Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Also still youthful, the 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon Annum is a blockbuster from Napa that has full-bodied notes of creme de cassis, crushed flowers, dried herbs, and spice box. It’s rich, fabulously concentrated, and textured, and a brilliant wine that’s still youthful.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Deep ruby colored, the 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon Annum is blended with 5% Petit Verdot and opens with unusual blue fruit notes—baked blueberry and boysenberry—with dark chocolate, smoked meats, cracked pepper, toasted cumin and fenugreek, graphite and loamy earth. Silky in texture but firmly structured by grainy tannins and juicy acidity, it's medium-bodied with a very long, chocolaty finish. 380 cases were made.
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Wine Spectator
Very tight, dense and backward, packing lots of fruit and tannins. The up-front flavors, built around dried currant, mineral, graph¬ite, camphor and cedar, are slow to unfold, showing touches of loamy earth and tobacco on the finish. Best from 2013 through 2024.
One of the most prestigious wines of the world capable of great power and grace, Napa Valley Cabernet is a leading force in the world of fine, famous, collectible red wine. Today the Napa Valley and Cabernet Sauvignon are so intrinsically linked that it is difficult to discuss one without the other. But it wasn’t until the 1970s that this marriage came to light; sudden international recognition rained upon Napa with the victory of the Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars 1973 Cabernet Sauvignon in the 1976 Judgement of Paris.
Cabernet Sauvignon undoubtedly dominates Napa Valley today, covering half of the land under vine, commanding the highest prices per ton and earning the most critical acclaim. Cabernet Sauvignon’s structure, acidity, capacity to thrive in multiple environs and ability to express nuances of vintage make it perfect for Napa Valley where incredible soil and geographical diversity are found and the climate is perfect for grape growing. Within the Napa Valley lie many smaller sub-AVAs that express specific characteristics based on situation, slope and soil—as a perfect example, Rutherford’s famous dust or Stags Leap District's tart cherry flavors.