2011 Pride Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon Vintner Select Cuvée
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Tasting notes
Black cherries, plums, smoke, new leather and spices meld together in the 2011 Cabernet Sauvignon Vintner's Select. Overall, the Cabernet Sauvignon offers a little more depth and mid-palate weight than the Merlot Vintner Select, but it, too, looks like a wine that will provide its best drinking sooner rather than later.
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Robert Parker
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
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The 2011 Cabernet Sauvignon Vintner’s Select (609 cases produced) is one of the top Cabernet Sauvignons of the vintage. Aged 20 months in 40% new French oak, it finished at 14.6% natural alcohol. It is 100% Cabernet Sauvignon primarily from Clone 337, blended with a small amount of Clone 15. It possesses a dense purple color, a full-bodied mouthfeel, notes of camphor, licorice, incense, blackberry and blackcurrant, and a multilayered, rich, full-bodied, pure style. Drink this impressive 2011 over the next ten years.
(14.6% alcohol, the highest of these 2011 reds; mostly from clone 337): Good red-ruby. Ripe aromas of redcurrant, plum, milk chocolate and nutty oak. Fat and subtly sweet for the vintage here; lacks real treble tones but shows good juicy vinosity to the red fruit and chocolate flavors. The substantial dusty tannins bite down on the finish but avoid coming off as hard. This should be more harmonious with a few years of patience.
Sweet tobacco, menthol, licorice, red fruit, iron and a host of ferrous notes inform Pride's 2011 Cabernet Sauvignon Vintner's Select. I don't find the power or structure of the best years, while the flavors seem a bit forward and faded. Personally I find the straight 2011 Cabernet Sauvignon more interesting today, as it has more depth and richness, along with better balance.