In 2017, we had the extreme good fortune of meeting Will Segui at Mending Wall, and he told us about he and his wife’s own wine project, William and Mary. We instantly wanted on that list!
We received the 2016 wines this last shipping season and, since the wines were new to us, have been eagerly waiting for a chance to Pobega them and check them out. Last night we had a friend over for his birthday and he is a young Napa cab aficionado, so the time was right!
Man, where to begin…
2016 William and Mary Proprietary Red: My wife led the way on this, she knew nothing of the composition. She immediately mentioned “structure” and commented on the subtle perfume notes she picked up, saying that she would guess some merlot or even petit verdot were in the mix. Then she qualified her description and added, “But in the context of balance.”
There were ample tanins, not too much oak (I would not overtly use “oak” as a primary descriptor for this wine,) all the fruit was complex in nature, and well balanced by how freaking well built this wine is.
We talk about ‘big’ wines, but it means something different to us. This wine is ‘big’ in the way that it makes your brain take full notice. You can tell you are really onto something good with this wine.
On the modern fruit scale, I would compliment this wine and say it was a bit austere, in the best way.
Katy guessed 25% or less merlot, with the “bigger boys” as the main part of the mix. I mention this because the wine is 50% merlot and 50% cab franc, but comes across as a getting the most backbone possible out of each grape.
Really fantastic.
2016 William and Mary cabernet: Well, everybody in the room got whiffs of this bottle as it sat open. The term ‘room filling’ was true. I was ready to post a note based only on the nose!
This is everything I could want in a cabernet in my life. It is the proverbial iron fist in a velvet glove. Nobody felt that there was anything other than cabrenet present and it straddled the most difficult line that exists in California cabs, for me. It is not overtly soft on the palate like many modern cabs, and it hearkens back to the days of classic cabernet structure from 30-50 years ago for Napa. This thing has a backbone and a keel! Plenty of acid and tannin and I bet it will live 30+ years.
I apolgize for the absurdness of this next descriptor: no need to mention which fruits were present on the palate and on the nose…it reeked of cabernet perfection. My brain couldn’t look for “cassis,” or “red fruit,” this 100% tastes of cabernet.
It had a mouth filling sensation of flavor and a huge top mid to rear palate and sides of the tongue finish that went on forever. (I would compliment its acid balance but I don’t know enough to say for sure if that’s what it is.) Another thing I like to catch in a wine are cedar and ‘pencil lead’ notes, and I got both from this in the sea of greatness that came out of that bottle.
This is perhaps the best new release cab I have ever tasted. I know, the recency of the experience looms large vs. past experience, but the wine is that great. I can’t recall the last time my jaded palate plotzed with the joy of my younger palate discovering a great wine. It’s an “epiphany wine” for Napa cab lovers.
Flawless.
It’s so good, I went and bought some more (I hope that was allowed, the website let me do it) of both.
Thank you to Will for this essentially perfect wine.
My highest recommendation on these.
As always, thank you to Mike Pobega for your contagious enthusiasm about opening young wines. People should buy a few and open one now for the joy of the experience.
. What is a “Pobega Experience” and how does one “Pobega” a wine?![[cheers.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/0ff9bfcdb0964982cd3240b6159868fbdf215b1a.gif "cheers"){kind=small}