2007 Dalla Valle Cabernet Sauvignon
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Tasting notes
(14.6% alcohol): Bright medium ruby. Knockout ineffable nose combines blackberry, blueberry, flowers, minerals, spicecake, iron and miso. Silky-sweet and highly concentrated, conveying an almost candied quality to its blueberry, blackberry and espresso flavors but energized by almost shockingly bright acidity. With its outstanding density and refined texture, this is clearly the product of a great site. This velvety, sappy wine utterly saturates the palate and tongue without leaving any impression of dryness. A superb wine with a long life ahead of it, but even today it's balanced and sexy.
Critic scores
Robert Parker
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
More reviews and scores
Revealing a more intense purple color, the 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon offers gorgeous aromas of creme de cassis, crushed rock, underbrush and licorice. It has a similar weight but more structure and perhaps an extra dimension in terms of fruit, glycerin and length. Impressively built and slightly more reserved than the 2008, it is a pure, beautifully balanced Dalla Valle that will benefit from 2-3 years of cellaring. It should drink well for two decades or more. One of the iconic wines of Napa Valley is Dalla Valle's blend of Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon (usually at least 50% Cabernet Franc), Maya. As history has proven, Cabernet Franc has flourished in the red soils above the Oakville Corridor. One can go back twenty years and find these wines still youthful with perhaps 40-50 years of total life in them. Tel. (707) 944-2676; Fax (707) 944-8411
Full ruby-red. Expressive aromas of boysenberry, licorice and flowers complicated by a whiff of torrefaction. Juicy and fruit-driven, with lovely inner-mouth aromatic character and definition to the flavors of dark berries, violet and licorice. The floral quality carries through to the firmly tannic finish. The lowest-ever production for this bottling at 270 cases. Give this at least a few years to expand.
About the producer
Dalla Valle Vineyards was founded in 1986 by Naoko and her late husband Gustav Dalla Valle, in Oakville. Initially they had wanted to create a luxury resort, but when they discovered the potential of the site, they changed tack and decided to make wine.