2021 Smith-Madrone Cabernet Sauvignon Spring Mountain District Napa Valley 750 ml

When wine lovers want a glimpse into a previous generation of Napa Valley—when they're interested in a style that is still possible but hardly common—Smith-Madrone is on a very short list of producers we recommend.

Smith-Madrone is one of the benchmark Spring Mountain producers, perfectly balancing the structure of mountain fruit with the rugged, cool herbal tones of Cabernet from a cooler pocket of the Valley. While much of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon succumbs to stylistic and aesthetic pressures, the willingness of the Smith brothers to continually produce wines of honesty and purity is inspirational—and their pricing is a throwback to an earlier time.

Smith-Madrone sits on backbreaking slopes between 1,300 and 2,000 feet in elevation. In the early 1970s, Smith studied his Spring Mountain landscape for a year before deciding to plant, and his Cab is on the prime south- and west-facing blocks. The red volcanic soils are rocky and rugged, a stressful environment for vines to live in, and that's exactly how Stu Smith wants it. He's famous for providing no irrigation whatsoever, a practice that yields intense flavor-bomb grapes.

That yields wines that age famously well. PRESS, here in Napa, has probably the deepest collection of California Cabernet of any restaurant in the world, and they prized older Smith-Madrone. Not long ago, they had the 2004, ‘05, and ‘06 on our list—and all of them are absolute stars. With time, these open up and blossom into dynamic bottles that are beautifully aromatic and elegantly textured. But as the stellar member-ratings attest, Wine Access members love these in their youth, as well. Just be sure to throw it in a decanter.

The 2021 Smith-Madrone Spring Mountain Cabernet is one of the greatest vintages ever for the estate, and is as fine a deal as you can find in the Valley, especially for a wine with this much character and aging potential, not to mention 97-point scores from both Wine Enthusiast—where it earned Editors' Choice honors and was named to their Top 100 Wines—and Decanter magazine.