Halpin Cabernet Sauvignon 2016 | Absolutely delicious
Halpin Cabernet Sauvignon 2016 pours with ruby-black with crimson reflections. While the aromas offer a heady blast. Comprised of red and blue fruits, black cherry, cassis, muddled violets, fine French cedar, and underbrush. Notably, palate-coating with the kind of impressive, grippy tannins that call to mind the first sips from a bottle of Georges de Latour or Beringer Private Reserve, filling the mouth with rich boysenberry, red currants, candied black cherry, mocha spices, and a kind of blood-orange acid citrus that makes it utterly refreshing sip after sip. A powerful Cabernet with a tight-knit structure, not over-extracted, but fresh, balanced, and impressive. Recommended 30-45 minute decant at cellar temperature to allow the fruit flavors and aromas to open up. Enjoy now – 2026.
Halpin | Exclusive Sourcing
The short story is that, in Robert Parker’s 98-point vintage, Halpin and his winemaker Ry Richards are tapping incredible sources that are usually earmarked for $100 bottles. “The main vineyard source for Halpin Cabernet Sauvignon 2016 is a west-facing, well-drained slope on the Vaca mountains just off Silverado Trail in the Stags Leap District planted to Clone C. The second source is a low-yielding site on well-drained clay loam in the heart of St. Helena. Of course, it’s a tiny site favored by top Cabernet producers as a blending component. Almost exclusively revered for their $100+ bottles because it brings a firm tannic backbone and lushness of fruit to the final blend.
Winemaker Ry Richards
Working in a wine shop stocking shelves is what sparked Ry’s interest in wine. So wanting to know more about what was in the boxes in the back room tasting at any available opportunity. Then he went off to college (UCLA if you really want to know) and thought about going to med school, but wine beckoned.
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Through good timing and a bit of luck, Ry got an internship at William Harrison Winery. Only there working with their winemaker and a consultant named Phillip Titus. Phillip became his mentor teaching while checking in to make sure Ry was doing the right things. Then impressing Titus, so he offered Ry a job at Sonoma-Loeb in 2006. With Ry being on the winemaking team ever since. He’s been a Cellar Rat, forklift grunt, barrel boy…you name it, Ry has been there. Ultimately learning to craft graceful wines under Phillip’s tutelage. And of course through this adventure becoming a rising star in Napa.
