2014 Staglin Family Vineyard Booth Bella Oaks Cabernet Sauvignon Rutherford 750 ml

We're deeply humbled and also sincerely excited to present our first-ever offer from Staglin Family Vineyard. 

In 2011, Master Sommelier Sur Lucero met Shannon Staglin for the first time. She was dining at Oenotri in Napa, where  Sur was working the floor, and she beautifully described the kind of white wine she wanted. It sounded to like Chablis. She told Sur he was was spot-on, but since it was an Italian restaurant, he served her a Verdicchio—thankfully, to great success. the two been friends ever since, and our camaraderie will last a lifetime.

What will not last—and what are some of the last bottles in existence, period—are the ten cases we're able to offer of the 2014 Staglin Family Vineyard Booth Bella Oaks Cabernet Sauvignon, which come to us thanks to Shannon, a mother of two, and second-generation Staglin in Napa Valley. At the end of 2015, the vines that supplied this wine were uprooted, meaning this is the second-to-last bottling that will come from the 1990 Bella Oaks plantings in Rutherford (a site that also supplied Heitz Cellars with their Bella Oaks Cabernet). 
 
Retired critic Robert M. Parker Jr. called it “a sensational 2014 to drink over the next 25 or more years.” We call it a rare and tiny slice of old school Napa, from one of the Valley’s most revered families, and today we have it for $199 per bottle coming directly from the Staglin Family cellars.
 
The level of prestige contained in this one bottle cannot be overstated. It was crafted by the Staglins, a family that came to Napa in the late 1970s, received guidance from Bill Harlan, and purchased their Rutherford estate (a former Beaulieu Vineyard property) in 1985. They immediately began to give back by supplying a generation of wine lovers with deeply profound, age-worthy Napa Cabernet, and by diving into Napa Valley philanthropy. The Staglins founded the Music Festival for Brain Health (now known as One Mind), which has raised a staggering $450 million for brain health research. 
 
The Booth Bella Oaks Cabernet combines the Staglins’ brilliance in winemaking with Cabernet grapes from the famed Bella Oaks vineyard, purchased by their close friends the Booth Family in 2010—hence the name “Booth Bella Oaks.” In the glass, this 2014 Staglin Booth Bella Oaks Cabernet has a dark ruby core with crimson around the edge. Black currant, warm blackberry, spiced plum, and notes of blueberry anchor the fruit nicely, while being accented by new leather, crushed bay leaf, and cedar. The center of the palate is rich and dense with an oily-minty tobacco note that shows signs of raw cacao. The texture is both powerful and contained, and there are flashing youthful tones that indicate a wine just beginning to hit its stride. The exceptionally long finish shows the inimitable texture of classic Rutherford dust.
 
For decades, the original Bella Oaks vineyard supplied fruit solely to Heitz Cellars for their Bella Oaks Cabernet—one of the seminal single-vineyard bottlings in Napa Valley. From 2012 to 2015, the Staglins produced a “Booth Bella Oaks” Cabernet, but at the end of 2015, these old vines were uprooted, bringing the project to a close. 

We're honored to share this legacy Cabernet with you, and know it will not only impress from the moment the cork is pulled, but will improve in the cellar for certain.