Corison 2019 St Helena Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon

Unlike her estate vineyard Cabernet (Kronos), Cathy's Napa Valley Cabernet comes from hand-picked Rutherford vineyards located next to her winery. By blending the wines she makes from these various growers, Cathy is able to craft a wine suited for more near-term drinking, so fans will have something to savor while awaiting her award-winning 'Kronos' to reach its prime drinking window - in a decade or two.

But that's not to say this wine can't age! I estimate it will continue to improve for 5-10 years, if you have the patience. If not, you'll be no worse for wear. This is simply a delicious wine crafted in the food-friendly, elegant style of old-fashioned Bordeaux (<14% alcohol).

Though early reports deemed a "Good" vintage with above average ageability, the 2019 vintage began with excessive rain and cool, cloudy days that gave molds and mildew prime conditions. Fortunately, the summer heat came in time and Napa saw little in the way of its increasingly ruinous heat spikes. Harvest weather was ideal, offering growers the opportunity to pick in waves, harvesting only the fruit that was at optimal ripeness - a costly but rewarding approach to harvests that can only be done when dry weather is forecast for days and weeks at a time. This dry harvest season led to some of California's worst wildfires in late October, but these grapes were harvested long before then. As these wines develop in the bottle over the coming months and years, we would not be surprised to see the vintage rating elevated to "Excellent", or at least "Good-to-Excellent".

Cathy's winemaking style calls for early harvests and as such, this wine came away completely free of any smoke taint.