Bruce Schoenfeld: In my opinion, this is the finest Mondavi Cabernet ever made. There’s a springtime feel to the wine, the smell of fresh-cut lawns and blooming violets and a consistent crispness from the long, cool growing season that gets more and more appealing as the wine matures. This bottle was impeccable. Still almost totally opaque, it shows off the California sunshine—including a September heat spike that rapidly advanced what had been a sluggish ripening process—to great effect. Yet the wine never seems lugubrious or the slightest bit unbalanced. It’s aged in 80% new oak, a slightly lower proportion than most of the Mondavi Reserves of that era—and one that well suits the vintage.