California Wine Report

2002 pinot bonanza from Marcassin

2012-01-11T10:00:00.001+01:00

Helen Turley is one of the most renowned winemakers. During her career, she's been making wines for numerous of high end wineries, such as Peter Michael Winery, Pahlmeyer, Bryant Family Vineyards, Colgin Cellars, Blankiet and Martinelli Vineyards.

Her own Marcassin Vineyard was planted in 1991. At that time Helen Turley and her husband John Wetlaufer planted 3.45 hectares of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir at the property with undeveloped land they had bought out close to Jenner out in the true Sonoma Coast in 1985.

The first wines under the Marcassin Vineyard label was made in 1990, but at that time they they only used grapes purchased from vineyards owned by the Martinelli family and by Jess Jackson, and since the Marcassin Vineyard selection was added, that vineyard has been planted with more vines several times, and now covers almost 16 hectares.

Their own vineyard is located on at around 340-400 meters on a slope close to the clusters of vineyards owned by Flowers Vineyards, Pahlmeyer, Peter Michael Winery and not too far away from Hirsch Vineyard. It shares a combination of cool breezes from the Pacific and the warmer temperatures at the higher elevation.

Helen Turley says that it's not important for a wine to be able to keep well in the cellars, and to her ageing does not always make a wine better of more complex. However, I have often noticed that I'm not too impressed by her wines when young, since I find them to be a bit closed, earthy and tannic, even with a little too much influence of the oak. Compared to others pinots of the same reputation (e.g. those from Williams Selyem, Hirsch Vineyard, Rochioli), they lack perfumes and floral notes. The Marcassin wines are quite different, they offer deeper and in one way more complex flavors, they seems to be more rustic and well structured in a Vosne-Romanée-like way.

This tasting with almost ten year old wines, showed a quite different experience than I have had from tasting her younger wines over the years. Now, when the wines has come to age, the tannic structure is softer, the acidity is still fresh, and hand in hand with the more seductive secondary aromas that has developed, there's still a beautiful fruitiness in them. I must say I was totally impressed by some of these wines, and the verdict based on this tasting is that the pinots from good vintages should be kept at least 8-10 years. None of these wines were fully matured, and they all developed well in the glasses during the hour we had them there!

2002 Pinot Noir Three Sisters Vineyard / 91-92 p

Color is pale cherry red with some yellowish nuances of maturity. Of the four this is the most elegant, also the lightest although it still offers a good depth, but not as open as the others. At almost ten years of age, there's still a lot of primary red fruit aromas, and really no signs of maturation, and it's quite complex.
On the palate it's almost medium bodied, very elegant and fresh with a fine and almost silky tannic structure, still it's a bit closed as the finish, which is totally dry and fresh, is not as long and open as in the others. The alcohol is a bit warm, unfortunately, and that's the main reason for not mistaking this wine from coming from Burgundy.
I would serve this at around 15 degrees Celsius, normally in a Burgundy shapes glass, but if you feel the alcohol warmth, you may well pour it in a Bordeaux shaped glass, that would help a bit.
Drink it 2012-2016

2002 Pinot Noir Bondi Home Ranch / 94 p

Color in this wine, as in all four, is identical to that of the Three Sisters Vineyard. It offers a deeper and a bit more intense strawberry fruit aromas, quite similar to what can be found in great wines from Gevrey-Chambertin, as well as some earthy and complex note. Compared to the Three Sister Vineyard bottling, it's just a bit more open.
On the palate, it's medium bodied, quite rich and elegant with the same burgundian red fruit qualities, a lively acidity and some mineral notes, as well as a bit more firm tannic structure than in the previous wine. Again, there's bit earthiness and, which I really like, that sweet touch of raspberries and strawberries so often found in the best premier crus and even grand crus of Gevrey-Chambertin. Serve it at 15 degrees Celsius in a Burgundy glass. As for the others, I prefer to aerate it at least 30 minutes in a decanter prior to serving it.
Drink it 2012-2018

2002 Pinot Noir Blue Slide Ridge / 94 p

I really like the perfumes of this wine, it's more vibrant, intense, sweetish and at the same time with a lovely note of sour cherries, and it also offers some floral qualities that add complexity. Overall, the impression is that this site is cooler than the others, and the overall balance it just beautiful.
On the palate it's more silky the previous two wines, most likely because it higher density, which also gives the impression there's more concentration and richer fruit here. I find the tannins be more or less at the same level as in the others, which gives a dry taste rather than a firm structure, as in the others, the acidity is lively and fresh. Again, the alcohol is a bit warm in the finish, but I don't really find it to be too negative. Overall, the balance is just fine and with food, which is the right way to serve these wines, the warm sensation of the alcohol will be totally incorporated. Serve it in the same way as the others.
Drink it 2012-2018

2002 Pinot Noir Marcassin Vineyard / 95 p

If the other wines are the premier crus of Marcassin, this offers the concentration and depths worthy a classification of grand cru. It's not only more powerful and rich, it's also a bit more refined and elegant. It offers layers of sweet raspberries and strawberries as well as dark red roses and just a touch of earthiness and I have to say this is delicious.
This is not the most concentrated of the quartet, but it is for sure the most structured wine. Tannins are still evident and keeps the intense fruit in a second position, although you for sure will notice the intensity of it. Dark cherries, ripe raspberries and strawberries are to be found here, but there's also a earthy and quite spicy quality that adds a certain complexity. The finish is quite long, but marked by the tannins and also a slight bitterness, which I guess will soften with another year or so in the bottle. One thing that strikes me with this wine, and the quartet in general, is that their flavors are more intense than their taste. To me, that's a positive thing. Far too many pinots are overly sweet and lush. Compared to what's found in Burgundy, if one even should make a comparison, is that most of the best wines in Burgundy are built on aromas and structure, and less on taste and sweetness. So I guess one could use the term "burgundy like here". But it took several years for this particular wine to reach that stage!
Drink it 2012-2020

Echoes from the past - Louis M Martini wines with age

2012-01-06T00:42:00.000+01:00

Only five wineries survived the prohibition. Two of them was in Napa Valley, Beringer Vineyards (founded 1876) and Beaulieu Vineyards (founded 1900). After prohibition, just a few wineries came back in production, and by 1960 there was just around 250 wine producers in California. In Napa Valley, there were a dozen. The new golden age wouldn't come until early 1970s, in the footsteps of the opening of Robert Mondavi Winery in 1966, and some years after the Paris Tasting in 1976, wine had become a more significant part of the culture in California.
Back in the 1950s and 1960s, the wine scene looked much different than it does today. I Napa Valley, some good wines was made at Beringer Vineyards, Beaulieu Vineyards, Christian Brothers, at the legendary Inglenook, by the Mondavi family at Charles Krug Winery, and at Louis M Martini in St Helena.

Louis Martini established his wine company already in 1923, when he bought a small winery in Fresno in Central Valley and started to buy, pack and sell grapes to home winemakers all over the country. Ten years later, after repeal, he moved to Napa Valley, which at that time was a rural valley with orchards, walnut farms and cattle ranches. There were only a few wineries, but no market for fine wines.

In 1940 Louis Martini begun to bottle some of his wines under his own label, and over some years he also bought several vineyard and more land to plant vineyards in Napa County (he was one of the pioneers in Carneros), Sonoma County (notably the famous Monte Rosso Vineyard) and in Lake County.

The Louis M Martini Winery reached its peak during the 1950s and 1960s, at that time the only wineries that could compete with their quality was Inglenook and Beaulieu Vineyards. In the late 1950s, Louis Martini was the first winemaker in California to install stainless steel tanks to ferment his wines in - up to that date, only old redwood tanks or cement vats were used.

When Louis Martini retired in 1959, his son Louis Peter Martini took over and was in charge of the wine making until 1977, when his son Michael Martini took over. He's still in charge of the production, even though the Gallo family bought Louis M Martini Winery in 2002.

I decided not to rate these old wines, how does one do that? What does the scores tell you? These are old and rare wines, echoes from the past. They are part of the Napa Valley wine history, of the California wine history. Bottles like these are not easy to find, they just show up if you are lucky. I was blessed by the opportunity to buy parts of an old cellar, and it was worth every dollar. Memories from the past are in my world not subjects for judging, for scoring, or for even consider if they are worth the prices asked for or not. For me, they are part of the lifelong education, and they tell you something about where we are today. If these wines have kept so well, I guess we don't have to worry too much over more recent vintages.

1966 California Mountain Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon / NR

As for the 1958 wine, this bottle was also in good shape with a firm (but short) cork and good level. Surprisingly, it was almost a bit closed the first ten minutes in the glass - I decanted it from its sediment right before serving it - but it opened up just fine over time in the glass. It wasn't as intense and concentrated as the 1958, but it shared the same earthy and sous bois complexity and that kind of sweet fruitiness and tobacco aromas that matured wines shows. I followed this wine over almost an hour in the glass, and it didn't fade away, which I find to be remarkable. On the palate, it's lighter that the 1958, totally mature with silky tannins, a quite soft acidity and a fine sweetness, and the aftertaste is good but not as long and complex as the one in the older vintage. I wasn't around in the wine world at that time, so my knowledge and experience of the vintages is limited, if not non existing. However, I guess that 1966 wasn't as great vintage as the 1958. Still this is a delicious wine that all my wine loving and wine collecting friends were totally overwhelmed by. I would definitely buy another bottle if I come across one.
Drink it over the next few years

1958 California Mountain Special Selection Cabernet Sauvignon / NR

The bottle was in good shape, the level was high shoulder and color looked reddish through the bottle. Of course there was some sediment in the wine, but it looked just fine. It was surprisingly easy to pull the cork, it came out in one piece without any problems. I needed to decant the wine to remove the sediment, but since it was a 53 year old wine, I only decanted it just before serving it. Far too many old wines has died on their way from the bottle to the last served glass, and I didn't want that to happen with this rare wine.
The wine has a bright, clear and mature appearance with tawny brick color with just a slight brownish nuance. The nose was surprisingly clean and vibrant despite the fact that is shows a distinct maturation with notes of prunes, sweet tobacco, chocolate, sous bois and truffles. It may have been a desire or imagination, but I actually felt a totally clean and sweet red fruit aroma as well, which to me indicated the wine was still alive and kicking.
The most interesting detail about this tasting, was that it was poured blind next to another wine, which was younger and more lively, a very good wine but actually not that much more exciting. That wine was the 1976 Château Petrus from Pomerol. Good God!
Well, back to the 1958, on the palate is was just lovely with a seductive texture, just like velvet. The tannins were fully matured and silky, yet they added a certain structure to the superb, slightly sweet fruit. By all means this wine is fully mature, and will not gain anything from further ageing, but I have to say I was more than surprised to see how well the wine kept in the glass, and the decanter, for more than one hour! Even what was left with the sediment in the bottle survived in a surprising way to the day after. I guess this bottle was a great one!
Drink it over the next few years

WINEMAKER OF THE YEAR 2011

2011-12-23T00:04:00.006+01:00

Manfred Krankl

I could easily write a book about Manfred Krankl, his life, his visions, his vineyards, his art works, and his wines. He is one of the most amazing vignerons of California, and just about everything he does, is special.

He ws born in Austria, but moved to California in 1980 (and he doesn't sound like Arnold at all!) and later opened up the Le Campanile restaurant in Los Angeles, and the La Brea Bakery company, which he sold for 20 million dollars in 2001.
Wine was always part of his life, but it wasn't until 1992 before he produced his first own wine, the 1992 Black and Blue together with Napa Valley winemaker Michael Havens. There was also a small production of wines for his restaurant Le Campanile. Two years later, in 1994, he established his own label Sine Qua Non. The idea was to produce small batches of great wines out of Syrah and Grenache. The production was, and still is, very limited and after just a few years, Manfred Krankl and his Sine Qua Non wines had become well known among wine collectors.

"I didn't have any formal education in growing vines or making wine, I learned it by trying, and now I'm too old for it anyway", he says.

He is one of the most detailed oriented wine makers of California, hence the perfection in his wines, that are huge and packed with super ripe and strictly sorted grapes. Even though he didn't had any vineyards on his own until he planted the now 8.90 hectare Eleven Confession Vineyard in the southern part of the cool Santa Rita Hills, he have always spent a lot of time in the vineyards.

He was lucky already in his first vintage (1994, unfortunately not tasted here) by being able to purchase grapes from famous vineyards like Alban Vineyard, Bien Nacido Vineyard and Stolpman Vineyard. Over the years, new great vineyard sites has been added to the program, like the great Whitehawk Vineyard in Los Alamos. Manfred did always farm the same blocks in each vineyard, hence the even quality over the vintages.

Today Manfred and his wife Elaine Krankl owns 24.10 hectares of vines in three vineyard sites. His first vineyard is Eleven Confession in Santa Rita Hills, a cool valley where he primarily grows Syrah and Grenache, but also some Roussanne and Viognier (which often is blended into the syrah wines).
In 2004 he planted various grape varieties, mostly Syrah and Grenache, but also Petite Sirah, Touriga Nacional, Mourvèdre, Roussanne and Petit Manseng in his beautiful estate in Oak View in the much warmer Ventura County. Today there are three blocks and a total of 12.3 hectares in this Cumulus Vineyard, plus the brand new state of the art winery he moved into for the 2011 harvest.

"Although much bigger and much better planned and easy to work in, it felt a bit unusual and strange after all the years in my old garage winery in Ventura", Manfred says.

Another vineyard, the now called The Third Twin Vineyard, was added to his estate program in 2010, a total of 6.10 hectares of Syrah and Grenache in Los Alamos close to Whitehawk Vineyard and Stolpman Vineyard just north of Santa Rita Hills. The ranch covers 120 hectares, and according to Manfred, there are several slopes to be planted in the future. With this, he may be one hundred percent estate grown within a few years from now. As of 2011, the only grapes he purchase is the ones from Bien Nacido Vineyard in Santa Maria Valley.

The hype around Manfred Krankl mostly comes from the great wines, made in a ripe but still so elegant and extremely well balanced style, and in so small quantities they have been subject for second hand sales at top dollars. One may have to pay a few hundred dollars up toll 500-700 dollars for a bottle!
Another hype around Sine Qua Non is of course the names and labels of the wines. Each wine carries a unique name ("Why give all your children the same name?", Manfred ask you when you ask him about this), and an artistic label, made by Manfred himself. This have not only created a sort of collecting phenomenon, but also inspired other wine producers to do the same. The difference is that Manfred Krankl is a true artist, in that sense Sine Qua Non is one of the most unique wineries of this planet!

The style of his Syrah and Grenache wines is ripe, typical Californian in most ways, yet one may mistake his wines for being the exclusive "La-La's" of Guigal (particularly La Landonne or the more lush La Mouline in warmer vintages). The Sine Qua Non wines are not for those who seeks light bodied wines with high acidity and more terroir than fruit and body.

The wines are crafted from highly ripe grapes, they are mostly destemmed (sometimes by hand) but certain lots are whole cluster fermented in small open top fermenters with manual pigage, or in small cement eggs. Maceration is long, and the ageing takes place in mostly French oak barrels (225 and 500 liters), of which a great proportion are new. Ageing stretches over 18-22 months, until the wines are ready to blend and bottle. To Manfred, the blending process is the most crucial. All barrels are blind tasted over a number of weeks or even months, and then small trials are made until he and his winemaker have decided how to make the blend.

I have been fortunate to follow the Sine Qua Non wines for more than a decade, I taste them regularly and I have also visited Sine Qua Non and tasted with Manfred a numerous of times. By all means, he is one of the most careful, detailed oriented and uncompromising winemakers in California. Therefore I'm proud and happy to appoint Manfred Krankl as the Winemaker of the Year 2011.

Vertical of Syrah from Sine-Qua-Non 2008-1995

(all wines tasted in one vertical tasting in 2011)

2008 B-20 / 95-96 p

This vintage is a blend of 92 percent Syrah, six percent Grenache and the rest Viognier, and grapes are sourced from the estate vineyards Eleven Confession (all Grenache plus some Syrah) in Santa Rita Hills and Cumulus Vineyards in Ventura County, as well as from Bien Nacido Vineyard (last vintage) in Santa Maria Valley and Whitehawk Vineyard in Los Alamos. They were harvested from 24.0 to 28.4 Brix, and 97 percent av the grapes were destemmed before they were fermented. The wines was then kept in French oak barrels, around 40 percent new and the rest up to four years old, up to 26 months. In this vintage, the alcohol level reached 15.4 percent. A total of 7 920 bottles and 180 magnums were made.
”This was the first of four consecutive vintages, and we didn’t harvest until November 24”, Manfred says. The extra long hang time resulted in a high phenol ripeness, but not overly high sugars, therefore Manfred was vary happy about this harvest. ”However, it will take some years before it start to show it true potential”, he adds.

Like all young wines from Sine Qua Non, this is compact and full of flavors, and even though there’s abundant of richness of blackberries, blueberries, dark cherries and even toffee, there’s something quite elegant over the nose. It’s not as impressive as some other vintages shown at this stage, but it’s rather av kind fresh elegance to it. Plus, I must say, some sweet and slightly spicy oak notes. On the palate it’s full bodied and rich, initially with some warmth from the alcohol, but giving it half an hour in a decanter, a more elegant structure reveals, and then the alcohol seems to soften a bit. Again, it’s not a powerful wine in that sense warmer and riper vintages are, still there’s a serious structure of tannins to balance the ripe fruit and make the finish totally dry. There’s a fine silky texture and a long finish, but also a youthful wildness that lead me to the conclusion that this wine needs several years in the bottle before it reach its very best balance and drinkability. And patience is always rewarding when it comes to the wines from Sine Qua Non.
Drink it over the next 5-18 years

2007 Labels / 96-97 p

In this vintage, the blend was made up by 89 percent Syrah, seven percent Grenache and the rest Viognier. Grapes were predominately harvested in the two estate vineyards Eleven Confession in Santa Rita Hills and Cumulus Vineyard in Ventura County, but 17 percent of all Syrah came from Bien Nacido Vineyard in Santa Maria Valley, en the same amount from the great Whitehawk Vineyard in Los Alamos. The wine spent 22 months in French oak barrels, of which 65 percent were new. The alcohol level is 15.3 percent.
”I really like the 2006 vintage, my wines are rich without being exuberant or too concentrated”, Manfred says.

If 2006 Raven was a bit difficult to judge at this young stage, the 2007 Labels is in the same position. They are also quite similar, with a mind blowing richness with abundant of perfectly ripe fruit flavors, yet so restrained and structured. It sounds like a contradiction, but that’s the way these wines are. The nose offers super ripe blueberries, almost like the finest confiture as well as crème de cassis, and it’s mostly about all those charming primary aromas.
With some aeration, some complexity showed, but it took almost 5-6 hours in the decanter before the wine really opened up and showed white pepper, violets and some sweet and spicy notes from the barrels. On the palate it’s ripe, voluptuous, there’s a slight bitterness from the oak and perhaps also from the stems, but it’s almost totally covered up by the richness. Overall it’s an impressive wine that’s far too young to even taste today. I’ll keep my bottles at least three to four more years before I touch them – Labels is a wine for the future.
Drink it over the next 5-20 years

2006 Raven / 97 p

The Raven is made of 93 percent Syrah, five percent Grenache and just two percent Viognier, most of the grapes from the estste vineyard Eleven Confession in Santa Rita Hills. The wine spent 21 months in almost all new French oak barrels, but some of them were larger, 600 liters. This very good vintage, the alcohol reached 15.3 percent.

From a stylistic point of view, Manfred think of 2006 Raven as something inbetween 2002 Papa and 2004 Poker Face, without being as concentrated as the latter.
It’s always hard to find the most elegant nuances in a young powerful wine like Raven, but already in at just one sniff, the greatness in it reveals. And that’s what I very often find in the wines from Sine Qua Non, an unlike most winemakers, Manfred has the talent to craft huge wines and blend them in a way where the richeness and concentration doesn’t end up in overwhelming wines. He is the master in maximizing power and new expensive oak barrels and still stay in balance.
Again aeration is nessicary for this young wine, and then a very fine note of white pepper and ink as well as a slight vegetal fragrance (from the stems) and notes of violts and aloe vera rises throught the compact fruit. On the palate, it's full bodied with an almost viscous texture, packed with ripe fruit and still so rich in its primary fruit flavors that I recommend a few more years of bottle age before it's opened. The tannins are important but well in balance, therefore almost silky. Complexity is not in my tasting notes of today, but I guess it will come in the coming years.
Drink it over the next 5-20 years

2005 Atlantis 1 Fe₂O₃ / 97-98 p

In this vintage, the blend was made of 93 percent Syrah (around 40 percent from Eleven Confession, almost 30 percent from Whitehawk Vineyard, some 20 percent from Alban Vineyard in Edna Valley, and the rest from Bien Nacido Vineyard), five percent Grenache from Eleven Confession and just two percent Viognier. Around 25 percent of the clusters were kept whole under the fermentation, and the maceration stretched over 17 days. Two thirds new French oak were used, the rest was used French but also a few American oak barrels. The ageing lasted for 22 months. Alcohol level reached 15.7 percent.
This was the first vintage Manfred decided to use three different labels for his wines. ”It is great fun to see how surprised people are when they unwrap the paper the bottles are wrapped in”, he says and laughs.

Although this wine is just a baby, one can clearly see the greatness in it. It’s packed with ripe, slightly sweetish and dense dark fruit flavors (cherries, blueberries and cassis), but there’s also cooler scents of crushed white pepper as well as a spicy touch of the stems, and a touch of new oak. The concentration is obvious, but even though the aromas and flavors are so intense, the wine is actually quite closed. This is more obvious when decanting the wine and one realize that it takes more than 5 hours in the decanter before it really starts to open up.
Man, this wine is really impressive, and its glycerol and silky fruitiness covers the huge but perfectly ripe tannic structure, hence giving the wine an almost velvety texture. At this youthful stage, there’s also a slight spiciness and bitterness from the stems, but that’s just fine.
Overall, there’s so much energy in the wine and taste seems to linger for minutes. As in so many wines from Sine Qua Non, it’s so impressive and good to drink already now. Knowing these wines from several tastings and vertical tastings like this one, I know that the real greatness will show with some more bottle age. The foresight for the most complex taste stretches at least 10-15 years from now. It may well be one of the classic vintages from Sine Qua Non.
Drink it over the next 5-18 years

2004 Poker Face / 98-99 p

In this warm vintage, 96 percent of the blend was Syrah, a third of that from the cooler Eleven Confession Vineyard in Santa Rita Hills and the rest from Whitehawk Vineyard, Bien Nacido Vineyard and Alban Vineyard. The 2.5 percent of Mourvèdre that added spiciness in the blend was sourced from Alta Mesa Vineyard, and the rest is 1.5 percent of Viognier. As always, all varieties and all vineyard blocks were vinified and kept separately throughout the 27 months of ageing in almost 90 percent new French oak (this vintage, 17 barrels made the cut into Poker Face). Alcohol level is 15.5 percent.

As the other young wines, this is almost opaque, unredeemed and massive fruit in a style which, oddly enough, also offers great elegance. Perhaps it is the small nuances of violets that makes the dark sweet cherry fruit so easygoing and, which I like so much, moves the focus from the youthful vanilla and smoky scents from the oak barrels. The nose is really remarkable.
The flavor is as concentrated of seductive cherry, sloe and raspberry fruit with the same elegant fragrance of violets and licorice, and both tannins and acidity gives the wine a serious backbone that promises a slowly evolving life that probably extends until 2025, at the very least. However, already today the superlatives are many, especially the remarkable balance between sheer power and seductive flavors, but with time more complexity will rise out of the dense primary fruit. The fresh acidity, which is so well integrated and balanced in the rich fruit, should not be underestimated - it will help giving the wine a long life. Poker Face is a great wine!

Drink it over the next 5-20 years

2003 Papa / 96 p

This lovely wine is made of 97 percent Syrah, two percent Mourvèdre and one percent Grenache. Grapes were sourced from Whitehawk Vineyard, Bien Nacido Vineyard, Alban Vineyard, the warmer Shadow Canyon Vineyard in San Luis Obispo County and Alta Mesa Vineyard, and for the first time also from the (now) 8.90 hectare estate vineyard Eleven Confession, planted in 2001 on a plateau above Arita Hills Vineyard (owned by Lafond Winery) in the southern part of Santa Rita Hills. The wine was matured in 90 percent new French oak barrels for 27 months, and as all wines from Sine Qua Non it was bottles without fining or filtration.
”I named this wine in honor of Matias Krankl, my dad, a very ordinary man who grew up in Czech Republic under poor circumstances – he left school after six years to work hard as an apprentice at a shoemaker, thereafter he worked even harder in the coal mines before he got a much safer job as a driver”, Manfred tells. ”Then he married a young and fantastic woman, and 22 years old, he became my father”, he adds.

Dense, youthfully purple and almost opaque, and almost equally massive in its aromas. When you try through the vintages from Sine Qua Non, you realize that Manfred Krankl is masterful in balancing the oak flavors, but in the younger vintages some sweetness, vanilla, slightly roasted and spicy oak flavors will be noted in the sweet and dense fruit. The concentration is huge with loads of ripe and lush fruit, and perfectly pure, in young vintages typically dark cherries, blueberries and blackberries as well as a dash of wild raspberries and a deliciously spicy violet note. Although the taste is so concentrated, full of ripe fruit, alcohol and glycerol to a very silky texture, there is enough of acidity, minerals and tannins to give the taste a great energy. It is not nearly mature and at its peak, not even five hours of decanting is enough to open up all the flavors. Two to three years of maturing would help.

Drink it over the next 2-18 years

2002 Just For The Love Of It / 99-100 p

This is one the best syrahs ever from Sine Qua Non, including the longer aged versions. It was made of 96 percent Syrah and two percent each of Grenache and Viognier. All grapes were sourced from Alban Vineyard in Edna Valley, Bien Nacido Vineyard in Santa Maria Valley, Stolpman Vineyard and White Hawk Vineyard in Santa Ynez Valley and just a little from Shadow Canyon Vineyard in San Luis Obispo County. Around 90 percent of the barrels were brand new, and all French. Alcohol level is 15.2 percent.
The name symbolizes the true passion and love for wine that so many – but not all – people show. ”The ones who live their lives from the heart”, Manfred says.

It has always been something special about this wine. When I tried a number of components from barrels at Sine Qua Non in 2003, I realized that Manfred Krankl with this vintage had placed himself on a level among the world's biggest stars. All barrel samples we tasted was outstanding, but Manfred said they lacked that greatness he looks for, and that he achieves by blending different grape varieties, batches of different vinification and from various vineyards. I thought of it then, by tasting several great components, as the finest wine made in the modest shed in downtown Ventura.
The wine is young, still purple, deep and intense, and the nose is rich with a deliciously sweet yet tangy and fresh note of cherries, wild raspberries and strawberries, it is so rich, fruity and deep, as well as earthy and complex, that it almost resembles an astounding cuvée of the best parcelles in Chambertin Grand Cru, added the finest flavor that can come from a pure wine of Grenache. The taste is rich and almost explosive, yet so elegant and vivid in its fruit saturated and tangy style. The oak is perfectly well balanced. Again, I'm impressed by the magnificent balance between pure power and elegance that Manfred is so skilled in capturing.
There is really only one reason not to drink this wine today, and that is that it actually has the potential to evolve for many more years to come.
Drink it over the next 10-15 years

2001 Midnight Oil / 97-98 p

A blend of 96 percent Syrah, 2.5 percent Grenache and 1.5 percent Viognier from Bien Nacido Vineyard, Stolpman Vineyard, Alban Vineyard and Whitehawk Vineyard. Vinification is the same as for the other vintages with around 90 percent of the barrens new. Alcohol level this great vintage didn’t jump over 15 percent, it was ”just” 14.9 percent. The production this year was 950 cases of six bottles.

Ten years old, still young and totally vital! The aroma is open and intense, well stuffed with sun ripe dark berries, blueberries and plums, but also with a really nice touch of lavender and licorice. Compared to the older vintages, one may find traces of the oak barrels in which the wine was brought up, but not more than a shadow of vanilla and grilled bacon (that note disappears after half an hour in the decanter, and instead all focus is set on the magnificent fruit). The flavor is equally intense and deliciously fruity, still quite marked by its tannins and good acidity, which gives a vibrant energy. This oil is one of the finest lubricants Manfred Krankl has given his wine quenching crowd of supporters. Despite the youth, it's absolutely good to drink now, but with a few more years of ageing the balance will be a little more polished, and life from that date extends at least 15 years.

Drink it over the next 15 years

2000 In Flagrante / 96-98 p

In this millennium vintage the Syrah fraction was the lowest of Sine Qua Non wines ever, it was only 88 percent. The rest was ten percent Grenache and two percent Viognier. Grapes came from Alban Vineyard, Bien Nacido Vineyard, Whitehawk Vineyard and Stolpman Vineyard in Santa Ynez Valley. The juice was fermented in stainless steel tanks and was then transferred into French barrels, only 72 percent new, for malolactic fermentation and 19 months of ageing. Again alcohol level stopped at 14.9 percent. A total of 725 cases of six were made of In Flagrante.

Deep, dark purple and still young, but with some deposit which reveals the wine wasn't filtered before bottling. The nose is dense, exuberant and massive with both cool scented and sun ripe and sweet fruit flavors, added with notes of liquorices and lavender, and even if the wine is young and so concentrated, there is also a more earthy hue that adds complexity. The body is still rich with somehow viscous fruit, glycerol and alcohol sweetness, and it took almost two hours of decanting before the aromas and flavors met each other in perfect harmony.
The wine is still young and unredeemed, but with aeration it opened up to a greater complexity with notes of air dried meet, charcuteries and white pepper, yet with the fruit in dominance. If absolute power and stylish elegance manage to find each other, they tend end up in a wine of this caliber. A few hours of aeration in a decanter is recommended, but rather should wine be mature in the bottle for a more few years.
Drink it over the next 10 years

1999 The Marauder / 97 p

One hundred percent Syrah, that’s the deal for the Marauder, and this is the only single Syrah wine made here at Sine Qua Non, ever. Around 40 percent of the grapes came from Alban Vineyard, 36 percent from Bien Nacido Vineyard and 24 percent from Stolpman Vineyard. Fermentation took place in stainless steel tanks and the wine was then transferred into brand new French oak barrels for malolactic fermentation and 17 months of ageing on its lees. ”My racking regime is all depending on each barrel, some barrels will remain unracked, some will be racked one time, others two or even three times”, Manfred says. Alcohol level is 14.9 percent. Only 1 998 bottles was made!

At first this was wine was a bit shy, although the dark and still slightly youthful purple color gives the impression that the wine still should be considered to be a young wine (except the fine sediment that revealed some bottle age). The nose is just lovely, after just some aeration absolutely delicious with both primary fruit aromas (sweet black currants, cherries and sun ripe blackberries) and more complex earthy, spicy and floral (violets) notes. To this, a fine acidity and a good grip of firm but ripe and to a certain extent also matured tannins are added.
Like so many 1999s, this wine shows that the vintage wine is superb and still not yet near to step into full maturity. One or two addition years in the cellar is a good thing, primarily to polish the tannins a bit more, and it will keep well until shortly after its twentieth anniversary.

Drink it over the next 10 years

1998 E-raised / 96-97 p

In this vintage, the cuvée was made of approximately 95 percent Syrah, five percent of Grenache and just a splash of Viognier. The grapes came from Alban Vineyard, Bien Nacido Vineyard and Stolpman Vineyard. The wine was aged in all new French oak barrels for around 20 months, and it was bottled without fining or filtration. In this cooler El Niño vintage, alcohol only reached 14.0 percent.
E? Well, that’s Elaine, Manfred’s charming wife. ”Without whom Sine Qua Non wouldn’t have been flying”, Manfred says.

Thanks to the cool growing season of 1998, this wine has a lively acidity that creates a beautiful and life giving structure. The fruit is brighter, still raspberry like and floral, and in fact almost unrelieved which gives the wine a great elegance, and makes it a little different than most vintages in the lineup. A delicious spicy note of fennel and liquorices root adds complexity. Due to the lighter body, some alcohol warmth is noted, but overall the wine is very elegant and lively. As in all vintages with just some age, the feeling of oak almost non-existent, and with aeration the red fruit flavors was lifted. In the aftertaste it offers an even sweeter, more lush and refined flavor of wild raspberries. Purely in terms of aromas, the E-raised could be seen as a hybrid between high quality burgundies and stylish wine of Grenache from southern France. The 1998 vintage is generally described as weak, or even bad for red wines in California, but in this particular case the wine has developed into a elegant, aromatic and well structured wine!
Drink it over the next 6-8 years

1997 Imposter McCoy / 93 p

Again, Alban Vineyard, Bien Nacido Vineyard and Stolpman Vineyard were the source of the 95 percent of Syrah and five percent of Grenache that made up this vintage. Yields was very small this vintage, and the production was around 2 900 bottles. Alcohol level is 14.9 percent.

This vintage is usually hailed as excellent and even phenomenal in Napa Valley and Sonoma, but down in Santa Barbara 1997 was one of the most difficult vintages in living memory. As in northern California it was hot, and the yields was unusually large, resulting in wines that are both a bit lighter and more fast maturing. This is evident in this wine, which certainly starts great with fine primary fruit aromas, and it even opened up a bit in the glass with some air, however it started to fade a little after a while - and even if the wine landed at a level that in other contexts might be described as really good, 1997 is one of the few weaker cards in the line up from Sine Qua Non. The fruit is a bit sweet, reminiscent of cherry liqueur with notes of blueberries and blackberries, much like a wine from Priorat in Spain, but with air it starts to dry out and thus that roughness becomes somewhat more austere than the other wines. Yet there has enough interesting flavors to the wine to be really good. There are similarities with the great wines of Châteauneuf-du-Pape, which has reached a kind of lap time in their lives. Drink now and until 2015, or something like that.

Drink it over the next 8 years

1996 Against The Wall / 97 p

”This was a very tuff year for us, we really felt we were pushed against the wall, hence the name of this wine”, Manfred says. It is a blend of 92 percent Syrah from Alban Vineyard, Bien Nacido Vineyard and Stolpman Vineyard, and eight percent Grenache from Stolpman Vineyard. After fermentation, as always with the indigenous yeast, the wine was racked into new French and (some) American oak barrels for malolactic fermentation and ageing for 19 months. Alcohol level is 14.5 percent. The production this year was 3 576 bottles.

The color reveals a slight nuance of maturity, still it is quite dense and yet with a deep, almost purple core. The nose is equally intense, developed in a way that many wine tasters usually describe as Bordeaux like, but there is still a sufficient power and youthful intensity in the fruit, which is both dark and a bit primary sweetish. This leads to the conclusion that this vintage has more to offer in the coming years. Nuances of fennel and licorice adds some complexity. Tannins are vital but mature and almost silky, thanks to the quite rich and slightly sweet fruit flavors and lively acidity, the aftertaste lingers for a minute or so, contributing to finesse. This is an extremely elegant wine which initially felt almost grenache like in its seductive fruit flavors, but with aeration it develops into a greater finesse. Although a very good wine indeed, I don't believe it will evolve into something much more complex with further ageing.

Drink it over the next 4-5 years

1995 The Other Hand / 94 p

During the 90s, a lot of things changed in California. One thing was the transition from more classic styled wines into riper and fuller bodied wines with higher alcohol. Therefore, I’m not surprised to see that the 1995 vintage from Sine Qua Non only have 13.5 percent alcohol. The blend this year, the second vintage for Sine Qua Non, was 94 percent Syrah and six percent Grenache from Alban Vineyard, Bien Nacido Vineyard and Stolpman Vineyard. The wine was aged in 70 percent new barrels, alls French, for 18 months. A total of 2 100 bottles was made and they was sold in cases of five with one bottle of the grenache.

The color still shows small traces of purple, almost as if the wine is young. The nose is great, intense rather than powerful and still fruit driven with notes of both sweeter dark berries and aromatic red fruits. With some air a more mature side starts to show, with complex secondary and earthy aromas of sous bois, cedar tree and tobacco. An almost fennel like spiciness and a floral nuance is still there to create excitement. The taste is medium full with dark fruit flavors and notes of violets, the tannins are ripe but still adds some resistance in the rich and slightly viscous mouth feeling, but giving the wine more aeration the age starts to show in the aftertaste, which now begins to show some signs of drying out. I'd love to find another bottle so drink again, then just decanted prior to serving it, just because it is so complex.
Drink it over the next 4-5 years

A unique flavor from the past!

2011-12-18T10:17:00.000+01:00

According the harvest reports, there’s only 93 hectares of the Mission grape in production in California. To find a wine made from it is not easy and to find a unique and very good wine from it, it almost unlikely. Yet there is one.
The Mission grape was brought to Mexico by the Spaniards in the end of the sixteenth century. They took if from the Canary Islands, where it is known as Listán Negra, en local variety of average quality and low interest. However, this is a variety that can make a drinkable wine in dry and warm regions.

The Spanish conquistadors brought cuttings of Listán Negra to plant in their new colonies, but it didn’t thrive in the warm and humid climate in the Caribbean, where the Spanish sugar canes did much better. When the Spanish soldiers conquered Mexico, they tried again to plant the cuttings, and here it worked much better. They used the wine for sacramental purposes at the mission stations the Jesuits priests founded, hence the new name Mission for this particular variety. When northern California stood in line to be christened, the Spanish priests build 21 missions stations from San Diego in the south, to the town of Sonoma in the north, and they planted this Mission grape for their sacramental wines.

In the mid of century, when California had become an independent state belonging to the United States of America, viticulture evolved and wines started to be made of European grape varieties, Vitis vinifiera. The Mission grape went out of fashion, and the few vineyards that were left, was abandoned either due to the phylloxera in the late 1800s, or under the Prohibition from 1920 to 1933.

When Deborah Hall and her (now) late husband bought an estate in the northern part of Santa Rita Hills in 1994, they did it with a dream of planting some vineyards. On their estate, they found a slope with old, gnarly vines that obviously hadn’t been taken care of for decades. They didn’t know what kind of vines it was, so they sent samples to UC Davis, where they via DNA identified the vines as Mission. Deborah later found out, through a quite in dept research, that the vineyard had been planted by the monks of Purisima Mission Station further west in the valley, but most likely were abandoned during Prohibition.

   In the hands of Deborah, these precious vines has since then been carefully taken care of. In addition to the 1.20 hectares of Mission they found (they are widely spaced, and some of vines are dead, so vineyard is not worth more than a third of that acreage), Deborah have planted another 0.40 hectare of Mission from cuttings of these old vines.
   Besides this unique wine, Deborah is also producing some pinots and her winery is called Gypsy Canyon. You should really look this winery up.
   Paul Lato is her consulting winemaker and the first vintage of the Mission wine was 2001, of the pinots 2003.

NV Ancient Vine Angelica Doña Marcelina’s Vineyard / 92 p

This unique wine is made from 100 percent of old vine Mission, planted in 1887 in the Dõna Marcelina’s Vineyard in the northern part of Santa Rita Hills. Grapes are harvested at full ripeness, whole cluster pressed and the juice is then allowed to sit in a small tank overnight to become totally clear. Then the juice is fermented until it reaches around ten percent alcohol, and then a neutral brandy with 95 percent alcohol strength is added for the fermentation to stop. That leaves a fortified wine with around 17 percent of alcohol and some 90 grams of residual sugar per liter. Since the Jesuit priests didn’t use new oak barrels in the past, this wine has been kept in small older barrels, which are only filled to 60 percent for oxygen to allow an oxidation during the three years of maturation the wine gets.
   The wine is golden amber of medium intensity, on the nose it’s rich and very complex with notes of honey, dried fruit, almonds and walnuts, it’s actually reminiscent of a slightly drier style of Madeira or the mosctels of Setúbal in Portugal. On the palate, it’s medium bodied but quite intense, as fortified wine normally are, and it combines a delicious sweetness with a good rather than fresh acidity, and there’s also a mild (and positive) bitterness from the slight oxidation the three years of barrel ageing has given. The complex notes of honey and walnuts are there, as well as a sweetish touch of Sultana raisins. It’s a lovely wine, one of a kind, and it one of the very few classical styled fortified wines of California.
   Sadly, the production is very limited, and normally Deborah bottles somewhere between 25 and 50 cases of half bottles every year. It doesn’t come cheap – around 140 dollar including tax, but then the wine is a rare reminder of the history of the wine country of California.
   It should be served at around 14-15 degrees Celsius to cheeses or not to sweet deserts. It can hold up a few weeks in the opened bottle, so it’s no rush finishing the bottle.
Drink it within 10 years

Lively and lovely sauvignons from Dragonette Cellars

2011-12-16T00:07:00.000+01:00

Dragonette Cellars is a newcomer on the Santa Barbara wine scene, and a good one. The winery was founded in 2005 by the wine loving brothers John and Steve Dragonette and Brandon Sparks-Gillis, whom they met in Los Angeles when buying wines from the store he worked in then. “We became friends, and soon we realized we shared the same passion for wines, the same ideas, and also the dream of making our own wines”, Brandon says.

All good things are three, so the trio joined forces and worked hard to establish their own label. Brandon, who had a history in several Santa Barbara County wineries, again took the role as intern at several wineries, among them Sine Qua Non, to add knowledge and experience.
   Dragonette Cellars have their own small winery in Lompoc, just as so many other small handcraft wineries in the region. They follow the traditional methods in making their wines, either whole cluster or fully destemmed grapes, a few days of cold soak, then fermentation with the native yeast in small, around one ton open bins, utilizing pigeage for gentle extraction. French oak barrels are used, and luckily, the amount of new oak is moderate.
   The annual production has now reached around 3 000 cases, and that’s a level that Brandon is comfortable with. Three types of wines are made, a couple of lively wines of Sauvignon Blanc, a range of intense and seductive wines of Pinot Noir and a few wines of Rhône varietals. Focused should be at the sauvignons and pinots, that’s the real deal at Dragonette Cellars.

2010 Santa Ynez Valley Sauvignon Blanc / 87 p
This is a blend of Sauvignon Blanc from three single vineyards, the Vogelzang and Grassini in the inland appellation Happy Canyon and the Refugio Ranch on the slopes of Santa Ynez Mountains. The great thing about this wine is its absolute purity rather than complexity – few wines of Sauvignon Blanc are complex in the sense chardonnays or cabernets can be. Around 60 percent of the juice is slowly fermented at low temperatures in stainless steel, the rest is fermented and raised in French oak barrels, of which just a few percent are new. Therefore pure varietal flavors and freshness is the personality of this wine. As expected, the nose is intense and highly aromatic with nuances of green apples, gooseberries and citrus, and there’s also a fine floral note here. On the palate, it is light to medium bodied, totally dry with a lively acidity that almost give the taste a tannic structure, and as the nose, it’s very aromatic.
   It’s a lovely wine to drink as a refreshing aperitif, or to be served to lighter dishes of steamed or seared white fish with lemon juice and olive oil, or greens or fresh herbs. Serve it at around 10-12 degrees Celsius, not more chilled that that.
Drink it 2011-2015

2010 Happy Canyon of Santa Barbara Sauvignon Blanc / 89 p
Again, one hundred percent Sauvignon Blanc, and again grapes are sourced from Vogelzang Vineyard and Grassini Vineyard in Happy Canyon of Santa Ynez Valley. The difference is that this cuvée is the top selection of grapes from the best blocks in these vineyards, also the vinification is different. The juice is fermented in 225 and 500 liter French oak barrels, just some new, and after malolaktisk fermentation the wines has been kept on the fine lees for around ten to eleven months to gain some weight and texture.
   Not surprisingly, this wine is richer and broader with more depths and length. Still it is as intense and aromatic as the Santa Ynez Valley version, however much more polished and actually, yes, complex. It’s not really Bordeaux like, it too rich and fruit forward for that, but it’s more in that direction than in any other. The oak has given the wine a certain vanilla flavor and viscosity, but this is by no means a wine where the oak is overly obvious. If the regular bottling should be drunk young and slightly chilled, this one can med poured at 10-14 degrees Celsius to deliver more of its richness, and be kept in the cellar for a number of years. Try this wine with seared scallops, grilled lobster or not too spicy Thai food.
Drink it 2011-2018

Four vintages of Syrah from Zaca Mesa

2011-12-14T06:33:00.001+01:00

Zaca Mesa Winery is a classic, a Rhône Ranger with a long and well established reputation. Yet they seem to be overshadowed by more recent producers, not because one is better or worse than the other, rather a common fact in California that newly established wineries are more interesting. To me, that’s a very strange mentality, especially in United States where history, as I’m told over and over again on my trips around California, is a missing part of the wine culture. So, when there is a history, why not be proud of it? Why not look back in the recent past, and check out how well certain wines age?
This is what I do on a regular basis, vertical tasting will tell you a lot of the quality and consistency of a winery or a particular wine. Today I revisited Zaca Mesa to taste some older vintages of their prestige wine, the Syrah.

Four vintages, all good ones, were tasted and the overall impression is that the wine has been very consistent over the years. There are some changes from the 1996 vintage to the 2008, such as a slightly different proportion of Viognier (from 20 percent in the 1996 vintage, to just a few percent in the more recent vintages). Also the grapes have been sourced from different blocks in the vineyard. Another detail differs, the alcohol. As in most wines in California, alcohol level has increased since mid 90s, in this case from 13.5 percent to 14.5. This is a quite common change in alcohol level in California during this period.
The overall impression is that the Syrah from Zaca Mesa Winery evolves very slowly, and to a very complex wine, and that’s good news to anyone who drinks their wines within days or even hours after purchase, which unfortunately is the most common, in United States as elsewhere.

2008 Syrah / 90-92 p
This is the current vintage, and it is of course young, riper and richer than the other I tasted. Since the vintage was short of Viognier, this wine is made exclusively of Syrah, at least almost. Instead of adding Viognier grapes, there was a co fermentation with the skins from Viognier, so I wasn’t too surprised to find a quite floral and spicy note from Viognier. Besides that, the fruit is ripe and dark scented, and the earthy and spicy notes, not very different from what the French calls garrigue, are quite evident. On the palate it is rich and almost full bodied, intense and quite silky, still the tannins are youthful and firm, and there’s also a good but not overly lively acidity. This is a very good wine, a bit riper than most of the vintages I have tasted from Zaca Mesa, but it is very well balanced.
Serving it today, it should be decanted at least 30-45 minutes before serving it. Based on the fine evolution of the older vintages, some more years of bottle age would be a better choice.
Drink it 2012-2028

2001 Syrah / 92 p
The 2001 vintage was considered to be great all over California. This wine is just another example of that, and the wine is impressive. I was so surprised to find see, that this wine is ten years old. There’s still a lot of primary fruit aromas of dark and sweetish berries here, but the spicy notes of liquorice and garrigue (just a little of that) and also of charcuteries adds the type of complexity one wish to see in a great syrah with age (or in this case, just some age). On the palate it’s still quite youthful, there’s still some primary fruit sweetness and the tannins are still young and firm, and overall it is reminiscent of the 1999 vintage, although this 2001 is bit more concentrated with riper fruit.
Even though it’s ten years old, it still benefits from some more years in bottle, or at least half an hour of decanting, and of course to be poured in a big glass and served with a hearty dish of grilled beef or with venison.
Drink it 2011-2021

1999 Syrah / 92 p
As in the 2001 vintage, there’s just a few percent of Viognier in this blend, still that addition is notable. The vintage itself is great, and the wine is a very good example of the vintage. Although the wine has kept some primary fruit aromas, it’s more to it than fruit. This is a very complex wine that offers fine notes of sweet tobacco, sous bois, dried French herbs, and charcuteries, and overall the nose is very well balanced. It’s medium intense on the palate, rich in flavor but totally dry in a way that’s more closed rather than on its way to dry out, because there god length to it. It is surpisingly fresh to be twelve years old, and it’s absolutely delicious. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to follow it in the glass more than ten minutes, but over that short time, it opened up a bit. I would have loved to follow it over an hour in a decanter.
Drink it 2011-2019

1996 Syrah / 90 p
Fifteen years old but not old, I wrote in my notebook. This is lighter wine the the younger ones, and both the vintage and the fact that this wine consists of 20 percent Viognier, explains that pretty well. If the younger wines could be described as being bluish in the fruit, this one is more to red fruits. The yellow scented tropical fruit notes from Viognier are gone by now, but there’s a fine spiciness and very elegant secondary aromas here, but, no oxidation at all. I have recently tasted a lot of “great 1996 cabernets from famous wineries in Napa Valley” that wasn’t as fresh and well kept as this syrah! Tannins are still there to give the wine a good structure, but they are mature and almost velvety. This lovely wine surprised me, it’s elegant rather than full bodied and rich, and that’s this wine’s greatest assets.
It’s no hurry to drink the last bottles of this wine, but I doubt it will gain more complexity from further ageing.
Drink it 2011-2016

The 2008 Le Caprice from Peter Michael Winery

2011-12-02T23:22:00.000+01:00

Peter Michael Winery now produces four pinots, with Le Moulin Rouge of fruit bought from the Pisoni Vineyard in Santa Lucia Highlands, as the first made (1997). The demand for pinots was one reason for them to add a few more pinots to the program, but the main reason was of course the love of Pinot Noir as a grape variety. In 2007 they started to buy grapes from the Reuling Vineyard close to Forestville in Russian River Valley (which is also classified as Sonoma Coast fruit). In this second vintage, the grapes are also sourced from that vineyard, but from 2009 they will only use fruit from their estate Seaview Vineyard far out in Sonoma Coast. With 2009 vintage, another two pinots was added to the wine list, the Clos du Ciel from the southernmost block in the vineyard with the least coastal climatic influence, and the Ma Danseuse, from the coldest block in the same vineyard.

All these wines are made in the same way, with totally destemmed grapes, four to five days of cold soak and then fermented with the indigenous yeast in small open top fermenters of stainless steel. During the fermentation and post maceration, pigeage is utilized twice a day. The wine is then transferred into 228 liter French oak barrels from Damy and Louis Latour, around 50 percent new, for malolactic fermentation and elevage during 15 months. Alcohol levels are around 14.0 to 14.5 percent.

2008 Le Caprice / 91 p

As always with the pinots from Peter Michael Winery, this one has a quite deep cherry red color with nuances of purple, but with a slightly paler rim. On the nose, it offers a youthful, pure and intense fruit aroma, quite ripe, still fresh and lively. At first it's a bit closed, but with just 5-10 minutes in the glass, it starts to open up. However, it doesn't have the finest and most seductive notes, and no floral qualities, this is much more about sweet cherries and ripe wild raspberries, and it's delicious. Even though winemaker Nick Morlet uses 50 percent new French oak for the elevage, the oak is very well integrated, almost totally absorbed by the fruit.
However, I find a slight trace of smokiness on the nose, but by no means at a level that substantially impaired the scent. I'm quite convinced that it derives from the smoke from the bush fires that haunted the Mendocino wine growers during some weeks in August. The smoke was pushed out to the sea from southern Mendocino, but was sucked back into the coastline of Sonoma. In some coastal vineyards, one may find small traces of smoke taint, and I guess this is what I find here.
On the palate, it's medium bodied, lively and fresh and of course fruit forward and almost sweetish. Tannins are fine, ripe and silky, alcohol notable but not too strong. Again, the oak stands in the shadow of the fruit, and there's just a small spiciness from it that adds some complexity. At this stage, I find the wine to be too young to really show complexity, at least the finish is quite closed.
It didn't really open up in the glass during the 30 minutes I had it, and even though it's a lovely and quite charming, but quite rich wine, it doesn't have the fragrance of a great pinot.
I'd keep it for a year or two, and serve it at 15 degrees Celsius.
Drink it 2013-2018

Captured by Kapcsándy’s 2008s

2011-08-25T01:03:00.001+02:00

Since the inaugural vintage, I’ve been impressed by the wines of Lou Kapcsándy and his estate just outside of Yountville. Lou, who founded a construction company in Seattle, came in contact with the American wine business when he built the winery for Chateau Ste Michelle and Columbia Crest in Washington.

The Kapcsándy family moved to California in 1962, and wine slowly became a more important part of the daily life for Lou and his wife Roberta. At that time, there wasn’t too many wineries up and running, but Lou visited the very few that were operation in Napa Valley and Sonoma at the time. Later on, in 1998, he started to import fine wines from France, mostly from Bordeaux, and from his homeland Hungary.

For many years, he had been a huge fan of the Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon from Beringer, and he noted that the Cabernet grapes from the State Lane Vineyard in Yountville very often constituted a significant part of the blend. When he sectrely heard that this vineyard was for sale in 2000, he put a bid on it and bought it. At the time, the vineyard was heavily hit by phylloxera, and Beringer, who since 1975 had a 30 year long lease on farming the vineyard, had cancelled the contract already in 1999, with a new contract to buy grapes the remaining five years.
The truth is that Beringer had wanted to buy the vineyard and replant it, if they had been given such an offer. Instead Lou Kapcsándy bought the vineyard before Beringen knew if was out for sale.
When Lou Kapcsándy took over, he planted the vineyard according to Bordelaise methods, with higher density and lower trained vines, he also changed the row orientation to obtain a more optimal effect of the sun and the airflow. He also made deep analysis on the soil, so he could plant the right grape variety and clone in the perfect matching soil.
The result has since the first vintage 2003 been remarkable, and the wines from Kapcsándy are already now among the finest produced in Napa Valley. Behind that quality and style, one finds a small state of the art and ultra clean winery, a sorting of grapes that is unparalleled, and an ambition that is sky high. Only French oak barrels of the finest quality are used.
Alcohol levels were a bit higher in the 2008 vintage compared to previous vintages, and I hope this was an exception from the rule. Neither Lou Kapcsándy nor his winemaker Denis Malbec is very keen on high alcohol levels, they opt for a maximum strength of 14.5 percent, but most often the alcohol is normally in the range of 13.5 to 14.0 percent.

I must say that these wines are among the finest ever made at this estate. Still I can’t get the outstanding 2007s from my memory. I just tasted the 2007 State Lane Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (below called "Grand Vin" in the 2008 vintage), which an absolutely stunning effort and a wine of great complexity, although still very youthful and marked by its classical structure. To be honest, you don’t have to look for any given vintage to find pleasure here, you just have to work hard find any bottle at all. And when you do, you’d better buy it.
The total production is around 4 000 cases of wine per year, and every single bottle comes from their own 6.50 hectare State Lane Vineyard.

2008 Endre / 90 p
According to Lou Kapcsándy, this is not a second wine, but another wine. “We put as much efforts in this wine as in the other wines, it’s just a wine with a lighter and more fruity body and leaner palate, made to be enjoyed earlier”, winemaker Denis malbec told me on my last visit at the estate. It’s a blend of about 55 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, 25 percent Merlot, 15 percent Cabernet Franc and a splash of Petit Verdot, all grapes from the estate vineyard. The wine was matured in French oak barrels, 80 percent new, for about 20 months.
As the intention was explained to me, this wine is clean and fruit forward with a sweet dark berry scent, quite elegant and easy to drink thanks to its lean texture with just a fine tannic structure. Style wise it’s related to the more serious wines (sorry for this comment, Denis) of Kapcsándy, but it doesn’t have the weight or the mid palate, or the intensity of flavor or the length. However, it’s good and very drinkable wine.
Drink it 2012-2018

2008 Estate Cuvée / 95 p
The estate cuvée is made to display the personality of the site, and the blend will vary quite a bit from year to year. In this vintage, the wine is made of 68 percent Cabernet Sauvignon (a relatively high proportion), 22 percent Merlot and five percent each of Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot. It was bottled after 20 months in 70 percent new French oak barrels.
Color is young, dark purple and almost opaque. Although it’s just a baby, the nose is open and offers a great bouquet of ultra pure, sweet and intense dark berry fruit with loads of cassis and blackberries, still it’s overall a very elegant wine with a youthful oak sweetness. What I really liked when I tasted it, and had it in the glass for around 20 minutes, was how slow but well it developed in the glass. Don’t forget it’s a very young wine, it’s should be (and it is) packed with primary aromas, yet I almost wrote complexity in my first tasting notes. On the palate, it is rich with that same purity I always find in the wines from Kapcsándy, they really can afford to use only the very best grapes, therefore the texture is lush and silky and just held together with a very fine tannic structure. The oak is well integrated, although at this stage just a bit toasty. Consider the youth of this wine, the finish is very long, and delicious.
Drinking it in the coming few years, I’d give it at least one hour in the decanter, and I’d pour it in large Bordeaux glasses. But I recommend a few more years of bottle age, and then the true complexity will be there.
Drink it 2013-2028

2008 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Grand Vin / 98-100 p
This is another absolutely stunning effort of this wine, just like the 2007 vintage of it. In this vintage the blend was 87 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, five percent each of Merlot and Cabernet Franc and just three percent of Petit Verdot. It was kept in French oak barrels, 85 percent new, for around 20 months.
As the Estate Cuvée, the color is dark, almost opaque, but the rest is quite different although you’ll see the house style. First of all, the nose is just stunning, totally amazing in its intensity and concentration, which however doesn’t make the wine overblown in any sense. On the contrary it’s so elegant thanks to its purity and freshness, and in contrast to the Estate Cuvée, there are already those complex Bordeaux like notes of cedar, lead pencil and grassiness (which is not unripness, but a quality sign on a perfect harvest decision). Still the fruit is dark, a bit sweetish and just lovely. On the palate it’s very rich with a great intensity, good mid palate and lingering aftertaste, it is well held together by the firm but perfectly ripe tannic structure, and thanks to the acidity the taste is fresh. Neither oak nor alcohol stands out, which is another sign of a very great wine, but there is s slight oak bitterness in the very finish of the taste, which is totally natural is a young wine like this.
As for the Estate Cuvée, some more years of bottle age is recommended, and the serving recommendations are the same. This wine though, would most likely live much longer.
Since it was only made in 400 cases, and Robert Parker gave it a perfect 100 point score, it will be very hard to find. However, it’s well worth trying!
Drink it 2014-2038

2008 Roberta’s Blend / 98 p
I have said many times that the Roberta’s Blend is one of the very best Merlot wines in the world. This vintage is another proof of that statement. In this vintage, there’s just four percent of Cabernet Franc in the blend, and the wine was raised in brand new French oak barrels for 18 months. “This vintage may well be the best we’ve achieved so far”, Lou Kapcsándy said when we tasted the wine together, and I’m willing to agree. As in the others wines, color is impressive, as is the nose. It boasts of dark ripe fruit, loads of blueberries, blackberries and cassis, and there’s also a very fine note of hazelnuts and dark chocolate from the oak, that marries just perfect with the fruit. On the palate, it’s richer than the Grand Vin, still the structure is there to make it totally dry and perfectly well balanced, and it’s just a wonderful wine with a great intensity and energy, and it will be a lolely wine to keep at least ten years to see how the complexity evolves over the years.
Serving recommendation is the same as for the other wines.
Drink it 2012-2033

2008 Vino del Sol / 95 p
This is a fun little sweet wine, made in a different way than in the 2007 vintage, when it was made entirely from dehydrated Merlot grapes from Roberta’s Block. In this vintage, it’s a blend of 47 percent Merlot, 34 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, 15 percent Cabernet Franc and four percent of Petit Verdot. The grapes were crished and fermented in steel tanks to around five to seven percent of alcohol before a neutral local brandy was added to stop the fermentation and leave around 90 grams of residual sugar in the wine and out the alcohol strength at 17.6 percent.
This port styled wine is lovely, loaded with sweet and delicious flavors of sun ripe blueberries, black currants and blackberries, and although it’s high in alcohol, it’s much smoother than most ports. Acidity is fine rather than lively, but it gives some needed freshness to the taste. I find it to be a delicious that I’d love to serve at around 16-18 degrees Celsius in medium size glasses to matured blue cheeses, or (which I prefer myself) to rich chocolate desserts.
Drink it 2011-2020

2005 Rosella's from Kosta-Browne

2011-08-14T12:29:00.002+02:00

Only the most reputed winemakers gets to purchase grapes from the famous vineyards of Gary Pisoni and Gary Franscioni in Santa Lucia Highlands, and Michael Browne of the premium Pinot Noir winery Kosta-Browne is one of very few who can boast to buy from both Pisoni Vineyard, Gary's Vineyard and Rosella's Vineyard.
The Rosella's Vineyard is located on the middle slope in the central parts of the Santa Lucia Highland bench, a location where the cool airflow from the Monterey Bay in the north still is important, but where there also are influences from the warmer inland part of the Salinas Valley. Therefore the wines from site normally combines high aromatics and a fresh acidity with some weight and good mouthfeel. The vineyard covers 20.25 hectares and is plantet to Pinot Noir of the clones Dijon 667, Dijon 777, Dijon 828, as well as the suitcase clone known as Pisoni Clone.
The 2005 is the first vintage from this vineyard for Kosta-Browne.

2005 Pinot Noir Rosella's Vineyard / 89 p
The clones Dijon 828 and Pisoni Clones are used for this wine, and the grapes are harvested at high 25.8 Brix, or higher (whoch in my opinion is too high to capture finesse). For some wines, or some part of some wines, Michael Browne works with whole cluster, but from this vineyard he prefer to destem all grapes. As always, there is a myriad of variations when it comes to vinification, each clone and vineyard, and part of the vineyard, are treated differently, and in the end it's all about blending all fractions for each wine in the very best way. For this wine, vinification goes something like this: five days of cold soak i small open top fermenters of stainless steel, followed by an alcoholic fermentatio that last for aound ten days, with pigeage two times per day. The wine is then transferred into French oak barrels, around 50 percent new, for malolactic fermentation and 15 monts of ageing.
In some years, alocohol reach around 14.5 to 14.8 percent, but in this vintage the label show 15.3 percent. Which is high, too high.
Even though ripeness was high, the wine offers a charming and intense nose, loades with red berries and a dash of rosehips. (I have tasted so many wines from Rosella's, from other producers, and the rose petals and rosehips seems to be part of the vineyards personality.) At first there was a slight oaky note, but it was toned down as the wine opened up with air. Lovely! I wouldn't really call it "burgundian like", it's to intense and rich for that, but there are several details in the wine reminiscent of great premier crus from Gevrey-Chambertin, although in a very ripe year. Also, details remiscent of Grenache...
On the palate, it's medium bodied, fresh and pure with a ripe but not really sweetish red fruit flavor. Tannins are silky, which makes the wine so enjoyable, and acidity is fresh but in no sense sharp. It's a very fine wine indeed, but I would have scored it slighly higher if it didn't have that slightly sunburnt grape skin flavor (it's almost not there) and if the finish would have been a little longer. Other than that, there's nothing to complain about if you are looking for a rich, intense and seductive Californian pinot.
I would actually pour it directly from the bottle, for everyone to enjoy the evolution with air (with more aeration, it becomes more Grenache-like), and I recommend a serving temperature at around 16 degress, but not higher than that.
Drink it 2011-2013

2008 Patrina Syrah from Alban Vineyards

2011-08-13T10:45:00.001+02:00

Since my first encounters with his wines in the early 1990s, John Alban has made remarkable progress in his viticulture and winemaking. There is no doubt that he is one of the most talented winemakers in Central Coast, and he is crafting some exceptional wines of Syrah from his own vineyards in the cool Edna Valley.
In the early years his bottlings of Syrah from the Reva and Lorraine vineyards was fantastic, and over the years they have gained more power, depths and structure. Following his intuition and the path of prominent wine producers such as Guigal in the Rhône Valley and Sine Qua Non in Ventura Couny south of Santa Barbara, he started to mature these vineyards selection and the ultra premium Seymour's, in oak for 38-42 months from the 2004 vintage. This was a smart move, I'm not the only one who felt the wines could take it, and that the extra ageing gave them a fine texture and mouthfeel.
The problem was that it took longer to get the wines on the market, and that prices went up. So, John wanted to make another Syrah, estate grown of course, but made to be a little bit lighter, with only 20-24 months of barrel ageing, and as important - less expensive. With the 2008 vintage, he made his inaugural vintage of that wine, the Patrina Syrah. And it's very good

2008 Patrina Syrah / 93 p
At first, it was a bit rough with loads of dark scented, ripe and sweet fruit flavors with smoky, slightly bitter and to be honest, not too elegant oak characteristics. Also, on the palate, the stated 14.7 percent of alcohol was definitely there, especially with its warmth in the long aftertaste, and the tannins as well as the oak bitterness, was a bit oversized. So I let the wine sit in the decanter for another four hours, of course with a revisit every hour to see how it evolved. Almost nothing happened. So I poured the wine back in the bottle, and let it stand next to my desk for two days! Then, suddenly, the wine was just stunning. I know the wines from John Alban need time, even though they are showy at once – but in this case I was overwhelmed by the transformation from roughness to pure power and finesse at the same time. This was my first experience with this wine, six month ago.
Now, it's much more calm, although it still needs one to two hours in the decanter. The color is dark, almost opaque, and the nose is concentraded with ripe, dark scented fruit, somehgow sweetish but not cooked. Now, two days later, the oak is just sweet – there’s no bitterness at all, tannins have soften, and the wine is much more silky, still sweetish and intense, and there’s a lovely blackberry fruit flavor with fine notes of wild raspberries. Only snall notes of the smoky oak is still here, but now it’s much more integrated, therefore more enjoyable. Based on the long aeration, there are reasons to believe this wine can age well for many more years. This is not a shye wine – serve it to steaks, braised meet, or other tasty dishes.
Drink it 2012-2023

A trio of pinots from Anthill Farms

2011-08-11T23:56:00.000+02:00

I have had the opportunity to taste and drink the wines from Anthill Farms quite often the last year, at my home, with my friends, at top restaurants in Napa Valley and Sonoma, and I also visited the winery in Dry Creek Valley to find out more about this small operation.
Anthill Farms is the result of three friends with a passion for Pinot Noir. Anthony Filiberti was born in Sonoma and worked with wines at Bergström Winery in Oregon and later on in Sonoma. Webster Marquez grew up in Virginia and didn't have any connection with wine, except from loving it and drinking it. The third guy, David Low, was born in Kansas but went to university in Berkeley and found his passion for wine there.

The common denominator was the legendary pinot producer Williams Selyem, where they all worked as cellar rats over a couple of years. Inspired by the outstanding quality of the wines, the dream of making their own wines was inevitable. In 2004 their dream came true.
They bought some grapes, and rented space at Papapietro Perry Winery in Dry Creek Valley, where David Low worked (and still does) as assistant winemaker with Ben Papapietro. Since this is a small winery, Papapietro Perry produces around 8 000 cases annually, they have now moved into a neighboring warehouse to make their wines, around 2 000 cases of 12 bottles per year.

The first vintage of Anthill Farms (the name doesn't mean anything, it's just a funny name revealing the trio is working with small vineyard lots) was 2004, and it didn't take too long before word to mouth gave them a red hot reputation.

The ambition is simple, to produce outstanding and elegant wines without too much influence of oak. It sound pretty much what I hear in Burgundy, where I travel a total of four weeks every year. They never use more than 40 percent of new oak (less for the elegant Mendocino wines), which is very smart, but not too common in California. If the vintage allows, they work with some whole cluster (up to 20-25 percent), and compared to the wines of Papapietro Perry (even though it is a completely different company, I think the comparison is relevant), the Anthill Farms trio works with longer cold soak prior to the fermentation.
As of the 2010 vintage, Anthill Farms produces six wines of Pinot Noir and two of Syrah. "We're not aiming for more than that", David Low says. Focus is important, and besides that they all love their other jobs.
These are some of the finest Pinot Noir wines made in California today, still they are not too expensive. They sell for around 40-50 dollars a bottle in the few shops that have them.

2007 Pinot Noir Comptche Ridge Vineyard / 92 p
Grapes for this wines is purchased from a tiny vineyard, 0.80 hectares, north of Navarro Vineyards but outside the appellation of Anderson Valley, hence the generic Mendocino County designation. It's owned by the Weir family and planted to the old Pinot Noir clone from Swan Vineyards in Russian River Valley. It's just a few miles from the coast, so it's a very cool site.
To be a Pinot Noir, color is quite dark, but that's not so unusual for Pinot Noir grown in such cold regions, where the grapes gets small and the skin grows thick. It's a lovely wine with a great personality and a quite intense perfume of dark cherries, ripe wild raspberries and sloe, and there's almost a Gevrey-Chambertin like punch to it as well. The oak, just 20 percent new, is beautifully well integrated, and alcohol at 13.7 percent. Therefore it's no surprise the one may put it in Burgundy if tasting it blind. It's medium bodied but intense and very silky, with a slightly sweetish texture and a lively acidity. I tasted it the first time a year ago, and again some months later, and found it to be a bit closed in the finish then, but now it's lovely. I prefer to decant it just prior to pouring it, so the aromas evolve a bit.
This time, I left a glass in the bottle to taste the day after, and although I still loved it for its intensity and lingering aftertaste, I missed some of the more aromatic perfumes from when it was newly opened.
Drink it 2011-2017

2007 Pinot Noir Abbey Harris Vineyard / 91-92 p
The 0.60 hectare Abbey Harris Vineyard is a lease, it's located at 330 meters altitude above Boonville in the warmer southern part of Anderson Valley. That's the reason why this wine have slightly higher alcohol, 14.1 percent. Compared to the Comptche Ridge Vineyard selection, this wine see around 30 percent new French oak barrels, but again the oak is not at all important in the flavor profile. Again, one could call this wine "Burundian like", at least when talking about the aromas. However, it doesn't have the Burundian mineral nuances. I forgot to ask David Low from Anthill Farms when I tasted the wine with him, if they use some whole clusters in the fermentation, at least there's some herbaceous notes reminiscent of stems. At this level, I like it (as I love the wines from Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, where they uses a hundred percent whole clusters), and it certainly adds some complexity to the wine. Acidity is lively and it gives freshness to the slightly more riper fruit, and the aftertaste is long and delicious. Decanting recommendations are the same as for the wine above (and all wines from Anthill Farms), and I'd prefer to serve it at 16-17 degrees Celsius. I'd probably use a burgundy glass with a wide bowl, but intense pinot wines like these may also be served in Bordeaux shaped glasses.
Drink it 2011-2017

2008 Pinot Noir Tina Marie Vineyard / 90 p
Please understand this tasting note is 2008, a vintage that in some parts of Sonoma (the coast line especially) to some extent was affected by the forest fires in Mendocino in August. Growers all over Sonoma Coast and the western part of Russian River (this vineyard is located in the cool Green Valley) told me that the smoke from the fires went out to the ocean, and was then pushed back in over land further south in Sonoma. I have tasted some wines from Sonoma, even down in Carneros (!) that had that smoky taint, that reminds me of the smoky flavor in some South African wines. Based on this theory, and I find just a "shadow" of burnt grape skins in this wine, I'm very positive about the 2008 vintage of the Tina Marie Vineyard. Yet, I have given the 2007 vintage a higher score (92-93 p) in previous tastings.
Okay, back to the wine.
Color is relatively dark for Pinot Noir, again it's a very cool site in Green Valley (which is cooler than most parts of Sonoma Coast), and the perfume is so seductive with its intense floral (rose petals) and reddish fruitiness (raspberries, sweet cherries, rosehip). Like the other pinots, it's silky and fresh with a moderate alcohol and lively acidity, the oak is perfectly integrated, and the aftertaste lingering. Compared to the wines from Mendocino, this one have a deeper and more concentrated fruit, therefore it's not as classic as those. However, it's seductive enough to make you wish for another glass, and another.

Drink it 2011-2016

Pierre Seillan of Verité

2011-06-18T14:31:00.002+02:00

WINEMAKER OF THE YEAR 2011

So many great winemakers, so few years – so I decided to name two skilled persons Winemaker of the Year every year. Pierre Seillan is the first one this year.

Pierre Seillan was born in Gascogne in France, and worked for some years at the family estate, before he in the late 1960s went to work as an exchange student in Temecula in the southern California. Back in France seven months later, he went to make wines from Cabernet Franc in the Loire Valley, followed by assignment at several estates in Bordeaux over the coming years.
In 1996 he met Jess Jackson, who asked him to come and work in California. Pierre Seillan wasn’t interested – he was too busy making wines in Bordeaux. Next year, Jess Jackson came back to Bordeaux, and asked him again. This time, Pierre accepted the invitation.

“Well, Jess asked me if I thought I could make a wine of equal quality as Château Petrus, and then I said, why not, but why don’t we try to make it even better”, Pierre recalls when we talk about the early years.

Together with Jackson’s vineyard team, Pierre planted the Jackson Park Estate to Merlot, and then started to make some wines under the Verité label in 1998.
Verité, “the truth”, are alongside the Lokoya label, the most impressive wines under the huge Jackson Family Wines umbrella. The idea was to craft a trio of great wines inspired by the sub regions Pomerol, Pauillac and St Emilion of Bordeaux, and the challenge was to make them even better.

The first vintage was the difficult 1998 vintage, and although there were troubles to get the grapes fully ripe, Pierre managed to produce two remarkably fine wines in that year. These wines still holds together, on the nose they behave like fine clarets from Bordeaux, and they even taste pretty well today, although they start to dry out a bit.

To make these fine wines, Pierre gets to select some of the finest lots, of even rows, of vines in the best of the Jackson family’s vineyards in predominately Sonoma. The Merlot grapes are mostly sourced from the outstanding 44.50 hectare Jackson Park Vineyard, situated at 165-186 meters of altitude on gently rolling slopes in the mountain above Benett Valley in Sonoma. It was planted exclusively to Merlot of Clone 181 taken from Château Petrus in Pomerol. To Pierre, that clone was essential to plant to be able to “compete” with the wine from Château Petrus.

Another very important vineyard source is the Alexander Mountain Estate in the eastern part of Alexander Valley, close to the home of the Jackson family. It’s an amazing vineyard, a patchwork of almost 200 smaller vineyard blocks stretching from 210 to 720 meters of altitude, planted to various varieties (Verité uses mostly Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot from here) in poor volcanic soils. Speaking about soils, Pierre Seillan just love the vide variation of soil types in Sonoma – which of course was one of the reasons for him to accept to work here with Jess Jackson.

“We have more different soils here than they have in total in France”, he says.

Pierre also buys grapes from Kellogg Estate at 150 to 280 meters altitude in poor volcanic soils in Knights Valley, where Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot of exceptional quality is grown.

The idea behind Verité is not to produce wines of true terroir from each mountain vineyard, but to create blends of the highest quality, inspired but the blends of Bordeaux. Although I find these wines to be, or at least mature into something very Bordeaux like, there’s one distinctive difference; I find more structure and energy (that’s due to the mineral qualities of these soils) in the Verité wines than in the bordelaise ones.

Three wines are made. La Muse is the Pomerol in the lineup, based on 82-92 percent Merlot depending on the vintage, with the balance of Cabernet Franc and just a dash of Cabernet Sauvignon. La Joie is the Pauillac blend, built on 64-75 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and therefore a bit more structured, whereas the Le Désir is the Saint Emilion in the trio, a lovely wine where Merlot and Cabernet Franc make up around 80-85 percent of the blend, most often in relatively equal parts.
All wines are crafted in more or less the same way, vinified in small lots and then transferred into brand new French oak barrels to spend 14-16 months including the time for malolactic fermentation. They are all bottled without fining or filtration.

The day I came to Verité on my latest visit, Robert Parker was on his way in to taste all wines and vintages ever made at Verité, so I guess his highly interesting report will be published quite soon as well. I look forward to – I’ve tasted all this wines over the years, but not all at the same time. The following wines were tasted over a couple of weeks in April and May (all wines of the same vintage at the same time), in the addition of the 2001 vintage that I tasted a year ago.

Pierre Seillan also makes the fine wines under the labels Anakota and Archipel, as well as wines in St Emilion and Tuscany.

Vintage 2007

2007 La Muse / 98-100 p
If the initial challenge was to make a wine as good as the one from Château Petrus, this may well have been what both the late Jess Jackson and his winemaker Pierre Seillan had in mind. This is a spectacular wine, already today (whereas the pomerols normally needs at least a decade before the start to show their true caliber). It’s a blend of approximately 90 percent Merlot, all from Jackson Park Vineyard in Bennett Valley, which Pierre Seillan holds as the best site on this planet for Merlot. Well, if not the best, it’s still amazing!
The wine was decanted an hour prior to the tasting, and by then the nose had opened up and offered a rich, ripe and seductive but yet extremely elegant nose with loads of dark berries, but also more complex nuances such as graphite, cacao and mineral. The oak is perfectly integrated, hence not noted in my book (except from the cacao notes). On the palate, it still is young and at first a bit closed, the tannins are firm and hold the fruit body back a bit, and also on the palate the oak is just like a whisper. Compared to the cabernet based wines, this hangs on for longer, and therefore it’s a bit more charming to enjoy already today than there are. However, I would love to retaste this wine in five or eight years, and it’s also then the great potential starts to show.
Drink it 2012-2032

2007 La Joie / 98-100 p
This is just an outstanding wine! It is dark purple and youthful, and it offers a big, intense, deeply concentrated yet so perfumed and elegant nose. On the nose I find cassis and sweet cherries, nuances of rose petals and violets, but also a lovely spiciness, and as all of the wines from Verité, the oak is totally absorbed by the fruit flavors. In many ways, it reminds me of some of the greatest Bordeaux wines when they were just released (1990s, 2000s, and even 2005s), but to be honest I find this wine more elegant and perfectly well polished. It took an hour of aeration before it started to open up, but then it started to show its true potential. I don’t how I managed to keep a quarter of this great wine in the bottle for another day – but I’m glad I did. Over the 24 hours in the opened bottle, it evolved into something even more seductive. The tannins, which already from the beginning were huge but fine, had become a bit softer and now felt silky, but the perfumes and the fruit body was still the same. Without a doubt, this is one of the most profound young wines from Verité I have tasted … yet!
It’s a perfect as I can which for, but still I guess it will evolve into something even more seductive, complex and perfect over the coming years.

Drink it 2012-2032

2007 Le Désir / 97-98 p
There’s really something desirable over this wine. Again, tasted direct from the bottle it was at first a bit shy, very elegant, but a bit closed. But giving it some air, already after 30 minutes in the glass it started to open up and show more of its depths and concentration. At first the nose was much finer tuned and almost shy, but with the help of some air, the flavors turned deeper, darker, and more intense. Also here, Pierre Seillan shows what a master of oak he is – it’s just a shadow of the oak, if even that. I’d rather say the oak flavor is so fine, it’s more likely you wouldn’t write oak in your tasting note. Instead you’ll find a fine blueberry fruit, the fragrance of red berries, and even some grassiness. Om the palate it’s elegant in the way a Francophile would love, but with more intensity, and (pardon my French) a taste, body, intensity and texture most vignerons in Bordeaux could only dream of. It’s really a first growth of Sonoma!
Also with this wine, I kept the bottle a day, to see how well the wine performed after 24 hours of decanting. And it kept, and it evolved into even greater complexity. It’s really a great wine!
Drink it 2012-2030

Vintage 2006

2006 La Muse / 94-95 p
If the intention was to impress on, and convince those who have their doubts about, 1) Merlot is not a great grape variety, 2) Merlot from California is even worse, and 3) no one on earth can make better wines of Merlot the those of Pomerol, this wine would be one of my California choices in that competition. With 14.1 percent of alcohol, an impressively deep and dark fruit flavor that lingers for a minute in a fine balance with tannins and acidity, and as with all the other wines in the Verité family an almost hidden oak character, it’s actually quite French in style. I really enjoy the energy in this wine, and although it takes an hour in the decanter for the finest balance to appear, it’s very elegant already from the bottle. The overall balance is one of the greatest assets in this gorgeous wine. As all Verité wines it should be decanted a good hour prior to serving it, if drunk young. But the best you can do, is to let it rest for some years in the cellars.
Drink it 2012-2026

2006 La Joie / 95-97 p
At first this wine showed a great concentration and intensity, yet a very fine tuned elegance with notes of graphite and cedar tree in addition to the perfectly ripe but not overripe and sweetish blueberry and cassis fruit. It took a while for wine to open up – actually, even the day after it stayed more or less the same in the opened bottle – but one thing that impressed on me, was the elegance. It’s really a beauty!
The structure is serious, tannins are firm but ripe and therefore on the elegant side. Even though the wine offers a ripe and to a certain extent sweet blueberry, cassis and cherry fruit, the tannins and the fresh acidity give the wine a very classic and complex taste, with a long and dry finish. There was a small bitter taste (from the oak?) during the first hours, but the air polished it and then the texture was more refined. Given the fact this wine kept so extremely well in the open bottle, there’s no hurry to drink it. It will keep!

Drink it 2012-2030

2006 Le Désir / 96-97 p
This vintage is almost as impressive as the 2007, slightly earthy with notes of chocolate (rather cacao) in combination with the ripe and somehow sweetish dark fruit body, with notes of cherries, blackberries and blueberries. Still it’s very elegant, even Bordeaux like, but young and at this stage more marked by fruit than what normally would be described as complexity. Nevertheless, so much finesse and elegance has been captured in this wine, it’ll just take a few more years of bottle age before we write “complexity” and all Bordeauxish adjectives in our tasting notes. More than the 2007 version, this gained from the one day decanting I gave the wine. On the palate, it tastes fresher and a bit more red fruit scented than expected, the acidity is lively and the tannins are young and quite firm, but mature. Still I’d give this wine at least one year more in the bottle. I guess it would keep as well as the 2007 version, but I doubt it will be the better one after ten years.
Drink it 2012-2030

Vintage 2004

2004 La Muse / 95 p
This wine was composed of 86 percent Merlot, seven percent of Cabernet Franc and the rest Cabernet Sauvignon and Malbec. Although the vintage was unusual warm and the fruit is rich and dark scented, there are no overripe flavors at all, well, besides the ripe, almost sweetish blueberry like Merlot flavors that is. Even when I tasted this wine three years ago, it was silky and well balanced, and with some more years of bottle age, the fine minerality is now more present, which of course is a great asset for the overall finesse. Also, a slight note of chocolate (from the oak, I guess) and sous-bois has developed over the years. It’s a great example from a vintage that overall gave ripe, delicious but not always excellent and perfectly balanced wines. I recommend an hour in the decanter before serving it, and a serving temperature of around 18 degrees to enhance the finer and fresher notes in the wine.
Drink it 2011-2022

2004 La Joie / 95-96 p

In this wine, Pierre Seillan included some grapes that normally go into the Anakota wines, and the final blend was 66 percent of Cabernet Sauvignon, 19 percent of Merlot, ten of Cabernet Franc and the rest of Petit Verdot. It’s as good as the Le Désir, and again it’s not obvious (if tasted blind) that this wine come from a very warm vintage. On the nose, it’s still rich and intense, but with its higher proportion of Cabernet Sauvignon, the tannic structure is much more firm compared to the other wines, so it behaves a bit younger and a bit dryer. It also offers slightly sweetish dark berry aromas, both blueberries and cassis, also a fine note of cedar tree, which most likely comes from the oak. Compared to my tasting notes some years ago, the aftertaste seems to be longer and more refined, I guess that’s due to the more polished tannins today. Still I’d like to decant this wine and serve it in a large Bordeaux glass, at 18 degrees Celsius for the finest balance, and to rich dish of beef of venison. To integrated the tannins a bit more, and make the wine even more silky and seductive, I would add a component with a fat or creamy texture – that’s the easiest way to please you palate when you serve a young and very serious Cabernet Sauvignon wine.
Drink it 2011-2024

2004 Le Désir / 96 p

This is a lovely St Emilion interpretation! It’s dense, dark fruit scented and concentrated, yet so elegant with a phenomenal complexity for being a 2004, and there’s enough structure of tannins to match the slightly richer fruit than average here at Verité. When I tasted it three years ago, it was a bit closed, but now it has opened up and reveals fine notes of ink, cedar and chocolate, but of these notes are finely integrated as small shadows in the purely fruity and almost silky body, that lingers for more than a minute.
This vintage was composed of 49 percent of Merlot, 47 percent of Cabernet Franc and just a few percent of Cabernet Sauvignon. It is definitely one of the finest Bordeaux inspired wines of the 2004 vintage from California’s north coast, Sonoma County and Napa Valley included. Since it continued to open up in the glass when I tasted it, I guess it’s a good idea to decant it a good hour before you serve it, at least if you’ll be drinking it in the coming few years.
Drink it 2011-2024

Vintage 2001

2001 La Muse / 96 p
Please take into consideration that the lineup of 2001s were tasted a year ago. Then this wine was dark, still youthful with fully ripe, dense and concentrated fruit flavor, still young with a good grip from the tannins which made up a very fine structure together with a lively acidity and minerality. The structure is still there, and still as magnificent as before. As in all vintages of La Muse, there’s a great balance, where the concentrated fruit never gets too sweet, it just makes you believe there’s some sweetness. This wine can really rival the very finest wines of Pomerol.
It should be decanted, not only to remove the fine sediment that may be there, rather more for the aeration. I’d serve this wine to a dish (chicken, red meat or even white fish) with butter fried mushrooms or truffle – that’s the perfect flavor match to a great Merlot based wine in its early stage of maturity.
Drink it 2011-2021

2001 La Joie / 97 p
Of the three 2001s, this always was and still is the most structured, it was a closed a few years ago, but is now a more open, yet youthful with layers of intense primary fruit flavors and it is extremely elegant and complex. Oak is not really part of the wines from Verité, but there’s a fine note of walnuts and cedar tree that I find very attractive. On the palate, it’s medium to full bodied, still young and relatively firm, tannins are important but ripe and therefore rather velvet like, and in the very long finish, the fresh acidity is perfectly well in balance with the fruit and the tickling mineral notes. Seamless would be a good word to describe the texture of this great wine – the finest (to my knowledge) of Cabernet Sauvignon based wines of Sonoma County this vintage.
Give it an hour in the decanter before you enjoy it. It’s still young, and it will open up with some air.
Drink it 2011-2025

2001 Le Désir / 97 p

Again, another great and extremely seductive effort of the Le Désir – one of the most complex Bordeaux styled wines in Sonoma County. Color in this ten year old is still dark and youthful with a touch of purple. The nose is stunning, rich and loaded with dark berry fruit, a bit spicy with fine tuned nuances of cedar tree, almonds and walnuts, also some tobacco which indicates a certain level of maturity, still the wine is young and full of primary fruit flavors. It’s very elegant, although medium plus bodied with good intensity and concentration, still so elegant and well balanced. In the long, lingering finish, you’ll find some tickling minerality, and the acidity gives a great energy to it.
As for the other two 2001s, decanting is recommended, also to serve it at around 18 degrees Celsius in a large Bordeaux glass.
Drink it 2011-2023

Vintage 1998

1998 Verité / 90 p
In this inaugural vintage, this wine was only called Verité, but later it would become La Muse. It was made of 90 percent Merlot and ten percent Cabernet Sauvignon. As for the 1998 La Joie, it’s a lovely wine with very much Bordeaux like aromas and flavors, and the right words to use as descriptors would be “complex”, “noble maturity”, “forest floor” and “truffle”, but overall there’s a great balance, a fine structure with polished but still vital tannins. When I tasted the wines two years ago, the aftertaste was sublime and long, today it have started to decline and dry out a bit – but what’s there, is very fine. Still I wouldn’t keep the wine much longer – it’s good as it is right now.
In my first tasting notes of this wine, I gave it 92-93 points.
Drink it 2011-2012

1998 Verité La Joie / 91 p

Wow, isn’t this fantastic! When every Cabernet Sauvignon winemaker in California complained over the wet and cool vintage, Pierre Seillan was quite happy about the climate in Sonoma, although he said it was a bit of a difficult vintage. I have tasted this wine, made of 70 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and 30 percent Merlot, several times over the years, and it’s now fully mature and very elegant with that kind of magic secondary aromas that only time will create. Any good taster, American or French, would put this wine in Bordeaux in a blind tasting.
Color is still surprisingly dark, but the tawny rim reveals the maturity of the wine. On the nose, ultra complex notes of cigars, cedar tree, sous-bois and dried mushrooms tell you the same story. On the palate, its much lighter (due to its age, and the weaker vintage) compared to the younger vintages, but there’s enough complexity and structure to make it very drinkable. It shouldn’t be decanted too long in advance, actually I’d rather decant it just before serving it, just to remove the fine sediment.
In my notes from 2008, I gave the wine 92-93 points.
Drink it 2011-2014

2007 and 2006 from Lokoya

2011-06-11T19:41:00.002+02:00

In 1994 Jess Jackson created the exclusive label Lokoya, named after a word Indians who lived up in the Mayacamas ranges used. The idea was to craft a range of great cabernets from different appellations within the Napa Valley. In that mission, the team Jess, his winemakers and wine growers were successful, and for many years I have looked (and tasted) at the Lokoya wines as some of the finest and most impressive efforts in Napa Valley.
The Lokoya winery doesn't own any vineyards, all grapes are sourced from the very best vineyards, lots and even rows that Jess Jackson has purchased in Napa Valley. As for Pierre Seillan at Verité in Sonoma, the winemaker at Lokoya, Chris Carpenter, gets to chose grapes first of all winemakers, hence the high quality of each vintage.

There are now four different bottling of Lokoya, one from each of the prestigious mountain appellations in Napa Valley, on the western side Diamond Mountain and Spring Mountain in the north and Mount Veeder (the best blocks in the great Veeder Peak Vineyard) in the south, and on the eastern side on from Howell Mountain (predominately the Keyes Vineyard).
All four wines are crafted in the same way, one hundred percent Cabernet Sauvignon (24-36 hectoliter per hectare), fermented with its own yeast in small open top fermenters of steel after four to five days of cold soak. The wine is matured in new French oak barrels for 18-22 months depending on each wine and the vintage, and there’s no fining or filtration before bottling.
Production is small, not more than 2 000 cases per year in total in a good vintage. The wines are only sold through mailing list and at the Cardinale Winery in Oakville, where the wines are made.
The sad thing is that prices took a giant leap up by the 2007 vintage, to 400 dollar per bottle. In one way I understand it – quality is outstanding, all four wines are among the very finest produced in their respective appellation – and production is smaller than the demand for the wines. I guess we have to accept the rising prices, there are now more and more wines getting closer to the magic 500 dollar limit, where (so far) only Harlan Estate and even more Screaming Eagle have touched or surpassed.

Vintage 2007

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Diamond Mountain / 95-96 p
Of all wines from Lokoya, this is always the most approachable as young. It offers a quite open, intense and fruit driven nose with lovely notes of cherries, maraschino, cassis and almonds, as well as a slight touch of the oak vanilla. If the other bottling of Lokoya is firm and tannic at this young stage, this one is more polished, as if the tannins were almost totally absorbed by the medium to full bodied and rich taste. There are also fine notes of mineral, almost towards a slight saltiness, and the acidity also help to give freshness to the taste. The wine was decanted a good hour before I tasted it, which was a good thing as the taste still is a bit closed, especially in the finish.
Drink it 2011-2027

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Spring Mountain / 96-97 p

Compared to the Diamond Mountain, the Spring Mountain bottling offers a sweeter and more intense flavor of cassis, but there’s also more aromas of stony minerality and rocks, which (at least for me) gives the wine a slightly more interesting complexity. In that sense, it’s also more distinct. On the palate, it tastes a bit younger due to the deeper fruit, higher density and more marked tannic structure. Again, the oak is extremely well absorbed by the fruit – the winemaking skill of Chris Carpenter is well worth mention, there’s 100 percent new French oak used also in this wine. The aftertaste is fine, but a bit closed at this young stage. A couple of years of cellaring are needed to see the full potential.
Drink it 2013-2032

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Howell Mountain / 98 p

Howell Mountain at its best – this is a manifest in mountain grown fruit. The color is dark purple, rather opaque to be honest, and even though the wine is very young and in no way offers the full range of flavors it will do in the coming years, the nose is just gorgeous in its full power, dark ripe but yet young fruit – mostly dark cherries and cassis, but there are also the typical fragrance of crushed rocks (I just love that) to reveal its origin – the poor volcanic soils of Howell Mountain. The taste is rich, packed with dark ripe fruit, yet so closed and restrained due to its marked tannic and mineral structure. Having had several vintages of the Howell Mountain from Lokoya over the past ten years, I know time will tell you another story than this tough one. Be patient, keep it a few more years, decant it at least one hour before you drink it, and enjoy it with a rich dish to soften the tannins even more. Already today the aftertaste lingers for a minute – just imagine what it will do in some years from now when the tannins will soften. This is the finest vintage of the Howell Mountain from Lokoya I have tasted!
Drink it 2014-2032

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Mount Veeder / 98-99 p

This wine is normally the most concentrated and well structured of them all, and so it is also in this vintage. Color is as dark and opaque as in the precious wines, but the nose is a bit more dense and concentrated, however more intense and aromatic. I find sweet cassis as well as some lighter red fragrances, walnuts, a touch of the oak vanilla (but no toasted aromas), the same fine stoniness and minerality as in the Howell Mountain bottling, and it’s just impressive how concentrated this wine is without being too much or even sweetish. On the palate, it’s huge, full bodied and concentrated with a dense and ripe but in no way sweet fruit, and in although it’s young and firm, the aftertaste lingers for more than a minute! Add the salty mineral saltiness to all that, and you’ll understand how complex this great wine is. I’d give it a couple of more years more to polish the tannins a bit more, and it is recommended to decant it at least an hour prior to serving it.
Drink it 2014-2032

Vintage 2006

2006 Cabernet Sauvignon Diamond Mountain / 95 p

After one hour in the decanter, the perfumes were still very intense, rich and almost sweetish with notes of ink, vanilla and toffee, but overall dark, ripe and absolutely pure berry fruit. During the tasting, the wine evolved slowly, and even one day later, it showed just beautiful in the opened bottle. As always, this is the most elegant and ready to drink bottling from Lokoya, although there is – as most of the time from mountain vineyards – a great structure of tannins and the lovely and almost salty minerality I enjoy so much. On the palate, it’s rich and concentrated but not at all sweet or plump. Instead it’s delicious, very elegant and a bit closed although there’s enough body and fruit to give a silky texture. The oak is pretty well integrated, just a dash of vanilla and some tannins shows on the palate. It’s a very fine wine, still young, but very enjoyable already today – especially after several hours of decanting.
Drink it 2012-2026

2006 Cabernet Sauvignon Howell Mountain / 96-97 p

One hundred percent of Cabernet Sauvignon from the Keyes Vineyard on Howell Mountain, and in the hands of winemaker Chris Carpenter, those grapes turned out to be just fantastic in the bottle. This is dark, well, actually it’s opaque, and youthful in its ink purple color. As expected the concentrated dark fruit is ripe but not sweet, since it’s balanced with loads of tannins and stony minerality – oh, yes, the Howell Mountain volcanic soil comes with the bottle. Surprisingly it’s not rustic or harsh at all, on the contrary I wrote “delicious” in my tasting notes, that’s because the intensity of the slightly sweetish, cherry like ripe and very delicious fruit. This dark fruit is joined by notes of graphite, an almost granite like dustiness, but to my surprise very little oak. Almost a third of the wine was left in the bottle until the day after, and when tasted, it was absolutely stunning. Even day two after the tasting, the wine held together in a way that was amazing. To me, that’s the best sign of a wine that will evolve slowly over many years, into something even more fantastic. A recommendation though, is to decant this wine at least 2-3 hours before serving it.
Drink it 2014-2030

2006 Cabernet Sauvignon Mount Veeder / 96-98 p

Normally the most impressive bottling from Lokoya is the one from Mount Veeder, and in this vintage there’s no change from that “rule”. When I poured it, it was a bit closed, still almost opaque and densely concentration, but I felt it didn’t show all its glory and power. Therefore I let the wine sit in the decanter for almost two hours before I started to taste and judge the wine properly. Even if there was a slight spiciness from the oak, it was extremely well integrated in the dense fruit, a detail that reveals the skill of the winemaker. Of the three 2006s of Lokoya, this is the most concentrated, but also the most impressive – not for its power, but for its overall fantastic balance. The fruit flavors are best described as cassis (with just a hint of aromatic greenness) and sour dark cherries, especially after several hours in the decanter. For sure there’s a lot of concentration here, still the minerality breaks through the fruit and adds a great complexity. Then there’s also a very fine tuned of chocolate (from the oak), but I wouldn’t call it oaky. As for the other Lokoya wines, I kept the bottle for one, and even two days, just to see how well it kept. Again, that’s a very good sign!
Drink it 2014-2030

2006 Ritchie Vineyard Chardonnay from Aubert Wines

2011-06-05T11:25:00.000+02:00

Mark Aubert has for a long time been one of the most celebrated consultant winemakers of Napa Valley. Today his consultant days seems to be over, although he still is part of the blending sessions at Futo Wines, a relatively new and highly interesting winery next to Harlan Estate and Bond Wines in Oakville.
Earlier this year, he moved the production from the custom crush facility at Laird Family Vineyards to his own winery in Calistoga. Most winemakers I have talked to, says that working in their own wineries give them a chance to focus more on every small details in the production, therefore make better wines. If that’s what’s going to happen for Mark and Teresa Aubert, then I really look forward to the 2011 vintage from them. Their chardonnays, which to me are their best wines, are already among the finest in the category of rich chardonnays in California.

2006 Ritchie Vineyard Chardonnay / 93 p

Grapes to this wine are sourced from the well known Ritchie Vineyard in the cooler part of Russian River that normally, as in this case, is bottled with the Sonoma Coast appellation. This is one of the oldest vineyards of Chardonnay in Sonoma, and it’s planted with the clones Old Wente, Robert Young and Chardonnay Musqué. Color is golden straw, quite deep and slightly cloudy since the wine is bottled unfiltered. At first, when poured directly from the bottle, the nose was very intense and showed an almost sweetish fruitiness with notes of pineapple and sweet lemon, but there’s also a spicy oak note reminiscent of all spice and cloves. To some consumers, this style of chardonnay is a bit too much, and I can understand that – but tasting the same wine after one, or ever tree hours of decanting, is a bit more elegant. (Sometimes I find this kind of chardonnays, when tasted at the same age, tastes better and more complex the day after!) When the sweeter fruit notes have started to mellow, a more complex and earthy, even stony an “almost but not really burgundian” quality evolves.
On the palate, the same mellowing effect is to be expected from decanting. At first, it is full bodied, rich and ripe with a silky texture but lively acidity that lingers for almost a minute, but with air, it’s more complex and elegant. The texture and finish is great, the only negative thing is the slightly too warm alcohol. Serving it with food, which is recommended, the alcohol warmth will be integrated and absorbed by creamy textures and some acidity. I’d like to serve it at around 12 degrees.
Drink it 2011-2014

More 2007 cabernets from Nickel & Nickel

2011-05-31T18:29:00.000+02:00

Earlier this spring I tasted a quartet of 2007s from Nickel & Nickel (the old red barn above), and when I visited the estate some weeks ago, I retasted a few of them and four more. It seems like the 2007 vintage suited Nickel & Nickel very well, and their ambition to show the diversity of Napa Valley shows clearly when one lines up the wines from various vineyard the samt vintage.

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon CC Ranch / 91 p
The CC Ranch sits on a gentle rolling knoll next to Silverado Trail and Oakville Crossroads, not far away from the Frog’s Leap Winery. Of the 46.50 hectares, Nickel & Nickel farms 6.10 hectares, all planted to Cabernet Sauvignon in a weathered gravelly soil. The resulting wine is elegant with a bit more reddish fruitiness with nuances towards sweet cherries, but also darker notes like black currants. At this young stage, there’s also a slightly sweetish vanilla note from the oak, and a roasted touch as well. On the palate, it’s the overall balance that’s impressive, tannins are fine and well integrated in the quite intense fruit forward body, and compared to most of the Nickel & Nickel bottling, this one is most approachable already when young. However, it will develop with age, and it benefits from decanting.
Drink it 2012-2022

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Regusci Vineyard / 90 p
I have had the wines from Regusci Estate on several occasion, without ever been impressed by them. They seem to be a bit rustic, earthy and sweetish at the same time, with little distinction. I guess it’s due to their winemaking – their vineyards shouldn’t be too bad, it’s close to well known wineries such as Shafer Vineyards and Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars – who makes some very fine wines. Also, the Regusci vineyard team also farms for other wineries, among them the Darioush further south on Silverado Trail, so I guess they are well respected.
This was the first time I tasted the Regusci bottling from Nickel & Nickel, and I felt some relations to my impressions of the estate bottling, yet so much better. However, it doesn’t have the same purity and aromatics as the rest of the line up from Nickel & Nickel, although the equally red and black fruit is quite fresh, but with some air, a lovely note of raspberries was revealed. On the palate, it’s quite silky, fresh and elegant, with fine tannins, some cedar notes and earthy qualities, and although it’s a bit lighter than the rest of the wines, it lingers for a while. It quite good, absolutely drinkable, but I don’t think it will evolve as good as the other wines in the lineup.
Drink it 2011-2021

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Vogt Vineyard / 93 p
If you like firm, classic wines with serious structure, this is it! Over the years, I have always been a fan of the selection from Vogt Vineyard, a 5.65 hectare vineyard at 480-550 meters above sea level on top of Howell Mountain. In the poor, well drained and stony volcanic soil, the vines suffers and gives only low yields of small bunches with small, thick skinned grapes, which produces a dark wine with huge structure and intense fruit flavors. Of all wines, this is the wine that needs more aeration, at least 30 minutes in the decanter is recommended.
The nose is intense, deeply concentrated, yet a bit shy – it offers just the most elegant of its dense black fruit qualities, and you can tell they are born in a poor soil – there’s a super complex aroma of something reminiscent of gravelly and volcanic dust. I love that part of it. On the palate, you’ll get the first sweet kiss of the immensely concentrated fruit, but there’s no real sweetness whatsoever – it’s just an impression due to the fact the grapes were ripe, small and full of flavors when harvested. A second later, the tannins and lively minerality takes over, and that’s what together with the fruit aromas lingers for a minute or so.
Even though it’s not charming at all, I find this style very appealing. Give the wine some more years, and it will taste more elegant, as the tannins slowly start to polymerize and soften.
Drink it 2014-2025
2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Witz End Vineyard / 92-93 p
Since the owners of the vineyard have started to make their own wine, this was the last vintage from Nickel & Nickel of this wine. Sadly, I have to say – this Rutherford wine is a classic styled wine, dark fruit scented with notes of blackberries, cassis, complex nuances of cedar tree, medium bodied with a very fine tannic structure, some mineral notes, a good towards lively acidity and a very complex, long and elegant aftertaste. It’s still young and a bit closed, but I noticed that it opened up in a very positive way during the tasting, to show a seductive note of wild raspberries to complement the darker berries first noted. As in all wines from Nickel & Nickel, the oak is very well integrated, and even though the wine is still very young, tannins are firm but perfectly ripe, therefore in full balance. It’s in all aspects a textbook Napa Valley wine, that show just how well concentration, finesse and terroir makes a good match here in the valley.
The vineyard itself is 2.25 hectares, located on a gentle slope with well drained gravelly clay soil in the southwestern end of Rutherford. Dirk Hampson told me once the grapes from this vineyard are very small, but with a great intense. Given the fact the vines were planted in 2001, it’s an impressive wine!
Drink it 2012-2027

The Maiden of Harlan Estate 2002 and 2001

2011-05-27T21:42:00.000+02:00

The Maiden is more of a little sister of Harlan Estate, than a second label. There’s nothing about this estate at all – every sincle barrel that is produced from the estate fruit is made with the same ambition, and the same care. All grapes are harvested with the intention to make the cut into the final cut. Fermentation is carries out in stainless steel tanks wooden fermenters and oak barrels, before the wine is racked into brand new French oak barrels for malolactic fermentation and slow maturation. After twelve months of ageing, Bill Harlan and his team of Bob Levy, Paul Roberts, Don Weaver and consultant Michel Rollad, goes through all the barrels to make the strictest selection to select the barrels that offers the typical Harlanesque style for the Harlan Estate bottling.

Wines with more of less the same characteristic but not the same intesisy and length, goes since the inaugural vintage 1995 into this little sister bottling, The Maiden. This wine is also very good, indeed, it’s very muich like a baby Harlan Estate – I’d often describe it as 75 percent of the style and quality to 25 percent of the price. In other words, it’s the best deal!

Whatever there’s left in the barrel cellar – and believe me, the selection is strict, so there’s a lot – is sold anonymous in bulk, to end up in blends somewhere without sanyone knowing where.

2002 The Maiden / 94 p
If 2001 vintage combined a relatively cool growing season with a few heat spikes, the 2002 vintage was more even, but overall a bit warmer. This can be tasted in the wine, which is a bit darker, more concentrated, riper and fruit driven than the 2001. Although there’s abundant of ripe cherry and cassis fruit flavors, more density and fuller body, there’s also a youthful and quite firm structure of tannins and mineral notes to make the wine fabulously well balanced. It’s a bit closer to its bigger sibling thanks to the concentration, silkiness, length and intensity, but then the 2002 Harlan Estate is also an even more intense and impressive wine. Taken the price into consideration, this is an outstanding wine that may well be compared to many of the much higher priced so called cult wines of Napa Valley, and it’s just a good as the best of them. During the hour I enjoyed this wine (and poured it again, and again from the bottle), it showd more and more the more I let it breathe, so decanting is essential to get to taste all flavors there is.
Drink it 2011-2027

2001 The Maiden / 93-94 p
I was a bit surprised how young and still purple this wine is – also that it still carries most of its primary fruit aromas. The nose is open, expressive and still intense with lovely aromas of black berries and cassis as well as more complex nuances of ink and stony minerality so typical for the wines of Harlan Estate. As with it bigger sister, the oak flavors a beaulitfully well integrated. Compared with the 2001 Harlan Estate, this wine is a bit more open, and – to be honest – at the moment also a bit more elegant due to it’s a litte bit less concentrad body. On the palate, it’s as youthful as on the nose, still firmly structured with a good amount of tannins, acidity and mineral notes, which hold the ripe, pure and fresh berry fruit back a bit. Its truly a great effort, a wine with lovely personality and complexity, and it will continue to age in a fantastic way more than a decande from now. Drinking it today, I’d decant it at least half an hour before I serve it.
Drink it 2011-2026

2007, the new release of Harlan Estate

2011-05-23T21:09:00.000+02:00

There’s no need to repeat the background of this magnificent wine estate, since I recently rewieved all vintages from 1992 to 2006 on this blog. On my latest visit at the estate, I retated the 2006 vintage, and tasted the 2007 vintage for the first time. It has been sold through the mailing list, so members should already have their bottles.

2007 Harlan Estate / 98-100 p
The wine wasn’t decanted in advance, so I had the opportunity to follow the evolution of the wine during almost an hour, while chatting with manager Don Weaver and Paul Roberts (manager of Bond Estates). And I really enjoyed this wine - it's another great or even perfect wine from Harlan Estate. The color is dark purple, almost opaque, and the nose was already open and intensely fruit driven when poured from the decanter almost directly after decanting it. Although it’s so young and youthful, it already show some of the typical notes of Harlan Estate, the ripe and extremely pure dark fruit flavors with its stony mineral and graphite qualities, a touch of grassiness and a slitghtly sweetish note of the brand new and expesive oak barrels.
Compared to the 2006 vintage, this is a bit richer, and even though it’s young and firm, there’s enough glycerol and mountfeel to balance the tannins. What I really love about Harlan Estate in great vintages such as this, is the impeccable balance, the purity, the energy, the length, and the layers of flavors that linger for at least a minute or even two. Given its youth, it was surprisingly easy to enjoy already today, even though I find it to be a bit sad to drink it over the coming years – the true magic of Harlan is rarely expressed before the wine has turned ten years, or so. This is another modern classic of Harlan Estate, and it may well be as profound as the 2001, 2002 and 2005 within just a few more years of bottle age.
Drink it 2012-2032

2008 and 2007 from Futo Wines

2011-05-19T09:47:00.000+02:00

This is an impressive estate!

Many years ago, I bought the wines of Oakford Vineyards. At that time I didn’t know exactly where it was, but friends in the valley told me it was the neighbor of Harlan Estate and that the wines were made by Heidi Peterson Barret. For me, that was just the right information to make me buy the wines. And I did.

They were good, sometimes not (like 2000), but sometime immensely impressive (especially the 2001 vintage, which ironically enough was the last one). I tried to call them to see them, to learn more. Nothing happened, no replies, never. On my regular visits at their neighbor vineyards Bond Estates and Harlan Estate, I passed by their gate that said “Oakford Vineyard – not open to public”, so I gave up.

Well, I didn’t. I continued, and finally a certain Joshua Lowell answered my calls, and told me the estate had been sold. Okay, “wait and see”, I thought.

And I did. On May 12, I did my first visit at the estate. And it’s so easy to summarize it: “WOW!”

Texan business man Tom Futo is the new owner – hence the new name Futo Wines. He bought the property in 2002. Immediately he started to replant the vineyards, and – which is extremely important it you should be able to make a world class wine – build a winery. In California, there’s a trend for winemaker to rent space in so called custom crush wineries, but that’s not the final solution. Numbers of winemakers have told me over the years all the problems involved with that, such as the pump isn’t available until tomorrow, you can only use the tank for 12 days (so no cold soak, fermentation and post maceration – please choose either one of that), and limited space for again. The first vintages from 2004 (not sold until quite recently, because it due to its richness didn’t fit in the program, until clients more or less asked for it), until 2007 were made at Laird Family Winery, on of the largest custom crush facilities in Napa Valley. The choice was fully natural – the first winemaker was Mark Aubert, who made his own wines down there.

Since 2008 the winemaker is the young and extremely talented Jason Exposto. So why him? Why didn’t owner Tom and manager Joshua opt for one of the true stars in the valley? Why didn’t they hold on to the heroic Mark Aubert, or hire Andy Erickson, Philippe Melka or Heidi Peterson Barrett (again)? Well, after meeting the young Jason, I know!

Why opt for what is already known as rthe best, when you can surprise with the next generation of superstar winemakers?

Not that Jason is an untested winemaker – his track record is quite impressive. After working in New Zealand and Western Australia, he moved to California where he worked with superstars David Abreu and St-Emilion winemaker Stépahne Derenoncourt (an exceptional vigneron, modernist and hero) in is efforts in Napa Valley, so there’s nothing rookie or interesting about him. He may be young, but he knows for sure what has to be done.

The Futo estate covers only 5.25 hectares of vines, all planted to Bordeaux varietals, but spread out over 24 vineyard lots stretching over 800 meters from north to south on the east facing slopes of Mayacamas Range, touching Harlan Estate (next to) and Stelling Vineyard and the even more famous Martha’s Vineyard below.

2008 Futo / 96 p
This is a blend of 70 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and 30 percent Cabernet Franc, a grape that really thrives in its high, sunny and well exposed lot high up on the mountain. After a rigorous sorting, the grapes are fully destemmed and the juice is then fermented in stainless steel tanks of four tons, thereafter transferred into mostly brand new French oak barrels from the cooper Taransaud (“They are the best, and the most consistent in quality”, Joshua says), among them a quite impressive amount of the ultra premium barrels T5, for which the oak staves have been air dried for at least five years. In these barrels, the wine may rest for somewhere between 18 and 20 months.
Color is purple and dark, almost opaque. Joshua decanted the wine almost two hours before I came, which has to be taken into consideration (that was certainly a smart move), so it had started (not more than that) to open up a bit. Already 15 centimeters above the glass, the beauty tried to seduce me, the aroma was loads with dark berries, a touch of vanilla and sweetness from the oak, but also more elegant nuances of graphite and cedar tree. I was surprised how Bordeaux like (vintages 2000, 2003 and 2005 in Bordeaux that is) this wine was.
On the palate its medium to full bodied, in no way too much or too rich, there’s too much sophistication in the construction of true flavors in this wine for that. Slowly it opens, little by little, to reveal its true glory, dark and densely concentrated fruit, mostly cassis and blackberries, but with no sweet notes. Also, there’s much more complexity to it, cedar tree and graphite mostly, but also a fine note of walnuts. And it’s damn delicious! On the palate, there’s first a silky sweetness, then the more serious texture and structure will take over, and the overall impression will be an almost impeccable balance with just a touch of alcohol warmth before the tannins, the slightly sweetish but by no means obvious oak flavor comes through, followed by a tickling minerality and long, very fine finnish.
Even though the wine hade been decanted for a while, and that’s neccisary when served young, it continued to open up and evolve in the glass during the hour I had it there.
Drink it 2012-2032

2007 Futo / 96-97 p
I didn’t taste the wine side by side, but the the the after each other. The 2007 shares a lot of the characteristics of the 2008 (therefore most of the tasting notes would have looked the same) with a young and dark, almost opaque purple color. It was decented one hour before it was tasted, as was the 2008, so in that sense the tasting conditions was equal. This wine had a slightly greater and more aromatic nose with dark berries such as blueberries and cassis, but also a peppery spiciness and a hint of walnuts. It was a bit closed on the nose, but it opened up just lovely with the time in the glass, but even after that, it’s well structured with a lingering minerality and acitidy that makes a great balance to the rich and almost silki textured fruit body. It’s not only the densely packed but yet so elegant nose that makes this wine so great, all the way from the first sip through the midpalate to the lingering aftertaste is built on intensity and balance. Drinking it today, I recommend decanting at least one hour prior to pouring it.
Drink it 2012-2032

A trio och vineyard selections from Saintsbury

2011-05-18T09:57:00.000+02:00

Saintsbury is one of the true Pinot Noir pioneers and specialists in Napa Valley. The company was founded 30 years ago when friends David Graves and Dick Ward made their first pinot together. They were (and still are) both pinotphiles and their ambition was to reach a production of around 20 000 to 25 000 cases per year, therefore they needed to build their own winery. Their wines became so popular that production rose to appromiately the double.

Saintsbury planted their first own vineyards around the winery in southern Carneros in 1986, followed by another vineyard (the Brown Ranch) six years later. They now own 30 hectares of vines, of which two thirds are planted to Pinot Noir

Grapes are partially whole cluster vinified, in the case of the vineyard designated wines they are almost entirely destemmed, and after a few days of cold soak in small open top fermenters of stainless steel, the juice is fermented with regular pigage during 10-12 days, before the wine is racked into French oak barrels, approximately 30 percent new, to undergo malolactic fermentation and ageing during 10 months.

The Sainsbury wines have been good for many years, but the quality took at step up in 2004, when the talented Jérôme Cherry was hired as winemaker. His background says it all – he was trained in Burgundy and came to California to work with Luc Morlet at Newton Estate, then Ted Lemon at Littorai (one of the very best pinot specialists in California).
It was also in 2004 that Sainsbury started to bottle a quartet of vineyard designated pinots. Due to the bush fires in Anderson Valley, there was no Cerise Vineyard bottling in 2008.

2008 Pinot Noir Lee Vineyard / 89-90 p
The Lee Vineyard is almost adjecent to the estate vineyard of Saintsbury in Carneros, where also the winery is. It was planted already in 1967, predominately with Pinot Noir of the Swan and Pommard clones, but also with some Dijon 115 (and some Chardonnay). Compared to the other vineyard designated pinots, this is a bit more rustic and the only one where I pick up some oak. However, the fruit is quite aromatic with fine notes of dark cherries and wild raspberries, and there’s also an earthiness that adds complexity. Thanks to its structure, it is a bit closed, especially if compared to the wine from Stanly Ranch, but it has a lovely lingering fruit flavor. It just needs to breathe – give in 15 minutes in the decanter, and it will open up.
Drink it 2011-2018

2008 Pinot Noir Stanly Ranch / 91 p
The Stanly Ranch is historic, it was planted already in the mid 1800s, but it was when Louis Martini planted it to Pinot Noir in the early 1950s that it started to become what it is today. Since then the vineyard has been divided, and the northern part is now owned by Treasury Wine Estates (Beringer). The block Saintsbury work with, lies in the southern part, and it’s densely planted with Dijon 115 and Dijon 667 selections.
Of the three, this is the most fruit forward and intense, there’s lovely notes of strawberries and wild raspberries, as well as higher notes of sweet cherries – in some how quite Gevrey-Chambertin like (on the nose!), with just a suptle earthy nuance. Tannins are silky, and well integrated in the medium bodied taste, and it’s all uplifted by a lively acidity. It’s a very fine offering, the most fruity and charming in the trio.
Drink it 2011-2018

2008 Pinot Noir Toyon Farm / 91-92 p
The most complex wine of the three is this one from the Toyon Farm, located on a small knoll not to far away from Stanly Ranch in the southeastern part of Carneros. This vineyard has a quite poor and rocky soil, and it’s planted to only the Dijon 115 clone. Even though the wine shows a lovely cherry like fruit, it’s a bit reserved and offers more of the earthy nuances. During the 20 minutes I had the wine in my glass it slowly opened up and became even more complex. As in the other wines, oak is nothing you taste – it’s extremely well integrated. On the palate, it is medium bodied, fine textured with a fresh and lingering acidity, loaded with dark cherries that combine sweetness and acidity, and of the three this is the wine with the longest and most elegant aftertaste. There’s also a fine mineral note in the finish.
Drink it 2011-2018

Sauvignon Blanc à la Lail Vineyards

2011-05-17T08:14:00.000+02:00

Although Lail Vineyards made their first wine in 1996, it rests on a story that’s amazing. It’s founder Robin Lail is the daughter of the late John Daniel Jr, who in turn was the son of John Daniel, the legendary winemaker of Inglenook, a vineyard that his uncle Gustave Niebaum planted in the 1880s.

At that time, Inglenook was the most famous vineyard in the still young valley, and although Inglenook today is a simple wine brand, the reputation of the old vineyard and the wines of that time, is impeccable. But that’s all old history.

In 1983 Robin Lail founded Merryvale together with Bill Harlan, and founded Dominus Estate with Christian Moueix in 1991. Things didn’t work out the way Robin wanted, as she told me she’s not a woman who takes five bites on the apple and is happy with that, she’s a woman who wants the whole apple. So she sold her shares in both ventures to found her own company, Lail Vineyards. She still had a 0.85 hectare portion of the famous Napanook Vineyard in Yountville that she together with her winemaker Philippe Melka budded over to Sauvignon Blanc, but also had planted 1.20 hectares of Cabernet Sauvinon (predominately) on a beautiful northwest facing slope way up on Howell Mountain. That’s the source of the grapes to the great J Daniel Cuvée, a very elegant cabernet wine with good ageing potential.
But there’s more to Lail Vineyards than that fine wine, and the almost as good Blueprint Cabernet Sauvignon, sold at half the price. These wines are very good, but the true jewel of the crown is the high end Georgia Sauvignon Blanc – one of the most profound sauvignons of the world outside Bordeaux.

2009 Blueprint Sauvignon Blanc / 89 p
This is made of 100 percent Sauvignon Blanc sourced from the estate Napanook Vineyard in Yountville as well as a cool vineyard down in Coombsville and, a bit surprisingly, the much warmer Crocker Vineyard that sits right in the middle of the valley in St Helena. “I just love the fruit from this vineyard”, Robin says. The grapes are slowly whole cluster pressed, but then the vinification takes a slightly different turn than in most cases – the juice is totally fermented in neutral French oak barrels with its own yeast, and then transferred into stainless steel tanks to mature for some months on its lees. The reason for this type of reversed oak and steel vinification is to gain texture and just a minimal touch of the oak, but the freshness and elegant fragrance that is kept, perhaps even enhanced by the time in steel. The result is very attractive, lively and fresh with a absolutely pure gooseberry, citrus and Granny Smith fruit. Compared to most California sauvignons without oak flavor, this has a very long and almost creamy texture, with weight and great mouthfeel, and that’s very attractive.
Serve it at around 12 degrees rather than very chilled to enjoy the richness.
Drink it 2011-2013

2008 Georgia Sauvignon Blanc / 93 p
This is a completely different wine, totally. “One shouldn’t compare them, that’s not fair”, Robin says, and I understand her perfectly well. For this wine, grapes are only sourced in the Napanook Vineyard, again the grapes are slowly whole cluster pressed before the juice is transferred into brand new French oak barrels to ferment with is natural yeast. Just a fraction of the wine underwent malolactic fermentation, so the acidity is marked and lively, which is a great asset in the rich wine. The wine spent 18 months in the barrels, and during that time Philippe made bâtonnage to add texture.
This is truly an exceptional wine, richer and deeper than the regular bottling, and it offers intense flavors of citrus, grapefruit peels, white flowers and a dash of elderberries, also some vanilla from the oak. On the palate, its rich and creamy without being full bodied, and the high but very well balanced acidity gives the wine an almost astringent structure, and the flavors and overall impression is that it’s very Bordeaux like (but a bit richer and with a slightly higher alcohol). The finish is just amazing, and it kept on lingering for minutes. I’d recommend decanting this wine, as I do with the whites from Bordeaux.
My experience in keeping white wines from California for a long time is limited, and so far it has told me not to keep them too long.
Drink it 2011-2016

2007 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon from Vineyard 7 & 8

2011-05-15T06:47:00.000+02:00

The first time I heard about Vineyard 7 & 8, it was with loud out spoken words. “This will be the Harlan Estate of Spring Mountain”, it was said to me. I like self confidence and I wish I had more of that. But when it comes to wines, and expecially in the Napa Valley, words are most often just words with little over even no closeness to realitly. This is the way it is in Napa Valley, the Disney World of the wine world, sorry to say to. Dreams still seems to be valid than down to earth!

I’m glad the words didn’t come from the proprietors themselves, the Steffens family. The words were rumors, spoken by people who didn’t know, who just have heard about the project atop of Spring Mountain, peolple who wanted to taste but didn’t have the chance to do so. So I went up the curvy Spring Mountain Road, and my car snarled and rumbled all the way up to the top of the mountain, where famous wineries such as Philp Togni, Pride Mountain and Paloma Vineyards are the neigbours of Vineyard 7 & 8, with Barnett Vineyards and Erna Schein as the very closest (they actually share the same driveway).
Vineyard 7 & 8 is a new venture, founded by the Steffens family, who bought this 16 hectare mountain estate in 1999. On the property there were already some blocks of Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon planted in 1981 to 1982, and of course the intention was to make some great wine from those grapes. Since they didn’t have the knowledge how – the Steffens family knew how to make money, which the had done at Wall Street – they hired a French winemaker who was a former winemaker at Château Latour and Château d’Yquem i Bordeaux. I don’t mean to be rude, but the early wines I tasted from Vineyard 7 & 8 didn’t impress me. At all!

Then came another French guy, monsieur Luc Morlet, the winemaker with the golden palate from Champagne, who when moved to California slowly but surely took place among the elite of winemakers, with assignement at first Newton Estate, then Peter Michael Winery, and in 2006 founded his own family business, the Morlet Family Vineyards. With Luc, the first vintage 2007 made a change, a big one. I remember tasting with Luc a cold December evening up at the newly built winery, the older vintages side by side with the one he made (2007). Day and night!
The winery is state of the art, built to make wines of perfection. Vineyards are among the oldest on the hill, today very well maintained and managed, and in the hands of the young Wesley Steffens (the son in the family, who is in charge of the operation) and winemaker Luc Morlet it may well be the “Harlan Estate of Spring Mountain”. At least, I hope it will be. It has the potential to be.
The first release, at least in the way I see it, it this 2007 vintage – and Vineyard 7 & 8 couldn't have had a better start.

2007 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 94 p
Color is dark, deep purple, quite typical in wines from mountain vineyards where the grapes comes small, thick skinned and stuffed with polyfenols. This is a wine that need to breathe, poured direct from the bottle is at bit introvert – but be patient. It only takes five minutes before the game starts, and another fifteen for the wine to start to play with you. It’s totally natural, a young wine like this doesn’t want to be opened – it wants to rest and grow up for some more years. However, there’s a certain charm with young wines from mountain vineyards, the powerful, densly packed fruit and firm resistance of tannins (ripe, but still huge), mineral from the stony soil and lively acidity. A wine from the valley floor with a concentration like this would most likely taste rather sweetish, this doesn’t. Dark berries, sweet almost black cherries, some cacao (I remind me of fine chocolate and cherry truffles), lead pencil and the finest dust from crushed granite are written in my tasting comments.
On the palate it is at first a bit reserved, again that’s expected and typical. In great wines like this the aromatics is normally easier to describe (and appreciate?) than the palate due to the young, huge structure. I don’t bother about that, time will always tell, and being able to taste the greates young and mature wines from California for two decades now, I’m very confident that this wine will be a long runner. I like to drink it already today, given it has been decanted at least one hour and then served in a large Bordeaux glass to a medium rare steak. Willing to join? If not, let’s wait another year or two, or even ten – this wine will not run away. It’ll keep very well.
Only 600 cases were made.
Drink it 2014-2027

2008 Continuum – a new golden era of Mondavi is born

2011-05-14T07:58:00.002+02:00

In the world of movies, it’s almost always the first in a series of movies that’s the best – the sequel is normally not as well written and made. In this case, I find the continuation of the fabulous story of Robert Mondavi to be absolutely stunning! Not that I wasn’t impressed and touched by the finest wines from Robert Mondavi Winery and the original story of Robert Mondavi – his achievements ranks among the greatest in the history of wine!
Sadly, the glory of the Mondavi dynasty faded a bit towards the end (I still liked the best wines from Napa Valley), especially towards the mid 1990s when the company grew too much and in some way lost its focus, while Napa Valley as a whole took giant steps forward and saw that boom that Robert Mondavi always talked about – decades earlier.

The very minute I heard the family lost control over their company, and was bought out by the giant Constellation Brands, my first thought was that it wouldn’t take long before something new would come out from the Mondavi family. Just doing nothing isn’t, as far as I know, something that’s in the genes of a Mondavi.

But how does one move from there?

Constellation Brands had bought out the family in 2004, Robert and his daughter Marcia and winemaking son Tim moved fast. Already 2005 they made their first new wine, then from fruit sourced from the famous To Kalon Vineyard, adjacent to their formed estate in Oakville. They called the wine Continuum, which is a brilliant name, for it is a continuation of the heritage started already with Cesare Mondavi, now nearly a century ago.

The Mondavi family managed to purchase a fantastic property with 70 hectares of land at 400 to 490 meters of altitude on Pritchard Hill, 16.60 hectares of it already planted to vines in 1991 and 1996 (those grapes went into the wine Versant). After they have bought this property in 2008, they started to clear land and plant new vineyard lots in 2010. Today the Cloud View Vineyard, the new name of the vineyard, covers a total of 24.30 hectares.

It’s a challenge to farm the land up here, the soil is poor and well drained, it actually have pretty much the same structure as the llicorella soil in Priorat in Spain – it’s a very stony, reddish volcanic soil. In the past it wasn’t considered to be suitable for growing grapes, since yields rarely exceeds 20-24 hectoliters per hectare, but modern winegrowers who makes wines from these low yielding vines just love the structure, the mineral notes and the intensity of flavors in grapes grown in these poor conditions. However, the hard work and the small yields will result in high wine prices. That’s intelligible and just fair. Great wines will never come cheap. (And why should they?)
Next month, the construction of the estate winery will start – caves will be excavated into the mountainside for a barrel cellar with even temperatures, connected to the winery which will have four rooms with wooden fermentation vats (like those at Robert Mondavi Winery, but smaller). I can only guess that the small details in the wine will be even finer tuned with this. Today the wines are custom crushed at the Trinchero family winery.

The view from the vineyard atop of Pritchard Hill is magnificent. A clear day you may see all the way to San Francisco. Not that the view is the reason for climbing the mountain, the true treasure is the wine made up here.

2008 Continuum / 95-97 p
This is a blend of 71 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, 17 percent Cabernet and small portions of Petit Verdot and Merlot. In this vintage, some 70 percent of the fruits comes from the estate vineyards – so for the first time since the inaugural vintage (2005) we are able to get a pretaste on what eventually will be one of the finest wines in the valley (or more accurate, above the valley). When the vineyards are mature, the blend will most likely consist of around 60 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and a greater proportion of Cabernet Franc Franc (which thrives in the reddish volcanic soil here).
Without doubts, Tim Mondavi is a great winemaker. Small yields, a strict selection of grapes, a few days of cold soak to enhance the flavors and reduce the amount of bitterness from the skins and seeds, and then a natural fermentation with a cuvaison of around 30-35 days. Then the wine is transferred into brand new French oak barrels for malolactic fermentation and around 20 months of ageing. The result is stunning!
Color is very dark, purple and almost opaque. Already above the glass, the aromas are rich and very intense, loaded with cassis and dark cherries, with a note reminiscent of violets, and in the background there’s a very complex addition of the stony soil (it’s just like someone stood outside the window, and hammers on rocks). That stony quality will follow on the palate, and in combination with the lively acidity it creates an energy that’s just amazing. It’s like the wine dances on your tongue. I can’t help falling for this – in all possible ways the wine speaks of its origin, and Tim Mondavi have just added his skills to steward that, without interfering. This is a wine of true terroir!Although there’s enough sweetness from the ripe fruit to be charming, there’s also a firm and very serious tannic structure not to be ignored. I’d recommend an hour or two in the decanter, or even a few more years in the cellar before you pop the cork. A not to daring guess is that this wine will into something extremely complex and Bordeaux like with ageing.
Style wise I’d call this a neo-classic wine. It offers everything you like from Napa Valley, without being over the top or to ripe or alcoholic. By the way, I didn’t even think about the alcohol when I tasted the wine. Almost 2 000 cases were made – still the wine is hard to find. But it’s well worth trying ...
Drink it 2014-2032.

2009s from Rhys Vineyard

2011-05-10T18:05:00.001+02:00

Rhys Vineyards is, together with Ridge Vineyards and Mount Eden Vineyards, the stars of the Santa Cruz Mountain appellation. The company was founded by Kevin Harvey, who in 1995 planted a tine vineyard with Pinot Noir on his property and a few years later started to make some wines in his garage. The first commercial vintage was 2003, and since then production has increased over the years. In 2006 Jeff Brinkman was hired as winemaker. In 2009 a brand new winery and wine cellar was built on the Skyline Vineyard property, at one of highest peaks of the mountain. All wines are small lot fermented (there are 80 one ton open top fermenters in stainless steel and nine in French oak) and kept in French oak barrels in the caves.
Altogether Rhys Vineyards owns 18.20 hectares of vineyards in Santa Cruz Mountains and below in the San Mateo appellation, but they also planted around 10.00 hectares with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay on high slopes in the deep end of the Anderson Valley appellation in Mendocino. That vineyard will bear fruit in 2013, or 2014.
Production is small, around 4 000 cases per year, and almost everything is sold through the winery’s mailing list.

2009 Chardonnay Alpine Vineyard / 94 p

The Apline Vineyard, planted in 2001 to 2003 at 380 to 450 meters elevation in the Santa Cruz Mountains, is a cool site with a thin, stony and well drained sandstone and slate soil with traces of limestone. It’s no wonder why the wine have such a structure and fine mineral notes – it’s almost like a part of the juice was fermented in stainless steel tanks. It isn’t. After a slow whole cluster pressing and settling of the juice, it’s completely fermented in French oak casks from François Frères (the oak at Rhys Vineyard is always air dried for four years), 25 percent new, in which the wine have spent 14 months, and even though the wine is fully malolactic, the acidity is fresh.

It’s a remarkable chardonnay, medium full bodied but still extremely elegant, with just a texture rather than flavor from the oak. The aftertaste is long, very elegant and absolutely dry. In many ways it reminded me of the wines of David Ramey, Mark Aubert and Steve Kistler. I kept the opened bottle and tasted it the day after, just to see how it developed with air, and as I expected, it tasted just fine, almost even dryer and more burgundian!

Drink it 2011-2017

2009 Chardonnay Horseshoe Vineyard / 92-93 p

Winemaker Jeff Brinkman crafts this wine in the same way, but with around 30 percent new oak here. The difference lies in the terroir, and it’s notable. “The vineyards are close to each other, just a few kilometers a part, but looking into the aspects of the soils, they are ten million years apart”, Jeff says. As in all vineyards of Rhys, this is stony and well drained, but of volcanic origin. The clones, which as for the previous wine, are the Old Wente and a selection from Hyde Vineyard, which is also of the Old Wente type, and they were planted in 2004 to 2006.

This wine is fuller than the Alpine Vineyard selection, not too much but still notable, with the same intensity and texture and – although at the moment a bit covered by the fruit – the acidity and mineral notes are more of less the same. Again, there’s a steely note in the wine that may fool you a fraction of it was fermented in steel, but again that’s not the case. The oak, or at least what I suspect is the oak, is somehow a bit spicier in this wine. Also this wine kept very well in the open bottle until the day after. For both these wines I recommend decanting at least one hour before you serve them. I suggest a serving temperature of 12-14 degrees Celsius.

Drink it 2011-2017

2009 Pinot Noir Family Farm Vineyard / 92 p

The Family Farm vineyard lies below the other vineyards at lower altitude, approximately 120 meters, therefore within the quite rare appellation San Mateo AVA, rather than Santa Cruz Mountains (which is created for vineyards above 240 meters of altitude). The soil here is less rocky, clay loam and alluvial, and in combination with the slightly warmer climate here, the wine is richer, fuller, more fruit forward and less structured than the other wines in the linup. I was a bit sursprised when winemaker Jeff told me that this wine is whole cluster fermented, still there’s no signs of bitternet or greenness – the spicy and earthy notes from the stems only shows after some time in the glass. Instead it’s the ripe fruit flavor that hits you, dark cherries and even blackberries at first, with air some more light red fruit nuances, as well as a fine note of orange peel. It’s a rich and in that sense very Californian pinot with ripe tannins, still with a fine acidity and a lingerling, deliscious aftertaste.

Drink it 2011-2019

2009 Pinot Noir Skyline Vineyard / 94-95 p

Again a 100 percent whole cluster fermented pinot, but this one with a much more aromatic, intense and less spicy nose. At first, it seems to be more concentrated, with a dark fruit body reminiscent of blackberries and dark cherries. The oak, 50 percent new in this case and of the same type as for all wines here – four year air dried oak from the François Frères cooperage company in Saint-Romain in Burgundy – is extremely well integrated, almost invisible. The spicy and earthy notes from the stems, shows only after 30 minutes of aeration, but then only very little.

The mayor difference from the Family Farm bottling is the structure. The 1.20 hectare Skyline Vineyard is situated at an altitude of around 700 meters in the Santa Cruz Mountains, where temperatures are lower and the growing conditions much more extreme. The soil is thin and based of sandstone, limestone and mudstone (a type of lime and clay soil), which gives the wine a serious structure and minerality, that gives energy to the taste and lingers for a minute on the tongue. By the way, another great asset of the wine is the low alcohol – not even noted in the taste. It’s only 12.7 percent! “If I would have been a French winemaker in Burgundy, I guess I should have chaptalized the juice”, winemaker Jeff says.

Drink it 2011-2022

2009 Pinot Noir Alpine Vineyard / 93-95 p

Just one sniff on the wine and you’re stuck! It’s so different from the previous presented wines. It has a fantastic nose, bright and extremely intense, loads of both dark and light red cherries, sweet and sour, a floral touch and the typical aromatics derived from the stems, in this case 65 percent of the cluster wasn’t destemmed. Again, the oak (60 percent new) is extremely well integrated – bravo! On the palate, it is medium bodied, a bit more shy and closed that expected, but with good intensity and fine mid-palate and with marked tannins and a lively minerality that, at least today, gives a kind of closed impression. I’d give this wine another year or two in the bottle to let the structure soften a bit, and when that happens, the wine will be even more seductive and elegant.

Winemaker Jeff Brinkman was kind enough to open a bottle of the 2006 Pinot Noir Alpine Vineyard (95-96 p) to show me how the wine develops over time, and is was a stunning bottle of wine. On the nose, it reminded me of the cherry notes in the grand crus of Morey-Saint-Denis, and the body, earthy notes, structure and minerality of the grand crus of southern Gevrey-Chambertin – but with a much more Californian type of richness.

To me, the Pinot Noir Alpine Vineyard may be one of the finest bottling from Rhys Vineyards.

Drink it 2013-2022

2009 Syrah Horseshoe Vineyard / 94-95 p

Another outstanding wine! If I have been served this wine completely blind, I believe my first guess would have gone to a slightly warmer vintage in the northern Rhône valley. Color is dark, almost opaque, and the nose is very dense, dark berry scented with loads of blackberries, plums and dark cherries, but also with that typical peppery and meaty note from Syrah grown in marginal climates. And the Horseshow Ranch is one of those cooler vineyards in California which can produce very Rhône like syrahs. It’s surprising how elegant this wine is, and knowing is have a 100 percent stem inclusion, there are no notes of greenness, bitterness or earthiness from the stems – only after 20 minutes in the glass, small signs of that shows, which throws you back in the northern Rhône again. In this wine, only 10 percent of the barrels were new, Jeff doesn’t like oak in his syrahs, again something that gives this wine a more rhônish personality. It’s a remarkable wine, and I can only dream of tasting this a decade from now. Then I’d put a thousand dollars on it as great St-Joseph or Cornas.

It’s recommended to decant this wine at least one hour before serving it.

Drink it 2013-2027

Estate Cabernet Sauvignon from Chateau Montelena 2005-1981

2011-05-07T13:45:00.000+02:00

Chateau Montelena is one of the finest estates in northern Napa Valley, and with a track record of almost four decades, it’s also one of the most historical wine estates in the valley. Already in 1886 wines were produced here, and under the stewardship of owner Alfred Tubbs and his French winemaker Jérôme Bardot, the wines gained recognition and Chateau Montelena became one of the largest wine estates in Napa Valley.
Wine production came to an end with Prohibition, and after repeal the production wasn’t important at all – the Tubbs family made some wine for their own consumtion, but most of the grapes were sold to other producers. Then came World War II, and with that a new era of difficulties. In 1958 Tubbs sold the property, but not even after that wine was produced here.

The change came when Chateau Montelena was sold to Leland Paschich and some private investors in 1969. One of them was James Barrett, a lawyer from San Francisco. His intention was to produce wines, and therefor Jerry Luper was hired as winemaker in 1972. The year after, the young Croatian winemaker Miljenko Grgich was hired to make the white wine and with his 1973 Chardonnay the internation break through came – that chardonnay was the winner of the now famous Paris Tasting in 1976.

The estate vineyard at Chateau Montelena, in the warm northern part of Calistoga, covers 39.70 hectares, of which 36.00 hectares are coverd with Cabernet Sauvignon. The soil is poor, gravelly and volcanic, in which the vines suffers and gives small grapes with thick skins and intense flavors. Almost all vines are planted on St George rootstocks, therefore the vines are old, actually among the oldest in the valley since they were not attacked by the phylloxera.

The philosophy is very classic, the grapes are harvested at around 23.5 to 24.5 Brix, so tannins will always be firm and alcohol levels moderate. The juice is fermented in steel tanks, but the malolactic fermentation takes place in wooden tanks, before the wine is transferred into small French oak barrels, only 25-30 percent new, to age for 18-20 months. Production varies from 8 500 cases (in 1999 and 2000) to 13 000 cases per year (1998).

This vertical tasting showed four things, 1) the quality and style is very even over the vintages, 2) even in cooler or more difficult vintages, the wine is very good and capable of ageing, 3) the wine is remarkable Bordeaux like, especially with some age, and 4) this wine ages very well.

2005 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 94-95 p
Harvested throughout September, from 4^th to 27^th at high 26 Brix, the Cabernet Sauvignon grapes produced a quite dense and rich, yet elegant och well structured wine with fine acidity and lingering mineral notes, and it’s surprisingly charming and open for being so young. Even though there are notes of milk chocolate and fudge on the nose – which is not the typical type of flavors in the wine from Chateau Montelena – there’s also a complex touch from the volcanic soil, also fine notes of lead pencil and ink. It’s very good already today, still I recommend to waint at least a few more years for the typical complexity and bordeauxlike flavors to evolve even more. Also, there’s no risk of waiting too long, I suspect most bottles will be drunk long before the wine has come closer to its optimium age. Drinking it withing the coming 5-10 years, I’d give it a good hour in the decanter, at least.
Drink it 2012-2030.

2002 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 95 p

This was a quite regular growing season, with a harvest that stretched from mid-September to mid-October. Although eight years old, the wine still appears a bit closed – at least compared to the younger vintages – but it is very elegant. The typical stony, mineralic and classice notes are here, as well as a lovely note of violets, and the dark fruit is sweetish on the nose, but very dry on the palate. This is typical in young vintages such as this, where the huge (but elegant) tannins hold the fruit back. In the lingering aftertaste, you’ll find cedar tree, dark fruit, tanniner and a very fine acidity. Decanting is necessary for this youthful wine.
Drink it 2010-2022.

2001 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 96 p
With a frost in May, and a heat spike around flowering, the yields turned out to be small. And that’s a good thing. At Montelena, this resulted in a wine of god concentration and a firm structure. Today it’s still young, but a beauty. Tannins are firm, much more present than in the 2002 and 1999 vintages, but it’s also a lot of stony mineral notes and good acidity to build the structure, and to make the ripe fruit taste dry and restrained. Even though it’s very classic and complex already today, it’s recommended to keep this wine a few more years, and it needs air when it’s served. Decant it a good half hour, or even an hour, prior to serving it.
Drink it 2012-2026.

2000 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 92 p

The long and relatively cool growing seasing resulted in grapes harvested over a period from September 15 thru Octoeber 27 (which was the longest harvest over the last three decades), at low 22.1 to higher 25.9 Brix. For those who claim that cooler vintages in California aren’t that good, I’d like to say; Oh yes, they are! This wine as well as the cooler and more diffuclt 1998 vintage are perfect examples on that.
On the nose, it’s elegant with fresh notes of blueberries and cassis as well as more complex nuances of cedar tree and graphite, and just a whisper of stony minerality. On the palate, its medium bodied, intense and quite deep and dense, still so elegant and fine tuned. There’s just a hint of sweetness, but thanks to the acidity, fine mineral note and the youthful tannins, there’s enough structure to give this vintage a more classic taste – which is just fine. However, the typical “American palate” would most likely call this vintage a bit weaker. I noticed that the wine opened up and showed a more elegant och complex nose and taste after 30-40 minutes in the glass, and that evolution is promising. Therefore one shouldn’t be afraid of keeping the wine, or decant it before serving it. It’s good, but I don’t think it will be a very long lasting and great vintage.
Drink it 2011-2020.

1999 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 95 p

Over the last 7-8 years, I have noticed that the 1999 vintage is a great vintage – at least for those who value finesse and complexity over pure power. Still, this vintage is much deeper and more intense the the 1998 and 2000 vintages, and the wine is loaded with ripe and intense but not sweet scented dark fruit (both cassis and dark cherries), and more complex aromas of cedar, graphite, rocks, walnuts and black olives – and I just love when I find so many fine tuned notes in the wine. On the palate, it’s medium bodied with great depth och body, still youthful and a bit closed – much due to the lively acidity, salty mineral notes, and firm (but ripe) tannins. On the nose, it was delightful at once, but it took a while before the wine opened up fully in the glass. Compared with the younger vintages, this wine doesn’t taste older – at least not more mature. Therefore, I recommend at least one or two more years of cellaring, but the true greatness will not come out when the wine reaches its perfect maturity another 5-6 years from now. This is a true, modern classic vintage.
Drink it 2012-2024 (or more).

1998 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 90-91 p
The El Niño vintage was cool and damp, and to the growers of Bordeaux varietals a very challengeing vintage, since it was so late that the grapes didn’t ripen perfectly. At least that was the case for Cabernet Sauvignon. But, there’s no rule withtout exception. Growers who were brave (and smart) enough to wait until November to harvest, could harvest grapes with if not perfectly ripe grapes, so at least grapes where the greenish methoxypyrazine flavors were burnt off, and the bitter tannins had ripen into something more enjoyable.
I’ve only tasted the 1998 Chateau Montelena at one time, a little less than two years ago and from a five liter bottle. I tasted it blind, and found the wine to be delicious, classic and elegant with typical notes of cedar tree, cigar, graphite some mineral notes. The fruit was dark and elegant, but it didn’t have that depth and concentration found in other vintagrs. What I really enjoyed, was how pleasant it tasted, although the nose was slightly better than the taste, which was a little bit weak and short – but good.
Based on the fact that I tasted the wine from a large format bottle kept in a perfect cellar, I believe this vintage should be drunk now and over the next year. And, it should only be decanted to remove the sediment – it really didn’t improve with air too mych.
Drink it 2011-2016.

1997 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 97 p

One of the best vintages I have ever tasted from Chateau Montelena is this 1997. Grapes were harvested throughout September at 23.5 to 24.5 Brix, which resulted in a wine with around 13.5 percent of alcohol. In a vintage where so many estates pulled out wines with 15-16 percent of alcohol, or even more, I’d like to applause the team at Chateau Montelena for making this wine! With this wine they showed that it is possible to make a great wine in Napa Valley without overripenss, concentration and a heavily use of oak. Of course this wine offers a great concentration, and it’s richer and denser compared to other vintages. Still today, there’s a sweetish and youthful primary fruit flavor, now with some earthy nuances and the (at Chateau Montelena) typical Bordeaux like notes of graphite tobacco and stony mineral. It’s just outstanding, and this is – and will stay for a long time – a true classic!
It still benefints from decanting a good half hour prior to serving it.
Drink it 2011-2025.

1996 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 90 p

The 1996 vintage have proven to be somehow uneven – some wines are still just great, but quite a few have started to fade away. Already when I poured this wine, it showed more maturity and a slight oxidation than both the 1997 and 1995 vintages – still it’s elegant and, to be honest, very complex. Sun dried raisins, tobacco, just a hint of cassis (not too sweet though) and a dash of stony minerality was noted in my tasting book. When tasted, I noted a medium body, again with the almost salty minerality, a medium intense but slowly fading fruit concentration which is starting to dry out a bit. There’s enough body to be enjoyed, but the finish lacks intensity and fruit, which tells you it’s time to uncork your last bottles.
Drink it 2011-2014.

1995 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 93-94 p

By far the 1995 vintage is more impressive than its one year younger sibling. The vintage is great, overall perhaps a bit neglected due to the fact it came after the glorious 1994, 1992 and 1990 vintages fresh in mind – and, realeased the year then the outstanding 1997 was harvested. It wasn’t an easy task for the 1995 vintage, still I have enjoyed so many great 1995s over the years, and this is just one of them. The body is medium full, wuite intense and still primary in its deep dark purple fruit, which is more ripe and sweetish than in the 1996. Tannins are still there, not firm, but still important enough to hold the wine together for another decade, perhaps, but most important – it’s really good to drink today, when the balance between the fruit, body, tannins and acidity is just fine. A particular asset in this vintage is the finesse, which is the result of the long, relatively cool vintage. Grapes were harvested from September 28 thru October 29, at 23.2 to 24.4 Brix, and the alcohol level stopped at 13.5 percent. Bravo!
Drink it 2011-2025

1994 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 93 p

It is amazing to see the evolution of this estate wine. Tasted blind, most tasters would end up in Bordeaux – at least before they really taste the wine and discover the structure of tannins and minerals, typical for the well drained volcanic soil of this northern situated wine estate. The dark but slightly tawny colored wine shows a medium intensity on the nose, clearly with a great deal of maturation with earthy, leathery and chocolaty notes, and there is also the same kind of gravelly dust you’ll find in fine wines of Médoc with some age. On the palate, the wine still show some sweet dark berry fruit, and the tannins are firm (as they normally are here) in a classic cabernet way. Acidity is relatively fresh and the finish is medium long, dry and very complex. It is truly a very well made, well kept and lovely wine.
Drink it 2011-2024

1992 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 96 p

What a lovely wine! The combination of depths, intensity, pure power and the extraordinary complexity that comes with age is awesome. In a way, it’s as concentrated as the other great vintages from Chateau Montelena, but the overall elegance and complexity is what you taste and feel. The very fine tuned notes of cedar tree, lead pencil, tobacco and stony minerality is dancing over the matured but still vital body – and more than in the younger vintages, this smells, tastes and feels like a first growth Pauillac! On the palate, the tannins still give some resistance, but I’d rather call them smooth and velvety like that rough of aggressive, and more than anything, you’ll most likely be blown away by the great, long and wonderfully elegant and complex finish. At the moment, it’s one of the greatest wines to drink from this estate. It’s a great example on how great the classic made wines, with alcohol levels around 13.5 percent, can age.
Drink it 2011-2022

1991 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 93 p

This bottle wasn’t part of the big vertical tasting – the tasting note is six months older. The wine had been kept in a very good, cold cellar for, I guess, at least 12 years, so it had been kept very well. We decanted it right before tasting it and it was of course matured, but in a very good condition, still youthful in the sense it was rich and dense, and, which I found quite extraordinary, with a dash of primary fruit aromas. Of course the mature notes were much more obvious, and secuctive. Tobacco, leather, lead pencil, sous bois and stil a stony minerality are noted in my book, and the structure is still important although much softer than in the past. It’s a marvelous wine, quite Bordeaux like (I poured it blind to several of my sommelier friends – among them Masters of Wine and World Champions) and at first, everybody took their guess at Bordeaux from a ripe and now mature vintage. I’d still give it half an hour in a decanter, even though it has reached its peak now.
Drink it 2011-2019.

1987 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 96 p

As the 1992 vintage this is a classic, but harvested at higher Brix and fermented to an alcohol level just above 14 percent, so it’s a bit riper, richer and fruitier. Still the color is dark and dense, although not purple at least younger than expected. From a visible point of view, it’s actually only the sediment that reveals the age of the wine. On the nose it shows a lovely combination of youth (dark, sweetish cheery and plum like fruitiness) and maturity (some earthy notes, as well as tobacco), but there is also a slight touch of vanilla from the oak. The medium bodied taste is still intense and, a bit surprisingly, also tannic – but not in the dry way you normally find in wines that has started to dry out, it’s just a very well structured wine. Also, there’s a lovely energy from the almost salty minerality, and the finish is long and still alive and kickning. Right in the end of the taste, there’s a small mintiess, a note I normally find in slithgly richer vintages of aged cabernet wines. Although mature, the wine took the aeration in the glass in a very good way during the tasting, so I guess it will keep pretty well for some more years in the bottle.
Drink it 2011-2019.

1984 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / 96 p

I have had this wine many times, served open or poured in blind tastings. One time I poured it blind next to 1989 Château Haut-Brion, one of the greatest wines in Bordeaux in modern time, and the 1984 Château Montelena didn’t fall into the shadow at all! Of course it show a good portion of maturity – you’ll find notes of leather, tobacco, lead pencil, sundried chile, and what the French call sous bois, the earthy forest floor – but still there’s a whisper of sweeter almost primary fruit aromas. It’s just that combination that gives this wine its great complexity. On the palate it still offers a good tannic structure (a few years ago, I had a dozen fine 1984 cabernets from Napa Valley in a tasting – and the one from Chateau Montelena was in comparison the youngest), as well as a lively acidity and fine mineralic saltiness and energy. One thing that surprised me, was how well the wine kept in the glass – not even one hour after I poured it, it started to fade away. This is one of the most impressive vintages I have yet tasted from Chateau Montelena, and I have tasted it on several occasions.
Drink it 2011-2019.

1982 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / NR
With older wines like this, you always have to consider bottle variation, and perhaps that’s the case with the bottle I had in the vertical tasting. It was significantely more mature than 1984 and 1987, and already 15 minutes after I poured it, it started to oxidize and fade away. But before that, I found it to very very attractive thanks to all its noble maturity; leather, tobacco, cedar tree, dried fruit and sous bois, but on the palate it was for sure telling me a different story. Tannins were still there in a quite dry way, and the fruit had started to dry out. Perhaps it was the bottle, I don’t know, but I have recently had similar experiences with other 1982s from Napa Valley.
Therefore I didn't rate the wine.

Drink it now.

1981 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon / NR

This wine was even a bit weaker, and as mature towards too old as the 1982. For a while, I enjoyed the notes of prunes, tobacco, lead pencil and forest mushrooms, but already after 10-15 minutes, most of those lovely aromas had been exchanged into oxidation, rust and not too pleasant earthy notes. On the palate, tannins were dry and a bit harsh, and as with the 1982 vintage, this wine should have been drunk a few years ago. Again, it could also be bottle variation, so I didn't rate this wine.
Drink it now.

But here’s the good news, having bottles of too old wines doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy them. Serving them to the right food, you can choose to enhance the finer part of the wine (the complex maturity) and hide the less wanted parts (the dry fruit, the tannins). If you have something with a creamy texture (a sauce, a purée of potatoes with butter and cream, or a risotto) the tannins will be absorbed and then the wine will not taste harsh at all. The next step is to workv with ingredients that mirrors the mature flavors of the wine. Mushrooms, truffle, roasted root celery or Jerusalem artichokes, air dried ham, salami (especially with truffle), and aged hard cheese, all shares matured or earthy aromas. Also, you can use an oxidized fortified wine like sherry in the red wine sauce, to mirror the oxidation in the wine. When you taste a fully matured wine to dishes like this, you will not recognize too much of the oxidezed flavors in the wine, and the tannins will not bother you at all.

Nick and Luc Morlet – brothers in wine!

2011-05-06T01:44:00.000+02:00

One could be funny and make a comparison with the famous Agatha Christie book “Ten Little Niggers” from 1939, and why not. The Morlet family has been cultivating vines in Champagne since the early 1800s, and today they farm around 30 small vineyards lots covering a total of 16.20 hectares, and they make champagne under their family label Champagne Pierre Morlet. Actually, "they" don't do, "he" does.
First there were three brothers. Then the oldest brother Luc Morlet left, after a journey in California, he went back to California in 1996, started to work as assistant winemaker behind John Kongsgaard at Newton Estate, got together with his girlfriend (they met earlier), married her, started to work at Peter Michael Winery and then left to work for Staglin Family Vineyard and to set up his own Morlet Family Vineyards in 2006.
Later the second and youngest brother, Nick Morlet, left Champagne and the family business to go to California, where he joined his brother Luc Morlet, and in December 2005 took over his job at Peter Michael Winery. He is still at that winery, and as his brother thrives in the California soil, climate and viticulture, so does he.
In Champagne, the middle brother Pierre Morlet, still works with the family vineyards, making champagne. As far as I know, he’s not on his way over the Atlantic.

2007 l'Aprés Midi of Peter Michael Winery / 88 p
The last vintages, the blend have been around 90-93 percent Sauvignon Blanc (mostly the Preston Clone, but also some Musqué Clone) with a balance of Sémillon, all grapes from Les Pavots Vineyard at approximately 420-440 meter of altitude. Color is pale straw, the nose bright and fresh and surprisingly shy (compared to what I’m used to in this wine), but very pure with delicious notes of lemon peel. Giving it a few minutes of air in the glass, some reticent notes of white lilies evolves, which adds to the complexity. Since only ten percent of the wine saw oak, it’s more fresh and steely. On the palate, it is as fresh and clean, but there is a fine texture that gives the wine a silkiness rather than the crisp structure one would look for in a sauvignon. It doesn’t come as a surprise that the oak fermented fraction was kept on its lees for ten to eleven months, with some bâtonnage to add that texture. Acidity, though, is fresh since there was no malolactic fermentation. It’s a nice, fresh and easy drinking, still quite complex wine. Try it with seafood, Thai food, elegant fish dishes … or just as it is.
Drink it 2011-2013.

2007 La Proportion Dorée of Morlet Family Wines / 91 p
The idea about this wine, Luc Morlet told me, was to find the average blend of the vintages of the greatest vintages of the white wine from Château Haut-Brion, hence the name (in French, of course) La Proportion Dorée. The golden recipe was 66 percent Sémillon, 32 percent Sauvignon Blanc and just two percent of Muscadelle.
At first, the nose is a bit closed with just small notes of lemon and yellow stone fruits, but knowing this wine quite well, I was patient enough to let it sit in my glass for another 15 minutes. Even that didn’t change the wine too much, but it made it open up a bit, and in blends like this it will make the Sémillon fraction take some more space. I found fine notes of bees wax and honey – not too much – but at this youthful stage the lemon notes is more dominant.
Compared to the l’Aprés Midi, this wine have more weight, some vanilla from the oak, slightly higher alcohol and longer taste. I prefer to serve this with more air (at least half an hour in a decanter) and at slightly higher temperature than the lighter l’Aprés Midi, let’s say 14 degrees, even though the alcohol is higher and show more. This is also a wine for richer dishes, like grilled fished and seafood with creamy sauces, or even poultry and white meat. It’s a lovely wine, but I rather drink it early – only a few California white wines ages with grace.
Drink it 2011-2015.

Two 2006 Cabernets from Notre Vin

2011-04-24T10:19:00.000+02:00

The duo behind the higly recommended label Alienor, French winemaker Denis Malbec and his Swedish wife Maj-Britt Malbec, also makes wine under the label Notre Vin (“our wine”). They don’t own any vineyards, instead they purchase all grapes for their wines.
The French heritage is a great asset here, and although the wines are truly American, the concentration and alcohol level is moderate, which is very much appreciated. Except for the Pinot Noir from Sonoma Coast, which I find to be a bit unfocused and lacking true intensity, I like the wines of Notre Vin more and more. They are fashioned in a very intelligent way and are very promising, the sad thing is that prices are too high.

2006 Cabernet Sauvignon Cuvée l’Etrier / 90-91 p

This is a cuvée of approximately 85 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and the rest Merlot and just a few percent Petit Verdot and Cabernet Franc. Grapes are sourced from the La Herradura Vineyard in Conn Valley (just opposite of Anderson Conn Valley) at the foot of Howell Mountain. After three weeks of fermentation and maceration, the wine spent 18 months in new French oak and it was bottled without being fined or filtered. It’s still dark with a youthful purple color, a young and very intense nose driven by primaty fruit aromas, but in a very elegant way that although typical for its origin also offers a French touch. On the palate, the fruit is much sweeter with loads of cassis and blackberries, but there’s a very good acidity and fine still young tannins to hold the sweet flavors back. There’s a fine but not marked mineral structure to make the wine serious, and even though I find the taste very pleasant, it doesn’t have the vibrant enegery I look for, at least at the moment. It lacks a bit of middle palate and the slightly greenish oak bitterness in the aftertaste needs to integrate a bit more. However, I don’t worry too much – time will make justice to that. Drinking it today or within a few years from now, I’d serve it to braised meet, steaks or venison and using a creamy texture in the dish, both oak and tannins will be balanced in a perfect way.
Drink it 2013-2021.

2006 Howell Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon / 92 p

In this case, the Cabernet Sauvignon proportion is higher (93 percent to be exact), and the rest is small amounts each of Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot. All grapes are sourced from the Hughes Vineyard at over 500 meters elevation on the western side of Howell Mountain. Vinification would the same as for the wine above, and it was kept in new French oak barrels for 24 months. Again alcohol level is moderate, 13.8 percent. It offers a more elegant and although young more complex nose, where a stony minerality adds an interesting energy and also makes the taste more serious and structured. The acidity is quite fresh, lively and good, and evne though the fruit is lush, a bit sweetish and intense, the overall impression is that the wine is young and tight, but promising. The oakiness is tasted more in the finish of the aftertaste than in the actual taste, so oak integration is good. I’d like to keep this some more years for more complexity to evolve and for the rougher details to be polished. Then, I’m sure it will taste really good!
Drink it 2013-2021.

Four Vines, nine grapes, one wine!

2011-04-21T22:42:00.000+02:00

A typical saying is that less is better. In cooking, that is often the golden rule. The more ingredients one uses in a dish, the more confusion on the palate. In winemaking, it may well be the same, at least one can wonder to what extent each and every grape variety contributes to in the blend. In Bordeaux, where blending has always been part of the philosophy, either Merlot (the most planted variety) or Cabernet Sauvignon play the leading role, and in Rhône Valley it’s normally Grenache, or Syrah. In addition, there are a number of blendning grapes. One may add body to the wine, another can contribute with a certain aroma or spiciness, and some grape varieties just add volume to make the final wine.
Châteauneuf-du-Pape is the most well knowm and, in the sense of number of variteties used of the blended wines in the world, the most complex. Fourteen varieties are allowed, although they all rarely are found in one blend. Most of these wines are based on Grenache, with the addition of five to eitght other grapes.
This kind of rhônish blends are also found in California among the so called Rhône Rangers. One of them is Four Vines Winery in the western part of Paso Robles. It’s a 40 000 cases per year winery founded 1996.
Overall, quality is good, but so far not impressive. A part from the quite elegant unoaked Naked Chardonnay from Santa Barbara fruit, most wines are a bit sturdy and lack finesse.
This wine, though, is one of the better.

2007 Cypher Ecelctic Red Wine / 88 p
Nine grapes were used in this wine, and the blend is in all aspects very unusual. Carignane is 22 percent of the blend, the Portugise port wine variety Touriga Nacional and the darkskinned Teroldego of Northern Italy 17 percent each. Three other port wine grapes are used in the blend, 12 percent Tinta Cão, 11 percvent Souza (sometimes called Periquita) and 6 percent Tinta Roriz (Tempranillo). Zinfandel is also here, at 8 percent, and so is Petite Sirah with only a single percent – I wonder how much that helped. The last 6 percent comes from Petite Verdot. Confused? For sure I am!
Color is dark purple, almost opaque. The nose it very intense, almost sweetish and very ripe, but there are so many types of fruit here – dark cherries, blackberries, cassis, a slightly greenish and vegetal touch, some vanilla, and some sweetness from the oak. At first, it’s not too elegant, and to be honest, it’s not elegant at all. However, it’s a very rich and powerful wine with some finer notes to it. Acidity is fine but not fresh, it’s more of a sweetish fruit driven wine with silky tannins and some warmth from the 14.7 percent of alcohol. It’s a great barbeque wine rather than a wine to more classic dishes, and it benefits from decanting, or at least one hour of aeration. Althoug drinkable now, I’d rather keep it another year or two to see if more complexity will rise through the massive fruit.
Drink it 2011-2017.

Second release of Ovid

2011-04-17T10:07:00.004+02:00

I was totally blown away byt the inaugural 2005 vintage of the estate wine from Ovid in Napa Valley. Since then, I’ve tasted both the 2005 and the 2006 vintages on several occasions. Every time, tasted open or blind, my impression stands – Ovid is a great site for vines, and a truly impressive wine. This second vintage is a blend of 43 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and 41 percent Cabernet Franc (which thrives just perfectly in the reddish volcanic soil and high altitude on Pritchard Hill). The rest is a balance of Merlot and Petit Verdot.

The team behind this outstanding winery is owners Dana Johnson and Mark Nelson, and the superstar trio of winemaker Andy Erickson, viticulturist David Abreu and consultant Michel Rollad.

2006 Ovid / 95 p

This baby is so young, color is dark purple and almost opaque. On the nose it’s initially a bit closed, although it’s packed with dark, ripe and an almost sweet cassis and cherry fruit – but it is massive in the way that the deliscious and fragrant aromas of violets, sour cherries and the stony minerialty of the volcanic soil is almost totally covered. Therefore, I let the wine sit in the decanter for another hour, and then two hours, to open up and reveal those finer notes. The oak is there, sweetish and slightly toasted, but still very well integrated. To achieve that, you need the highest quality of fruit and barrels, and the wisdom to use the oak in a smart way. I think that Andy Erickson does that. One could easily expect this wine to be heavy and sweet on the palate, and of course it’s rich and very intense, the with a lively to fresh acidity, huge but ripe tannins, and a thickeling saltiness of minerality, I find the overall impression to be extraordinary well balansced and elegant. The fruit is at first somehow sweetish, with both blackberries and cassis, but the sweetness is held back a bit, and even the oak is extremely well in tune with all other components. Balance is the key word here. It’s an impressive wine with a very promising life, which if kept in a good way will evolve to give pleasure for another 10-15 years, and for those who enjoys fully mature wines, even longer that that. Decanting is recommended, at least the two hours I did at first, but even when I tasted the wine the day after, it was very enjoyable – the fruit was the a bit more elegant with lovely notes of black currants and sour cherries. Drink it 2014-2031.

White power from Sine-Qua-Non

2011-04-14T10:59:00.014+02:00

Sine Qua Non is much more famous for their stunning reds of Grenache and Syrah, than their whites. A reason for that is that the reds are slightly better and more complex, another that the production of the whites is much smaller, hence the rarity to find them. However, the reds are not more impressive than the whites – the latter are wines of great power and intensity, wines with as much personality as concentration, depth and length. These are not wines for those who seeks finnesse and fine tuned fragrance. These wines are true power, yet with elegance.

While Manfred Krankl crafts his reds from either Grenache or Syrah with small proportions of the other, the cuvée of the whites is more various. The blend may be based on Roussanne (most of the times) or Chardonnay, but there’s almost always an important fraction of Viognier to add floral notes and spiciness to the blend. Every vintage will be different, and the spectrum of flavors and texture is much more various from vintage to vintage, compared to the evenness of the reds, if one compares several vintages of those. Grapes are mostly sourced from Alban Vineyard in Edna Valley, a great source of white Rhône varieties, and the juice is always fermented in new French oak barrels. One thing that surprises, is that Californian whites normally is at its best when served at around 12 degrees, but in the case of the Sine Qua Non whites, I’ve often noticed that they benefit from decanting (2-3 hours) and a serving temperature of 14-16 degrees.

2006 The Hoodoo Man / 93-94 p

This cuvée, 39 percent of Roussanne and the rest to me an unknown blend of Chardonnay and Viognier, is golden straw, and since not filtered, slightly hazy. As all white SQN’s, this one is ripe and very intense with lovely floral notes (violets and lilies, and lavender) as well as a licorice spiciness, vanilla sweetness and slightly roasted notes from the oak. I most cases, I find the oak to be too loud, but thanks to the intensity, it’s pretty well integrated here. On the palate, it’s full bodied and fruit forward, slightly sweet at first, but with a lovely acidity that lingers longer than the sweetness last, but in the long finish there’s a bit too warm alcohol that lower the score a bit. Still, it’s a delicious wine with a great personality and a very long taste with notes of sweet lemon and flowers. When served, at first it was more sweet and powerful than elegant, but after two hours in the decanter, it really showed just great! A serving temperature at around 14 degrees is recommended, but after tasting the wine five hours after it was decanted, it tastes just great at 18 degrees! I suppose this tells me the wine will benefit from another year or two in the bottle. Drink it 2011-2016.

2003 Sublime Isolation / 93 p

All grapes in this cuvée, 44 percent Chardonnay with 37 percent Roussanne and 19 percent Viognier, were sourced from the great Alban Vineyard in Edna Valley. I’ve tasted it several times before, and always liked it because it richness and honey notes, but even though the fine notes of violets, I noted this time that the oak was a bit more present than last time. Yes, it may depend on the bottle – this one may have been kept a bit warmer and therefore matured a bit quicker. At least the small note of yellow apples tells me so. Still there are enough floral notes to add elegance, and given the fact that it evolved just fine with four hours in the decanter, it’s not in any way over the top. It’s just the vintage that’s a bit more rustic than the 2006 tasted the same time. On the palate, it ripe and rich, loaded with sweet citrus notes and honey flavor, the acidity is lively and surprisingly fresh (especially after the initial sweetness has faded away after decanting), and there’s also an almost tannic sensation in the long, lingering aftertaste. I actually liked more after some hours of air, than directly from the bottle. Serve it at 12-16 degrees, depending on your tolerance for temperatures and power. Drink it 2011-2014.

1997 Twisted & Bent / 88 p?

Well, to be honest, this wine is on its way down, for sure. Still I kind of liked it, especially when it was served with rich food, which balanced its fully mature flavors and covered most of its slight oxidation. The wine was made of 60 percent Roussanne from Alban Vineyard in Edna Valley and 40 percent of Chardonnay, as always fermented in French oak barrels and bottles without being filtered. Color is deep straw towards golden, but it didn’t look too matured. On the nose, it shows maturity, honey and yellow apples as well as a slight nutty and almost smoky note is there, but all this is in balance, not on the edge of being too much. Actually, I was a very surprised over how well the wine kept in the glass, even two hours after pouring it! To me, that shows the wine, if not having more to offer, at least may keep another year or so. On the palate, it was at first rich and glycerol textured, still dry and very complex in a way that was a bit “Bâtard-Montrachet-like”, but with sweeter fruit and higher alcohol, and it also showed an almost tannin like structure. It’s quite honey like in the long, lingering and dry finish, and I have to tell it’s quite delicious as well. Drink it 2011-2012.

Napa Valley diversity from Nickel & Nickel

2011-04-01T17:22:00.009+02:00

Nickel & Nickel is a very interesting winery in the heart of Napa Valley, owned by the team behind the equally interesting and good, but totally different winery Far Niente. While Far Niente is based on the philosophy of an estate blend, just like a château in Bordeaux, Nickel & Nickel crafts their wines from single vineyards around Napa Valley (mostly), thus more like what’s done in Burgundy. Nickel & Nickel and Far Niente owns around 97.00 hectares of vines, among them the John G Sullenger Vineyard (17.00 hectares) close to Opus One next to the winery in Oakville, and the Stelling Vineyard (40.00 hectares) that surrounds Far Niente, just south of the famous To Kalon Vineyard and right below the great Harlan Estate. Further south in the valley, in the cooler Coombsville, they also own the Carpenter Vineyards, 10.50 hectares, in which the grapes for the Far Niente Estate Chardonnay is grown (the 2009 vintage of that wine is particularly good). This vineyard was previously partly planted to Cabernet Sauvignon, but since the site is so cold, these grapes didn’t ripen every vintage, so these vines were replaced with Chardonnay after the 2004 harvest.

Winemaking is overseen by co-owner and senior winemaker Dick Hampson, who has been with Far Niente since 1982, and at Nickel & Nickel since their inaugural vintage 1997. However, the everyday winemaking is since 1998 done by chief winemaker Darice Spinelli. She’s been working at Inglenook and Beaulieu Vineyards, and came to Franciscan in 1990, so her knowledge of the terroir in Napa Valley is deep. All wines are more or less made in the same way, but since the expression of terroir is the driving force at Nickel & Nickel, adjustments in viticulture as well as winemaking is done to enhance as much of each vineyards expression as possible.

“It may be that we harvest the grapes in the various vineyards at different maturity levels, ferment them at different temperatures, work with different length of maceration and oak ageing, and use different proportion of new oak for different wines, and different vintages”, Dirk says.

From making six different wines in 1997, the wine list has grown to around 25 different wines every vintage. “It’s a great challenge to understand all these terroirs, and making the best wines out of them, but that’s also to great fun about my job”, Darice adds. And she’s doing her job very well – the wines from Nickel & Nickel are very good indeed, and they shows the width, diversity and complexity of the terroir in Napa Valley. Production stretches from 25 000 to 30 000 cases per year, of which the 12-13 cabernets counts for around 50 percent.

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon John G Sullenger / 93-95 p

This wine comes from the estate vineyard John G Sullenger in the heartland of Oakville, where the soil is dominated by clay with some gravel. This is quite often one of the most complex and finest in the line up of cabernets from Nickel & Nickel. As all four wines in this tasting, it’s youthful and a bit closed, even though the nose is quite intense. Dark ripe berries such as black currants and blueberries, lead pencil and cedar tree dominates the aroma profile, and with some air the typical Bordeaux like complexity start to show. With that, one finds the first signs of the great classic complexity so often found in this wine, with a few more years of bottle age. The oak, the upbringing took place in 43 percent new French oak during 16 months, is very well integrated, and just adds complexity and some structure. There’s a good mouthfeel, it’s rich and intense with loads of dark berry fruit, but it’s fresh and elegant rather than full bodied and cloying, I would say it’s concentraded with a great classic complexity, and the taste lingers for a minute or so, with a fine but still youthful tannic structure and a lively acidity. It would benefit from a few more years of bottle age, but the way to enjoy this wine is to keep it for at least ten years. This count for all cabernet wines from Nickel & Nickel.

Drink it 2013-2027

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon CC Ranch / 91-92 p

The grapes for this wine comes from a 6.10 hectares fraction of the CC Ranch vineyard, which covers 46.50 hectares on gentle rolling hills in the easter part of Rutherford, very close to Frog’s Leap vineyards. The soil is dominated by weatheres gravel. This wine is a bit more dense, fruit intense and sweetish than the John G Sullenger, therefore (at this stage of maturity) it doesn’t show the same finesse, range of nuances and complexity. Still, it is delicious, almost impressive, and based on the evolution in the glass (during the 15 minutes I tasted the wine), it will evolve into something more elevant over the coming years. As with most wines from Nickel & Nickel, the oak (in this case 16 months in 46 percent new French oak) is well integrated, therefore in full harmony with the fruit. On the palate, its medium towards more full bodied, rich and although with a young and relatively firm tannic structure, almost silky thanks to the glycerol like fruit texture, and inte the long aftertaste there’s abundant of ripe and lush blueberry like fruit, fine tannins, a hint of oak as well as a energic touch of minerals. Although it’s the best today drinking wine of the quartet, I’d love to come back to it in a few years time to taste the beauty that’s today a bit covered by the lush fruit. An hour in a decanter would help the wine to find part of that already today.

Drink it 2011-2025

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon State Ranch / 92-93 p

For some reason, this was the first time I tasted a wine from this vineyard, so my knowledge of is is close to zero. However, it was a great first taste – love at first sight! Looking for a very fine wine with a neoclassic and true Napa Valley expression, this wine may be a one to look after. It offers a relatively open and expressive nose with dark, ripe fruit with cassis flavors as well as black olives, lead pencil, ceder tree, tobacco and just a fine fragrance of the new oak (43 percent new, for 17 months) that may be described as a cup of coffee being served in the room next to where you stand. On the palate, it is medium bodied with intensity and a good depth and length, but the tannins and minersality still holds the fruit body back, making the wine firm and a bit closed. It took around ten minutes to really get the flavors free flowing, then the wine tasted just glorious. The alcohol, around 14.5 percent, gives the wine a warm aftertaste, but I guess that’s just because the lushness and body is a bit closed due to the firm structure. With some air, aromas of cedar tree, tobacco and lead pencils shines through the taste, especially in the aftertaste, and I really enjoy that. It’s a true example of the greatness of Yountville. I’d keept this wine for several more years.

Drink it 2013-2027

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Branding Iron / 91-92 p

Branding Iron is a 1.60 hectare vineyard on a gentle slope inbeteween the famous Martha’s Vineyard and Harris Vineyard in the western part of Oakville. It’s truly a great location – the vines are exposed to sunshine all day long, therefore the wine often gets a ripe fruit flavor. Still, it’s often a very elegant wine fashioned in a classic way, but compared to the wine from State Ranch it’s (as expected) richer, slightly more fruit driven and almost sweetish. There’s also a bit more oak spicyness here, although the oak regime is the same (43 percent new French oak, for 17 months), but I find it common that oak flavors tend to taste more obvious in riper wines, as if the fruit sweetness enhances the oak tannins and flavors rather than cover it. This doesn’t make the wine lesser interesting, just different, and for me ripe fruit and spicy oak (well, it’s not that spricy) tells me I have to wait a few more years before the wines true complexity reveals itself (for instance, I found many Napa Valley cabernets from 1997 to be too sweet and too oaky in the beginning – now many of them are fabulous). The lush fruit gives the wine a richer and fuller body and a more silky texture, which I find very attractive rather than complex, and also makes me wanting to serve this wine to richer dishes. Still there is enough tannin and fine acidity for making the wine keep in the cellar for a long time. Drinking it today, which is also recommended, I’d give it an hour in a decanter to let the wine open up a bit.

Drink it 2011-2025

Zeductive Zinfandel from Turley Cellars

2011-03-28T01:01:00.014+02:00

Turley Cellars is one of the most well known zinfandel specialists (Ravenswood, Seghesio, Rosenblum Cellars and Carlisle are other recommended zinfandelists), and their wines always have a typical house style. The winery is owned by Larry Turley, and the first vintages was 1993, made by his sister Helen Turley, who already at that time had become well known for her powerful and high scoring wines. The styles was pretty much set but her, but since Larry is a great fan of amarone wines, and likes his wines full bodied and rich, this is the style you can expect from Turley Cellars.

Helen Turley only made two vintages, and from 1995 the talented Ehren Jordan is responsible for making the wines and he’s doing a great job although the style is till immensely rich and extravagant. In total, there are 80.90 hectares of estate and leased vineyards (2.00 hectares around the estate and winery in St Helena in Napa Valley, the Rattlesnake Vineyard up at Howell Mountain, the Vineyard 101 close to the freeway near Geyserville in Alexander Valley, and the fine Pesenti Vineyard in Paso Robles). In addition to these vineyards, Larry and Ehren are buying Zinfandel and Petite Sirah from numerous vineyards with old vines (at least 40 years old) around the state.

These wines are not for everyone. Not that they are overly expensive – well, they’re not cheap – more that they are quite extreme in their concentration, ripe and almost sweetish fruit and above that, their high alcohol levels. It’s commonly known that Zinfandel is able to ferment into very strong wines with alcohol levels over 16 percent. Sometimes that’s not enough to measure the alcohol levels of the zinfandels from Turley Cellars. However, looking beyond the high alcohol levels, there’s a lot of quality in these wines. The intensity and aromatics of the fruit is impressive, especially in the wines from Paso Robles and from the mountain sites (such as the Pringle Family Vineyard in Howell Mountain, one of the finest zinfandels from Turley Cellars, and the Zinfandel Black Sears Vineyard from the same appellation). The two latter wines also offer a great structure, typical from mountain vineyards, which makes these wines even more serious and complex. Total production varies from 10 000 to 15 000 cases per year.

2008 Zinfandel Pesenti Vineyard / 91 p

The Pesenti Vineyard in the cooler but still warm western parts of Paso Robles was initially planted in 1923 by Frank Pesenti. Since then it has been replanted in 1947 and 1965, so vines are not extremely old here. A good thing though, is the chalky soils which brings a fine sour minerality to the taste. It’s always a good wine, one of the better and more elegant in the range of zinfandels from Turley Cellars, but from the upper parts of the vineyard, the grapes for the even better wine Zinfandel Überroth Vineyard are sourced. Color is purple red and quite deep, and the nose is (as expected from this winery) very ripe, almost sweetish, opulent and intense, with notes of dark cherries, blackberries and sweet raspberries. There’s just a hint of oak. On the palate, it’s full bodied without being too concentrated, however the fruit is ripe and sweet, quite lush and driven by the intense fruitiness. There are a lot of sweet raspberries, not too different from those found in the wines of Melville Estate (their pinots), but there is also a lively and fresh acidity and a fine tannic structure, as well as a rhubarb kind of bitterness and acidity, to balance the sweetness, but there’s also a significant warmth from the high alcohol. Although I really like the flavors of the wine, the fiery alcohol lower my score a bit. This is for sure a delicious wine, but based on the high alcohol, I’d rather drink it with a steak, or venison with a creamy sauce, that to drink it as it is. It needs at least half an hour in the decanter to develop more finesse.
Drink it 2011-2015.

Hirsch Vineyards, now and then

2011-03-20T21:18:00.002+01:00

David Hirsch was one of the first to plant vineyards in the region known as True Sonoma Coast. Already in 1980 he planted a 1.20 hectare block with Riesling and Pinot Noir, at that time more for fun rather than thinking about becoming av full time winegrower and winemaker. The first years, all grapes were sold to Williams Selyem, and later on also Kistler Vineyard (not anymore), Littorai and Siduri. Over the years, David worked hard to understand his land, to see the details and the anatomy of his vineyard. Working close with several great winemakers who bought his grapes, he learned more and more about each single block in his vineyard, which had expanded into 29.15 hectares.

Still he wanted to go even deeper, and the only way he could truly see the microdetails and improve the quality of his vineyard management, was to start to make his own wines. The first true vintage was 2002, however, David told me he made some wines for fun earlier. He told med that the 2001 actually tastes pretty good!
Typically, wines are red at Hirsch Vineyard. There’s only 1.60 hectares of Chardonnay planted, so production of the white wine is small. There are now quite a few pinots made, with Bohan-Dillon from the youngest vines as the lightest and most deliscious of them all. The San Andreas Pinot Noir (until 2006, this was sold just as Pinot Noir) is a blend of different clones, mostly Dijons clones, but also Pommard and Swan, and approximately 75 percent of the grapes comes from blocks planted between 1980 and 1990.

There’s also a Pinot Noir “M”, named after Davids wife Maria, a barrel selection with the most elegant and perfumed lots of Pinot Noir. Since 2009, the wine is sold as Pinot Noir Reserve, and that vintage and wine tasted from barrels is one of the most profound pinots I’ve ever tasted from Sonoma Coast.
Since 2007, there are also small lots of single block wines that are very interesting. These wines are the result of understanding the vineyard and its different blocks through their own winemaking.
Since 2010 the young and talented Ross Cobb of Cobb Vineyard (they make a great series of pinots from the Freestone in the southern part of Sonoma Coast) is the winemaker. He finished the blend of the 2009s, and did that with honor.

Production reaches around 5 500 cases per year.

2009 Chardonnay / 92 p
This great wine is made from whole cluster pressed Chardonnay grapes, and fermented in a smart combination of 50 percent small French oak barrels, very little new oak, 35 percent small stainless steel tanks 15 percent in small glass damejeannes (from the 2010 vintage, all juice is fermented in oak, but only 20 percent new). Alcohol level is 14 percent, which is just perfect to add that backbone that the rich but still very elegant and freshly acidic body needs. On the nose, it’s almost burgundian like, the oak treatment is perfect, and there are small traces of minerality that may fool most tasters in a blind tasting. Although the wine has gone through full malolactic fermentation, there’s no buttery or creamy texture or flavor in the wine. It’s really a great Californian chardonnay in a style that would make any Franchofile thrilled. Only 600 cases were made.
Drink it 2011-2016.

2004 Pinot Noir / 92 p
The first vintage was made in 2002, but I wasn’t that impressed with that vintage (I actually preffered the Hirsch Vineyard selection from Failla and from Siduri). Since then the quality has improved significant, with the 2009 vintage as a great stand out for the new, ultrahigh quality. However, there have been some fine vintages and the 204 is for sure one of them. I just decanted it 15 minutes prior to pouring it at 17 degrees, and it showed just great in the big Riedelglass. The nose offered loads of dark and very aromatic cherries, some floral notes, just a dash of oak and overall a very intense and elegant wine with a good portion of complexity. (I actually poured it next to the 2002 Clos de la Roche Grand Cru Vieilles Vignes from Domaine Ponsot, and everyone around the table both preferred the Hirsch Pinot Noir, and thought for a while that is was the wine from Burgundy!) Well, to be honest, it didn’t have the typical chalky minerality found in burgundies, but the flavor profile was for sure very French. In the lingering aftertaste, there‘s some sweetness, but the alcohol is perfectly well balanced.
Drink it 2011-2018.

The 2005 cabernets of Eagle’s Trace

2011-03-18T20:47:00.002+01:00

Gus Anderson founded Anderson’s Conn Valley Vineyards in 1983, and has since the early 1990s crafted a bunch of very good wines in a style that combines the finest of Napa Valley and Bordeaux. In 2003, a new brand was created, Eagle’s Trace. For this brand, grapes from the best lots (a total of 10.50 hectares) in the estate vineyard are used, and the wines are made by Gus (although he is not young anymore!) and Gonzalo Valleges, who worked at Caymus Vineyards for 16 years.
Besides the six barrels of Pinot Noir from Valhalla Vineyard in the cooler southern parts of Napa Valley, that I’m not particularly found of, the wines of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot are very fine and well worth looking for. The Estate Merlot is a blend of 75-80 percent Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc, and according to Gus, it’s inspired by the wines of St-Emilion and Pomerol.
The merlot, as well as the Estate Cabernet Sauvignon and the top selection Cabernet Sauvignon Latitude 38, offers a very elegant aromatic profile, not so different from what’s found in fine bordeaux’s, when they age a few years. However, the body and the structure is for sure Californian, so they are better served to more flavorful dishes than the typical bordelaise food.
There’s not more than 2 000 cases produces annually, so the wines may be hard to find.

2005 Cabernet Sauvignon / 90 p
This could be considered as a second wine to the Latitude 38, and in fact it is. Yet it is a very serious wine, fashioned in the same way as its bigger sibling, but with less intensity and concentration. It’s also kind of classic wine, made in a style right inbetween the most typical Napa Valley and Bordeaux styles, with a medium intense and fine tuned dark fruit and a slightly toasted and coffee like oak aroma. Compared to the bigger Latitude 38, I find this to taste even more Bordeaux like, and I cant wait for the years to pass and the wine to evolve into something even more complex. There’s just one negative thing, the finish is a bit dry, but I guess that will change over the coming years, when the tannins starts to soften. Drinking it today, half an hour in a decanter would be just fine, and serving it to lamb, a medium rare steak, braised beef or venison seems very tempting.
Drink it 2013-2020.

2005 Cabernet Sauvignon Latitude 38 / 91-93 p
Color is young and purple dark red with high intensity. On the nose, it’s concentrated and generous with ripe and deep dark fruit qualities, yet with a very classical scent that reminds me of that of riper vintages at young age in Bordeaux. Part of that resemblance is due to the coffee like oak flavor, which is more common in Bordeaux than in California. Still young, it’s not fully developed, and I noticed how well the wine opened up during the 20 minutes I had the wine in my glass. On the palate, it’s also quite Bordeaux like, however much richer with a sweet scent and a slightly more notable alcohol. It’s still young, tannins are serious and even though they are ripe, they are still not yet fully polished. In the long, rich aftertaste, there’s a slight green note – that’s not because the grapes were unripe, that’s just because the wine is a bit too young. I’d give it some more years.
Drink it 2013-2025.

A good cabernet from Duckhorn Vineyards

2011-03-09T23:11:00.002+01:00

Duckhorn Vineyards, founded by Dan and Margaret Duckhorn back in 1976, was one of the first wineries in United States to focus on Merlot. At the time, Merlot was almost unkown and rarely used for varietal wines, it was, as in Bordeaux, a blending variety. Even though the Duckhorns became famous for their merlots, it took until the early 1990s for Merlot to be fully accepted as a variety of its own. For the Dockhorns, Merlot was love at first sight on their first trip to St Emilion and Pomerol, and when they returned to California to plant their vineyards, Merlot was the grape of their preference. The legendary winemaker Ric Forman, one of the first to make a varietal wine of Merlot (in the late 1960s), stood by their side and helped them to get started.
Although Duckhorn Vineyards are considered to be a Merlot producer, this wine is made of approximately 85 percent Cabernet Sauvignon with the balance of the other Bordelaise grapes. They are all sourced from the southern parts of Napa Valley, around Yountville, and the wine has been raised in French oak barrels for 16 months. Normally I don’t find this wine to be more than “just good”, but in this vintage, I really like it.
The wines to look after are the merlots, with the exception of the regular Napa Valley Merlot (which is good, but far too expensive for its quality), they’re very good. The Three Palms Vineyard Merlot from a vineyard on the flatland south of Calistoga is generally very good, but more often I find the Howell Mountain Merlot more impressive. The best bottling is normally the Estate Merlot, the most structured and serious merlot of Duckhorn Vineyards.

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon / 89-90 p
I have quite often found that the wines of Duckhorn Vineyards are not to the level of their price, and that they somehow lack intensity even though they have concentration. And normally their merlots are better than their cabernets. This wine, however, is very attractive, although young and still a bit closed. On the nose, if offers a good, quite high intensity without being rich and ripe, and the dark scented fruit balances the oak in a very good way. On the palate, it’s medium full bodied with a very attractive, young and intense, pure and fresh dark berry fruit, still a bit closed (especially in the aftertaste) but with a very fine tannic structure to promise a good life in the cellars. There is still some oak bitterness in the aftertaste, but drinking the wine to a dish with some creamy texture, both the bitterness and tannins will integrate perfectly. Well, unless you want to cellar it for some more years, which of course is a very good idea.
Drink it 2012-2020.

Two fine wines from Corison Winery

2011-02-26T19:22:00.002+01:00

There’s nothing fancy about Corison Winery and its wines. Most people who drive up and down St Helena Highway will most likely pass it, but that’s their mistake, and a big one. There’s so much distraction in this part of the valley, vineyards, fancy wineries and limos driving wine geeks back and forth on their wine tour in the valley. The Corison Winery almost disappears in all this. But the ones who pull off the highway, and step into the small grey barn (the winery, with its small tasting table), will taste some very elegant wines, fashioned in the elegant and classic way wines were once made. They will not be impressed by powerful wines and richness, since there’s no power to find in the wines. Instead Cathy Corison is looking for elegance, finesse, and that fine tuned and lingering aftertaste that’s so delicious.
After a master degree in oenology at UC Davis, Cathy Corison worked as a winemaker for many Napa Valley wineries, among them Freemark Abbey (back then she was one of the very few women in the Napa Valley wine cellars) and at Chappellet, where she spent ten years making wines.
She thinks of herself as a classical winemaker, and she doesn’t like full-bodied, ripe and overly alcoholic wines. The first vintage she made under her own label was 1987. At that time she made them at Robert Sinskey’s winery in Stags Leap District, and continued to custom crushed her wines until 2000, when her own winery was ready to operate. There’s only one estate vineyard, the Kronos Vineyard. In addition to that, Cathy purchase grapes for her other wines. The total production is around 4 000 cases per year.

2004 Cabernet Sauvignon / 88 p
Although 2004 was a very warm vintage, Cathy Corison managed to capture some finesse in this wine. It’s young and dark purple red with high intensity, and on the nose you’ll find sweet notes of ripe berries, but also that cool and slightly grassy note one finds in lighter and more elegant cabernets. I wouldn’t call it unripe, as several of my American wine writing colleagues would, it’s just a kind of note that Cabernet Sauvignon often has – especially in cooler climate and in very warm vintages, then the vines shut down over a time due to the heat. As always in Cathy’s wines, the oak have been used in a very intelligent way, and it’s very well balanced. On the palate, it is medium bodied, clean and quite fresh with a lingering mineral energy and fine tannins. Although it’s fruity, it’s elegant and quite classic, at the moment a bit closed and therefore not too complex, but there’s small notes of cedar tree and lead pencils in the finish, which I expect to develop more in the years to come. This is a good but not great wine that I rather drink in five years than today.
Drink it 2012-2018.

2005 Cabernet Sauvignon Kronos Vineyard / 91 p
This is always the more powerful, darker and more complex wine of the two. Grapes are sourced from the 3.25 hectare Kronos Vineyard adjacent to the winery and since it was planted on phylloxera resistant St George rootstocks in the 70s, vines are still strong and healthy and belongs to the older ones in this part of the valley (many vineyards in Napa Valley were affected by phylloxera in the 80s and 90s and had to be replanted). On the nose, it’s quite deep and dense with notes of dark berries, and since the house style is more towards finesse, the concentration is good but not too high. Either you like this more elegant style, or not, it’s a wine of very good quality. It’s young and a bit closed, so it needs to open up in a decanter to blossom, but as the regular cabernet, it will gain a lot more complexity with bottle age. On the palate, it’s fresh and actually more cassis driven than on the nose, and tannins are fine, acidity fresh, the intensity medium high, but the aftertaste a bit tight and short.
I’d describe this as a classic and very elegant wine, and for those who enjoy these kind of wines, it’s absolutely a wine to put down in the cellar for a few years. Over the years, I’ve enjoyed several vintages of this wine, and it always developes into something very complex!
Drink it 2012-2022.

Selling point at Ed Sellers

2011-02-18T09:52:00.002+01:00

Paso Robles is at the moment one of the most interesting appellations in California. One thousand vines were planted already at the Mission San Miguel Arcangel by the legendary Franciscan monk father Junipero Serra in 1797. At that time, the Mission grape (a Spanish grape known as Listán Negra) was the only grape planted, today Paso Robles is known for its Zinfandels, and various southern French varieties. Zinfandel came with Italian immigrants already in the late 1800s, and you’ll still see some vines from that time.

During the 1920s, more Italian families moved to Paso Robles to grow wine. Most of those families, like Pesenti, Dusi, Bianchi and Martinelli, planted Zinfandel, and during the time of Prohibition (1920-1933) they sold their grapes to home wine makers all over the country, or to the very few wineries with a license to make wine for the church.
Paso Robles is a unique Californian wine region. Not only is it the region with highest fluctuation in temperatures day and night. It can fall from 40+ degrees Celsius daytime to just under 10 degrees during the night. That creates very special growing conditions, and full bodied wines with intense and ripe fruit flavors, great structure and fine natural acidity. Also, the geological aspects are unique – Paso Robles offers a wide selection of soil types and is one of the few in California where you will find limestone.

Since gaining it status as appellation, AVA, in 1983, Paso Robles has slowly developed into a highly interesting wine region with lots of personality. There’s now 10 560 hectares of vines planted, and from having only a few dozens of producers in the 1990s, there are today more than 120 wine producers.
One of the recent stars is Edward Seller, a pilot and sailor with passion for wine who founded his wine company in 2004. At the time, he didn’t have his own winery, so his custom crushed his grapes at Paso Robles Wine Exchange, and still do so, but now at Denner Vineyards.
From only buying grapes, Edward Sellers now owns 12.15 hectares of vines (1.60 hectares of that is planted to green Rhône varieties).
The wines from Edward Sellers are very fine examples of the Rhône varieties, they can easily be taken for being French if tasted blind – and that’s why Paso Robles has become the home of so many Rhône Rangers.
Today Edward Sellers makes around 5 000 cases annually, and for their price level, they are outstanding!

2008 Estate Blanc / 91 p
This is normally a blend of approximately 50-55 percent Grenache Blanc, around 25-30 percent Roussanne (from a block white snow white limestone soil) and 15-20 percent Marsanne from the estate vineyard in the cooler part of western Paso Robles. The juice is fully barrel fermented, but since Edward doesn’t use new barrels, there’s no toasted of vanilla sweet flavors in the wine. Just a small fraction of the wine went through malolactic fermentation, and in total, the wine spent just 6 months in the barrels.
Oh, what a lovely and elegant nose, rich and intense with notes of sweet lemons, white flower and honey. There’s a serious stuffing on the palate, white peaches, honey and an almost sweet lemon flavor that lingers for a while, and the aftertaste is just fantastic. The first sip may make you think you’ll find be some kind of sweetness on the palate, but there’s no sweetness at all, just a silkiness to make the aftertaste even more seductive. As in many wines from Paso Robles, this wine has a fine and refreshing acidity, which is very important for the overall balance. I’d love to see this wine with seared scallops, lobster of king crab. Serve it at 10-12 degrees Celsius.
Drink it 2011-2014.

2007 Vertigo / 92 p
A range of varietal wines is complemented by a few blends, and the Vertigo is a very fine blend of approximately 70 percent Grenache, 15-18 percent Mourvèdre and 13-15 percent Syrah. The wine has spent 18-19 months in French oak barrels, of which 40 percent were new. This is a quite rich and intense wine, reminiscent of those of Châteauneuf-du-Pape, but with a more lively acidity.
It’s dark cherry red, high intensity. On the nose, it offers a range of dark barriers, but more of an earthiness that’s quite attractive and that adds complexity, and there are no traces of oak at all. Poured blind, it could easily been taken for being a blend from south of France, which is not so uncommon for fine red blends of Paso Robles. At Ed Sellers and some of his colleagues, this is even more common. On the palate, it offers a medium to full body without being overly ripe, rather intense and fruit driven, relatively high in alcohol (15 percent) but by no means out of balance, and with a fine tannic structure to hold everything together. In the finish, there’s a slight bitterness that will soften with one or two more years of bottle age, but already today you’ll find a very attractive fruitiness. Again, France would be a great guess if poured blind. Serve it at 18-20 degrees in large glasses.
Drink it 2012-2017.

The pinotphile on the mountain top

2011-02-13T21:36:00.002+01:00

At the age of 71, William “Bill” Smith sold his brand and winery La Jota Vineyard (he kept the vineyard) to Jess Jackson, who incorporated that in his empire of high end wine estates. The reason Bill sold his company wasn’t because he wanted to retire, he had other plans than that.

“No, I’m an old man, I don’t like to drink tannic cabernets anymore, and my wines of La Jota takes so long time to mature so I wanted to do something else – and since I love Pinot Noir and it makes a wine that’s ready to drink young, I wanted to make some pinots”, he told me. “And it would keep me busy”, he adds.

So in 2001 he founded a new company, W H Smith Wines, and custom crushed his first two vintages 2002 and 2003 in Sebastopol. But his plans didn’t stop there, so he built his own winery (a cave) next to his Cabernet Sauvignon vineyard on the top of western Howell Mountain, just few miles from his former La Jota Vineyards winery.
Bill still makes two wines of Cabernet Sauvignon from his own vineyards on Howell Mountain, but his core production is the five pinots from purchased grapes in all over Sonoma Coast. They are all made in the same way. Grapes are harvested early in the morning and then trucked in small boxes to the winery on Howell Mountain, then sorted, totally destemmed but not crushed. After a few days of cold soak, the juice is fermented in small open top fermenters of stainless steel, but rather than doing pigeage (punch down) for extraction (the more common technique for Pinot Noir), he use remontage (pump over).
Only French oak (of course) is used for ageing, both new and two and three year old, and the wines normally spend around 10 months in the barrels. During that time, some bâtonnage is done.
The wines of W H Smith are not ripe and rich as those of Kosta-Browne, nor intense and ultra pure like those of Melville Estate. They are more in the style of those of Calera and Au Bon Climat, light and fresh, elegant and a bit rustic, in that sense quite classic. Some people don’t like that at all, others love it. As for me, I appreciate the different styles for their different personalities, and I find the somehow rustic and sometimes a bit old fashioned pinot notes in Bills pinots to be very attractive. Since I also like old style burgundy wines, the wines from W H Smith suits me just perfect. They combine, in a very fascinating way, both the old and the new world.

2007 Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir / 88 p
For this wine Bill sources the grapes from several vineyards in Sonoma Coast and Russian River, and this is most of all a kind of second wine to the vineyard designated bottling. The wine is kept in mostly neutral French oak barrels for around nine months and it’s always the lightest and most delicate of the five pinots from Bill Smith. The color is pale cherry red in a very burgundian way (rather than the more common darkred color of California pinots). Delightful, fragrant red berries are found on the nose, mostly cherries and cranberries, also a kind of earthy note reminiscent of stems and there’s just a small note from the oak. The palate is fresh, quite light and elegant with fine red fruit aromas and silky tannins, and the aftertaste is lean and refreshing. Serve this beautiful wine just as a burgundy at 15 degress Celsius in a classic burgundy glass.
Drink it 2011-2014.

2007 Maritime Ridge Pinot Noir / 90-91 p
This is also a blend from different vineyards in the Sonoma Coast area, predominately the Hellental Vineyard, Umino Vineyard and Hanes Vineyard (which add the darker and more concentrated fraction of the blend), but also from Marimar Vineyard in Green Valley. According to Bill, this is his top selection and normally is his most intense and complex wine. Compared to the Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir, this one is darker, more intense and deeper, which slightly sweeter and more ripe cherry notes, but less earthyness and almost no oak at all. With air, the wine opens up a bit and then offers more complex nuances. On the palate, is riper but not sweeter, and the acidity and fine tannins give the wine a very elegant structure, which in many ways are similar to what’s being found in fine reds of Burgundy. There’s just one thing missing – the chalky minerality. The aftertaste is fresh, silky and seductive, and it lingeres for quite a while as well. It’s a beautiful wine that really needs to be decanted to open up and show that silkyness. Serve it at 15-16 degrees in large burgundian glasses.
Drink it 2011-2017.

New wines from Alienor

2011-02-11T18:17:00.002+01:00

Denis Malbec, former winemaker at Château Latour and since 2000 with his Swedish wife May-Britt vintner in Napa Valley, started to make wines under the Alienor label in 2005. Their red cuvée is a very good and highly recommended interpretation of red bordeauxs, and since based on Merlot and Cabernet Franc, it’s more towards the St Emilion style than the Médoc.
I’ve been writing about these wines before, but here are some new efforts well worth looking for. Both the 2009 Sauvignon Blanc and the 2008 La Roseraie are inaurugal releases, and in the pipeline there’s a dark red wine of Syrah and a sweet late harvest of Sauvignon Blanc. Both these wines are still in barrel when this report was written.

2009 Sauvignon Blanc / 88 p
This is the first vintage of the sauvignon, made of the Clone 1 from an organically block planted in 1998 on eroded alluvial soils at 400 meters of altitude in Vindrem Vineyard in Kelseyville in Lake County. Approximately a third of the juice is fermented in small steel drums, the rest in brand new French oak barrels. Denis Malbec told me he had to use new oak for this inaugural vintage, but in the future, there will be a third each of new oak, neutral oak and steel drums. There was no malolactic, so the acitiy is very fresh, but it is balanced by a fine texture, which to a certain extent was enhanced by some bâtonnage during the three months of oak ageing that took place. Color is pale straw and the nose is bright and intense with notes of grapefruit, some passion fruit and just a dash of the oak. It’s not too far away from white Bordeaux. I’d love to see this wine in the coming few years, as I expect it to evolve into a more complex taste just with another year in the bottle. Serve it at 12 degrees to oysters, elegant fish dishes, pan fried or grilled white fish with lemon, or just because it’s so good and refreshing. Only 133 cases were made of this wine.
Drink it 2011-2016.

2008 La Roseraie / 85 p
This rosé, also an inaugural vintage, is made with the saignée method by bleeding of the juice of equal parts of Merlot and Cabernet Franc (and oinly two percent of Petit Verdot) after just a few hours of maceration from the fermentation of their 2008 Alienor Grand Vin. Again, grapes are sourced from vineyards in Lake County. The pink colored juice was fermented in neutral French oak barrels with commercial yeast and then kept in the oak for around one year, and during the ageing there was some bâtonnage. It’s a very classic rosé, pale pink in a typical French style, and the nose is quite elegant but also a bit closed. For sure there are notes of the oak, as well as texture and just some tannins and bitterness thereof, so I guess this is not everyones rosé. However, I find it attractive in it’s classical, well structured and somehow complex style, but I rather drink it with food (pasta, grilled fish or seafood, greens and cheeses) that having in on its own. Serve it a 12-14 degres.
Drink it 2011-2014.

2008 Alienor Grand Vin / 90-91 p
As the 2007 vintage, this is more or less a blend of 49 percent each of Merlot and Cabernet Franc, with a splash of Petit Verdot. Five to seven days of cold soak, then the fermentation takes place in five ton stainless steel fermentes for two weeks with regular pump over. After little more than two weeks of postmaceration, the wine was barreled in French oak barrels, 70 percent new, and kept there for 22 months. It’s still a very young wine, driven by its rich and slightly sweet fruit and the spicy oak, but underneath that, there are those fine notes of lead pencil I found in the previous vintages, and I really like that. It would benefit from some more years of bottle age, or if drinking it today, a good hour or two of decanting. Also on the palate, it’s a bit closed, of course, and although the tannins are huge, they are mature and in no way aggressive, dry or bitter. They just hold the fruit back, today. Keeping the wine in the mouth for a minute, one more easily can take notice of the great and very much Bordeaux like qualities there is in the wine, and that’s very promosing.
Drink it 2013-2023.

The story of an American grand cru; Harlan Estate 1992-2006

2011-02-03T01:33:00.009+01:00

There’s so much to tell about Harlan Estate. I could easily write a book on the topic, and perhaps I’ll do that in the future. This time I’ll focus on the wines and leave the history and the in depth facts for future writings.
The vineyard of Harlan Estate covers 15.40 hectares, split over 24 small blocks located at 100 to 170 meters of altitude on slopes with various exposures in the western side of Oakville- Close neighbours are Far Niente Winery and Martha’s Vineyard of Heitz Cellars. The most predominant soil type here is called Franciscan Shale, a kind of volcanic slate mixed with a dark, brownish clay soil with alluvial components.
Initially, David Abreu was in charge of the vineyards, but today Harlan Estate has their own vineyard manager as well as three full time vineyard workers. David Abreu still brings his crew for harvest, which sometimes stretches into mid November. No details are to small or two expensive for the team to overlook. The sorting of grapes is strict, and sometimes yields after green harvest and the rigourous sorting in the winery is ridicoulously low, which, of course, results in wines with great intensity – and, to be honest, quite high alcohol. If you don’t like that, you’re most likely will not love these wines as I do.
Alreay in 1998 world renowned consultant Michel Rolland was hired, primarily for the blending and according to Don Weaver, the manager of the estate, his contribution is of great importance.
”Travelling around 300 days per year and working with several of the greatest estates worldwide, hes knowlegde is a great asset for us – no one in the world have the same overview of the best wines in the world than Michel Rolland”, Don says. ”Also, Michel has a unique talent for blending”, he adds.
At Harlan Estate, they can afford the detailed work in the vineyards and winery, the strict sorting and the costs that comes with great consultants like Abreu and Rolland. The price of the wine has steadily increased from 250 dollars in the early 2000s, to 350 dollars, and from 2005 vintage 500 dollars. Still it’s not the most expensive wine in the valley.

The first vintages to be made here was 1987, 1988 and 1989, but it wasn’t until 1990 that Bill Harlan and winemaker Bob Levy found the wines from the young vineyard to be at the desired quality level. It was sex years since I tasted the inaugural 1990 vintage of Harlan Estate, so I’ve chosen not to review it here, although it tasted fabulous back then and I know most wines at this level, especially from this great vintage, will still be very good to drink today. However, it should be mentioned that the 1990 vintage have a high percentage of Merlot, for that simple reason Merlot was more widely planted in the first vineyard blocks to be established. Those bottles left from this 300 cases inaugural vintage should be drunk relatively soon.
For some reason I haven’t (yet) tasted the 1991 vintage, so the review will start with the 1992 vintage.

1992 Harlan Estate / 98 p
Tasted three times over the last year, of which two were in vertical tastings with at least five vintages each time. During these tastings, the 1992 Harlan Estate behaved as one of the most complete and complex wines, and – which is important to mention – one of the most Bordeaux like of all vintages ever made here. The nose it just stunning, still rich and deep, but with a wide spectrum of dried berries, leather, tobacco and sous bois (rather than barn yard). When tasted completely blind, I could swear it was either Château Latour or Château Haut Brion (1989 or 1990), even though there’s still a dash of sweetness in the end of the long finish. In my five to six year old notes, I gave the wine a perfect 100 point score – the reason for not doing that now it that the fruit has started to dry out a bit in the finish, while the structure still firm, but noble. I’d love to drink this wine again, in the years to come.
Drink it 2011-2017.

1993 Harlan Estate / 93 p
This wine is a statement of how not depend on overall vintage comments. Although the 1993 Harlan Estate is the weakest in the history of the estate, it has now turned into a wonderful och quite surprising wine. Making a wine like this in a vintage like 1993 (a warm spring with some rains that disturbed the flowering, followed by a cool summer that finally resulted in grapes with good sugars but not a perfect phenolic ripeness), shows either a great terroir or fantastic viticultural and winemaking skills. Or both! Only those who dared to wait for the perfect ripeness made good wines. This is one of the best, if not the best wine, I’ve ever tasted from 1993. Today it’s perfectly matured with a nuanced and elegant nose with fine notes of cedar, tobacco and that typicall grassiness that so often is found in the wines from this estate. Since this vintage is a bit lighter than the others, the minerality shows quite well here, and that’s positive to me. One could have expected the tannins to be weak, and while not firm, they are are still present.
Drink it 2011-2012.

1994 Harlan Estate / 100 p
Since the first time I tasted this wine a decade ago, I have in all tastings – blind or open – given it a perfect 100 point score. This was also the case the two times I tasted it during the research for this report. There’s just one difference – it now shows more of the classic and Bordeaux like greatness than some years ago. It is of course more intense, richer and deeper, and to be honest, also slightly more youthful than great Bordeaux wines of the same age.
“For us as growers, everything during the growing season was pretty much perfect”, Don Weaver said to me when we talked about the outstanding quality of this wine.
Even though the wine now has turned 16 years old, one will still find some of its primary fruit qualities, and today I would describe its texture as velvet like. There’s still enough acidity, tannins and tickeling mineral notes to make the wine taste relatively young, and if not for the slightly matured notes in the fruit, I would never have guessed the age of the wine. I normally describe this stage of maturity like the combination of a wise old man, and the curiosity and energy of a young boy. This is for sure a grand vin, and I guess that a wine like this was what Bill Harlan had in mind when he started to develop Harlan Estate. To me, this wine is at its peak, it’s absolutely perfect to drink, but I do belive it will keep well for some more years.
Drink it 2011-2020.

1995 Harlan Estate / 98 p
Well, there’s actually nothing to complain about here – 1995 in general has given me many memorable wines in Napa Valley – the only reason for not giving this a perfect score, is because I’ve had it next to the glorious 1994 vintage twice. For some reason, the 1995 vintage is a forgotten one, and I can only explain it with the fact it came within great strike of vintages of 1990, 1991, 1992 and 1994, and then the 1997 and 1999. The 1995 growing season was warm, which is noted in the wine’s ripe and dark fruitiness (cassis, blueberries and blackberries), which shows a hint of sweetness, as well as in the slightly higher alcohol. With age, this wine have now developed more noble aromas of cedar, graphite and sous bois, and that fine grassy harlanesque note I find so attractive.
This is a splendid wine, one of the best I’ve tasted from this surprisingly underrated vintage. Given its structure and still vital fruit, it will hold up for many more years in the cellar. I would actually decant it at least 30 minutes (or more) prior to serving it today.
Drink it 2011-2020.

1996 Harlan Estate / 95 p
From the release and the following years, I found the 1996 vintage to be gorgeous. It still is, but I have reduced my score a few points only because the intensity of fruit has started to fade a bit (not too much, though – it’s still a very good wine) and therefore disclosed just a hint of bitterness. There’s not too much to say about the nose, other than that it used to be more voluptuous – today it’s more mature (fine tobacco, cedar and walnuts), yet with a lush and almost sweetish black currant note. However, it is the aftertaste that shows that this isn’t one of the greatest vintages of Harlan Estate – not really that it lacks concentration, it just doesn’t offer the same purity, intensity, length and texture. I wouldn’t keep my bottles more than a few more years. And why should I, when it tastes so good to today … more age will not improve it.
Drink it 2011-2016.

1997 Harlan Estate / 98 p
Already at harvest, the1997 vintage was called the “vintage of the century”, and at Harlan Estate they made one of the most impressive wines ever made in this part of the valley. Some critics gave it a perfect 100 point score – other rejected the wine and called it “too much”. And too much it was. When I tasted it the first time just after release, the overly high alcohol and super ripe fruit (almost sweet) reminded me of a vintage port från Taylor’s. Not too bad to be a “regular wine”, but to be honest, not so complex. Still I liked it, in a way.
Over the last four or five years, I have tasted it a couple of times, and to my surprise the wine have become more and more complex (although I liked the wine from the beginning, I didn’t believe it could evolve in this direction – it was too ripe for that I thought). The ripe and lush fruit is still there, but it has calmed down a bit and I actually found the wine to be elegant. To a certain extent it can be explained by the fact that some of the sweetness started to dry out a few years ago, but most of all because there’s an almost perfect balance of primary fruit flavors and seductive secondary aromas. There’s enough tannin to add some structure to promise some more years of bottle age, but rather would rather describe the taste as silky than structured. Some sommeliers I poured this wine to at a dinner party, told me it was their “wine of the year”. It’s easy to see what they liked about it. Based on the fact that I have had it side by side with other great vintages of Harlan Estate, I will not give it a perfect score, just almost that!
Drink it 2011-2017.

1998 Harlan Estate / 95 p
So much has been said about 1998, and much of it wasn’t too good. This was the El Niño year, cool and damp – and late, very late. For many growers, Cabernet Sauvignon didn’t ripen until November! But was it a bad vintage? Were the wines unripe and green? At least that was the general verdict when the wines were tasted back in 1999 and 2000. Well, a lot of wines showed unripe flavors, but the growers who made a strict green harvest, waited for the grapes to ripen, and then made a rigorous selection of grapes, were able to make wines of truly good and even great quality. At Harlan Estate, no mistakes were made.
When I asked, I was was told that 1998 as the only one ever, was made entirely of Cabernet Sauvignon, and that the yields were down to 13 hectoliters per hectare to get the grapes ripe. “We also worked with the lees during the ageing in barrels, to add texture”, Don Weaver said.
When I tasted it in the early 2000s, it didn’t show any signs of green and unripe flavor, but I remember it as closed, hard to taste, hard to like. It took several years for it to show its true personality. Now, many years later, it does, and I have to say it’s a fantastic effort from this difficult vintage. The fruit is dark, pure and surprisingly intense (compared to other estates 1998s), but not as impressive as in greater vintages. However, you’ll find some secondary aromas that add complexity. After tasting several dozens of red 1998s from Napa Valley and Sonoma over the last years, this is one of the very best! Even though it may keep well over the next decade, it has reached its peak now.
Drink it 2011-2020.

1999 Harlan Estate / 98 p
I have always been a great fan of the 1999 vintage, in which the wines combines a classic structure and flavor profile with a great body. I remember how I many years ago looked forward to see how well these wines would age, and now – almost a decade later – I know I was right in what I once just predicted. The 1999 vintage is one of the finest of the last decade. With almost ten years of bottle age, the 1999 Harlan Estate is just wonderful. So it has always been, but now it has turned into some more nuanced, more developed and much more complex. Although in the beginning of its first maturation, you’ll still find quite intense primary fruit flavors of cassis and blackberries and discreet and typical notes of grass, but these flavors are now partners with the finest cigars, lead pencils, walnuts and dark chocolate. The oak is now perfectly well integrated and the tannins, although important, are now much more polished. It’s still so young you need to decant the wine at least half an hour before serving it. In that sense, the wine is still young, and I’ll keep my last bottles for another 5-10 years, although they will keep for longer than that.
Drink it 2011-2029.

2000 Harlan Estate / 94-95 p
With a cooler vintage, the 2000 Harlan Estate is a more elegant and classical structured wine than the 1997, 1999, 2001 and 2002. It’s also a wine which in a vertical tasting will fall in between, with slightly lower scores. Still, it’s a damn good wine! Don Weaver told me that he recommend consumers to drink this vintage before the riper and more intense wines of the mentioned vintages. “Normally I recommend people to wait to open our wines at least until they’re seven or eight years old, when they start to show their first maturation, but in this case, I prefer to drink it earlier”, Don Weaver says.
The nose is a bit lighter compared to that of other vintages and it offers the typical dark berries like black currants and blackberries, as well as a very elegant grassiness. There are also some fine notes of cedar tree, almonds and corinths, which indicate maturation, and I find it to be very elegant och complex without being great and impressive. It’s very easy to use the description “Bordeaux like” and I guess that note will be used even more in the years to come.
When I tasted this wine in the vertical tasting, and one time a couple of months earlier, the wine had been decanted for one and a half hour, and that’s a very good recommendation. To me, this wine is great now, but it will keep beautifully another five to ten years.
Drink it 2011-2020.

2001 Harlan Estate / 100 p
Since the first time I had this vintage, and every single time I’ve tasted this wine since, I’ve always loved it an given it somewhere between 98 and 100 points, and most of the time a perfect 100 point score! It’s just a fantastic wine, a benchmark wine for Napa Valley cabernets!
The color is still dark, almost opaque and the nose is intense but very elegant and there’s a substantial concentration of ripe dark berries (dark cherries, blackberries, and cassis) to add body, depths and lengths to the taste. The overall balance is what makes this wine impressive, it’s really an amazing wine with great finesse, and although nine years old, I would describe it as youthful. In all aspects I can think of, this is a perfect wine. Not even the fact that winemaker Bob Levy kept the wine in brand new oak for 21 months (a record at Harlan Estate), gave too much oak impact on the wine. The ripe och lush fruit has absorbed the oak in a great way. At this stage you’ll only find some sweetness and spiciness, there’s no bitterness at all, therefore the typical mineral notes shows just beautiful!
The 2001 vintage has been described as almost perfect for the winegrowers and winemakers all over California, and there’s plenty of wines at all price points to prove that.
Drink it 2011-2031.

2002 Harlan Estate / 98-100 p
If any vintage of the complete range of wines made at Harlan Estate can claim to be as perfect as the 1994, 2001 and 2005 vintage, 2002 would be my choice. I’ve been lucky enough to taste it several times, open at the estate and on dinners, and blind in tastings. I always gave it a perfect or almost perfect score. It’s still a very young wine, dark, and huge, concentrated and dense, yet remarkably well calibrated and elegant, with loads of ripe and very pure dark fruit. The oak is still present with nuances of vanilla and dark chocolate, but it’s so well integrated you’ll still find the typical earthy qualities of prime land in the Oakville region, and the black olives so often found in great cabernets from this part of Napa Valley.
One of the most fascinating things about this wine is the texture. Although there’s a substantial power and concentration, and tannins are huge (but ripe), I’ve always described the wine as viscous and silky, which in other words means perfectly well balanced. If there’s one thing about the wine one could discuss, the 15.5 percent of alcohol would be it. It’s there for sure, and you taste it, but I expect it to diminish over the coming years – normally it does. And I have no problems with waiting – this is a profound wine that will improve its taste and complexity with further bottle age.
Already after one hour in the decanter, more and more of the Bordeaux like silkiness and complexity starts to show, and to be very honest, apart from the riper style and higher alcohol, it’s not very different from the very best wines of 2000, 2003 and 2005 vintages in Bordeaux. If you didn’t fall in love with the nose and taste of 2002 Harlan Estate, you will in its aftertaste. It lingers for minutes, and minutes, and it’s just gorgeous. My prediction is that this will be one of the greatest wines from this Californian grand cru ever!
Drink it 2012-2032.

2003 Harlan Estate / 96-97 p
I wonder why there’s so little said about the 2003 Harlan Estate. I guess the answer lies in the fact that 2003 is sandwiched in between superb vintages like 2001, 2002 and 2005. With the not yet released and super hyped vintages of 2001 and 2002, the 2003 vintage had to accept to be kind of forgotten when it was harvested and fermented. It’s a bit sad, though. To me, even a little less reputed vintage of Bill Harlan and his team, is still a great wine and most likely a dream to any other vintner and winemaker with ambitions.
Both the spring and the following growing season were slightly cooler than average, and therefore the wines became lighter but in general a bit more elegant. For me, as a European sommelier and writer, I value the finesse over absolute power and concentration, which is why I give this wine a high score.
The nose is just lovely, not as deep and concentrated as in the top vintages, but elegant with class and that lovely grassiness that I find so typical for Cabernet Sauvignon when ripe, but note overripe. (I know some tasters refer to that flavor as unripe, but grassiness is a typical personality of Cabernet Sauvigon, as its parents are Sauvignon Blanc and Cabernet Franc.) Thanks to the slightly ligther body, the fine acidity and thickeling saltiness of minerals appears a little bit more, which I find very interesting. That’s one of the assets of this fine but not impressive vintage. Still there’s enough fruit and concentration to give the wine a good body, and to flirt with any critical taster. Compared to the other vintages of the 2000s, I would drink this vintage earlier since it’s already starts to show some maturity.
Drink it 2011-2023.

2004 Harlan Estate / 95 p
If 2003 was a cooler vintage, 2004 was warm! That’s obvious when you compare the two vintages – the 2004 offers a much riper and fruitdriven body, a somehow sweetish fruit with ripe notes of cassis, blueberries and blackbarries, and as often found in wines from warmer vintages, the oak is a bit more upfront and toasted. (Giving the wine more oak, and a bit more toasted oak, seems to be a common way to balance the riper fruit in a warmer year.) If one should take a standpoint, slightly cooler vintages are normally the better ones in warmer wine growing regions such as Napa Valley. Still the 2004 Harlan Estate is a very fine wine – although not the top of the range in a historical ranges of vertical tasting this article is based on.
No surprise the alcohol is on the warmer side, just above 15 percent, which at the moment is notable. At both vertical tastings, a few tasters complained about this wine and said the alcohol was over the top. I don’t really care about that too much, at least not at the in a long term. With the now wonderful 1997 vintage in my fresh memory, I know that this kind of warmth will calm down with some years of bottle age. Also, I find the 2004 to be more elegant now compared to how I felt about the 1997 at the same age. My conclusion is that there’s no reason to worry. Just give the wine a few more years of bottle age to make it more harlanesque.
Drink it 2014-2022.

2005 Harlan Estate / 99-100 p
I’m not surprised over all positive words used to describe the vintage and wines of the 2005 vintage, most growers and winemakers seems to have been very happy about the weather conditions. And at Harlan Estate, again, they did no do any mistakes – this is one of the finest wines of the the vinetage. Of course this vintage is far too young to really enjoy today, it’s so loaded with ripe dark fruit, but also notes of cedar lead pencil (which makes the wine quite Bordeaux like). Although it’s massive in its rich primary fruit flavors, it’s just astonishing. On the palate it’s medium to fullbodied with a good acidity, a serious but ripe and fine tannin structure which includes a mineral saltiness. If the first impression is lovely and impressive, the midpalate is gorgeous, but it is in the lingering and perfectly balanced aftertaste the true greatness of this wine reveals. It’s really a textbook example of the unique terroir and skillful winemaking that makes Harlan Estate one of the very finest wines in Napa Valley, California and – to be honest – the whole New World.
Of course it’s still a baby, and based on me early notes of great vintages like 1994 and 2001, I don’t feel like touching the 2005 Harlan Estate for another five years or so. What will happen after that, only the most patience winelovers will know. I expect this vintage to age for many decades, and it will most likely be one of the most memorable vintages ever from Harlan Estate.
Drink it 2015-2040.

2006 Harlan Estate / 96-97 p
I first tasted 2006 Harlan Estate at the winery, just before release. My tasting notes then were based on a very young wine, and to be more correct, a much too young wine. At that time, the oak wasn’t perfectly integrated in the ripe, lush and young, very intense primary fruitforward body. Tasted again last year, all components had finally married, and even still young and dense, it offered a great finesse and even though it’s much riper, much more concentrated, deeper and with more oak and more silky texture, it’s fashioned in a Bordeaux like way.
The taste is mediumbodied with a dense and very intense dark berry like fruit, ripe and rich as expected, yet a bit restrained in a classic way. Of the once obvious oak flavor, there’s only a fine note of vanilla, ceder tree and bacon. My first impression when I tasted the wine, was that it due to the balance of astringency, structure, acidity and and intensity, reminds me of what a blend of the great 1994 and the lighter and fresher 1996 would have been. It’s lileky to assume that the wine will evolve in the same way as the 1996 vintage. So, in ten years from now, I guess this will be a very fine and complex wine, extremely well drinkable but not with the same depth and concentration as the 1994. I will not touch my rare bottles of this baby for some years, and when I do, I’ll decant the wine a good hour prior to serving it.
This may be an interesting reflection: when I tasted the 2006 Harlan Estate at the estate, I also tasted the full range of 2006 wines from Bond. At that time, I found two of the Bond wines to be as good or even “better” than Harlan Estate (those were Vecina and Pluribus). That was, at least for me, the first time I rated Bond higher than Harlan.
Drink it 2013-2026.

Flying high with Sinatra

2011-01-28T22:41:00.003+01:00

Sinatra Family Estates is a newly established winery in the never ending story of Napa Valley. It’s owned by Frank Sinatra’s children Nancy, Tina and Frank Jr, as well as John Schwarz and Danielle Price who run the business. There is just over two hectares of estate vineyard south of the town Calistoga, planted to Bordeaux varietals on a gentle slope with soils composed of volcanic clay, sand, gravel and cobbles. Winemaker is Kent Jarman, but he is assisted by well known Heidi Peterson-Barrett (winemaker at Screaming Eagle until 2005, now at Revana, Amuse Bouche, Au Sommet and her own label La Sirena).
The Sinatra family also owns 1.20 hectares in Tuscany, where they with Bibi Graetz make a blend of Sangiovese and Colorino called La Voce.

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon “Come Fly With Me” / 92-94 p
This inaugural vintage is made of 90 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, seven percent Cabernet Franc and three percent of Petit Verdot from the family vineyard in Calistoga. The upbringing took place in brand new French oak barrels from coopers Taransaud, Seguin-Moreau and Saury for 22 months, a quite common recipe in the cellars of Napa Valley.
I really couldn’t keep my fingers from popping the cork on this wine, although I knew it was too early to drink it. I was too curious for that. So I pulled the cork, poured the wine into a decanter, and let it sit there for two hours. As all young Napa Valley cabernets, it was dark and concentrated, at first a bit closed but intense and somehow spicy. The nose is loaded with dark berries, you’ll find cherries, blackberries and cassis, but also some sweetish vanilla and slightly roasted notes from the oak. Based on my experience of Calistoga wines, I expected the taste to be more tannic. Of course the structure is huge, but I found the tannins to be ripe and perfectly well integrated in the rich, ripe, intense, a bit lush (but not sweet) and therefore silky body. This is a beauty, as very fine tuned wine with great concentration and length, and the high scores are based on the overall balance and finesse. The only thing I miss now is a bit more complexity – and that will come with bottle age.
It’s recommended to decant the wine at least one but rather two hours prior to serving it – it opened up just beautifully with air and continued to evolve in the decanter throughout the meal.
Drink it 2012-2022.

2005 Syrah from Zaca Mesa Winery

2011-01-25T10:21:00.002+01:00

Already in 1978, Syrah was planted for the first time in the vineyards of the young Zaca Mesa Winery in Santa Ynez Valley. Zaca Mesa was founded in 1972 and vineyards were planted the year after. At that time, Syrah was a rare grape – less than 20 hectares of it existed and pioneers were Joseph Phelps Vineyards in Napa Valley and Gary Eberle in Paso Robles. Little did they know that Syrah 30 years later would be the fifth most planted red grape in California (7 641 hectares in 2008, of which 567 hectares lies within Santa Barbara County). Although winemerchants and wine growers says it’s difficult to sell wines of Syrah, is highly popular amongst so called “Rhône Rangers”, and quality can sometimes be very good to outstanding. It’s no doubt that Santa Ynez Valley is a great region for Syrah, and at Zaca Mesa Winery, they now farm nine different clones on 36.40 hectares of this fine grape.
It wasn’t until the early 90s that the new owners, twin brothers John and Lou Cushman, realized that they should focus on the Rhône varietals. They replanted most of their vineyards with Roussanne, Viognier, Grenache, Mourvèdre and more Syrah (they still have some 1.41 hectares of Syrah in the original Black Bear Block), and that was the rebirth of Zaca Mesa Winery. Today they produces some 35 000 cases per year, of which 10 000 cases is made from Syrah.

2005 Zaca Mesa Syrah / 90 p
Up to four percent of Viognier is normally co-fermented with Syrah in this fine wine. All grapes comes from their own vineyards - at Zaca Mesa Winery, no grapes are bought in – and they are normally harvested (by hand) in mid October. Vinfication was traditional, with total destemming and fermentation in small open top fermenters followed by malolactic fermentation and 18 months of ageing in small French oak barrels, of which 25 percent were new. It’s something very French over this wine, and I really like it, but not for just that reason. If offers a dark and quite intense fruit with ripe and sweet scented blueberries, blackberries as well as a dash of black currants, but what gives it that French attitude, is the spicy notes of licorice, the floral parfumes of violets and apricots (from the Viognier) and the complex addition of charcuteries and dried meat. You may well consider small notes of Brettanomyces, or at least some earthiness reminiscent of that, but if so, it’s at the level that makes the wine a just bit more interesting.
On the palate, it is medium bodied, ripe and quite rich, yet elegant and classic. Tannins are important, but ripe and therefore well suited for the good but not fresh acidity and the slightly sweetish fruit, and everything seems to hold up quite well in the long finish. Since I’ve been trying and drinking the syrahs från Zaca Mesa for almost 15 years now, I knew that this wine would develope very well with decanting, so I gave it a good hour before I retasted it, and another two hours before serving it on California wine seminar. It’s still young, but I wouldn’t mind having a case in my cellar for the coming years. It will develop into something more complex over the years.
Drink it 2011-2019

2006 Cemetary by Erna Schein

2011-01-15T13:53:00.004+01:00

Although the Erna Schein winery is young – it was founded in 2005 – the people behind it are no newcomers. Already in 1993, Les Behrens and his wife Lisa Drinkward and their friends Bob and Lily Hitchcock, started to make wines. Their wine company, Behrens & Hitchcock, soon gained a great reputation for their very serious wines. All grapes were purchased, but over the years growers with great vineyards offered them to buy grapes. The wine became better, and better. “In the end, we made some 20 different wines every year”, Les says and added that it must have been quite confusing for the consumers.
Les and Lisa, who were restaurateurs, sold their restaurant in 1997 to focus full time on the Behrens & Hitchcok label. They bought a property on the top of Spring Mountain and built a small winery. In the early 2000s, things changed. Bob and Lily wanted to retire, and in 2004 they sold their share of the company to Les and Lisa. Since there were no more Hitchcocks in the new company, they changed the name to Erna Schein, the mother of Les Behrens.
Although Lisa Drinward is a winemaker (she have her own label with the well known winemaker Françoise Peschon of Araujo), it’s Les Berhens who makes the wines, with Mark Porembowski as assistant winemaker. A dozen wines, 3 000 cases anualy, are now produced.
This is a fantastic small boutique operation!

2006 Cemetary/ 93-95 p
This is a cuvée of approximately 75-80 percent Cabernet Sauvignon with the balance of mostly Merlot and some Petite Verdot, all grapes purchased from two very famous but not official stated vineyards in St Helena (I guess I promised not to reveal which these vineyards are, so I’ll keep my mouth shut). “We have an understanding with the owners not to mention the vineyards on our labels”, Les Behrens said to me when I asked him a few years ago. Well, the source may be a secret, but there’s no secret at all that this is a stunning wine! Already on the nose, the great quality reveals itself – this is not just fermented and oak aged grape juice – this is a good example of a wine driven by its terroir.
There’s something sauvage about the nose, a kind of forest floor quality that adds complexity to the dark, ripe but very elegant fruit. I find the combination of a typical Californian cabernet and classic clarets of Bordeaux to be very interesting, and seductive. Around 90 percent of the French oak barrels are new – still the oak flavors are very well integrated. The classic notes and structure dominates the taste, which today is a bit too young and not completely developed to offer its full potential. After two hours in the decanter …
Drink it 2012-2026.

2006 Lucia Abreu Vineyard from Aubert Wines

2011-01-08T12:08:00.005+01:00

Mark Aubert was born in Napa Valley, so working with wine came natural for him. After working in the cellars at Rutherford Hill Vineyards and Monticello Cellars in the 1980s, he met Helen Turley and her husband John Wetlaufer in 1990, the same year they started their own label Marcassin. At the time Helen was the winemaker at Peter Michael Winery in Knights Valley, and she offered Mark Aubert to work with her as assistant winemaker there. Of course he took the job. Later on, when Helen Turley left, Mark Aubert became the head winemaker. He stayed at Peter Michael Winery until 2000, when he made his first wines (of Chardonnay) under his own label Aubert Wines. Mark continued to make wines for other wineries over a number of years, among them Colgin Cellars up on Pritchard Hill where he was the winemaker from 1999 (again, he took over after Helen Turley) until 2007.

His own wines were always made at the custom crush facility at Laird Family Vineyards in Oak Knoll. But in 2010, Teresa and Mark Aubert bought a small winery next to Silverado Trail in Calistoga, and production has now moved there.
“It’s great, for eleven years we have dreamed of having a winery of our own, and to give a home for our wines”, Mark says.
The total production is now around 2 500 cases per year, of which the Chardonnay Ritchie’s Vineyard counts for approximately a third.

2006 Lucia Abreu Vineyard Howell Mountain Red Wine / 90-92 p
This second vintage of this wine is a blend of approximately 50 percent Merlot, 30 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and 20 percent Cabernet Franc, all grapes from the Lucia Abreu Vineyard up in Howell Mountain (adjacent to the famous La Jota Ranch) which is owned and planted by the well known viticulturist David Abreu.
After almost 40 days of maceration, the wine is transferred into new French oak barrels from coopers Taransaud and Sylvain, to undergo malolactic fermentation and 18 months of ageing. Mark Aubert is known for making big and ripe wines, and there’s no change from that philosophy here – the wine boasts of super ripe, intense, sweet and lush fruit and an alcohol level of 15.8 percent. Is it too much? Well, many wine drinkers would say so, and I may agree with them, at least when the alcohol overwelms the fruit and burns. However, this wine it’s quite delicious, at least if serving it to a rich dish. At this stage, it's a bit closed, much due to the high proportion of firm tannins. There’s also a slight greenish bitterness (it taste like it comes from the oak), it doesn’t show too much of a mid palate and the oak is a bit to upfront. Since it was the first time I tasted this wine, and I had high hopes for it – one should have, it’s a David Abreu and Mark Aubert wines – I was at first a bit disappointed. I wanted it to give me more pleasure.
So, I left it in the decanter for almost four hours, and by then it had turned into something much more elegant and complex, but still without being so great I wished for. The final verdict at this young stage is that it is a good to very good wine, but taking into consideration where it’s from, who grows the grapes and who makes the wine, I ask for a little bit more than this. However, I look forward to taste future vintages, since I suspect things will be better over time.
Drink it 2012-2018.