Shafer Hillside Select Collectors Series Tasting Saturday, March 10th 7:30pm and all the Shafer Vineyard Wines in the store on SALE!!
"A man dies too young if he leaves any wine in his cellar." - Wine writer André Simon (1877-1970) who had only two magnums of claret in his cellar when he died.
If your cellar is not completely full you could be cutting your life expectancy dangerously short, so it’s time to stock up!
This landmark winery from the Stags Leap district is one of our favorite and if you look at every wine they produce you could make a case for each wine being among the best in its category each year. In addition to the multiple (100 Point) scores that the Hillside Select has received with 2001, 2002 and 2003 from the Wine Advocate and their #1 "wine of the Year" title won for their 2010 vintage of Relentless syrah. All we have to say is that it could not have happened to more deserving wine family. We were sad to hear the winery sold in 2022, but we are confident that nothing will change with Elias Fernandez still at the winemaking helm and Doug Shafer still watching the ship the continued success of Shafer Vineyards is certain for the near future.
We are big fans of Shafer Vineyards so when our good friend from Shafer Melinda Barrett asked if we wanted to host a Hillside Select Collector series event I knew that we had a lot of Shafer Hillside Select collectors out there that would love to bring a bottle out of their cellar to share with our group tonight.
Our collector series tasting event is where we ask you, our wine drinking people, to come up with some wine from your wine collection to add to the party in exchange for your ticket to the event. That’s correct the collector series tasting means you must bring a bottle of Shafer Hillside Select from your cellar to attend the event. The catch is we only need one bottle of each vintage of Hillside Select for this event and we already have three vintages spoken for.
Shafer Hillside Select Collectors Cellar Tasting
With Special Guest Melinda Barrett
Saturday, March 9th
7:30pm
Let me explain further- This is a two-part event:
The first part of the evening begins at 7:30pm, this is where we will be tasting through a selection of new releases of Shafer Vineyards. This will be a happy hour style event at the bar. The wines we will be showing are the ones below.
2022 Shafer Chardonnay Red Shoulder Ranch Carneros
Price: $78.75 Your Price: $69.30
(94 Points) A modern-day classic, Shafer's 2022 Chardonnay Red Shoulder Ranch continues the tradition, delivering pristine pineapple notes alongside hints of citrus curd, pencil shavings and mocha. Full-bodied, round and generous, this no-malolactic-fermentation Chardonnay harmoniously tapers down into a clean, crisp finish. Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
2021 Shafer TD-9 Napa
Price: $89.25 Your Price: $78.54
TD-9 is a proprietary blend that celebrates a bold move. In 1973, in the space of a few months, John Shafer went from riding morning commuter trains in Chicago to teaching himself to drive a TD-9 tractor in our Napa Valley vineyard. He’d never grown grapes or made wine in his life. That spirit of risk-taking and adventure still guides Shafer today and inspired the creation of this new wine.
2019 Shafer Relentless Syrah Napa
Price: $112.00 Your Price: $98.56
(96 Points) The 2019 Relentless is mostly Syrah, yet the cuvée always includes a good bit of Petite Sirah, with 11% in the 2019. A deep purple-hued blockbuster of a Syrah, it offers loads of ripe blackberries, ground pepper, sappy herbs, and violet-like aromas and flavors. One of those wines that delivers richness and intensity with no sensation of weight of heaviness, it has terrific balance, ripe tannins, and a great finish. Enjoy bottles over the coming 10-15 years. Jeb Dunnuck
2021 SHAFER CABERNET SAUVIGNON ONE POINT FIVE NAPA
Price: $141.00 Your Price: $124.08
(96 Points) More Cabernet-dominated, the 2021 Cabernet Sauvignon One Point Five checks in as 95% Cabernet Sauvignon, 2% Petit Verdot, 2% Merlot, and a splash of Malbec. It has incredible purity in its cassis, graphite, lead pencil, and camphor on the nose and a concentrated, medium to full-bodied, layered style on the palate that stays tighter and more compact than the TD-9. Jeb Dunnuck
Part 2 of the Evening:
Dinner with your bottles of Hillside Select
Here are the vintages of Shafer Hillside Select that we have already:
2001 Shafer Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon Napa
2004 Shafer Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon Napa
2005 Shafer Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon Napa
2016 Shafer Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon Napa
(I will add the vintages as people respond with the vintage they are bringing)
Menu
Selection of Cheese and Charcuterie
Grilled Vegetable and Burrata Salad with Sundried Tomato Vinaigrette
Tuna and wild mushroom tartar with lavender Aioli
Duo of Filet Mignon and NY Strip with Cabernet Sauvignon Reduction and Mongolian BBQ Served with Creme Friache Mashed Potatoes
Double Chocolate Chip Bourbon Pecan Pie
You must have a bottle of Shafer Hillside Select to contribute to the dinner to attend this event. The fee for dinner is $150 + tax, for reservations call 954-523-9463 or e-mail andy@winewatch.com.
If you do not have a bottle of Shafer Hillside Select in your cellar, we have a few vintages available here at Wine Watch. You have to provide one bottle of Shafer Hillside for each person attending the event.
Vintages of Shafer Hillside Select available at Wine Watch:
1989 Shafer Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select Napa
Price: $395.00 Sale Price: $300.00 Quantity in Stock: 14
1999 Shafer Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select Napa (Magnum)
Price: $825.00 Sale Price: $695.00 Quantity in Stock: 1
(97 Points) The 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select is one of the finest wines of the vintage. The 14.9% alcohol is barely noticeable given the amazing concentration and intensity. A saturated opaque purple color is followed by scents of vanilla, blackberry liqueur, crushed minerals, and a hint of white flowers. There is stunning intensity, tremendous purity, full body, and a remarkable, seamless finish (amazing given the elevated, austere tannin). Give the 1999 another 2-3 years of cellaring, and enjoy it over the following two decades or longer. A brilliant effort! There are 2,000 cases of this offering, which is aged for 32 months in 100% new French oak prior to bottling. It is head and shoulders above any other Cabernet Sauvignon from the Stags Leap appellation, combining an extraordinary elegance, delineation, and purity with a tremendously layered, thick opulence that coats the palate with exceptional purity as well as precision. Even in vintages such as 1998, this is a formidable offering. Wine Advocate #150, Dec 2003
2003 Shafer Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon Stags Leap District
Price: $495.00 Sale Price: $395.00 Quantity in Stock: 1
(95 points) The 2003 is a singular style of wine, but by no means wimpy or undernourished. The 2003 Shafer Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select has a dense, purple color, notes of creosote, graphite, blackberry and cassis fruit, charcoal and scorched earth. It has a full-bodied mouthfeel and excellent purity, while some rather noticeable tannins kick in on the finish. This wine seems to be moving from adolescence to that early mature stage, where I would expect it to hold for at least another 10-15 or more years. Clearly not one of the superstars in what was a rather astonishing qualitative lineup, but it’s outrageously good Cabernet Sauvignon, and I expect myself, as well as any of my readers, would drink this 24/7. eRobertParker.com #216, Dec 2014
2018 Shafer Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select Napa Magnum
Price: $828.50 Your Price: $729.08 Quantity in Stock: 6
2018 Shafer Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon Napa
Price: $412.50 Your Price: $363.00 Quantity in Stock: 5
(98+ Points) Made from 100% Cabernet Sauvignon, the 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select displays a deep garnet-purple color. It charges out of the gate with bold crème de cassis, blueberry pie and black cherry preserves notes, plus hints of smoked meats, fragrant earth and tar, with a fragrant waft of violets and Provence herbs. Full-bodied, the palate is packed with muscular black fruits, supported by a solid foundation of firm, grainy tannins and compelling freshness, finishing long with an enticing herbal lift. End of November 2021, The Wine Advocate
2019 Shafer Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select Napa
Price: $412.50 Your Price: $363.00
(98 Points) Sourced from specific blocks of estate-grown fruit, the 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select is another highly successful vintage. All Cabernet Sauvignon aged 32 months in 100% new French oak, it boasts intense aromas of pencil shavings, dark loam, cassis and plum on the nose, while the palate is full-bodied, super-ripe, rich, dense and concentrated—a truly impressive California vin de garde. Tannic but ripe, it finishes long and firm on the finish, adding a hint of mocha. To be released in September 2023, it's a strong showing and hopefully an indication that quality will remain high under the new ownership. Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
A bit about Shafer Vineyards
Shafer Vineyards was officially founded in 1979, but it really all began in 1972 when John Shafer left a prominent position in the publishing business in Chicago and moved his wife and four children to the Napa Valley. It was a courageous decision for John, for he knew very little about grape growing and making wine. He wanted a change for himself and his family, and the romantic lifestyle of the gentleman farmer/grape grower was irresistible. It was a pure stroke of luck that he found a neglected 50 year-old vineyard in the eastern foothills of the valley at the northern tip of the Stags Leap palisades - this part of the Napa Valley is now officially known as the Stags Leap District. The same year that John Shafer came to the valley, a Frenchman named Bernard Portet, whose father once was the technical director at Château Lafite, made his first Clos du Val wines in leased cellars. (Clos du Val was the very first winery to break ground in the Stags Leap area). Just to the south of John's hillside vineyards, another transplanted Chicagoan, Warren Winiarski, had just made his first Cabernet Sauvignon at his new winery called Stag's Leap Wine Cellars.
The Shafer family went to work replanting and developing 43 acres of hillside vineyards - John was a pioneer back in those days because he recognized the fact that hillside grapes produced more concentrated wines. As a result, John Shafer is now in the fortunate position of being the only producer in the Stags Leap appellation to have his red wine vineyards planted exclusively on hillsides. Four years later in 1976, the world discovered that exceptional Cabernet Sauvignon could be produced from Stags Leap grapes. At a now-famous blind tasting conducted in Paris in 1976, the 1973 Stag's Leap Wine Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon beat out some of the most renowned and expensive wines of Bordeaux. Suddenly everyone was interested in Stags Leap area wines, and John Shafer knew that he had made the right decision to buy land in this untested area of the Napa Valley. In 1978 the family decided to build a winery and follow their grapes from the vine to the bottle. After a long, drawn-out struggle, John Shafer was finally successful in getting separate viticultural recognition for the Stags Leap viticultural area in 1989, and his Cabernets (beginning in 1986) now bear that designation. The sharp eye might note the spelling of Stags Leap - it was a compromise with several other wineries in the area that at one time opposed the move. One was called Stags' Leap Vineyards and the other Stag's Leap Wine Cellars; the most acceptable name to all parties for the appellation was agreed upon as Stags Leap!
The winery now produces a Cabernet, a Reserve Cabernet called "Hillside Select", a Merlot, a Chardonnay, and as of 2000 a Syrah called Relentless. Shafer is a very small winery by Napa Valley standards - production is only 35,000 cases. The Shafer family prefers that most of its wine comes from its own 135 acres of vineyards (53 acres in the Stags Leap area planted to the Bordeaux varietals and a small amount of sangiovese, 23 acres of merlot in Carneros, 17 acres of merlot and sangiovese in the Oak Knoll District, and 27 acres of chardonnay in Carneros. In 1988 Shafer purchased an undeveloped 80-acre tract in Carneros to provide grapes for future Chardonnays (planting was begun in 1990). The winemaker through the 1994 vintage was John Shafer's son, Doug, who graduated from UC Davis in Enology and then did a two-year stint as assistant winemaker for Lakespring Winery. Doug has now taken over the reins at the winery; and his very able assistant, Elias Fernandez, is now the winemaker.
In the brief span since the first releases in 1978, Shafer's wines have steadily improved - although the winery's Chardonnays have never quite kept pace with the reds. Until recently Shafer has been considered a "red wine" winery with much positive acclaim for the Cabernets and Merlots. All that changed, however, with the release of the 1994 "Red Shoulder Ranch" Chardonnay. The fruit was sourced entirely from the Shafer's new vineyard in Carneros; it received rave reviews - including being selected by us as one of the "Top Ten Chardonnays of 1996" in The Wine News.
The Cabernets at Shafer are the flagship wines and, in our mind, have been bellwether wines for the past decade. Although Silverado or Stag's Leap Wine Cellars might produce an occasional reserve wine that might be better, we strongly feel that Shafer is the most reliable and most consistent producer of Cabernet Sauvignon in the Stags Leap District. The regular Cabernets have been excellent - one of the most acclaimed in recent memory was the 1990. It won the Platinum Medal with a (98) score at the American Wine Competition conducted by Wine & Spirits. The even better 1992 regular Cabernet was a classic study in style and finesse. The reserve Cabernets (labeled "Hillside Select") are drawn entirely from Shafer's own vineyards and have been outstanding from the very first vintage in 1982. On the strength of the "Hillside Select" bottling we would rate Shafer as one of California's top ten producers of Cabernet Sauvignon; the regular bottlings also place the winery among the leaders in the medium price range as well. The 1991 "Hillside Select" was the finest Cabernet produced in the history of Shafer Vineyards and was selected as one of our "Top Three Cabernets for 1995" in The Wine News. The 1992 "Hillside Select" has drawn even more praise from some quarters; Robert Parker scored it a very impressive (95) in The Wine Advocate. The 1993 "Hillside Select" was rated a (94) in The Wine Spectator. This wine has become one of the hardest wines to acquire, that is what happens when Robert Parker rates four vintages in a row near perfect scores; the 1994, 1995, 1996 & 1997 scored (99), (98), (98-100) & (98-100) respectively. I know we need to update this story but little has changed except more 95+ scores from the critics and that they have changed the name of the Stags Leap Cabernet Sauvignon to 1.5 commemorating the 1.5 decades that father and son have worked together.
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