98 pts - Wine Advocate
(no tasting note available)
89 pts - Wine Spectator
Offers a firm, complex, tannic mix of earth- and graphite-laced currant and dried dark berry notes, turning quite chewy and tilting toward dryness on the finish. Has reached a nice drinking plateau but can hold. The charry oak, tobacco leaf and savory herb and underbrush flavors are the dominant themes in what is ultimately a rustic style.—2006 California Cabernet blind retrospective (December 2015). Drink now through 2022. 500 cases made. — JL (11/2016)
95 pts - Vinous
Good full red-ruby. Slightly medicinal aromas of red berries, minerals, brown spices, menthol and tobacco leaf. Pliant, generous and sweet, with lovely depth to the red berry, plum and tobacco flavors. This subtly complex wine rises and expands on the very long back end, dusting the mouth with flavor. Still a bit youthfully tight and in need of patience. A superb vintage for this wine, and a fitting swan song for the "old style" of Screaming Eagle. The cabernet franc was left out of the wine because it was "too drying," noted winemaker Andy Erickson, who made the final blend very late and bottled the wine last September.- Stephen Tanzer (05/2009)