In 1886 the first blocks of the Monte Bello vineyard were planted and construction on the winery begun. The first vintage was the 1892. In the early 1940s, the last of the old vineyard was abandoned; in the late forties a few blocks were replanted. Those cabernet vines—now over sixty-five years old—produced the first Ridge Monte Bello (1962) and subsequent vintages until 1974. By then other abandoned blocks had been replanted and their fruit considered for use in the Monte Bello. A number of those consistently produced a more accessible wine that developed its full complexity earlier, and these were combined as the “Santa Cruz Mountains.” With the 2008 vintage, the name of this stylistically distinct wine became the Ridge Estate Cabernet Sauvignon, stressing the principal varietal and the Monte Bello estate vineyard as its source.

A dry winter, with only fourteen inches of rain, followed by a warm summer, created stress on the vines. Fortunately, this concentrated flavor but also required extra attention during fermentation not to over extract tannin. As a selection of lots primarily from Monte Bello’s Klein Ranch, our Estate Cabernet uses parcels that show the distinctive character of our soils and climate, but as a wine tends to mature somewhat earlier than our Monte Bello bottling. This pure, mountain cabernet is best cellared for two to three years and will improve over the following ten to fifteen.

JamesSuckling.com: 94 Points “Graphite, tobacco, grilled plums, black olives and black cherries are held firmly by velvety tannins on a medium body at 13.3% alcohol. Tense, concentrated, linear and acid-driven while deep in black fruit and subtle oak accents. Grapes grown on Ridge’s Monte Bello property at lower elevations on the slopes. Best after 2029.” -Jim Gordon (May 2024)