Robert Mondavi 2019 Napa Valley Red Blend
A Vintner’s Vision, A Vintage Realized
“Wine to me is passion. It’s family and friends. It’s warmth of heart and generosity of spirit. Wine is art. It’s culture. It’s the essence of civilization and the Art of Living.”
— Robert Mondavi
The Robert Mondavi 2019 Napa Valley Red Blend is more than a recognisable Bordeaux-style red from a familiar label — it connects almost sixty years of Napa Valley history, a singular winemaking philosophy, and one of the more favourably reviewed recent vintages. To understand the wine in the glass, you have to begin with the man whose name is on the label.
The label’s history
Robert Mondavi (1913–2008) opened Robert Mondavi Winery in Oakville in 1966 — the first major new winery built in Napa Valley since the 1930s. His decision came in the wake of a famous family rift at Charles Krug, the Mondavis’ earlier operation, where disagreements with his brother Peter over quality and ambition led to his departure in 1965. Where Krug had been a successful but conventional business, Robert envisioned something audacious: a California winery whose top wines could stand alongside the great estates of Bordeaux and Burgundy. He raised $200,000, broke ground at the foot of the Mayacamas Mountains, and built his now-iconic mission-style winery on Highway 29. Over the decades that followed, he became America’s most visible ambassador for wine, partnering with Baron Philippe de Rothschild on the Opus One joint venture in 1979 and pioneering tours, concerts, and culinary events on site. The winery was sold to Constellation Brands in 2004 for roughly $1.36 billion. It remains the guardian of Mondavi’s legacy and original vision.
Robert Mondavi’s DNA on the wine and in its vineyards
Several of the practices Robert Mondavi introduced or popularised in California are baked into how the Napa Valley Red Blend is made today: varietal labelling, and the back-label blend disclosure that followed from the same principle, cold fermentation in stainless steel, and — most relevant here — aging in small French oak barrels, a then-radical step that brought Bordelais polish to California fruit. He also believed deeply in wines that reflected their origin, and his choice of Oakville as the home of the winery was a deliberate bet on its unique terroir. Robert Mondavi Winery’s stewardship of the legendary To Kalon Vineyard — widely regarded as one of the finest Cabernet sites in North America — has anchored its identity for decades. The Napa Valley Red Blend draws on the broader network of sourcing fruit that Mondavi established over time. Nearly half of the 2019 blend comes from Oakville, with additional fruit pulled from Stags Leap District, Oak Knoll, Yountville, and Rutherford — a 100% Napa Valley wine that layers the complexity of several nuanced expressions of fruit into a single glass.
Winemaking and blend composition
The 2019 Napa Valley Red Blend is composed of 74% Cabernet Sauvignon, 13% Cabernet Franc, 9% Merlot and 4% Petit Verdot — a classic Bordeaux quartet that gives the wine both backbone and breadth. Grapes were hand-harvested, and the finished blend was aged for 22 months in French oak barrels, 74% of them new — which lends the wine its hallmark notes of cocoa, vanilla, toasted nut, and sweet baking spice. Geneviève Janssens, Robert Mondavi’s long-serving chief winemaker and a former Wine Enthusiast Winemaker of the Year, set the house style for many years, and her team’s signature is evident in the wine’s polished tannins, ripe-but-controlled fruit and pronounced oak frame.
The 2019 vintage
2019 has emerged as one of Napa’s most quietly excellent recent vintages. After a wet winter — the valley recorded over thirty-four inches of rain between January and May — soils were deeply replenished, and early growth was vigorous. A cool spring delayed bud break by as much as two weeks in some sites, but from June onward the season settled into a long, warm, remarkably even pattern, with daytime temperatures hovering between 23°C and 29°C and few of the heat spikes that defined recent harvests. The result was a generous hang time and fruit of deep concentration; tannins were generally ripe and supple, with most wines showing good acidity and freshness.
Production
Alcohol: 14.0%.
pH: 3.6.
Total Acidity: 6.5 g/L.
Residual Sugar: 0.9 g/L.
Production: Approximately 10,000 cases
Tasting Notes
I recently tried it over dinner, and for a seven-year-old wine, I found it still youthful and vibrant on the palate, with plenty of graceful development to come.
Aromas are of cassis, forest berries, mocha, cedar, tobacco leaf, sandalwood and gingerbread spice. The bouquet is enticing and attractive.
On the palate, the wine is medium-to-full bodied with good depth of flavour, finesse and complexity, a core of rich, ripe fruit and exceptional length (the Petit Verdot earning its badge here). On entry, a creamy texture of bright forest berries and plum fruits glides into the mouth, arriving at a juicy, jammy dollop of fruit in the middle of the palate. This gives way to oak-derived notes of cedar, tobacco and épices à pain, before the fine, savoury tannins kick in.
This is an impressive Napa Cabernet with a good five to eight years on it. Still young, but a wonderful drink now with lamb, beef, or game. It was superb with the Australian beef from Indoguna, prepared in the brilliant kitchen of Luu Meng’s Yi Sang – The Garden restaurant. Enjoyed with dear friends Nicole Siyean and Kha Eang. A wine that does a great service to the man, his vision and legacy, it is well worthy of bearing the Mondavi name. Grab it while you can, 94/100.
Darren Gall
