Tasting Notes

Release Date: Fall 1990

Opulent richness is the theme here. Mouthwatering blackberry and cassis flavors create the initial impression with the innate sauvage of the Cabernet Sauvignon adding complexity and flavor interest.  This wine is very much a Mount Eden Cabernet in its concentration, structure and length yet with an early accessibility uncommon in recent vintages.

Two year in French oak and a light egg-white fining this Cabernet was bottled unfiltered. The ’86 should continue to live well into the next decade and possibly the next century.

Production

756

Tech Notes

Sorry, technical notes are not available for this vintage.

Reviews

95 points San Jose Mercury News - Review by Anthony Dias Blue - November 19, 1990

About the only Cabernet from the Santa Cruz area that has been taken seriously is the Ridge Vineyards Monte Bello, A wine with a remarkable track record back to the late 1960s. The latest Monte Bello, the 1988, is another complex and charming wine with great fruit , structure and aging potential.

But perhaps the most exciting current release from the Santa Cruz Mountains is the Estate Bottled 1896 Cabernet Sauvignon form Mount Eden Vineyards ($28) (95).

This is an amazing wine with finesse and breeding. It has an enormous depth of flavor with lovely herbs and soft plums. The wine was made from vineyards that are “2,000 feet above the floor of the Santa Clara Valley.” It is an exceptional achievement.

90 points Robert Parket Jr's The Wine Advocate - August 1996

Issue # 106

This impressively-endowed, youthful Cabernet Sauvignon reveals a deep ruby/purple color with lightening at the edge. The backward yet promising nose of hickory smoke, chocolate, minerals, black-cherries and currants is just beginning to emerge. Rich, structured, medium to full-bodied, and powerful, this wine needs another 2-3 years of cellaring; it should age effortlessly for 10-20 years.

The tasting notes for this section are from two single blind tastings, one conducted in May, 1996, in California, and the other in June, 1996, in Baltimore.

California Grapevine - June/July 1990

Medium-dark to dark purplish ruby; tight, cedary, herbal aroma; medium-full body; concentrated, herbal, ripe berry fruit flavors; medium-full tannin; lingering aftertaste. Above average quality. A rather big, intense Cabernet which needs a good three to five years of bottle aging. Highly recommended.

Connoisseurs' Guide to California Wine - June 1990

Rating:

While a bit tight on first pouring, the deep, well-extracted aromas expand nicely with air and reveal a potent sense of ripe currents along with suggestions of olives, herbs and toasty oak. The flavors too take a similar course in slowly broadening from their compact beginnings and parallel the nose in their display of deep, herbal-tinged, carefully oaked fruit. Medium-full bodied with good acidity and well-proportioned tannins, the wine finished with a but of toughness but will develop nicely if given five to ten years of age.