Toasted Head Cabernet Sauvignon 2006 Review

Toasted Head has a small group of wines that are elegant, yet affordable. The wine featured here is Toasted Head's Cabernet Sauvignon 2006. According to Toasted Head's website, the grapes for this wine are sourced from the Lake County region of California and from Mendocino, including the Redwood Valley. These grapes thrive in the loamy and gravel-like soil of these vineyards. They also mention that the aging process can continue for up to five years in the bottle. The bottle has a pretty unique label as it has a picture of a bear blowing fire! That is just plain awesome in itself. The dark black bottle and the deep red label complement each other spectacularly. In regards to smell, when the bottle was first opened, it smelled very strong of cherries and toasty smells from oak barrels. When poured into a wine glass, the dark reddish plum color looked very luscious. It looked as if you would grab a whole bunch of grapes and dark cherries and juiced them right into the glass. When smelled while in the wine glass, the same scents were present except there were more chocolate notes present. Not the sweet milk chocolate smell but more the dark, cocoa smell. When tasted, this wine was good. The cherry and oak notes were very present and there were small hints of the chocolate. The wine seemed somewhat dry and to not have as much fruit flavors. This wine would probably taste perfect with a hamburger, a nice steak or even a chocolate dessert. The wine was good by itself and could work at a social gathering but it's flavor would shine much more if you had cheese/red meat at that same social. This wine was tasted with Colby cheese and that tended to bring out the cherry and oak flavors much more. This wine can be found ranging from $9.99-$14.99/750mL/ in 13.5%ALC/VOL. This wine has a wonderful value for the price. This wine was purchased on sale for $9.99, after a $3.90 discount. This wine is a great entry level Cabernet Sauvignon for someone who wants to "get their feet wet" in the wine world and try the different types of wine. Soon there will be a featured review on another wine in the less-than-$10 price range so keep reading and checking back! In closing, this is a good wine for the value and works best with a food complement.

Appearance: 9/10

Scent: 8/10

Single Taste: 7/10

W/ Food Taste: 9/10

Overall Score: 8.25/10