Monte Bello

Very beautiful colour with pronounced depth for this very pretty wine, with a wonderful elegance and remarkable balance. A must in California...

The history of Ridge Vineyard dates back to 1885 when Osea Perrone, a practicing physician, bought 70 hectares near the top of Monte Bello Ridge in the Santa Cruz Mountains at 850 metres above sea level and planted terraced vineyards. In 1940, the vineyard, then abandoned, was bought by William Short, a theologian who planted several plots of Cabernet Sauvignon. However, it was not until 1959 that the first vintage of Monte Bello Cabernet Sauvignon was produced under the supervision of Dave Bennion and his three partners, all of whom were researchers at Stanford University. In 1967 Ridge Vineyards became a private company with a production of 3000 cases per year.

In 1989, Paul Draper, a graduate in Philosophy from Stanford University, joined the company on his return from Chile where he had been running a winery. Paul Draper is not an oenologist and has a very pragmatic approach that compliments the winery's philosophy of expertise gained over the years. Paul Draper's philosophy is simple, find the grapes with the greatest aromatic intensity and extract these aromas in the most natural way possible. He succeeded in bringing Ridge to the pinnacle of Californian winemaking and was named Decanter's Man of the Year in 2000. All of the estate's wines were fermented with natural yeasts, the reds in small vats to increase the intensity of the extractions and the Chardonnays, unstemmed, in naturally dried French (65%) and American (35%) oak barrels. The Zinfandel is vinified with the cap submerged, while the other varieties are vinified by gently pumping the grape juice over the cap at regular intervals.

The thirty parcels that make up the Monte Bello vineyard are fermented separately and aged for 85% in American oak barrels and 15% in French oak barrels. The blending is done after the malolactic fermentations and is based on blind tasting of the different vintages. All important decisions (harvesting, pressing, sub-strapping, bottling) are based on sensory analysis, with laboratory analysis used only to confirm sensory decisions. The best Cabernet Sauvignon vintages are selected for the estate's flagship wine, Ridge Monte Bello, while the others are blended for Ridge Santa Cruz.