Maddalena Cabernet Sauvignon

Maddalena is both a wine brand name and that brand's namesake.  Born in Piedmont, Italy, Maddalena would marry into the Riboli wine-making family of Los Angeles and then became instrumental in their San Antonio Winery.  The winery had been established in 1917 concurrently with the family's ongoing wholesale food business.  If you follow their timeline, things at San Antonio really started taking off when Maddalena became involved in the 1940's.

Today the Riboli family has vineyard holdings in Monterey, Paso Robles and Napa and markets wines under thirteen labels.  The Maddalena label was started in 1983 and today uses fruit from their estate in the El Pomar American Viticultural Area (AVA) within the larger Paso Robles AVA.

Back on April 15th we blogged about the Santa Lucia Highlands AVA and the strong winds from the Monterey Bay that cooled the area sufficiently enough to grow some pretty good Pinot Noir.  El Pomar gets those same breezes further south through the Templeton Gap.  Central to the whole of Paso Robles, the AVA is a higher elevation than most of Paso and has soils that reflect its marine past with alluvial fans and dry river and creek beds.  Drainage is no problem with these kinds of soils so root systems can flourish.

The winds mentioned earlier serve to modulate the temperatures often providing a twenty to thirty-five degree shift daily, essential for creating lush ripe flavorful fruit.  The 2021 Maddalena Cabernet Sauvignon in the store right now is bold and structured with a rich round body, silky texture and soft tannins.  Flavors may include ripe dark plum, spicy cherry, vanilla, carmel and oak.  It is the best we have under twenty dollars.