🏷️ Lot Overview
- Region: Pritchard Hill (Napa Valley)
- Vintage: 2024
- Blend: Cab, Merlot, Cab Franc, Petite Verdot, Malbec
- ChatGPT Original Source Guess: [redacted]
- Wine Berserkers Guess: [redacted]
- Alcohol: 14.4%
- Oak Aging: ~60% new French oak
- Cam Price: TBD
- Retail Estimate: $200–$350 (based on source program tiers)
- Drink Window: 2027–2045+
- Cases Produced: ~130 cases
🍷 Cameron’s Release Notes (Email)
Dear Friends,
Today’s offer, Lot 47 2024 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon comes to us from a blue chip estate on Pritchard Hill and is a proprietary blend that winemaker Katie and I assembled using two main components from said producer plus some additional wines from our cellar. I’ll explain more on the product page. Yes, it is a bit pricier than some of our other, more recent Napa Cabernet offerings, but it’s worth it.
It is a fabulous, highly-pedigreed ’24 Cabernet Sauvignon but neither of us saw the need to keep the wine in barrel any longer than through January (the 24’s are remarkably ripe and open-knit, even at altitude) and plan to bottle the wine in February.
🍷 Tasting Notes / Website Text
I’ve password protected as the one of the base component blends might be used to identify the producer. To protect the innocent as well as my ability to continue to source these little gems for you guys, please refrain from naming the producer or putting the blend online anywhere.
Lot 47 comes to us from, lets just say, a notable estate program on Pritchard Hill. We received two lots, one comprised of two barrels of a BDX blend comprised of Cabernet, Merlot and Cabernet Franc and the second Lot comprised of three barrels of 100% Cabernet Sauvignon. The two barrel lot originates from their $300+ higher-end BDX blend program, the three-barrel lot from their circa $200/bottle Cabernet Sauvignon program. I would have happily bottled them separately, but the simple fact is they were better blended together. This is not about logistics. All told, we should end up with about 130 cases.
Whether these wines didn’t make the final bottling blend, or just inventory control, or they simply weren’t up to speed, I don’t know. What I do know is the base components were fantastic and the blend we put together is mind-blowingly gorgeous (we did add an additional 5% Cabernet, 5% PV and 2% MB to the final blend). Our plan it to keep the wine in barrel through January and bottle in February…as I mentioned in the email, the 24’s are ripe and open knit and we do not feel the wine needs to stay in barrel any longer. However, I do suspect this wine will take some time to come around in the bottle.
Deep purple around the edges with an opaque core verging on squid ink. My sense after having tasted a bunch of Napa valley ’24 Cabernet’s is that the best will come from elevation. Lot 47 comes from a vineyard at 1,500 feet which, I think, explains the incredible bouquet. Sexy and vibrant and worth the price of entry in and of itself…crazy uplifted creme de cassis and blackberry pie notes are piercing and uplifted with beautiful purple flowers, leather and sage notes. DAY 2, the bouquet continues to open, complexing with blueberry and chocolate along with graphite and cedar underpinned with iron and rock. Sublime.
On entry, perfectly ripe fruit is interlaced with a massive-yet-elegant, minerally mountain tannin structure with layers of redcurrant and raspberry that unfurl the darker fruited cassis and boysenberry notes in a chocolatey finish with leather and iron retro-nasals. Velvety and ripe yet remarkably elegant and complex , these lots were made with Swiss-watch precision and artfully blended by winemaker Katie, who deserves tons of credit for knitting these together so seamlessly. This wine will age effortlessly for decades.
🧠 ChatGPT says
🔍 Source Guess: [redacted per Cam’s request]
🎯 Rationale
(internal reasoning omitted for publication per Cam’s request)
⏳ Drink Window
⏳ Drink Window
Best After: 2027
Peak: 2029–2040
Hold Potential: Through 2045+
Why: Dense mountain tannin, high-elevation acidity, and elite structure — needs time to knit, but will age like a flagship hillside Cabernet.