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96 Wine Spectator
Dramatic, with its ripe, rich, plush core of exotic currant, anise, cedar, vanilla and berry notes that are enormously complex on the finish. Delicious.--Opus One vertical. Drink now through 2010. 20,500 cases made. ?JL
90 Robert Parker
In a blind tasting, this wine did not fool many tasters when served blind. It was quickly identified as a California wine despite the fact that it is made in a Bordeaux-like style. The wine performed well, exhibiting a deep ruby/purple color, a lead pencil, grapy, spicy oak-scented nose, medium body, a tight, more compact texture than the Bordeaux, as well as more elevated and obvious new oak. Rich and ripe, as well as graceful, it stood out as having higher acidity than the Bordeaux. Although soft enough to be drunk, the 1990 Opus One is capable of lasting 15 or more years.
Producer
Opus One Winery
Unarguably the most well-known European wine families, the Rothschilds, paired up with one of the great New World wine pioneers, Mondavi, to create this legendary Californian estate. What started as a joint venture between the two, Robert Mondavi of Napa Valley and Baron Philippe de Rothschild of Bordeaux’s Château Mouton Rothschild back in 1978, the Opus One Estate is now one of California’s most high-profile wineries. They released their first vintage, the 1979, in 1981, at a then astonishing price of fifty dollars a bottle. When the Cabernet blend was released, it was originally named Napamedoc, but in 1982, they began to label it under Opus One - accentuating the bond between the old and new world. A blend of all five Bordeaux varieties, the icon wine consists of Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, Malbec and Petit Verdot. This flagship wine, along with the duo’s innovative vision, has made the Opus One Estate Napa Valley’s leading cult-winery.