Winemaker Notes
Blend: 96% Cabernet Sauvignon, 2% Petit Verdot, 2% Merlot
Professional Ratings
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Wine & Spirits
This estate-grown reserve is 96 percent cabernet sauvignon, aged for 18 months in French oak barrels (95 percent new). During that time, the savory Rutherford fruit developed the richness of a fresh pack of Drum tobacco in parallel to its round, sumptuous dark-cherry flavors. It’s a voluptuous wine, even as everything about it is clean—the kind of accessible Napa Valley cabernet that’s tempting to drink young, though its depth of flavor holds complexities that will develop with age.
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Wine Spectator
Exhibits a mix of creamy oak, dense dark berry, mocha, graphite and cedar flavors. At points this is smooth and supple, yet also shows a tannic backbone. Impressive finish. Drink now through 2028. 3,863 cases made
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2015 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve is a deep garnet-purple color with a crème de cassis, plum preserves and balsamic-scented nose with hints of dried herbs, cedar and black olives. Full-bodied, rich and concentrated in the mouth with a velvety texture, it's spicy on the finish.
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Wine Enthusiast
Woody cedar, toffee and coffee highlight a soft, richly concentrated core of full-bodied power and brawny tannin in this reserve-level wine. Black fruit has a smoky edge of toast and oak and is intensely concentrated.
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.
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.