Robert Craig Cellars The Stick Howell Mountain Red Blend 2017
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Suckling
James -
Dunnuck
Jeb
Product Details
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Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
The 2017 Cabernet Sauvignon The Stick, a Cabernet Sauvignon blend is dense, powerful and beautifully concentrated. The nose is perfumed with luxuriant aromas of black currant, boysenberry, cedar box and Herbes de Provence. The intensely layered palate excites with cassis, plum, and graphite. Rich and seductive with a velvety texture finishing long and perfumed.
Blend: 65% Cabernet Sauvignon, 30% Merlot, 5% Cabernet Franc
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
A red with blackberries and hints of plums and some chocolate. It’s medium-bodied with round tannins and a fruity finish. Very attractive now, but can age.
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Jeb Dunnuck
A new wine (it's the first time I've tasted it, anyway) the 2017 Cabernet Sauvignon The Stick checks in as a mix of 65% Cabernet Sauvignon, 30% Merlot, and the rest Cabernet Franc, all from the Candlestick Ridge Vineyard on Howell Mountain. It's similar to the Howell Mountain cuvée and has brilliant purity and elegance as well as textbook blue fruits, sappy herbs, pine forest, graphite, and violet-tinged aromas and flavors. Pure, balanced, and full-bodied on the palate, it's a head-turner and one rock-solid 2017.
Rating: 93+
Other Vintages
2016-
Suckling
James -
Parker
Robert
One of the world’s most classic and popular styles of red wine, Bordeaux-inspired blends have spread from their homeland in France to nearly every corner of the New World. Typically based on either Cabernet Sauvignon or Merlot and supported by Cabernet Franc, Malbec and Petit Verdot, the best of these are densely hued, fragrant, full of fruit and boast a structure that begs for cellar time. Somm Secret—Blends from Bordeaux are generally earthier compared to those from the New World, which tend to be fruit-dominant.
Today Cabernet Sauvignon is the star of this part of Napa’s rugged, eastern hills, but Zinfandel was responsible for giving the Howell Mountain growing area its original fame in the late 1800s.
Winemaking in Howell Mountain was abandoned during Prohibition, and wasn’t reawakened until the arrival of Randy Dunn, a talented winemaker famous for the success of Caymus in the 1970s and 1980s. In the early eighties, he set his sights on the Napa hills and subsequently astonished the wine world with a Howell Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon. Shortly thereafter Howell Mountain became officially recognized as the first sub-region of Napa Valley (1983).
With vineyards at 1,400 to 2,000 feet in elevation, they predominantly sit above the fog line but the days in Howell Mountain remain cooler than those in the heart of the valley, giving the grapes a bit more time on the vine.
The Howell Mountain AVA includes 1,000 acres of vineyards interspersed by forestlands in the Vaca Mountains. The soils, shallow and infertile with good drainage, are volcanic ash and red clay and produce highly concentrated berries with thick skins. The resulting wines are full of structure and potential to age.
Today Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Petite Sirah thrive in this sub-appellation, as well as its founding variety, Zinfandel.