Quintessa Red Blend 2020 750ml

Here is one of the stars of this challenging vintage. A muscular wine, leading with tremendous freshness on the palate, restrained red-toned fruit, and very subtle yet elegant cedar wood intermixed with red-rock minerality. Medium to full-bodied, offering more black fruit on the palate, redolent of muddled blackberries and juicy plums. An iron fist in a velvet glove comes to mind, given the tannin texture, which leads with the furry, velvety side of the glove and transitions to an undercurrent of ironclad and dusty minerals. All this turns fresh and lively through the finish. Perhaps a bit hot on the alcohol, but this will soften soon enough—absolutely one of the more riveting wines of the entire vintage. I had the chance to taste this wine at Quintessa with Rebekah Wineburg, Winemaker and Rodrigo Soto, General Manager, and it was the last in a lineup of wines going back to the 1994 vintage, and it showed all I have written -- Wineburg and Soto are so finely in tuned with Quintessa’s vineyards that it’s almost no surprise they devised such a beautiful wine through such a difficult year, battling fires and dealing with obstacles related to the pandemic. Seek this out.

Deceptively soft on first sip, this wine holds a deep well of dark fruits, seductive spices and firm tannins that build and broaden with more tastes. Yummy milk chocolate, cinnamon and blackberry flavors are wrapped in supportive tannins. Best from 2025–2035.

The 2020 Cabernet Sauvignon, blended with 7% Cabernet Franc, 4% Carmenere, and 2% Petit Verdot, is deep garnet-purple in color. It leaps with vibrant scents of wild blueberries, redcurrant jelly, and warm cassis plus hints of underbrush, pencil shavings, and bay leaves. The full-bodied palate is lively and fine-grained, with bags of bright fruit and a fragrant lift on the finish of this impressive wine.

A lovely red with a pretty core of currants, berries, spices and mushrooms. Medium to full body, layers of polished tannins and a juicy finish. A very balanced and fine wine. A little chewy. Drink or hold.

Reveals a tug of loam that runs from start to finish, underscoring the core cassis and plum fruit flavors, while cedar and roasted vanilla accents score the finish. Shows muscle, but also the vintage's touch of rusticity on the back end. Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Carmenère and Petit Verdot. Best from 2025 through 2033. Tasted twice, with consistent notes. 6,000 cases made.

The great wines of the world consistently express the distinct qualities of the estates from which they come. In Napa, Quintessa is such a wine. To preserve the natural mosaic of the vineyard, each small plot is farmed, harvested and vinified individually so that the nuances of the land shine through. Afterward, the best components are brought together to create a wine of elegance and harmony. Depending on the vintage, Quintessa may include some or all of the five varietals grown on the property Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot and Carmenere. The fruit is harvested early in the morning, then sorted and gravity fed into oak, stainless steel or concrete tanks and vinified. Once fermentation and maceration are complete, the wine from each plot is aged separately for up to two years in French oak. After the final Quintessa blend is created, the wine is bottled and laid down for yet another year before release.