Kirk Venge's Silencieux Cab is about as pleasure-bent as Napa Cab gets. The 2022 is no exception, and this stuff is opulent, decadent, polished, and it really showcases all of the virtues of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon.
After a long absence from the shop, it's back, and the '22 is drinking like a dream. It truly showcases Kirk Venge's mastery of Cabernet Sauvignon, and you're going to love it!
2022 Venge Silencieux Cabernet Sauvignon
Kills Caymus, destroys Duckhorn, and slays Silver Oak!
I've stocked every vintage of this wine back to 2010, and it is always a great snapshot of the vintage. Kirk includes grapes from Calistoga, Oakville, and Rutherford for the composition of Silencieux, and this showcases classic valley floor richness, density, and style.
I've never had a bad vintage of this wine, and that is because Venge is a quality fanatic. Silencieux is his highest-production Cab, but he still only makes roughly 7,000 cases of it. At that production level, he can still hand-harvest, hand-sort, and hand-make this wine to maintain the consistent quality we've all come to know this wine for.
Before I get into my own tasting notes, I must remind you that we never get enough of this wine. We sold 300+ cases last year before it ran out -- we could have easily sold a bunch more. I attribute the success of this wine to its very high quality-to-price ratio. As I've said in the past, this destroys a lot of more well known Cabs that cost two to three times the price.
Incredible value for money, that's what this wine delivers. It's made using the same care and "ingredients" as many wines that cost 3 to 4 times the price. Fruit comes from top sites in Calistoga, Oakville, and Rutherford, and the wine is aged for 18 months in high quality (and high dollar) French oak (65% new). The finished product slays so many Napa Cabs that cost so much more.
Okay, I've hyped the hell out of this thing -- here are my personal tasting notes. Opaque in color, very "leggy" in the glass, and the nose is classic Venge. Huge notes of cassis, ripe dark berries, dark chocolate, vanilla bean, espresso, and oak spice all come out to play. This coats every square inch of the palate and offers up similar flavors as aromas.
Seamless in texture with fine-grained, ripe tannins, this is a big wine that drinks a little too easily. Super long on the finish! Like most vintages of this wine, this offers immediate gratification, but I suspect it will provide great drinking over the next 10-15 years.
