Penfolds Bin 704 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2019
97 POINT RATED TYSON STELZER, 96 POINT RATED HUON HOOKE THE REAL REVIEW & 95 POINT RATED TONY LOVE WINE PILOT
- 97 Point Rated Tyson Stelzer
- 96 Point Rated Huon Hooke The Real Review
- 95 Point Rated James Halliday Wine Companion
- 95 Point Rated Campbell Mattinson The Wine Front
Vintage: | 2019 |
Source/Region: | Napa Valley, California |
Grape Variety: | Cabernet Sauvignon |
Cellaring: | Drink now or cellar up to 2036 |
Bottle Top: | Foil over cork |
Alcohol Content: | 14.50 |
Standard Drinks: | 8.60 |
Rating: | 97 |
Cabernet sauvignon, tick. Napa Valley, tick. Penfolds, tick. Red and sweet spice abound, paprika, sumac, cinnamon, rose water, saffron. Red currants, Iranian barberries, pomegranate. Steely-coolness, ferrous minerality. From the pâtisserie, dark cherry pie, milk chocolate mousse dusted with freeze dried raspberries. French oak announces itself, cedary and structural, proudly supporting a saturated mulberry and summer berry core. So defined, yet so approachable. Silkiness, a gorgeous texture that glides effortlessly across the palate. Succulence, mouth-watering and appetite-inducing crunchy acidity. A fine graphite core confirms the varietal identity. There is power lurking beneath, a dense black fruit drive which is somewhat unexpected, yet most welcome. A confident wine, enjoy now or cellar for a decade or more.
Excellent winter rainfall ensured the soil was fully saturated at the beginning of the growing season. Spring was cooler and wetter than recent years, resulting in a two-week delay to budburst and flowering. May rainfall was especially helpful in maintaining the soil moisture profile. Warm summer weather had the vines moving along well making up for the slow start to the season. August was characterised by warm days and cool nights, optimal conditions for veraison. Harvest across the region was one to two weeks later than usual with yields close to long-term average. A good vintage for cabernet sauvignon, with grapes showing bright acidity, powdery tannins, and strong varietal flavours.
97 Point Rated - Tyson Stelzer
"If there is one wine this year that declares the potential and promise of the Californian venture of Penfolds, this is it. Napa Cabernet from a strong, late harvest is married with 40% new French oak in a beautifully toned and honed guise, the philosophical mirror reverse of Bin 407. Pristine blackcurrant fruit is tightly coiled in a fine shell of superb oak. Brilliantly confident yet perfectly polished tannins carry a finish of drive and determination, promising marvellous things in the decades to come. Singular evidence that the Penfolds fit in the Napa is a confident one. And for all it represents, great value, too!"
96 Point Rated - Huon Hooke The Real ReviewSuper concentrated blueberry and cassis aromas, a different fruit profile here; dense and full bodied, elegantly structured and very firm with fine grained, powdery tannins and tremendous persistence. A cracking cabernet.
95 Point Rated - James Halliday Wine Companion
"Matured 17 months' in French oak (40% new). A fascinating wine. There's an abundance of tannins, yet they are fine and soft, something you don't often associate with the Napa. Perhaps it's the modestly elevated pH that mediates the impact and heightens the juicy fruit profile. It's ready, willing and able."
95 Point Rated - Campbell Mattinson The Wine Front
"Bin 704 is meant as a “mirror image” of its Australian Bin 407 stablemate. This wine is 100% Cabernet Sauvignon from the Napa Valley, matured for 17 months in all-French oak, 40% new. Penfolds is the master of the cuddly red wine but it’s never been sucked into making them too big. This is another exquisitely crafted and balanced wine, full of run, texture and flavour, pleasure-providing, sweet of fruit but not just that, herbal, smoky, a touch resiny, redcurrant in with black, tannin folded and fine, so many berries, such judicious oak, so supple. This is Australia’s Penfolds, out of the US, making a composed Claret-style, and making it work."
95 Point Rated - Tony Love Wine Pilot
"Let's get the in-house Penfolds riddle out of the way: the Bin number 704 is the reverse of it's South Australian classic Bin 407 Cabernet Sauvignon. This is all Napa Valley material crafted by Penfolds winemakers, confident and expressive from the outset, more redolent of crimson berries then darker fruits with a faboulus waft of the full spice cabinet, thanks perhaps to a judicious 17-month maturation in French oak, 40% new. There's plenty of drive in the palate, warm with ripeness, potent through deftly proportioned."
94 Point Rated - Erin Larkin Robert Parker Wine Advocate
"The fruit for the 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Bin 704 is from across Napa Valley, and the classy fruit is shaped by French oak (40% new) and firm tannins through the finish. This is supple and sweet and shows blood plum, raspberry, red licorice and even cocoa. The wine is long and lingering and shapely. Sophisticated."
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