*Blend: 100% Cabernet Sauvignon
*Vintage production: 100 cases
*Mole Hill was named in homage to a wine created by Robin’s father, legendary vintner John Daniel, Jr. (above). The story goes that when John’s great friend and fellow Napa Titan, Louis Martini, Sr., made a wine in the 1940s, the irony of him labelling it Mountain Red was not lost on John because Martini’s wine was from a rolling hillside vineyard versus the precipitous mountain vineyards of Europe. A brilliant man with a celebrated sense of humour and a particular love of puns, John responded with Inglenook Mole Hill Red, whose whimsical label featured a very cute mole with a magnifying glass checking a small pile of dirt.
In 1996, the Lail family acquired a special vineyard site high atop Howell Mountain, surrounding what is now Robin’s home (see attached photo), and named it Mole Hill. The vineyard’s west-facing gentle slope has shallow soils with rocks that rise to the surface like cream in coffee, creating a spartan home for the vines and generating a concentration of flavours in the grapes. These thin, rocky, and dry soil conditions create Cabernet Sauvignon with firm structure, incredible varietal intensity, and excellent aging properties.
The Mole Hill Vineyard became a core part of Lail’s iconic J. Daniel Cuvée Cabernet Sauvignon from the 1998 vintage, and gives the wine its unique and beguiling style. In 2007, the quality of the fruit was so exceptional that the best parcels were specially bottled into a limited run of 320 magnum, named Mole Hill Cabernet Sauvignon. Since this debut of this ultimate unicorn wine, only 10 vintages have been releases from the most exceptional years. Each vintage the path of the mole changes on the label designating each one unique. In Robin’s own words: “We now make a Mole Hill out of a mountain!”
