Foley Shelter The Butcher Cabernet Sauvignon 2016

Bob Foley is a winemaker who has always had a plan going way back to 1977 when he first started making wines at Pride Mountain. From Pride, he went on to build Parker darlings like Switchback Ridge, Hourglass and Paloma. Not possible without the best of plans. So, with that kind of resume, doors open pretty easily when it comes to finding some of the best Cabernet grapes possible in the Napa Valley. Shelter, Bob’s latest venture is an extremely polished, fruit forward, delicious bottle of wine. The wine is a powerhouse with layers of black fruit and a hint of cedar and mocha on the finish. Seven years of bottle age has smoothed out the edges; the wine is drinking beautifully right now.

Foley’s Shelter Cabernet Sauvignon gets released after years of both barrel and bottle aging once they’re finally deemed ‘ready’ by the master himself. Not starving for money or fame, Foley holds the wine back out of the purview of the critics, aging graceful, smooth blends of Napa Cabernet from some of the same vineyard sites he uses to make his signature wines. You may remember a few years back, the 2011 vintage of ‘The Shelter’ wasn’t released until 2017, and that one didn’t hold a candle to the brute force and brawniness of this, its younger sibling. This is the new 2016 vintage (I know doesn’t sound new), which also happens to be a historic year for Napa Valley Cab. Bob Foley strikes again!