Celebrating America's Wine Icon Robert Mondavi Winery's 60th Anniversary With A Taste Test Of The Commemorative 2023 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon

If anyone was to be named the face of American winemaking, and bear in mind the country has no shortage of phenomenal winemakers each with their own incredible stories and striking philosophies, it would almost undoubtedly be Robert Mondavi. His is a name that few could argue against, and many more will surely attest to. The man was the very definition of larger than life, with a vision for what American winemaking could be, a true pioneer who was so bold and ambitious that the world would literally be his oyster, and yet at the same time had a real heart for his fellow winemakers, often pushing them along and supporting them behind the scenes with a constant desire to bring American winemaking as far ahead from where he had found it - most critically, he made America believe in itself as it would soon become the dark horse of the wine world.

And so, as we celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Robert Mondavi Winery, let's attempt to do a retrospective of a man whose life surely cannot be contained in any single page. This is the Robert Mondavi story!

Robert Mondavi.

Before Mondavi took on the nickname of being the Father of American Wine, he was born in 1913 to an Italian immigrant family who had settled down in California producing bulk wines and handling fruit packing - when Prohibition hit, they would supply households around America with fresh grapes that could be turned in homemade wines. Mondavi was a bright young man very early on and would eventually graduate in 1936 from Stanford University with a degree in Economics and Business Administration, followed by further studies in viticulture and oenology at UC Berkeley. The wine world at the time was nevertheless sleepy and still reeling from the harshness of Prohibition, and yet when Mondavi had heard that the historic Charles Krug winery, Napa Valley's first commercial winery, was up for sale, he would quickly convince his parents to purchase it, which ultimately became the family business. Mondavi knew that the winery had sat on some 160 acres of prime vineyards and that with some effort and ingenuity, the winery could certainly be turned around. With Robert leading the charge as the winery's de facto global ambassador and his brother Peter taking charge of its operations, along with the introduction of pioneering winemaking methods such as cold fermentation and the use of sterile filtration, the Mondavi family would return Charles Krug to its former glory over the course of the next two decades. Unfortunately, a rift would form between Robert and his brother, culminating at a particular White House dinner with the then American President John F. Kennedy, which ultimately saw Robert leaving the family winery after 22 years of service. 

Mondavi was by far the biggest ambassador for American wines, having believed in it long before anyone else did.

Now at the very young and tender age of 53, Mondavi was to build it all from scratch once again. He would thus in 1966 establish the Robert Mondavi Winery in Oakville, California, laying the foundations of the first major winery in Napa Valley to be newly built since Prohibition. Having possessed great familiarity with arguably America's most highly regarded vineyard, To Kalon, whose name is taken to mean the highest beauty, through his family's winery, Mondavi would decisively seize the opportunity to acquire 12 acres of the famous vineyard when it came up for sale. Mondavi would also commission designer Cliff May to construct the winery's now iconic Mission-style archway and belltower, today a silhouette that any wine lover will readily recognise. Do it once, some will call it luck, but do it twice and it becomes unquestionable. And so over the course of the next almost four decades, Mondavi would build his winery into a formidable force of nature. From innovations that ranged from winemaking to wine marketing, Mondavi would do it all - he would promote the use of cold fermentation in stainless steel with the use of French oak barrels for ageing in order to compete with the French, to championing the use of varietal labelling on bottles with the likes of stating plainly that a cuvee was Cabernet Sauvignon or Sauvignon Blanc or otherwise, and then there was the time Mondavi almost played magician, having rebranded Sauvignon Blanc as Fume Blanc with the use of oak ageing and turning a wine that was deeply unpopular into one of America's greatest hits!

The iconic Robert Mondavi Winery.

Mondavi would ceaselessly advocate for American wines on the world stage as he had always done, and would further go on to show his peers what serious wine tourism looked like having turned his winery into a public tasting room that also held regular education tours and even concerts and art events, inviting the world to come and see what American wines was all about. Mondavi's unyielding energy would of course not be confined to America, as the man would forge high profile wine partnerships with some of the most famous winemaking families from around the world, starting first with Opus One in 1978 which saw Mondavi partner with Bordeaux's Baron Philippe de Rothschild (of Chateau Lafite Rothschild), before then expanding beyond the United States to work with the Marchesi de Frescobaldi family in establishing the Super Tuscan Tenuta Luce in Italy in 1995 (with whom he would also share in Tenuta dell'Ornellaia), followed by the first Chilean 100-pointer Sena that was inaugurated in the same year with Eduardo Chadwick of Vina Errazuriz. Beyond the wine, Mondavi was also notably a passionate philanthropist, having greatly sought to support what is today the UC Davis Robert Mondavi Institute for Wine and Food Science in a bid to help raise future generations of winemakers who would help push the frontier further from where they would pick it up from Mondavi's tapestry of work. Mondavi would pass away in 2008 at the age of 94, leaving behind an incomparable fingerprint on the American wine story that would remain for many years to come.

Nestled in the legendary To Kalon vineyard.

Today, the Robert Mondavi Winery remains an icon of American winemaking, now part of one of the country's most successful drinks producers Constellation Brands (which also owns the likes of Corona, Modelo and Pacifico beers, as well as wine brands such as Kim Crawford, Ruffino, Schrader Cellars and Lingua Franca, with also spirits brands including High West and Casa Noble Tequila) since 2004. The winery, having expanded its ownership of the legendary To Kalon vineyard to some 500 acres (which is also used to produce the prized Opus One), now produces over 115 distinct labels, with wines ranging from Cabernet Sauvignon and Sauvignon Blanc to Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Malbec, Syrah and Pinot Grigio, amongst others. Impressively, it has also been named in the World's 50 Best Vineyards list for all seven consecutive years of the list's publication, today lading the charge in organic and sustainable farming having been conferred full Napa Green Certified. In the lead-up to the winery's big 60th anniversary milestone, it would undergo a substantial three year transformation that has seen the winery now equipped with state of the art winemaking infrastructure, from the likes of gravity flow systems to optical sorting technology and also an expanded portfolio of stainless steel, oak and concrete vessels.

And so with all that said, it's time for just one last thing - taste testing the Robert Mondavi Winery's 60th Anniversary Comemmorative Edition 2023 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon!

Let's go!

Wine Review: 2023 Robert Mondavi WInery 60th Anniversary Commemorative Edition Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon

100% Cabernet Sauvignon.

With fruit almost equal parts harvested from Robert Mondavi Winery's To Kalon and Wappo Hill vineyards, the wine was made with 24 days on the skins and with 19 months of ageing in 36.30% new French oak.

Tasting Notes

Colour: Deep Dark Ruby

Aroma: Opens with opulent jammy dark fruits of blackberries, prunes, plums and blueberries, with alongside a rugged earthiness of leather, tobacco, cigar boxes, a dash of bouillon cube umami, with then a chewiness of black licorice and mulberry leaves. Running through the bouquet is a minerality of spring water and sleek, steely graphite, and an edge of cedar.

Taste: Medium-bodied, it's juicy, creamy and with a good richness, polished, silky and plush, with the same generous body of bramble fruits, plums, prunes, blackberries, mulberries and blueberries, closely padded with that earthiness of leather and tobacco, and this time garnished with sensual and perfumed rose petals. That bit of umami bouillon cubes offers a counterpoint to the sensual, inky opulence. An undercurrent of mineral spring water and basalt gives the body a lift of freshness, with the acidity light and sleek and the tannins fine grained and resolved, if not a little powdery. Adding a little edginess is that delicate yet pointed element of shaved cedar and whetted graphite. 

Finish: More of those brooding yet handsome dark fruits, of plums, prunes, blackcurrants, mulberries, and alittle more assorted here with additions of raspberries and blueberries. Those fragrant rose petals carry over, more evocative now, with that textural chewiness of black licorice alongside the melding of bouillon, leather, tobacco, wet stone and cedar into the clean and perfumed floral and leafy, slightly herbal finish. Prune preserves linger on.

My Thoughts

A really charismatic and handsome expression that is polished, broad and broodingly generous. It's an abyss of sensual dark fruits that are always perfumed with florals and well balanced with umaminess, earthiness and minerality. The fruits exude an almost beguiling mystique that jostles with its understated complexity. As opulent as the body is, juicy and structured, it's also not heavy, with a pleasurable stature and weight, more than enough to hold its own with heavier foods like steak, yet sufficiently lifted to maintain its appeal for more. With the acidity present and sleek, the tannins resolved and fine grained, this sits ready at the crosspoint of being availably approachable and also having that body and structure that says it can still age for a couple of years, hinting towards having more to reveal. Incredibly stylish and masculine, this is a moreish wine that's as effortlessly charming as it is straight up hedonistic.