Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
-
Jeb Dunnuck
Named for the owners three daughters, the 2021 Cabernet Sauvignon Three D Dr. Crane Vineyard is 100% Cabernet Sauvignon that's a selection of the best in the cellar and aged 33 months in new French oak. It's slightly richer than the classic cuv e but also brings more elegance and purity, with gorgeous cassis and blue-tinged fruits, notes of lead pencil, scorched earth, and liquid violets, lots of minerality, medium to full body, ripe, polished tannins, and just a seamless, layered, gorgeous style that will evolve for 15+ years.
-
James Suckling
A big, bold yet somehow silky and refined wine that surrounds powerful black fruit and graphite flavors with elegant tannins for a melt-in-your-mouth texture. Dark chocolate, dried cherry, baked blueberry and cappuccino flavors seem to grow as you sip and continue through a lingering finish.
-
Wine Spectator
Ripe and with the vivid edge of the vintage, this bursts with energy as its core of red and black currant and boysenberry fruit pumps along, fueled by bramble, anise and violet accents. Turns sleek and polished, with a subtle alder infusion through the finish. Best from 2026 through 2040.
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.