Duckhorn Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2017 750ml

This is a Duckhorn Napa Valley Cabernet that does everything right. Renee Ary blends fruit from Duckhorn’s estate with grapes from growers, including 12 percent merlot to point up the luscious texture, aging it for 16 months in French oak barrels (half of them new), without the wine becoming overtly oaky.

Tightly tannic and robustly concentrated, Duckhorn Napa Valley Cabernet is a powerhouse red wine, dotted in black cherry, vanilla and toasted oak. Accents of dried herb and sage provide complimentary spice and earth to the richness.

Warm plum, blackberry, and boysenberry reduction notes glide through, infused with sage, melted licorice and warm tobacco leaf accents. Takes on a gently mulled feel on the fleshy finish. Drink now through 2025. 42,000 cases made.

Lush, energetic, and intense, this gorgeous Cabernet begins with aromas of blackberry, huckleberry, and chocolate, as well as hints of mint, cardamom, clove, and graham cracker. On the palate, it displays lovely brightness, with firm, resolved tannins framing flavors of boysenberry and black currant. As it evolves in the glass, subtle sweet and savory notes are revealed, carrying the wine to a long, focused finish.

It’s a wine of elegance and restraint, delicious in its sweet purple-plum intensity, succulent in its earthy tannins. Those mineral tannins retreat into the finish, allowing the savory fruit to move in. Accessible now, this will only improve with a few years in bottle.

The 2017 Duckhorn Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon deftly defines what a Napa Valley red is all about, and this is a great thing. This wine displays aromas and flavors of warm berries, savory spices, and oak front and center. Enjoy it with prime rib, and ask for a rare cut.