The medium to deep garnet colored 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon Pritchard Hill, a blend of 76% Cabernet Sauvignon, 16% Petit Verdot and 8% Malbec, opens with baked blackberries and warm plums scents on the nose giving way to underlying garrigue, sautéed herbs, espresso and cedar chest. The palate is full-bodied, super concentrated and built like a brick house, with firm, grainy tannins and background freshness supporting the muscular fruit, finishing long.

Tough-edged, earthy and leathery, though deeply concentrated and muscular. Built around a core of dense dark berry fruit, mineral, cedar and graphite, this is not the early-allure charmer it's been in recent years. Best from 2013 through 2022. 2,309 cases made.

Not showing much pleasure now, it’s so tannicly astringent and shut down. Almost rustic, with a heart of blackberries and currants, and bone dry. The tannins are augmented by oak. It takes imagination to conceive of this Cabernet aging, but it probably will.