2014 Stags' Leap Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Cask 23 Napa Valley 750 ml

Fast-forward 40-plus years, and Stag’s Leap is still producing wines of absolutely stunning quality and expressiveness. Their 2013 Cabernet Sauvignon Cask 23, in fact, earned a jaw-dropping 99 points from Robert Parker and landed on the cover of Decanter Magazine. Now, with the 2014, the quality is every bit as high…and so is the excitement surrounding it.

It makes sense: 2014 is widely considered to be one of those rare “vintages of a generation.” James Suckling called it “one of [Napa’s] best years in the last two decades.” 

The accolades support that assertion: Jeb Dunnock scored it 97 points, Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate gave it 96, and Wine & Spirits bestowed 95 points on this bottling. Beyond those startling numbers, however, is a wine of real character, a deeply felt sense of soul that only the best bottles ever achieve.

The Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon Cask 23 is a reliably gorgeous combination of fruit from both S.L.V. and FAY Vineyards, the estate-owned properties that contribute to the final blend an ambrosial combination of power and richness alongside a sense of impeccable elegance.

The level of detail that goes into the crafting of Cask 23 is nothing short of amazing. For the 2014, each of the four individual blocks from S.L.V. and five blocks from FAY were vinified on their own, and aged individually for 21-and-a-half months in small French oak. Only once each had attained its potential were they blended together, and then allowed to age a bit more in order to coalesce into the thoroughly complete bottling they ultimately have become.

All of that work has resulted in a wine that, more than four decades after its predecessor burst onto the world scene, is a more than worthy inheritor of the Stag’s Leap reputation, and a transporting expression of one of the best vintages in Napa in recent memory.