napa

A PLAYFUL VALUE NAPA CAB FROM A MULTI-100 PT. WINEMAKER

Our intent here is to talk about an excellent value with respect to Napa Cabernet. Bear in mind that, given the typical price of Napa Cab, you can make a pretty good case for the $60-70 range as a legitimate value given that most Cabernets of this quality start above $90 and go up from there. The Teeter Totter label has behind it winemaker/owner Benoit Touquette who worked alongside Andy Erickson on iconic labels like Arietta, Favia, Hartwell, Ovid, and Screaming Eagle, as well as Chateau La Louviere and Chateau Couhins-Lurton in his native Bordeaux, and is currently the winemaker for Napa super-boutique Realm. The guy knows what good wine is supposed to taste like (he has made, thus far, 28 wines that have received 100 point scores) and that is an important perspective with any project. His name gives Teeter Totter gravitas and credibility, even though the label is quite playful.

Teeter-Totter is Benoit’s affordable Cabernet (again, by Napa standards…most of what Benoit makes has three-digit prices) but clearly the grape sourcing and winemaking speak of a higher plane. The blend for the Teeter Totter Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2021 is a little quirky, in this case 85% Cabernet Sauvignon blended with 5% Zinfandel, 5% Charbono and 5% Petite Sirah. You get the power and elegance of classic Napa Cab but with a somewhat boisterous fruit note courtesy of the ‘other’ varietals in this blend.

Suave, chocolaty, with abundant creamy cassis and plum fruit with notes of tobacco and cedar, this has been a 92-and-up consistently itself (94 for the 2019) through the 2019 vintage from Jeb Dunnuck, The 2021 (like many Napa producers, they didn’t make a 2020 version) reflects another excellent vintage in Napa that is more elegant but still with abundant sleek fruit. Put this in your ‘white tablecloth’ scenario and no one would guess you paid a mere $64.98.

SERIOUSLY GOOD CABERNET

We taste a lot of Cabernets always with the intent of finding the best and the brightest as well as striking values when the opportunity presents itself. It is rare for us to get ‘wowed’. But in the case of The Setting Cabernet Sauvignon Alexander Valley 2019, we were impressed in a way that rarely happens around here.

We’ll give you the winery spiel first, “Known for his ability to extract the deepest expression of each vineyard into his wines, Jesse uses extended barrel time in new and neutral oak, as well as minimal intervention to produce unfined, unfiltered wines that delicately balance purity of fruit with the distinct characters of each site.”

While that sounds like a pretty lofty profile for winemaker/partner Jesse Katz, son of famous photographer Andy Katz, in our experience nothing is overstated. Having spent time a Petrus, Screaming Eagle, Robert Foley, and Vina Cobos, he had the opportunity to work with top of the heap talent and clearly learned his craft well. He was the founding winemaker at Lancaster, and has been getting accolades for his current work at Aperture, and this project is his own. The expectations were high and they have been met if not exceeded.

The 2018 version of this wine were pretty spectacular and collected a number of impressive scores including a 97 from Wine Advocate. There have been no reviews we have seen on this wine yet, but we suspect it will get its due. What is interesting here is that the review on the 2018 from Jeb Dunnuck is pretty much interchangeable with our impressions of The Setting Cabernet Sauvignon Alexander Valley 2019:

“The 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon Alexander Valley is stunning stuff, offering up a dense purple color as well as both black and blue fruits, notes of lead pencil, crushed stone, graphite, and tobacco, full-bodied richness, ripe, velvety tannins, and a great finish. This powerful, sexy, seamless Cabernet will keep for two decades or more. “

Like the winery press release says, this wine really does deeply express the dark red fruits and spice, layered with chocolate and coffee tones, that is the Alexander Valley at its best. The depth of fruit, power, poise and balance are at a level that few producers achieve at any price. It is one of the most impressive Cabs we have tasted in a very long time and actually represents a value at a price under $100. As you know, we don’t spend a lot of time trying to sell California wines in this kind of price range. But this one is well worth the experience.

ANOTHER EXCEPTIONAL NAPA CAB VALUE FROM KRUTZ

Not to sound like a broken record but we are starting to see at our end of the distribution spectrum the beginning of what we shall call ‘the great nothing’. We’re referring to the anticipated shortage of Cabernet Sauvignon over the next couple of years. If you’ll recall, late wildfires in the fall of 2020, besides destroying a lot of property, created smoke taint on many of the grapes that were still hanging in the vineyards which, at that time of fall, was mainly Cabernet.

A lot of premium wineries are not producing 2020 vintage Cabs. We’ll leave the rest of it to your imagination except for saying that Cab drinkers need to prepare for ‘the gap’. For our part, we are going double-time through Cabernet options, and still finding some pretty cool stuff from the 2018 and 2019 vintages. But as you can imagine, the number of options are shrinking while our standards are unchanged.

In light of that, let us introduce a label that is new to us. Krutz is a family winery that started in 2003 in Monterey with a 60 case production and eventually migrated to Sonoma. Actually first they migrated to California from Mississippi where the brothers Krutz were born. The bottle bears a magnolia on the label (the state flower of Mississippi) to represent their southern roots.

Thought they are located in Sonoma, they make wine from all over the place. For example there is a Pinot Noir from Soberanes Vineyard in the Santa Lucia Highlands, and under their value Magnolia label a Sonoma Cabernet. But it was this Krutz Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2019 that presented us something that was really timely. The fact we could sell this dark, ample, tasty Cabernet for under $40 that made it an even more important find.

The Krutz Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2019 is 100% Cabernet from multiple vineyard sites in the Valley. For the geeks out there, the notes say the soils are ‘mountain rock’ and the vines were Clone 4 and Clone 7. Of more specific interest to us is that the wine saw 22 months in French oak, 50% new. Only 300 cases were produced.

This has classic deep Cabernet color and aromas of chocolate, cassis, and cedar. It has the size and volume in the mouth to please Cabernet fans, a plush palate feel and fine balance. The finish brings back the chocolate plus tobacco and the telltale signs of premium oak in support of the fruit.

With only 300 cases, not a lot of pundits have run across it. But Jeb Dunnuck’s take echoes our own, “The 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon is outstanding. All varietal aged in 50% new oak, it has some pure cassis fruit as well as textbook herbal and tobacco notes. Medium to full-bodied on the palate, it’s elegant and has supple tannins, wonderful balance, and a great finish. It could be two to three times the price and still be a good value…93 Points.”

Forty bucks for good Napa Cabernet is a sensational deal in today’s market, particularly given the Cabernet outlook for the next couple of years. But it is also part of our Blue Chip Wine Club, so members can save even more!

CAB ALERT AND REDUB OF THREAD FEATHER ‘STAG’S’

We’ve mentioned this in passing in a number of articles and emails but felt we should take a moment to make the point specifically here as well. There are shortages on the horizon of some of your favorite beverages. Thanks to the wildfires in northern California in 2020, which occurred rather late in the growing season, a number of vineyards containing later harvested varietals like Cabernet were affected by smoke taint.

There are those that will tell you that smoke taint in grapes can be ‘handled’ in the cellar. That is a subject for debate and we definitely don’t agree. Neither do most producers and most of the quality Napa vintners will not be bottling Cabernets from the 2020 vintage.

Bottom line? There will be less Cabernet to go around, obviously, if you eliminate the majority of an entire vintage. Some vintners will choose to the conserve and stretch the ’18 and ’19 vintages to cover the gap. Others will simply clamp down and protect the wines for restaurants (so you can pay more for them) or raise prices. Other simply won’t have anything to sell. In short, there will be much less to choose from for what we estimate to be a period of 18 to 24 months.

So what does one do? Simply, by a little more now and put it aside. The 2018 and 2019 vintages are quite good and still fairly available, so the old adage of a ‘bird in the hand’ is very appropriate right now. We are doing to do our best to build our own back stocks of reds to ride the storm, but there is only so much we can do.

While we’re on that subject, we went back an bought out the rest of the delightful Thread Feather Cabernet Napa Valley Stag’s Leap 2019 which we offered via email late last year. A high-quality $69-list Napa Cabernet for under $40 is a good place to start your Cabernet ‘survival kit’. Thread Feather Winemaker Niel Koch has trained at elite places, with Philip Melka at Seavey Vineyards, Bryant Family and Vineyard 29, as well as a stint as Assistant Winemaker at Lewis Cellars. He knows what great wine is supposed to taste like.

This particular bottling is important for a lot of reasons, though a Cabernet this good for this kind of price is always relevant. This, and the 2018 Howell Mountain, were the elite efforts of a serious run of excellent Cabernets from Thread Feather. The blend is 97% Cabernet Sauvignon, 2% Merlot, and 1% Cabernet Franc grown on an eastern facing slope on the west side of the Silverado Trail.

The Thread Feather Cabernet Sauvignon Stag’s Leap is bright and opulent with dark fruit notes of dark cherry and blueberry compote and hints of baking spice, cedar, violet, crushed stone and a slight whiff of mint. It is rich with beautiful structure, superb balance, polished tannins, and luscious layers of fruit that represent the nuances of Stag’s Leap, the appellation, to a tee. Simply put, this wine blew us away, and you know we don’t say that kind of thing all that often.

We’ve seen plenty of top-end, ‘reserve’ bottlings from Stag’s Leap wineries at three to five times the price that don’t deliver this much character and joy. A gorgeous, hedonistic Cabernet even in its impetuous youth, at $39.98, you’ll feel like you got away with something that was mismarked.

ANOTHER GREAT ‘UNDER-THE-RADAR” NAPA CAB

We’re always looking for another sneaky good Napa Cabernet at a great price no matter what. The upcoming shortage of Napa Cabernet (and a few other things) thanks to the 2020 wildfires has made the search even more urgent. A lot of folks haven’t really taken our message that seriously but, as an example of what we are talking about, our supplier just informed us that there will be no Cakebread Chardonnay available for retail until September! Armagedden? Maybe not quite, but certainly worth noting.

This one is a bit unique in a “French connection” sort of way. Winemaker Christine Barbe was born and raised in Bordeaux France. She studied biochemistry and received her doctorate degree in Enology and Viticulture from the Bordeaux Institute of Enology. Her knowledge of Sauvignon Blanc is extensive as she made wine at Chateau Carbonnieux and La Louviere in Pessac-Leognan as well as the renowned Denis Dubourdieu.

WHile the winery seems to be best known for Sauvignon Blanc, which has a style that mimics a white Bordeaux, clearly she picked up a few nuggets on Cabernet while she was at it. The style of the Terroir Coquerel Cabernet Sauvignon Walnut Wash 2019 definitely shows a Bordeaux sensibility and elegance, but still has the richness and body of something New World.

Plush and tender for its age and definitely in that value price range for Napa Cabernet, there’s a seamless presentation of blue fruits with notes of of savory spice, cocoa, and toast that delivers a nicely proportioned mouthful that will deliver substance alongside grilled red meats while not being s0 ‘big’ that it will overpower food. Nicely defined, lovely Cabernet, there aren’t any current reviews on this bottling but, in the upcoming Cabernet crisis, this is a fantastic option to have on hand from both a performance and price perspective.

SURPRISE CAB DEAL FROM A FAMILIAR ‘FACE’

Corporate types never seem to tire of creating new SKUs. Beringer already has a few different Cabernet bottlings. We went to their website and started counting, quitting when we got to 30. So why not one more? We had not seen the Cabernet Sauvignon Distinction Series before this 2016, nor could we find a review on a vintage before this (though there was a 2014 on the Beringer site). So we’ll say this is not the first, just the first for us. It is packaged in a black label that is a different design than their Knight’s Valley.

So what is it? Good question. From the winery, “Beringer’s Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon is an enticing expression of this varietal and the depth and complexity of flavor it can exhibit when grown in the right place. Select vineyards and blocks from AVAs up and down the valley are used to craft a wine that is the quintessential expression of Napa Valley terroir.” That doesn’t really tell us a lot but it wasn’t the marketing that caused us get interested in this, it was the juice itself. Whatever they called it, they clearly had bigger intensions for this one, as evidenced by the $65 price on the website.

Deep, saturated color leaning toward black, a big nose of cocoa, vanilla and toasty oak along with cassis and dark cherry, it prepares you for what’s coming. With air, insistent spice notes started to emerge and the well ‘seasoned’ fruit making a big impression across the palate. This is big, dark, expressive Cab from a vaunted vintage. Yes this winery makes a lot of wine, but they have wherewithal to make some rocking Cab when they have a mind, too. To be clear, no one is going to confuse this with something European. This is unabashedly Californian and we were taken with its power and balance and thought we’d pass the message along.

It got some love from Wine Advocate’s Lisa Perotti-Brown who wrote, “The 2016 Cabernet Sauvignon Distinctions is blended of 83% Cabernet Sauvignon, 9% Merlot, 5% Cabernet Franc and 3% Petite Sirah, aged in 35% new French oak for 20 months. Deep garnet-purple colored, it bursts from the glass with crème de cassis, blueberry pie and preserved plums over nuances of Chinese five spice, hoisin, chocolate box and dusty soil. Full-bodied, rich and decadent, it has loads of spicy layers and a firm, grainy backbone, finishing on an earthy note… 93 points.”

Even though the name doesn’t really tell you much of a story, at just a notch over $40 ($41.98) the Beringer Cabernet Sauvignon Distinction Series 2016 qualifies as a notable value in Napa Cabernet,

‘BOUND & DETERMINED’ TO DELIVER CAB VALUE

As we have mentioned many times, finding good, well-priced Cabernet Sauvignon, particularly from Napa, is a priority. It’s good business. Cabernet is still king for most wine drinkers and we are well aware of that fact. This latest find came from a winery called “Roots Run Deep” which makes a number of wines We had never seen this one before, a well priced Napa Cab with kind of a funny name, ‘Bound and Determined’, from a vintage that has proven to be somewhat erratic among Napa Cabs, 2017. You may know ‘Roots Run Deep’ from their bottlings that have a label that looks like a chalkboard in an engineer’s office covered with ‘equations’ and is called called “Educated Guess.”

We knew those labels as proper, value-driven bottlings that are competent, but not necessarily thrilling, and the consummate 87-88 scorers. Given those visuals, we didn’t have any preconceived notions or expectations about Bound and Determined. But, as we so often say, that’s why we taste. That’s how you find things and find something we did. Given our experience with the vintage, we were keenly aware to look for hard tannins to poke out from underneath the fruit. There weren’t any, which immediately put this Cabernet in the upper echelon of what we tasted for the vintage.

There was also a deep, sturdy, very attractive core of blackberry and plum with notes of pepper, toast, and cinnamon. The flavors were pure and showed considerable breeding. It had some chew to the finish, but not at all in a bad way. It was more like an honest throwback to another era when Cabernets were less overblown yet it is still bursting with fruit. It delivered everything one could expect from a Napa Cabernet and did so for under $30. That is something worth paying attention to.

The juice for Bound & Determined Cabernet Sauvignon 2017 came from some serious sites in Oakville and Rutherford (which of course we can’t mention), and the ‘breeding’ is clear in the wine’s depth of flavor and healthy, saturated color. We can’t point to massive reviews as the winery doesn’t get a lot of media coverage. We did find a few words from James Suckling however on this and what we presume was the inaugural 2016, “A generous, medium-to-full-bodied red with aromas and flavors of grilled black plums, burnt orange, black peppercorn, praline and toffee. Firm, chewy tannins. Flavorful. Drink or hold…90 points.”

We actually think that 90 point score is a little low but we understand moderately priced ‘unknowns’ aren’t likely to pull down big reviews from the press, even of they are from Napa. We’re more on about price performance, however, and this one excels in that arena. A definite diamond in the rough, this tasty Napa Cab for under $30 is definitely newsworthy.

A PRINCELY NAPA CAB DEAL

Sometimes it’s good to mix things up a little bit. But we want to tell you up front and make it perfectly clear that this is a Jeb Dunnuck review for the last vintage of this wine, the 2018:

“The 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon comes all from Napa Valley and is 100% Cabernet aged 20 months in 60% new French oak. It tastes as though it costs three times the price and has a rocking nose of blackcurrants, chocolate, tobacco leaf, and cedar pencil, with a touch of rocky minerality and graphite showing with time in the glass. Not your simple, value-priced fruit bomb, it has considerable depth of fruit, building tannins, and a great finish…. Hats off to winemaker Maayan Koschitzky for over-delivering on all these wines from Royal Prince…93 points.”

Now we never tasted that wine nor, for a variety of reasons, previously ever heard of Royal Prince wines. We can’t spring a review on the 2019 because it just came on the market. We looked up the label on Wine Advocate, Wine Spectator, James Suckling, and Vinous in search of any past reviews and, apparently, they hadn’t seen it either. That’s fine. It is clearly one of the better kept secrets in California Cabernet, and that can be an advantage. We can tell you that 2019 is considered an exceptional vintage in Napa and time will tell if it may be even a little better than 2018, which is great.

The ‘mind behind’ the project is one David Green, someone we have crossed paths with before with a marketing resume that includes some familiar names like Cliff Lede, Dana Estates and Joel Gott. He’s been around a while (over three decades) and has lots of contacts in the wine trade. We’re a little curious about the context of the name but most important is that this is meant to be a high-performance ‘value brand’. If you interpret that to mean a $45 Napa Cabernet that can be on the table with $80-90 Napa Cabs, you’ve got the picture.

Of course, while sourcing fruit is a significant task, someone needs to make magic in the cellar. That’s where Mayaan Koschitzky comes in. A former paratrooper and judo black belt, Mayaan made wines in Israel for a half decade before coming to America. He couldn’t have started with more impressive gigs than with Screaming Eagle and Dalle Valle in 2011, and then was tapped to work as an assistant with Philippe Melka in his consulting firm in 2014 and, two years later became director of winemaking. One piece we read said he is now Melka’s Partner. Clearly the guy has serious chops and more than a good idea of what great wine is supposed to taste like.

That brings us to Royal Prince Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2019, or what we might refer to as the ‘NDA cuvee’. The list of iconic vineyards in this blend is (which we can’t publish) pretty eye-opening, but what Mayaan did with it is the real news. To use their words, “A plush, opulent, densely textured, full-bodied wine that shows loads of black raspberry fruits, violets, shaved cocoa with polished, sweet tannins. The 2019 Royal Prince Cab is dark and almost opaque in color. It shows aromas of truffle, black cherry, and licorice. The 2019 takes over where its predecessor left off – a massive over-achiever. The NDA on the sources for this wine is long and littered with iconic names. At once powerful and richly textured, it also shows flashy acidity and great persistence in the finish.” It is all of that in fact.

But the feeling we got from the wine was almost haunting. It wasn’t ‘big’ per se by Napa standards. There was a broad swath of very engaging, spiced, cocoa-laced blueberry fruit that effortlessly rolled down the middle of the palate, nicely rounded edges, and a feeling of polished glycerin that screamed pure Cabernet fruit. More unsettling was its resemblance to an elite Bordeaux texturally, rich yet elegant and never ponderous, silky from beginning to end. Some of the flavor profiles gave us hints of very specific, elite Bordeaux like Ducru Beaucaillou and Palmer. Somehow this was Napa Cab with a higher calling and very distinct from the rest of a very good lineup of Napa juice that was on the table that day.

There are bigger Cabs out there, but this one has sufficient size and a charisma all its own. All that and its only $45? That’s a ‘wow’. Like Jeb said about the 2018, “Hats off to winemaker Maayan Koschitzky for over-delivering (again) on all these wines from Royal Prince.” For us this is a ‘ground floor’ kind of opportunity on a yet-to-be discovered gem.

A NEW ‘OLD FRIEND’ IN NAPA

One thing we have been repeatedly reminded of over the years is that things can change. The most recent demonstration occurred recently with a Napa Valley winery called Amici. This was a winery that we had tasted on few occasions over the years and came to the conclusion that the label was largely forgettable. Yet across a board the in Amici lineup we were presented recently, virtually every offering impressed. So did the prices.

Amici started back in 1991 as a project among friends (amici is ‘friends’ in Italian). Clearly things have changed quite a bit since our earlier encounters. Starting as a virtual winery (a label that owned no vineyards or building as so many are these days), over time owner John Harris has forged long standing relationships with some serious fruit sources. They now make a number of single vineyard wines from some very recognizable vineyard sources and we have to presume that at some so of that juice trickles down into this Amici Cabernet Napa Valley 2018.

The current winemaking team of Anthony Biagi and Jesse Fox likely had a lot to do with the current high level of performance here. Biagi has an impressive resume including Cade, Hourglass, Odette, Plumpjack and Senegal, and joined Amici/Olema in 2015. Fox started at the French Laundry as a Cordon-Bleu trained chef but the wine bug bit him hard. He did some winemaking work internationally then spent a decade with Harlan, The Napa Valley Reserve and Ram’s Gate. He came to Amici/Olema in 2016 and teams with Biagi on both the Amici and their value oriented Olena projects. Certainly, the jump in quality we see here has a bit to do with them.

A blend of 91% Cabernet Sauvignon, 4% Merlot, 3% Petit Verdot and 2% Cabernet Franc that sees 18 months in 75% new French oak, there the promise of some pretty serious fruit in this wine. There is also a serious lineup of reviews which are all made more significant by this wine’s very modest tab (by Napa Standards). We’ll get to that in a minute.

It all started with a barrel review from Jeb Dunnuck, “…this is a vintage loved by winemaker Tony Biagi…Starting with the 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley, it could end up being one of the values of the year if it shows this well from bottle, displaying classic cassis, tobacco, and crushed rock-like minerality. With medium to full-bodied richness and depth, ripe, polished tannins, and great purity of fruit, it’s tastes like it cost three times the price…93-95.”

Given the other reviews, it apparently did get into the bottle in fine shape, as the across the board kudos would attest (James Suckling 93, Vinous 92, Wine Advocate 92). From Suckling, “A cooler style of Napa cab with blackcurrants, hot stones and violets that follow through to a full-bodied palate with creamy, polished tannins that integrate nicely on the palate and provide a delicious combination of fruit and character…”

From Wine Advocate, ““The 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley is a blend of 91% Cabernet Sauvignon, 4% Merlot, 3% Petit Verdot and 2% Cabernet Franc. Deep garnet-purple in color. It opens with expressive notes of warm cassis, black cherries, blackberries and fragrant earth with hints of bay leaves and black truffles. Medium to full-bodied, it delivers mouth-coating cassis flavors with compelling herbal sparks, framed by a lively backbone and wonderfully velvety tannins, finishing long.”

From Vinous Media, “The 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon (Napa Valley) is fabulous. Rich, plummy and forward, the Amici Napa Valley Cabernet makes a terrific introduction to the vintage. Even better, it is incredibly fairly priced. Succulent dark cherry, plum, mocha, spice and licorice are kicked up in this fleshy, open-knit Cabernet Sauvignon.”

Given all of that, one would not expect to pay less than $50, yet that is the reality. The Amici Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2018 is one of the true sleeper Cabernet deals from this part of the world.

THE LATEST STYLISH CAB FROM THREAD FEATHER

Thread Feather continues to a people’s choice. Clearly this label resulted from the rivers of unsold juice at some of the elite addresses in the Napa. Throw in a pandemic and things would have gone on for a long time, but the fires in Napa in 2020 will definitely have an effect moving forward. Clearly, we have learned that ‘the bird is the word’. We have made the point long ago that California vintners, particularly in Napa, have continued to raise prices and pretend that everything is just rosy. If that were the case, a label like this wouldn’t exist. For us it has been a fantastic source of intriguing, very polished Cabernets that taste like they had much higher price aspirations.

Given the current state of affairs, owner/winemaker Niel Koch has dialed himself in to get some remarkable juice. His company called Flight Wine Company has developed an impressive program of ‘one-offs’. He specializes in small lots of 100-500 cases of what he calls ‘sub AVA’ wines. Everything we have seen thus far has been a ‘district’ bottling, as is today’s menu item, the Thread Feather Cabernet Sauvignon Mount Veeder 2018. Koch clearly knows what great wine is supposed to taste like. He learned from the best having trained under Philip Melka at Seavey Vineyards, Bryant Family and Vineyard 29, as well as a stint as Assistant Winemaker at Lewis Cellars.

The Thread Feather Cabernet Sauvignon Mount Veeder 2017 comes from a single vineyard (they can’t tell us which one) situated at 1000 feet above sea level on the eastern slopes of Mount Veeder on the western side of the Napa Valley just south of Oakville. The grapes, 91% Cabernet and 9% Merlot, were handpicked, sorted and then optically sorted. After a 3-day cold soak, and 14 day fermentation with extended skin contact the wine was moved into 100% French oak, 30% new. As has been the practice, production is limited and the original retail in this case stood at $65.

As with the other Thread Feather wines we have offered, this Cabernet speaks of its origins. The flavors start with urgent cassis and plum fruit laced with Veeder’s telltale insistent baking spice character. There are ticks of graphite, tobacco, and earth, but the spice wins the day as it so often does in this part of the Valley.

This is mountain fruit, so it sits a little firmer out of the gate. A little air time makes a big difference. But the tannins are ripe and supple. This is a 2017 as well, so there is more structure and a little more reserved personality. It’ll take a touch more coaxing but you will be rewarded. It impressed the buyers more on the second day as the air had really allowed this one to expand.

There’s a lot to like here, particularly for the price. We aren’t talking the previously mentioned fare either as we are offering this ‘reserve level’ effort for a modest $34.98. It’s another winner from Thread Feather as well as a great buy on serious Napa Cabernet.