Black Stallion’s director of winemaking, Ralf Holdenried.
Led by German-born Ralf Holdenried, Black Stallion Winery’s winemaking team – including fourth-generation Indelicato family winemaker Stephen Mathews — save their best grapes and best terroirs for the Prestige Collection.
Complex, age-worthy reds aimed at exhibiting the pinnacle varietal expression of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. How they differ comes down to sourcing, wine style and technique.
Bucephalus blend
‘Bucephalus is always a blend of three or more red varieties’, explained Holdenried, suggesting the inspiration is plainly Right Bank Bordeaux. Cabernet Sauvignon generally makes up about three-quarters of the blend with small amounts of Petit Verdot and Malbec to soften the palate.
Some vintages may even include a splash of Syrah to layer in floral notes and spice to the bouquet.
‘We typically use fruit from high-elevation mountain vineyards for Bucephalus, ones that yield small berries with more concentrated fruit and more tannin, from sites on Diamond Mountain, Howell Mountain and Atlas Peak’.
Entirely Transcendent
By contrast, Transcendent is always entirely Cabernet Sauvignon. ‘It’s a selection of the twenty best barrels of the vintage, which always represent each of the three key terroirs that define Napa Valley’, said Holdenried, ‘its benchlands, hillsides and valley floor’.
Because sourcing for Transcendent is not tied to any particular vineyard, Holdenried – apprenticed by assistant winemaker Stephen Mathews, whose great-grandfather founded the family’s original winery in Manteca, California – is free to ‘cherry pick the very best fruit we crush that year’, as he put it, which is how the winemaking team can maintain consistently high quality from vintage to vintage with Transcendent.
‘The combination of immensely structured, textured mountain fruit and softer, valley floor fruit, and the nuances that one finds in certain benchland vineyards, is key for us in creating a Cabernet of both power and finesse’.
Earning renown
What the two wines share is a sumptuous fruit profile that telegraphs their Napa Valley origins and a growing following abroad, particularly in Europe. Holdenried has been visiting the EU regularly in recent years to tell Black Stallion’s story.
‘I’ll be in northern Europe in November, and back again for Vinexpo Paris 2025. It’s gratifying to see the winery gain recognition and to make those personal connections with our trade partners and consumers. It’s the ultimate reason why I find winemaking meaningful — to bring pleasure to the table through the prism of wine’.
Even in the midst of the 2024 harvest, Holdenried, like so many other Napa producers, can’t stop thinking about the previous 2023 vintage in barrel, and is surely anticipating blends to come out of that exceptional harvest.
‘I am super pumped about our 2023s. The vintage is spectacular. These are some of the best wines we’ve ever made’, he said. With mild, optimal weather throughout the growing season and longer hang-times, grapes ripened perfectly, and the reds have polished tannin with pure flavours and ample structure.
‘These are wines that take you from beginning, to middle, to the very end, and the long, luxurious finishes on the ‘23s point to tremendous potential for ageability’.
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