Under-$20 Napa White: 100-Point Talent and Top Terroir
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2019 Hill Family Estate Sauvignon Blanc Napa Valley 750 ml
- Curated by unrivaled experts
- Choose your delivery date
- Temperature controlled shipping options
- Get credited back if a wine fails to impress
Napa’s Under-$20 Answer to the Loire and Marlborough
A combination of top estate-owned Napa vineyards and 100-point talent raises this Sauvignon Blanc to the absolute peak of its category. It’s a benchmark statement of New World poise and riveting citrus cut, available at a price we know can’t be beat.
From Napa icon Doug Hill of Hill Family Estates, this is one of the valley’s signature Sauvignon Blancs—California’s mouthwatering answer to the best of the Loire and Marlborough, alive with sunny, cool-climate energy, flawlessly rendered in stainless-steel purity.
Hill Family is famous for supplying grapes to Duckhorn, Quintessa, David Ramey, and Caymus, forming the basis of collector’s-item bottles that cost hundreds of dollars. But when vintage conditions work out, the same terroir—not to mention the same level of winemaking prowess—produce today’s incredible Sauvignon Blanc deal, silken in texture and richly appointed with aromas of sage, lemongrass, and flint.
Traditionally, few can take advantage of that value: There’s very little of this wine made (just a few hundred cases), and what does exist is in such high demand that we’ve never been able to offer it before. And we’ve known Doug a long time!
The refined vision for this Sauvignon Blanc expression belongs to two Napa winemakers at the top of their game. Alison Doran, a disciple of André Tchelistcheff, has been with Hill Family Estate since their inaugural vintage. The consulting winemaker is Jean Hoefliger, the 100-point genius behind so many of the legendary wines of Alpha Omega, Clark-Claudon, and AXR.
For this wine, Doug Hill drew on decades of experience to match clones to rootstock to soil. Most of the grapes hail from the Windy Flats Vineyard, comprising just a few acres carved from rocks and cliffs, lending the wine mineral verve and aromatic complexity. They supplemented that base with grapes from the steep hillside of Watson Vineyard, characterized by cool-climate, vibrant acids. Cold fermentation locks in all that coiled energy, fleshed out by a rest on the lees.