2018 Aperture Cabernet Sauvignon Alexander Valley

Here’s a piece of free advice: Buy any bottles you find from winemaker Jesse Katz on the spot. It’s the equivalent of snapping up the early works of Picasso, before he became known as the defining artist of his generation.

Today’s small allocation of Katz’s monumental and spellbinding 2018 Aperture Cabernet—which earned a bombshell 97-point review from Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate—might be the best shot you’ll get.

Drawn off four volcanic sites on the cool hillsides of the Alexander Valley, it’s crafted with the savoir-faire Katz absorbed across 20 harvests at iconic properties like Petrus, Screaming Eagle, and Viña Cobos. With most other 97-point California wines costing two or three times as much as this, it’s a genuine bargain, and one of the most memorable Cabernets we’ve tasted in the last year.

“The palate is stunning, powerful but silky and fresh, lushly fruited and nuanced and finishing very long,” gushed the Advocate in a starring review. “While this 2018 is approachable and utterly delicious now, it will reward cellaring and should be very long lived.” Decide later what you’ll do with it. For now, just focus on locking in every bottle you can, like we did. Your future self, and anyone who joins you for its densely fruited, elegantly mineral pleasures, will thank you.

At just 37 years old, Katz has already made one of the world’s most expensive wines (a $350,000 Cabernet sold at auction), and a Malbec that Robert Parker speculated “may be the finest I have ever tasted from California.”

He’s been named a Wine Enthusiast 40 Under 40 Tastemaker, a Wine Spectator Rising Star, and was the first winemaker to land on Forbes‘ 30 Under 30 list. He developed a custom wine for the wedding of two friends—who happen to be Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel. “Cult” is a word freely thrown around his releases for Devil Proof, Aperture, and The Setting Wines.

So what does a winemaker—again, still just 37!—do after all that? Katz headed to Sonoma, particularly Alexander Valley, to try to do things no one’s done before. Vineyards like the ones he chose for this wine are still being studied and understood—the region is decades behind Napa in terms of site selection, he told us. There’s an opportunity to make a mark by raising Cabernets like this one to unprecedented heights, while keeping prices in the wheelhouse of everyday buyers.

He was drawn to Alexander Valley for the red volcanic soils, which impart fine acidity and mineral complexity, and the unique climate, with cold nights and days that heat up as quickly as an oven. For this 2018 bottling, he focused on south- and southwest-facing hillsides that are mostly dry-farmed, making for grapes tautly balanced between freshness and powerful concentration.

The vitality and muscle of that Cabernet gets an extra dose of juicy color and smooth roundess from small amounts of Malbec, Merlot, and Petit Verdot. Wrap it all up in 50% new French oak, aged 18 months in 60-gallon barrels, and you’ve got the makings of a future California legend.

• Fruit Intensity
• Oak Intensity
• Body
• Acidity
• Tannin

• ABV 14.60%
• 30 mins
• Now – 2030
• 86% Cabernet Sauvignon7% Malbec5% Merlot2% Petit Verdot
• Serving temperature – 60°
• Cork