2017 Tychson Hill Cabernet Sauvignon

Starting out, the 2017 Tychson Hill is gorgeous, revealing a saturated purple color as well as a sweet bouquet of blackcurrants, ground herbs, chocolate, toasted bread, and subtle yet high class oak. Full-bodied, beautifully textured, and flawlessly balanced on the palate, it has silky tannins, a stacked mid-palate, and a big finish. This is a backward, primordial beauty that’s going to need 4-5 years of bottle age yet shine for 30 years or more.

The 2017 Cabernet Sauvignon Tychson Hill is bright, focused and bristling with energy. In 2017, Tychson Hill is more overly tannic and structured than in most years, but all that means is that readers need to be a bit patient. A rush of black cherry, plum, lavender, mint and licorice builds as this explosive Cabernet Sauvignon gradually opens up in the glass. Heady and exotic in its beauty, the 2017 is positively stellar. It reminds me a bit of the 2001, a wine that needed years to soften and be at its very best. That may very well be the case here as well. (AG) 96+

The berries at Tychson Hill vineyard were very small in 2017. “This wine totally required baby steps with the extraction,” said winemaker Allison Tauziet. Very deep purple-black in color, the 2017 Cabernet Sauvignon Tychson Hill Vineyard leaps from the glass with vibrant black cherries, warm blackberries and blackcurrant scents with hints of violets, dark chocolate, lavender and camphor plus a fragrant waft of rose hip tea. Medium to full-bodied, the structure is taut, restraining all the tightly packed, energetic black fruit layers, with a wonderfully fine-grained texture and bags of freshness, finishing long and mineral laced. Still very tightly wound, this one needs time, but it should handsomely reward patience.