Review: 2018 Paul Hobbs Cabernet Sauvignon Coombsville
2018 is widely considered the best vintage for Napa cabernet sauvignon since the vaunted 1997 release, which is perhaps why Paul Hobbs was so careful about the timing of this Coombsville bottling, which was kept in the cellar until 2024. Born in one of the coolest parts of Napa County, the wine is made from a blend of grapes from Hobbs’s Nathan Coombs Estate and Flat Rock and was aged for 20 months in 69 percent new French oak.
We were fortunate enough to score a bottle while it remains, barely, available to purchase.
If you weren’t convinced of 2018’s greatness, give this wine a try. Rich with berries and plum notes, it’s never overly fruity nor jammy, but rather a soulful and introspective dive into what makes great cabernet great. The cassis is immediate and laced with chocolate and vanilla, then later touches of coconut. Sharply acidic as it develops in glass — a surprise — the fruitier components take on a lightly floral quality that evokes violets amidst a light layer of baking spice and a pinch of aniseed. Tannins are omnipresent but subdued, tempered by time enough in bottle… but surely to be further aided should the wine withstand another decade or so in cellar.
Outstanding today, but come 2030, I can’t even imagine.
A / $120 / paulhobbswinery.com
2018 Paul Hobbs Cabernet Sauvignon Coombsville
$120
