2018 Neyers Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 750 ml

Everybody in the Valley knows Bruce Neyers.

He’s a Napa legend: At Joseph Phelps, he stayed for nearly two decades and built an icon as their general manager. He moved on to become the first national sales director for legendary importer Kermit Lynch, where he visited the cellars of some of the greatest producers in France and Italy—we’re talking names like Coche-Dury, Raveneau, and Chave—filing away their winemaking secrets. 

This wealth of experience led Kermit Lynch himself to call Neyers “one of America’s greatest wine men.” Despite this, Neyers Vineyards—the winery Bruce started with his wife, Barbara, in 1992—flies under the radar. 

Neyers’s Napa Cab has long been one of our favorites. From what might be the greatest vintage in the history of Napa Valley—Wine Spectator doesn’t think there’s ever been a better one—it’s an elegant, sophisticated wine that’s complex and delicious all at once.

Neyers and his talented winemaker, Tadeo Borchardt, a former assistant to Wells Guthrie at Copain, source this Napa Valley Cabernet from a single vineyard belonging to Neyers’s friend Ron Smith. It sits in Oak Knoll, the AVA that adjoins the Stag’s Leap District and Mount Veeder.

Smith’s vineyard produces small-berried grapes that ferment slowly and yield complex wines—especially since Neyers and Borchardt are strong believers in using native yeasts in their wines. 

A few weeks ago, in the mid-autumn Napa sunshine, it paired brilliantly with thick steaks grilled over wood coals and seasoned with sea salt, rosemary, and black pepper. But in the intervening period, we’ve been drinking it with lentil salads, nutty cheeses, and, most notably, fresh pasta with some of this year’s first porcinis. It’s been stunning every time.