2021 Amici Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve Napa Valley 750 ml

Tony Biagi was Antonio Galloni’s Vinous Winemaker of the Year in 2020. His résumé is packed with some of the most famous names in Napa Cabernet—including Plumpjack, Cade, Neal, Sinegal, and Hourglass—and he recently replaced former Screaming Eagle winemaker Andy Erickson as winemaker at To Kalon Vineyard Company, whose prized bottles don’t dip below $200. 

Grown in the outstanding 2021 vintage, Biagi’s Amici Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve Napa Valley puts some of the greatest sites in Napa Valley—including Georges III, Hudson, Hyde, and Morisoli—on display. As critic James Suckling wrote in his 95-point review, it “shows the magic of 2021.” 

Since 2015, Biagi has quietly been making wines for Amici up in Calistoga. Most of Amici’s wines put single vineyard sites on display, and the sites they work with could fairly be called iconic: Their lineup includes bottlings from Missouri Hopper, Oakville Ranch, To Kalon, Hirondelle, Hyde, and more—which obviously bodes very well for their Napa Valley Reserve Cabernet. 

The 2021 draws off some household-name Cabernet sites, as well as a few equally famous but slightly more unorthodox locations. Rutherford’s celebrated Georges III and Morisoli sites, planted solely and primarily to Cabernet Sauvignon, form the backbone of this blend. The Amici team departed classic Cabernet country and sourced the rest of the fruit from two of the most lauded sites in Carneros, the Hudson and Hyde Vineyards, to source fruit that provides a beautiful cool-climate lift to this rich Napa Valley Cabernet.

After fermentation in stainless steel and aging in 100% new French oak, this wine is opaque, expansive, bold, spicy, and hedonistic. A big Cabernet from a giant of Napa winemaking.