Monte Bello Magnum

The 2018 release of Ridge's Monte Bello, assembled from 23 selected parcels on the Monte Bello ridge above Cupertino. Soils are greenstone and clay over decomposing limestone - Franciscan terrane on the east side of the San Andreas Fault, the rare California limestone bedrock that defines Monte Bello's mineral signature. Organically farmed, between 1,300 and 2,700 feet, fifteen miles from the Pacific.

Composition: 74% Cabernet Sauvignon, 17% Merlot, 7% Petit Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc. Hand-harvested parcel by parcel, destemmed with 15% automated berry sorting, 100% whole-berry fermentation on native yeasts, natural malolactic, minimal sulphur. Seventeen months in 100% new oak - 90% American, 7% French, 3% Ozark - with the staves famously air-dried outdoors before coopering rather than kiln-dried. Harvest ran 28 September through 18 October 2018 at an average 24.4 Brix - a long, late, cool ripening window. 13.7% ABV. 1500ml Magnum.

2018 in the Santa Cruz Mountains was classic and balanced: below-normal rainfall (around 26 inches) with most of it arriving late in March, then an even, cool growing season - producing mid-weight Cabernets with firm acidity and structural backbone. The 13.7% natural alcohol is the visible signature of that long even ripening.