2008 Ramey, Pedregal Cabernet Sauvignon, Oakville, Napa Valley, California, USA

2008 Ramey, Pedregal Cabernet Sauvignon, Oakville, Napa Valley, California, USA

Product: 20081186598
 
2008 Ramey, Pedregal Cabernet Sauvignon, Oakville, Napa Valley, California, USA

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Description

The 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon Pedregal Vineyard brings together all of the elements of the Ramey house style. A beautiful, well-articulate bouquet melds into layers of dark fruit. Clean, vibrant mineral notes give the wine its energy and vitality. This is a typical Oakville Cabernet loaded with class and pedigree. Exotic spiced notes wrap around the textured, multi-dimensional finish. This is a dazzling showing. The 2008 Pedregal is 84% Cabernet Sauvignon and 16% Petit Verdot aged for 24 months in 100% new French oak barrels. Anticipated maturity: 2016-2028.
Antonio Galloni - 23/12/2011

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Critics reviews

Wine Advocate96+/100
The 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon Pedregal Vineyard brings together all of the elements of the Ramey house style. A beautiful, well-articulate bouquet melds into layers of dark fruit. Clean, vibrant mineral notes give the wine its energy and vitality. This is a typical Oakville Cabernet loaded with class and pedigree. Exotic spiced notes wrap around the textured, multi-dimensional finish. This is a dazzling showing. The 2008 Pedregal is 84% Cabernet Sauvignon and 16% Petit Verdot aged for 24 months in 100% new French oak barrels. Anticipated maturity: 2016-2028.
Antonio Galloni - 23/12/2011 Read more
Robert Parker93-95/100
Not surprisingly, the 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon Pedregal has also improved after a year in barrels. A wine of undeniable richness and intensity, this blend of 84% Cabernet Sauvignon and 16% Petit Verdot exhibits notes of graphite, blackberries, black currants, scorched earth/burning embers, white chocolate and cedar. It tastes like a hypothetical blend of a Bordeaux Pauillac and Graves, but with the intensity and opulent fruit of Napa Valley well-displayed. It should be more approachable than the 2007 when it is released, yet last just as long, 20-30+ years.
(Robert M. Parker Jr.'s The Wine Advocate, December 2010) Read more
Other94
Inky purple. Highly perfumed aromas of blackcurrant, cherry-cola, cracked pepper, roasted coffee and rose oil. Then suave and expansive in the mouth, with an alluring sweetness to the complex flavors of dark berry preserves, candied licorice and tobacco. This rich but energetic cabernet really stains the palate but shows no excess weight. Finishes sweet and extremely long, with resonating floral and cherry notes.
(Stephen Tanzer’s International Wine Cellar May/June 2011 )

Our fifth vintage from this small, outstanding vineyard on the lower slopes of the eastern Oakville hills. “Pedregal” means a rocky place in Spanish, and that is certainly a distinguishing feature of the site. During 2008 we agreed to a long-term lease of this vineyard which gives us complete control even through any change in ownership, so this is the first vintage we’ve directed farming ourselves (we converted to organic). Aging the 2008 on its fine lees has coated the tannins and smoothly integrated the wood, and we left this vintage 26 months in completely new barrels—yet it’s hard to find the oak.
(David Ramey, Winemaker) Read more

About this WINE

Ramey Wine Cellars

Ramey Wine Cellars

David Ramey built his reputation at such luminary wineries as Matanzas Creek and Dominus before he and his wife Carla established Ramey Wine Cellars in 1996.

From his earliest experiences in wine, David has been inspired by European styles. Having worked in France at Château Pétrus, he dedicated himself to applying the old-world techniques he absorbed to the perfectly ripe fruit of Napa and Sonoma. At a time when technical winemaking, straight out of the textbook, was the norm in California this made David something of a pioneer on the west coast. He remains one of the most influential winemakers in North America.

David and his wife Carla started small, their first two wines were Chardonnays from the Hyde and Hudson vineyards. To tell the story of their terroir David vinified each in the same fashion, leaving only the quality of the fruit to express the personality of the vineyards. This is a practice continued today across the range of Chardonnays.

In common with most Californian wineries, the majority of grapes are bought in rather than from estate-owned vines. David’s deep understanding of the region and its vineyards have ensured that he only works with great vineyards farmed by great people. His long-standing relationships allowing for a collaborative approach to get the best quality from each site and exemplify their character.

Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon play the leading roles at Ramey, with most of the Chardonnay coming from the cool Sonoma where proximity to the coast gives more exposure to the morning fogs. The Cabernet is all classic Napa. A Sonoma Syrah was added in 2004 and they have subsequently diversified the range with parcels of Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Pinot Noir which David could not resist trying his hand at.

David believes that better farming is the key to California’s continued and growing success. They manage vineyards they lease themselves using organic methods and work hand in hand with their growers to promote sustainable and low intervention methods.

In the winery David’s approach is recognisably Burgundian. Grapes are pressed without crushing to avoid skin contact. Alcoholic fermentation takes place in barrel followed by aging on fine lees and battonage. Malolactic fermentation is allowed to happen. David’s view is that the answer to flabby over-oaked Chardonnay’s once popular with the critics is not to go 180° but to take a balanced approach. This is precisely what he has always done – making wines for critics has never been part of the mantra.

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Cabernet Sauvignon

Cabernet Sauvignon

The most famous red wine grape in the world and one of the most widely planted.

It is adaptable to a wide range of soils, although it performs particularly well on well-drained, low-fertile soils. It has small, dusty, black-blue berries with thick skins that produce deeply coloured, full-bodied wines with notable tannins. Its spiritual home is the Médoc and Graves regions of Bordeaux where it thrives on the well-drained gravel-rich soils producing tannic wines with piercing blackcurrant fruits that develop complex cedarwood and cigar box nuances when fully mature.

The grape is widely planted in California where Cabernet Sauvignon based wines are distinguished by their rich mixture of cassis, mint, eucalyptus and vanilla oak. It is planted across Australia and with particular success in Coonawarra where it is suited to the famed Terra Rossa soil. In Italy barrique aged Cabernet Sauvignon is a key component in Super Tuscans such as Tignanello and Sassicaia, either on its own or as part of a blend with Sangiovese.

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