Shafer’s flagship wine is the 2,000 case cuvee of Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon. Aged 32 months in 100% new French oak prior to bottling, it is one of the world’s greatest Cabernet Sauvignons. Like many of the top wines of the vintage, the 2001 Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select has closed down, but it reveals impressive potential. Its dense purple color is accompanied by an exquisite bouquet of charcoal, sweet oak, black currant liqueur, and graphite. Full-bodied and powerful, with superb intensity, length, persistence, purity, and texture, it should either be decanted for several hours in advance, or given another 2-4 years of bottle age. Drink it over the following 20-25 years. Shafer Vineyards, one of the most impeccably run wineries in the world, is a wonderful family operation that deserves all the success they have earned. - Robert Parker
(14.9% alcohol): Good dark red. Knockout nose captures the site's full aromatic range: plum, blackcurrant, dried sage, licorice, dark chocolate, musky tobacco, game, lead pencil and tar. Superconcentrated and impressively dense and thick but still held in check by a compelling juiciness; this wine wants to explode! The red fruit and plum flavors are complicated by graphite minerality and cedary oak. Finishes with serious, thick tannins that are totally supported by the wine's mid-palate material. The very long, vibrant finish suggests a long life ahead. A great vintage for Hillside Select, and still improving.- Stephen Tanzer (7/216)
Producer: Shafer
Vintage: 2001
Varietal: Cabernet Sauvignon
Country: USA
Region: CA - North Coast (Napa,Sonoma)
Sub-Region: Napa
Appellation: Stags Leap District
Sub-Appellation:
SKU: #
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