruit and touches of camphor and vanilla. Full-bodied and expansive, it's a bit firmer and more structured than the Vintner's Select cuvée, with considerable aging potential and a long, tannic finish.
Rating: 95+
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.
St. Helena is in the heart of the Napa Valley, nestled between Calistoga to the north and Rutherford on its southern border. On its western side, the Mayacamas Mountains guard it from the cooling effects of the Pacific Ocean; to its east stand the Vaca Mountains. In conjunction, these mountain ranges serve to lock in summer daytime heat. But in the evening, cool air from the San Pablo Bay funnels up through the valley, creating very chilly nights. It isn’t uncommon for temperatures to drop 50 degrees, a shift that promotes a balance of sugar ripeness and acidity in wine grapes.
St. Helena contains a plethora of different soil types in a small area, which have been enhanced over centuries by rain runoff from both mountain ranges. Its vineyards cover a variety of terrain, spreading across the bucolic valley floor and its benchlands.
These ideal topographic and climatic growing conditions easily caught the attention of early winemaking pioneers. In fact, St. Helena is the birthplace of Napa Valley’s commercial wine industry. Dr. Crane founded his cellar in 1859, David Fulton in 1860 and Charles Krug in 1861.
Today there are no less than 400 separate vineyards planted within the 12,000 acres that make up the St. Helena appellation.
Revered most for its red wines based on Bordeaux varieties, namely Cabernet Sauvignon, the St. Helena appellation is also a source of superior Syrah, Zinfandel and Sauvignon blanc.