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Steady and composed, with a lovely bouquet of black currant, plum and tobacco, dark currant and blackberry on a dark, deep palate, seamless fine-grained tannins and notes of dark cherry and cedar gliding through a balanced, long finish.
Available in store
Close87% Cabernet Sauvignon, 13% Merlot
Food pairings: Grilled ribeye, herb-crusted rack of lamb, braised short ribs, duck breast with a blackberry reduction, porcini mushroom risotto and aged Gouda or sharp Cheddar.
Scores:
Winemaking: The grapes were hand harvested between October 3 and 13, 2023, at the end of one of the longest growing seasons, with cool, even temperatures that allowed extended hang time and gradual ripening. Fermentation was by wild, native yeasts with minimal manipulation or additions: no chaptalization, no acid, no digestive enzymes and no fining, fermented dry to leave room for the site to show through. The wine was aged 19 months in French oak barrels, 30% new, and bottled unfined. A touch of Merlot lends early approachability and balance.
Vineyards and terroir: The Ranch is grown entirely on the Snowden estate in the Vaca Mountains on the eastern edge of Napa Valley, between St. Helena and Rutherford, in predominantly volcanic rhyolite soils. Cabernet Sauvignon comes from the Pool Block, the westernmost vineyard at 600 to 650 feet, facing west across the valley and replanted to Cabernet in 1997, and from the Lost Orchard, a small hilltop bowl ringed by oak woodland at the east end of the property; a touch of Merlot comes from the Lost Vineyard, which lies between the two. Only a small part of the ranch is planted to vines, and the rest is kept as wild woodland.
Family and history: Wine grapes have grown on the ranch since 1878, when Levi and Lucretia Davis homesteaded the land and planted the first vines. Wayne and Virginia Snowden bought the property in 1955, and in the early 1960s Wayne planted Cabernet Sauvignon with budwood from Nathan Fay's vineyard in the Stags Leap district. His sons Scott and Randy replanted in 1981 and for years sold fruit to celebrated Napa wineries before the family kept enough to bottle its first wine under its own label in 1993. Third-generation Diana Snowden Seysses, a UC Davis graduate who has also been oenologist at Domaine Dujac in Burgundy since 2003, has been the winemaker since the 2005 harvest.
In the pictures: Winemaker Diana Snowden Seysses; the Pool Block, the estate's westernmost vineyard and a source of The Ranch; and the Lost Orchard vineyard in its hilltop clearing (photos courtesy of Snowden Vineyards).
