{"id":3532,"date":"2019-12-26T19:17:26","date_gmt":"2019-12-26T19:17:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/?p=3532"},"modified":"2019-12-26T19:20:30","modified_gmt":"2019-12-26T19:20:30","slug":"3532","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/2019\/12\/26\/3532\/","title":{"rendered":"A ‘RESOLUTION’ TO THE VALUE CABERNET ISSUE"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The search for value Cabernet, specifically from Napa, is never-ending. But thankfully it is not hopeless, though we do have to work through a lot of juice to find a precious few gems. A while back (specifically January 2018) we introduced a new find (for us) that answered the prayers of California Cabernet drinkers.\u00a0\u00a0 It was clean, varietally true, showed the nuances of its Napa Valley heritage, and cost under $20.\u00a0 A late Christmas miracle?\u00a0\u00a0 Apparently not as here we are with the latest edition of the Branham Estate Resolution Cabernet Napa Valley <\/strong>that hits the mark again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Winex has been scouring the countryside for remarkable\nvalues for nearly four decades.  We have\nto wonder why we haven\u2019t run across the wines of Gary Branham before.  The guy has been in the wine business, by his\nown account, since 1971, and started the first of his two estates by planting\nBranham Rockpile Vineyard in 1994.  In\n1997, Branham purchased Obsidian Vineyard in Napa Valley, located near the Napa\nRiver near the Silverado Trail and Bale Lane. \nThis 10-acre estate was planted in 1986 and then 60% was replanted in\n2005.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gary has basically existed as a grower for most of the time\nbut has made numerous small lots of a variety of different things under his own\nlabels, Branham and Resolution, all of which seemed to be priced at very\nreasonable fares given their pedigrees. \nApparently, while Gary makes the majority of his livelihood as a grower,\nhe likes to make wines that express their vineyards and that people can afford\nto drink.  What a concept! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We couldn\u2019t have been more elated when we were presented this Cabernet.\u00a0 In the value game, there are far too many one-hit wonders.\u00a0 This version was every bit as good as the last one, and that\u2019s a big compliment.\u00a0 The Branham Estate Resolution Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2017<\/a><\/strong> comes mainly from Gary\u2019s Obsidian Vineyard with a portion from each of two other vineyards he works, one in Calistoga and one in St. Helena.\u00a0 There are bits of Merlot and Petit Verdot in the mix as well.\u00a0 This is all Napa Valley juice that sees 16 months in 100% used French oak to polish and soften the mid-palate and make something tender and delicious for current applications\u2019\u00a0\u00a0 A year or two more in the bottle certainly won\u2019t hurt either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018The Res\u2019, as the winery refers to it, is full-bodied, rich,\nand balanced with aromas of dark berries, cassis, mocha and spice on the nose.\nYou get the same profile on the palate with a touch of coffee in the mix as\nwell.  For Cab drinkers, this is a\nfastball down the middle, delivering all you could ask for in terms of size,\nrichness and nuance, as well as actual notes of Napa Valley terroir.  If we told you this was a $30-40 Cab, you\nwould have no reason to question it since even that<\/em> would be a pretty\nsensational deal for legit Napa Cabernet in today\u2019s world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like its predecessor, perhaps the biggest plus for us is\nthat it actually tastes<\/em> like good Cabernet.  Simply put, this is the \u2018resolution\u2019 to all\nof our Napa value Cabernet needs… at least while it is around.   Once again it isn\u2019t going to make a gigantic\nsplash in the marketplace because only 700 cases were produced this time\naround.  So grab this\nneedle-in-a-haystack\/holy grail\/unicorn Cabernet value while you can.  Last year\u2019s version sold out in a flash and\nwe suspect those folks will happily be back for the next round.  Wines like this don\u2019t come around all that\noften, and they usually don\u2019t hang around very long.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The search for value Cabernet, specifically from Napa, is never-ending. But thankfully it is not hopeless, though we do have to work through a lot of juice to find a precious few gems. A while back (specifically January 2018) we introduced a new find (for us) that answered the prayers of California Cabernet drinkers.\u00a0\u00a0 It … Continue reading “A ‘RESOLUTION’ TO THE VALUE CABERNET ISSUE”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[9,639,70,504,640,641],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3532"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3532"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3532\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3536,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3532\/revisions\/3536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.winex.com\/stockreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}