1978 Robert Mondavi Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve

Community Tasting Notes (74) Avg Score: 92.4 points

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  12/3/2023 - englishman's claret wrote: 93 Points

  Lovely ripe red cherry and warm earth; a hair simple, but correct, classic, sun-kissed Napa.

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  12/2/2023 - RockinCabs wrote: 94 Points

  California Wine Weekend; 12/1/2023-12/3/2023 (Mos Eisley Cantina & Waterhouse Restaurant): Nose: Black Cherry, berry liquor, eucalyptus, leather and a quince note. Palate: Ripe and dense, great viscosity to the mid-palate balancing some blue, black and red fruit notes. Leather, graphite and a bit of mint. Quite a bit going on, and a slow wine to unfold.
  
  Within striking distance of winning this flight, but not as compelling as the Clos du Val today.

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  2/5/2023 - Cailles wrote: 92 Points

  30x California 1978: So many wines from this great Californian vintage at the age of 45 certainly qualifies as a “once in a lifetime” event. A few observations: 1) The quality was very high (almost all my ratings above 90pts). And only four faulty wines (2x corked, 2x over the hill/flawed, sadly those two were the Ridge Monte Bello and the Phelps Insignia). 2) The wines are ready to drink, the tannins have melted but the tension and freshness remain high - across the board. 3) There is still lots of fruit left and I was surprised how most wines didn’t show lots of tertiary aromas (find me the Bdx 1982 without tertiary aromas!). IMO, more than a handful of the wines could continue to improve for a few years. 4) Style wise, these are obviously quite different from today’s Napa wines with much less ripeness and more mineral accents. But hardly any wine we had would be mistaken for a Bordeaux in a blind tasting (unlike 80s/90s Dominus). 5) Best reds: Inglenook Limited Cask, Beaulieu GDL Reserve, Stags Leap Cask 23 4.5l (all 96pts), Heitz Bella Oaks, Simi Reserve, Stag’s Leap Cask 23 0.75l (all 95pts). The best wine overall, however, was the magical Late Harvest Riesling from Phelps (98pts).
  
  TN: A bit nail polish/heat on the nose. On the palate this misses a bit of balance, it remains quite acidic at first. But then with more air this wine got better and better. All the components integrated, the wine became much rounder and more harmonious displaying dried fruit, herbs, and even some sweet chocolate notes. While I had it at 87pts at first, the score kept climbing the longer it sit in the glass. But overall, the wine had not enough substance to get to the same 95+pts score the best wines got.

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  1/28/2023 - G_H wrote: 94 Points

  1978 California Cabernet Horizontal: Distinctive nose, sweetness, smoke, bacon, liquid butter. Very dense and finishing super long. Still in its prime.

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  1/28/2023 - sirpat00 wrote: 93 Points

  California 1978 (Zunfthaus zur Waag, Zurich): Grand tasting of 1978 California wines, mostly from Napa. Main takeaways: i/ surprisingly high quality on average for wines that were not intended for such long-term aging with plenty of primary fruit left, ii/ but within the detail nonetheless a broad range with the worst few suffering from clear signs of fatigue while the best showed hardly age, iii/ top wines were Phelps Cab Sauv (97), Firestone Cab Sauv (95), and Beaulieu George de Latour Private Reserve (95). Full list sorted by score included in the tasting story.
  
  Tasting note:
  Ripe dark berry fruit, extracted but in a good way which added a jam-like character. Elements of black olives, lots of eucalyptus, fine oak notes and sweet spices of vanilla. The palate was dense, juicy and felt utterly youthful with a ton of power that felt somewhat out of proportion.

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