Nice aroma of dark fruits with some spice and vanilla. Dark fruits, vanilla, spice notes building up, a little bit of cocoa and leather on the palate. Soft tannins, medium acid, medium finish with baking spice.
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Really nicely made, a rare example of richness combined with freshness without canceling each other out. This is probably the closest Washington Cabernet has come to feeling like Napa for me, even with the small syrah component which I think is relatively noticeable. A big part of that Napa-adjacent feel is the oak, which is beautifully toasty and almost buttery, something I rarely get from any Cabernet beyond Napa. Thankfully, the oak still gives the fruit plenty of breathing room. Ripe black fruit but mostly very fresh, even a little smoky- spiced blackberry, black cherry, sugar plum, eventually maybe even blueberry. There are two components which add some interesting complexity- one is a subtle dark cocoa tone (oak?) that I really associate with WA Cab in particular (also very present in the Long Shadows Feather), as well as an unusual high-toned sort of savory accent- picture a sort of smoky, meaty, leathery black raspberry and you're getting there- I felt like this was the savory WA syrah talking. All this was on the nose!
The palate itself had excellent structure- plenty of dusty tannin but very fine-grained and not so demanding, great acidity that feels fresh without being awkwardly tart. My only little gripe is that the fruit itself could be more present on the palate. It's there, some fresh dark berry and little hints of oak, but where the nose feels deep and rich with fair complexity, the palate is a little thin and inexpressive at this stage. Slightly better on day 1, still fresh on day two but the tannins became slightly overwhelming. Then again, this also indicates to me that it'll absolutely improve with short-term aging. Really solid QPR at $50.
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5/22/2023 - axz055 Likes this wine: 91 Points
Nice aroma of dark fruits with some spice and vanilla. Dark fruits, vanilla, spice notes building up, a little bit of cocoa and leather on the palate. Soft tannins, medium acid, medium finish with baking spice.
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5/25/2021 - sid_loves_wine Likes this wine: 94 Points
Really nicely made, a rare example of richness combined with freshness without canceling each other out. This is probably the closest Washington Cabernet has come to feeling like Napa for me, even with the small syrah component which I think is relatively noticeable. A big part of that Napa-adjacent feel is the oak, which is beautifully toasty and almost buttery, something I rarely get from any Cabernet beyond Napa. Thankfully, the oak still gives the fruit plenty of breathing room. Ripe black fruit but mostly very fresh, even a little smoky- spiced blackberry, black cherry, sugar plum, eventually maybe even blueberry. There are two components which add some interesting complexity- one is a subtle dark cocoa tone (oak?) that I really associate with WA Cab in particular (also very present in the Long Shadows Feather), as well as an unusual high-toned sort of savory accent- picture a sort of smoky, meaty, leathery black raspberry and you're getting there- I felt like this was the savory WA syrah talking. All this was on the nose!
The palate itself had excellent structure- plenty of dusty tannin but very fine-grained and not so demanding, great acidity that feels fresh without being awkwardly tart. My only little gripe is that the fruit itself could be more present on the palate. It's there, some fresh dark berry and little hints of oak, but where the nose feels deep and rich with fair complexity, the palate is a little thin and inexpressive at this stage. Slightly better on day 1, still fresh on day two but the tannins became slightly overwhelming. Then again, this also indicates to me that it'll absolutely improve with short-term aging. Really solid QPR at $50.
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