Benchmark Wines by

Jonata

The Winery

Jonata

“This remarkable Santa Ynez estate is under the same ownership as Napa Valley’s Screaming Eagle winery… this is one of California’s most exciting new wineries. What they are accomplishing with Bordeaux varietals is mind-boggling.”
– Robert Parker, The Wine Advocate

Jonata is a 600-acre property in Santa Barbara County with only 83 of those acres planted to vines. The name of the producer, previously owned by Charles Banks and Stanley Kroenke, comes from a Spanish land grant from the 1840s, Rancho San Carlos de Jonata. The first harvest was in 2004 under the direction of Winemaker Matt Dees who dedicated himself to produce excellent Syrah, Sangiovese, and Bordeaux varietals contrary to widespread skepticism. The winery is dedicated to sustainability as a way to continue to improve the heavily emphasized quality movement that has become popular in recent years for the California wine industry.

www.jonata.com

2014
1 In Stock
750ml
JD94–97
WA+93
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Tasting Notes

JD94
A Cabernet Sauvignon dominated blend that includes 13% Merlot and 4% each of Petit Verdot and Cabernet Franc, the 2014 El Desafio de Jonata gives up lots of blackcurrant, cedar, lend pencil and licorice aromas and flavors, medium to full-bodied…
WA93+
Matt Dees observed that the 2014 El Desafio de Jonata has really begun to open up from its rather surly state six months ago, and he opened a bottle to prove his point. While the wine is certainly still quite tightly coiled, it unfurls in the glass with an attractively complex bouquet of cassis, smoky herbs, charcoal, burning embers and espresso roast, its new oak already nicely integrated. On the palate, the wine is medium to full-bodied, with a rich chassis of structuring tannins, nice concentration and depth and a crunchy core of fruit underpinned by succulent acids. I`d be inclined to wait another year or two and then drink this over the following 6 years.

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