Winemaker Notes
Blend: 100% Cabernet Sauvignon
Professional Ratings
-
Vinous
The 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon 29 Estate, 100% Cabernet, shows just how special this site in northern St. Helena planted in 1989 with Grace clone Cabernet is. Copious blackberry jam, espresso, chocolate, licorice and cloves saturate the palate. Readers will find a truly distinctive Cabernet built on aromatic intensity, huge fruit and equally potent tannins. Give it a few years to soften.
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon 29 Estate, from the original vineyard on an east-facing slope just north of the town of St. Helena, is 100% Cabernet Sauvignon, aged in 85% new French oak. It's less opulent and more classically styled than the Aida, with hints of thyme, sage and bay leaf lacing through cassis and blackberries. Full-bodied, with fine-grained tannins—but plenty of them—it's both mouthfilling and mouth-drying, with a long, gently dusty finish. Again, it could use some time in the cellar, and then it will drink well for two decades or more.
Rating: 97+ -
Wine Enthusiast
Gorgeous, ultraripe fruit flavors meld beautifully with subtle oak spices and dark chocolate in this full-bodied and gently tannic wine. The ripeness and almost sweetness of black currant, black cherry and blueberry soaks through the fine-grained tannins for a very smooth texture. Best through at least 2030.
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.