Realm Cellars The Absurd 2018

  • 100 Jeb
    Dunnuck
  • 99 Robert
    Parker
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Realm Cellars The Absurd 2018  Front Bottle Shot
Realm Cellars The Absurd 2018  Front Bottle Shot Realm Cellars The Absurd 2018  Front Label

Product Details


Varietal

Region

Producer

Vintage
2018

Size
750ML

Features
Collectible

Boutique

Your Rating

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Somm Note

Winemaker Notes

The Absurd stems from a simple yet fantastically complex proposition: it’s the very best wine that Realm Cellars produces. It began in 2005, a big, gorgeous vintage that gave the winery an abundance of glorious fruit. With no rules, no restrictions, they created what they called the super blend, the best of the best.

The Absurd is only made in certain years, when there is enough fruit to make this small blend without impacting the other Realm wines. The Absurd could be one varietal, it could be five. It could come from one vineyard lot, it could come from a dozen. Each time they make The Absurd they start with a blank canvas. The sole guideline is the palate. The sole aim is the best Napa Valley wine of the vintage.

Professional Ratings

  • 100
    As always, the 2018 Absurd is a cellar selection of what the estate thinks is the absolute best they can do in the vintage, and in this reviewer’s opinion, they succeed brilliantly. (I’ve rated four of the five vintages I’ve tasted 100 points.) The 2018 reveals a dense purple/blue color to go with a monster bouquet of blackcurrants, scorched earth/burning embers, tobacco, lead pencil shavings, chocolate, and gravelly earth. I’ve often compared this wine to a great Pessac from Bordeaux given its incredible minerality and cold fireplace-like nuances, and the 2018 has these in spades. Concentrated, full-bodied, and built like a skyscraper, it builds beautifully with time in the glass and has incredible purity, silky, polished tannins, and a dense, layered mid-palate. As with the majority of Realm’s 2018s, the cellar is going to be your friend, since this needs a good 5-7 years of bottle age, but it will be incredibly long-lived. Hats off to winemaker Benoit Touquette and the entire team at Realm for yet another magical, legendary wine.
  • 99
    The 2018 The Absurd—the estate's über-blend of the best elements from the vintage—displays a deep garnet-purple color, offering alluring notes of baked plums, crème de cassis and boysenberries with suggestions of chocolate box, aniseed, iron ore and candied violets plus a perfumed hint of Indian spices. The full-bodied palate is an exercise in decadence, coating the mouth in black fruit preserves and exotic spice layers, supported by velvety tannins and beautifully integrated freshness, finishing epically long and fragrant.

Other Vintages

2021
  • 100 Jeb
    Dunnuck
  • 95 James
    Suckling
2019
  • 100 Jeb
    Dunnuck
  • 100 Robert
    Parker
  • 96 James
    Suckling
2017
  • 97 Jeb
    Dunnuck
2016
  • 99 Robert
    Parker
2015
  • 100 Robert
    Parker
  • 100 Jeb
    Dunnuck
  • 95 James
    Suckling
2014
  • 100 Robert
    Parker
  • 97 James
    Suckling
2013
  • 100 Robert
    Parker
  • 96 James
    Suckling
  • 93 Wine
    Spectator
2012
  • 100 Robert
    Parker
Realm Cellars

Realm Cellars

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Realm Cellars, California
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Realm Cellars is one of Napa Valley’s most electrifying wine brands with estate vineyards in Stags Leap District, Pritchard Hill and Coombsville. In 2012, owner Scott Becker and his partner, winemaker Benoit Touquette teamed up to revive a nearly bankrupt brand. Since then, Realm has been transformed into one of the most collected wineries in Napa Valley, with a vineyard portfolio that today exemplifies the beauty and longevity of Napa Valley. Making wine at the very highest level is at the core of Realm Cellars. Since 2012, the wines have been awarded more 100-point scores from internationally recognized wine critics than any other producer in Napa Valley.

Formerly the Hartwell Estate, Realm acquired the property in 2015 and began initial construction and development phases of an endeavor that will take decades to realize. In 2022, Realm acquired Nine Suns and Houyi Vineyard in Napa Valley’s famed area, Pritchard Hill. Realm’s portfolio of wines includes estate, single vineyard wines and proprietary blends, unified by a “style” best described as a creative tension between richness and precision, density and finesse, purity of fruit and nuance. In addition to its estate vineyard sites, Realm partners with Napa Valley’s most prestigious and iconic wine growers and vineyard sites, including Beckstoffer Dr. Crane and Beckstoffer To Kalon.

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Undoubtedly proving its merit over and over, Napa Valley is a now a leading force in the world of prestigious red wine regions. Though Cabernet Sauvignon dominates Napa Valley, other red varieties certainly thrive here. Important but often overlooked include Merlot and other Bordeaux varieties well-regarded on their own as well as for their blending capacities. Very old vine Zinfandel represents an important historical stronghold for the region and Pinot noir is produced in the cooler southern parts, close to the San Pablo Bay.

Perfectly situated running north to south, the valley acts as a corridor, pulling cool, moist air up from the San Pablo Bay in the evenings during the hot days of the growing season, which leads to even and slow grape ripening. Furthermore the valley claims over 100 soil variations including layers of volcanic, gravel, sand and silt—a combination excellent for world-class red wine production.

KJOKJ2551_2018 Item# 780284

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