CALIFORNIA CABERNETS


Many people view "Cabernet Sauvignon" as a lovely meal-time beverage.  California's Napa Valley is, as it turns out, a wonderful place to cultivate, make and sell Cabernet.

During the 1950s and 1960s, when there was but a handful of wineries in the Napa Valley, people wondered if California could produce Cabernet Sauvignon wine worthy of comparison with the wines of France's Bordeaux region.

In those days, Merlot did not exist in California.  Wineries in Napa such as Inglenook, Beaulieu Vineyards, Charles Krug and Louis Martini were "the" hot brands and any restaurant worth its salt had to have BV's Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, Inglenook's "Cask" Cabernet, Louis Martini's Special Selection and Charles Krug's Vintage Selection (Red Stripe).

Most every wine sold its wines for similar prices.  If Louis Martini's Cabernet was $3.75, Christian Brothers might be $3.50, BV was perhaps $4 for the regular and $5.75 for the Private Reserve and Inglenook's were within the same price range.

Souverain was a small winery near St. Helena and it was owned and operated by former Hillsborough resident, Lee Stewart.   Mayacamas was a fledgling Cabernet maker in the western hills.  Freemark Abbey was a hot, new winery in the early 1970s as were Chappellet and Cuvaison.  Stag's Leap Wine Cellars was about to launch its first vintage (the 1972) and Chateau Montelena was brand new as the '70s began.  

Some fellow named Robert Mondavi left his family's winery (Charles Krug) and aided by financing from a Washington State brewery, he launched his brand with the 1966 vintage.
Mondavi's family owned a winery out in Lodi and he was working in Napa at the Sunny St. Helena winery...when he heard the Charles Krug facility was up for sale, he somehow convinced his conservative father to buy the place.  Disagreements with his family caused him to leave and, with help from beer brewing interests, he was able to set up the Robert Mondavi Winery in Oakville in time for the 1966 vintage.

The cult winemaker in that era was Joe Heitz, who made distinctive Napa Cabernet Sauvignons, especially one from "Martha's Vineyard."
His wines were difficult to find and the somewhat cantankerous Heitz told my father "I'd have time to make more wine if I didn't have to field phone calls all day long from people such as you!"  Years later, Mr. Heitz was a most gracious fellow when I'd see him.

We eventually were able to purchase Heitz' wines in the mid-1970s.  One of the finest wines we've ever tasted was a 1968 Heitz Napa Cabernet...it was one of those rare wines which was worthy of "the search."  And can you image?  Heitz had the nerve to ask $8 for his top bottling of Cabernet.  

Freemark Abbey was a leading producer of Cabernets (and Chardonnays) in the early 1970s.  The ring-leader was a fellow named Charles Carpy, who was a major proponent of preserving Napa for agricultural uses.

They hired a winemaker named Jerry Luper, who also had a hand in the first vintages at Al Brounstein's "Diamond Creek" winery.  

A Cabernet Sauvignon from the Bosché vineyard was the crown jewel in their line-up.  I can't imagine the wines they made in the early 1970s finding much of an appreciative audience in today's world of deep-colored, high alcohol, lavishly-oaked wines.  



The "dean" of Napa Valley winemakers was Andre Tchelistcheff at Beaulieu Vineyards in Rutherford.

This fellow had a remarkable influence on the California wine scene in the 1950s and beyond and his influence is still felt today.  Aside from making some stellar wines, he was instrumental in training other winemakers and offering consulting advice.   He was a true giant, despite being less than 5 feet tall!

We read, once upon a time, a quotation attributed to Mr. Tchelistcheff: "God created Cabernet Sauvignon, but the Devil created Pinot Noir."

One of the young upstarts was Warren Winiarski, who founded Stag's Leap Wine Cellars.  
We were just about the first customer of Stag's Leap Wine Cellars.  Winiarski was from the Midwest and arrived in California, working with Lee Stewart at Souverain in the mid-1960s and then at Robert Mondavi's new establishment in its first years.  Around 1970 he planted Cabernet in the Stag's Leap district (after planting Cabernet on Howell Mountain years earlier!).  

The Winiarski family sold the winery in 2007 to a partnership of Italy's Piero Antinori and Washington State's Ste. Michelle Wine Estates.

Another new label was that of the Wagner family.  Old Charlie Wagner and his son Chuck were grape growers in Rutherford and they launched their brand with the 1972 vintage.  That was a wet year and though it was not a highly-regarded vintage, both Caymus and Winiarski's Stag's Leap Wine Cellars offered us really nice wines from that vintage.
The Wagners had a fellow named Randy Dunn was their winemaker in the 1970s and Dunn, of course, remains a producer of "old school" Cabernets under his own banner.

Caymus made all sorts of wines in that era...Oeil de Perdrix was a pink wine made of Pinot Noir (yes, they grew Pinot in Rutherford!).  Caymus also made Zinfandel and, once upon a time, Merlot.  They bottled a sweet Riesling they purchased on the bulk market, as well!

Also making some top Cabernet in the 1970s was the Conn Creek winery.

The Franciscan winery opened in the early 1970s and after a change (or two) of ownership, one of its winemakers, Justin Meyer, went on to found Silver Oak.

Sonoma was home to some good wineries, too, but its history was more of producing good quality wines at reasonable prices.  

Savvy wine buyers knew Pedroncelli in Sonoma's Geyserville area to be a source of good wines along with Parducci, farther north in Mendocino's Ukiah.

Sonoma's Alexander Valley gained a measure of notoriety when a fellow named Tom Jordan started his winemaking enterprise.  The 1976 vintage was released at an unheard of price: $6.75 (if memory serves).  







The Santa Clara valley was home to several notable wineries.  Martin Ray, of course.  Ridge Vineyards established itself in the 1970s as a top source of great Cabernet (they made an Eisele Vineyard Cabernet from the famous Napa vineyard in the 1971 vintage).  Mario Gemello made some stellar wines in the 1960 vintage and through the early 1970s.


Mario Gemello in 2003, or so.




Well, today wineries such as Heitz offer entry level Cabernet for $40 and Stag's Leap Wine Cellars costs $55.  It took them 30 years to get to the fifty dollar level.  And yet, these days, the market is full of brands vying for shelf and wine-list space which cost $100 or more for Cabernets with little history and no track record.

We've seen the advent of "cult wines" over the past couple of decades.  Names such as Bryant, Colgin, Harlan and Bond fetch hundreds of dollars.  Seeing this trend, many people have started wine brands in hopes of catching lightning in a bottle.

A fellow brought in a perfectly standard bottle of Napa Cabernet, asking $75 a bottle.  I pegged it as being "worth" $20.  "What makes this worth $75?" I asked.  The fellow showed me a map of famous vineyards and since all the neighbor's wines cost big bucks, their wine had to cost a similar small fortune.

When I asked another gentleman "Precisely what brand of crack are they smoking at your winery to think this young vines, simple Cabernet could possibly warrant your asking nearly $200 for a bottle?" he told me "That's a good price for a cult Cabernet!"
Too much Kool-Aid, in my curmudgeonly view.


Back in the 1960s and early 1970s, Cabernet wines were somewhere in the range of 12 to 13% alcohol.
Many wines were aged three to five years before being released.

Today, in search of greater acclaim from various wine critics, winemakers pick grapes at ever higher levels of sugar and ripeness.  You won't find many California Cabernets with less than 14% alcohol these days.

While people may have been more patient in the 1950s and 1960s, today it's a world of instant gratification and wine drinking has changed.
Many people used to enjoy wine as a meal-time beverage and as an accompaniment to food.  In today's world, many consumers drink wine on its own, nearly as a cocktail beverage.
This explains, to some degree, the change in winemaking and wine styles.


The winemaking has changed with respect to Cabernet.  Years ago it was normal to make Cabernet Sauvignon without blending any other varieties.  Today, many producers add Merlot to "soften" their Cabernets.  There are other winemakers who blend in other Bordeaux varieties, such as Malbec, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot. 

One winemaker, years ago, told me his best wine was 100% Cabernet.  "I blend Merlot into our regular wine, but mainly to give the marketing people something to talk about." he said.

Looking back to the wines made in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s in Napa, we find most were aged in large wooden tanks.  The notion of adding oak chips to flavor the wine was certainly foreign to winemakers of that era.  Wines were often aged in redwood tanks or relatively neutral cooperage for a few years and then a few more years in bottle before the wine reached the market.

Today many people give their wines 12-18 months in smaller cooperage (it matures faster in 60 gallon barrels than in a 2,000 gallon vat).  Many replace a percentage of barrels each year in order to insure a certain amount of oak is showing in the wines' bouquet and flavor.   And the wines are pushed into the market after 2 or 3 years, whereas into the 1960s and 1970s, most Cabernets arrived in shops when they were about 5 years old!

While many winemakers produce big, deeply-colored, aggressively tannic wines, there is not guarantee that a wine of such style will "age well."  The wine must have an appropriate amount of fruit (grape character) to go along with the tannin.  Even more important is the level of acidity in the wine.  Low acid/high tannin wines, in our experience, often do not age particularly gracefully. 

We have had the pleasure of opening old bottles of California Cabernets which we are fairly certain we not outrageously tannic when the wines were young.  I am thinking of bottles of Louis Martini Cabernets from the mid-to-late 1940s which, at 50 years of age, were still vibrant in color and fresh in "fruit."  I also recall a Simi Cabernet of elderly stature (probably from the mid 1960s or so) which we shared with a group of visiting Alto Adige (Italian) food and wine fanciers: the wine was fruity, berryish and thoroughly delicious despite never having been hugely tannic or excessively oaky.  

The late Mario Gemello also made exceptional Santa Clara County Cabernet Sauvignon.   His 1960 is legendary!  And still fabulous (the bottle in the photo above was opened, and consumed with enthusiasm, in January 2001).  That wine was aged in wood for nearly a decade!!!

Yes, winemaking has changed.

Our shop caters more to people who "drink" wine as opposed to those who "collect" wine.  We do, of course, have many deluxe bottles in the shop.  But we appreciate having good quality and sensible pricing.  These days there's a lot of "Fool's Gold" in the wine market.  

If you've got lots of cash, but what you like.  If you're looking for value, come see us.

Cabernet Best Buys

RODNEY STRONG
2005 Sonoma County CABERNET SAUVIGNON  (list $15) SALE $11.99

Sonoma County Cabernet with about 16 months in wood makes for a medium-bodied, minty, woodsy red.  

We think this is one of the best values in North Coast Cabernet in California.  It is drinkable now and may be kept for several more years.  

 

HART'S DESIRE 2006 "CLARET" $18.99

John Hart married a woman named Desiree, so he pretty much had no choice in naming the winery!

He's been making a delightful "Claret" for us over the past few years and the just-arrived 2005 is exceptional.  It's actually got 60% Cabernet Sauvignon and 30%  Cabernet Franc and 10% Merlot.  All Alexander Valley fruit.   The wine has a nice touch of wood (the proverbial "kiss" of oak) and the tannin level is such that drinking it now is a pleasure.

It's a medium-full bodied red.  Not huge, over-the-top, but balanced and refined.  And sensibly-priced.

 

ALEXANDER VALLEY VINEYARDS
2006 Alexander Valley Cabernet Sauvignon $16.99

The Wetzel family has been farming in Sonoma's Alexander Valley for more than 40 years.  We bought our first wines from them with the 1975 vintage!

Though many of their neighbors ask serious money for a bottle of Cabernet, the Wetzel's still sell wine for a price which allows one to drink well, even if you didn't part with a fifty-dollar bill.  In fact, you'll get change and a bottle of wine for a twenty-dollar bill!

The 2006 Cabernet is much like its predecessor, a deep, cedary, woodsy note on top of dark, black cherry fruit.  I find it to be quite good and one of the few bargains in California Cabernet.  The 2006 is nice now and it will age well, given another 5-8 years of cellaring.

MARIO PERELLI MINETTI
2005 Napa CABERNET (reg $21) SALE $18.99

Uncle Mario lives a few blocks from the shop and is a kindly, old (he's about 90-something) gentleman who loves wine.
He and his grandson run MPM wines.  Mario's family was a major force in the California wine business, once-upon-a-time.   Wine runs in Mario's veins.

His Cabernet Sauvignon comes from Napa Valley fruit.  It's entirely Napa and entirely Cabernet.  Oak is not a major player here, as Mario hates having his palate pummeled with toothpicks.  It's a good wine to pair with mildly-seasoned beef, for example.  

RAMSPECK 
2006 Napa Valley CABERNET SAUVIGNON  $17.99

We've periodically found good wine with this label, the work of winery Gerald Rowland.

He's the son of an Australian grape grower and began his career working at the historic Seppelts winery Down Under.  Up top, he's worked at Stags Leap Winery and Chappellet before launching Rowland Cellars and its trio of wine labels.

 

We have a particularly good Napa Cabernet.  It's from the 2006 vintage and though young, it's not a wine intended for extended cellaring.  You can drink this now (and how!) with grilled steaks or lamb.  It's a medium-full bodied Cabernet with dark fruit aromas and flavors and a nice bit of cedary, woodsy oak.

FORTH WINERY

The Forths are relative newcomers to Sonoma County, having been living in San Diego for a number of years.  Gerry and his wife Jann have ten acres of vineyards in the Dry Creek Valley, a site that started out as a simple "get away" refuge.

Gerry has been in various health care sector business ventures.  He's, for example, the Chairman of the Board of a health care patient/info company called Intellidot.  Interestingly, this firm sells a system which utilizes bar codes scans for medicines and patients, yet Forth's wine bottles do not have UPC codes on them!

We tasted a really good Cabernet from this winery and it's called "All Boys."  That's because none of the fruit comes from their daughter's parcel of vineyards...only their sons, grandsons and a neighbor's vineyard (also only 'boys')...

 

The wine is from the 2006 vintage and it's quite drinkable now.  We like the elements of red and black fruits along with a touch of oak.  It's a dry wine, but not aggressively tannic or mouth-drying. They've done a good job in capturing both the character of Cabernet Sauvignon and the character of "Dry Creek Valley" in this wine.    It's one of the best buys in good, stylish California Cabernet.

 

Currently in stock:  2006 FORTH "All Boys" Dry Creek CABERNET $19.99

 

MCMANIS

Our friend Jeff Runquist makes wine for the McManis family just south of Lodi out in the Central Valley.   We're typically allergic to wines from this part of the planet, but Jeff uses a good 'recipe' and manages to make something even fussy palates might enjoy.

The wine shows lots of sweet oak fragrances and it's intended for immediate drinking, not cellaring.  Some consumers will see the 2007 vintage date on the bottle and figure this is too young.  In fact, it will not age especially well and it's vinified with the idea people are going to buy it and drink it within about half an hour's time.  It sells for small money and is aimed at wine drinkers, not "wine collectors."

Currently in stock:  McMANIS 2007 CABERNET  SALE $9.99

 

 

Other suggestions: 

Consider some marvelous Spanish wines:     Pago Florentino at $19.99.  Rioja can be had for $12-$25...there are also some really good reds from the southwest part of France...Madiran wines give these California Cabernets a run for the money and they're $19.99.

Bordeaux is another great place to start exploring.  We have reasonably price, delicious Bordeaux wines from $11.99 to $25.  

DeLuxe CABERNETS

ALTAMURA VINEYARDS & WINERY

This family enterprise started out in the mid-1980s with a lonely little stone building on the Silverado Trail.  Chardonnay was an early release, but given their penchant for aging wines in oak, reds have been the highlights here.   


Frank Altamura used to work at Caymus and so he's partial to oak.  In abundance.  The winery makes Sangiovese and Cabernet Sauvignon.  The vineyards are in the southeastern part of Napa Valley in an area, appropriately, called "Wooden Valley."  Production remains small and the wines have a good following thanks to nice fruit and balance in the wines.  The current and recent vintages show less strong oak and more Cabernet.

 

The 2005 is remarkably good...really "classic" Napa Cabernet aromas.  The oak is not as prominent as in early vintages of Altamura.  The wine has tremendous balance every-which-way...tannin...fruit to oak...everything.

Currently offered:   2005 Napa Cabernet $71.99

Bob Gorman's photo of Altamura's vineyards.


Bob's photo inside the Altamura Winery...

BEAULIEU VINEYARD

Located in Rutherford, in the heart of "Cabernet Country," the BV winery has made an impressive comeback in recent years.  I'll bet, however, they'd claim they never left.  Yet for those looking for serious quality Napa Valley Cabernets, this winery went into the doldrums from about 1975 or so until the 1994 vintage.
Two historical figures play prominent roles here:  the founder, a Frenchman named Georges de Latour and a Russian gentleman named Andre Tchelistcheff. 

Georges de Latour was from the Perigord region in France and came to California in the 1880s in search of gold.  He lost what money he had attempting to find gold in the Sierra Foothills.  He had a background in chemistry, however, and traveled from winery to winery buying sediment and the tartrates which precipitated out during the aging process.  This he made into cream of tartar which was destined for baking powder.   His business was headquartered in Sonoma near the Dry Creek Valley.  In 1899 he purchased a property located immediately north of the very prestigious (at that time) Inglenook winery in Rutherford.  He returned to his native France for vine cuttings and opened a small winery. 

In 1915 he bought the stone cellars of the Seneca Ewer winery across the road and that remains the main home of BV. 

Prohibition didn't shut down the winery, as de Latour was a producer of altar wines for the Catholic Church.  When Repeal finally came along, de Latour had stocks of well-aged wines and was ready to supply a thirsty market. 
Claude Rains portrayed Georges de Latour in a movie called "This Earth is Mine," based on a book written by Alice Tisdale Hobart.  I understand the situations were changed somewhat to avoid legal wranglings.

De Latour and his son-in-law, the Marquis de Pins, visited the Institute National Agronomique in Paris in search of an enologist to replace the retiring Professor Leon Bonnet.  They met a research enologist named Andre Tchelistcheff who accepted their offer of a position in the Napa Valley. 
Tchelistcheff felt Cabernet Sauvignon had the greatest potential and wanted to concentrate on making a wine to challenge the best of Bordeaux.  But the owners of BV felt they had to have a complete "line" of wines and made everything including Napa "Burgundy," "Chablis", "Muscat de Frontignan" and other fortified dessert wines. 

The first BV "Georges de Latour Private Reserve" Cabernet Sauvignon was from the 1936 vintage. 

I have a very old copy of Leon Adams "The Wines of America" in which he writes of the initial Private Reserve:
"It was the 1936 vintage and was priced at a dollar and a half.  (At this writing, the ten year old Private Reserve brings fourteen dollars a bottle in the few stores that have any in stock.  The three year old can be bought at the Beaulieu tasting room in Rutherford for $5.25 but there is a limit of two bottles per buyer."

I think I still may have a bottle or two of that $5.25 Private Reserve with our ancient orange price sticker on it!

The winery was sold by the Marquise de Pins in 1969 to the large Heublein company. Tchelistcheff remained as winemaker, though he retired in 1973 or 1974.  His protégé, Dick Peterson made the 1974 vintage and left shortly thereafter to be the head honcho at the new "The Monterey Vineyard" in Monterey County, California. 

The winery, in our view, went into a tailspin through the late 1970s and all through the 1980s.  It seems, to our taste-buds, the winemaking was being hampered by the bean counters as less-than-stellar fruit and barrels were being used to make, not surprisingly, less-than-stellar wines. 

We were shocked when a BV Private Reserve 1994 won a blind-tasting here.  We were delighted, however, to see the return of "an old friend."   This, to us, marks a renaissance at BV.

The shackles have been removed, it would seem, and BV can, once again, take its place as a source of excellent quality wines.  BV Reserve Cabernets have won blind-tastings here with their 1995 and 1996 vintages. 
The winery is also making tiny amounts of special bottlings of Cabernets and other experimental varieties.  We hope the string of successes continues!

BV makes a modest quality "Coastal" Cabernet which has yet to attract our attention.  Their regular bottling of Napa Cabernet is called "Rutherford," though some in Napa are amused that the wine is NOT made exclusively from Rutherford-grown fruit.  Actually, the word isn't really "amused."  They're not at all happy about this. 
BV Private Reserves have been entirely Cabernet Sauvignon.  

The major change effected by their director of winemaking, Joel Aiken, is BV's Reserves are no longer exclusively matured in American oak.  The latest Reserves have been matured in French oak to the tune of 73%.  The balance is American wood, with 80% of the cooperage, in some fashion, being new oak. 

Another wrinkle in the BV fabric has been the introduction of a Bordeaux-styled blend.  You could call it a "Meritage" wine, but that would cost a premium, so BV came up with their own proprietary name, "Tapestry."  
This wine has been BV's "Bordeaux-styled" blend.  They've worked to market the wine at the $50 price level, a bit ambitious, in our view.  If you poke around the shop, though, you'll find the 2005 here at a very attractive price and it's a lovely, woodsy, minty, oaky red wine.


The 2001 Private Reserve is pretty typical of BV's recent Reserve Cabernets.  I find some nice oak, of course, though it doesn't strike me as being as big as the 1999.  It's the sort of red wine that pairs most handsomely with a grilled steak or perfectly grilled lamb.  Drinkable now, if you like and it probably can be cellared another decade, or so.  
The wine garnered a shocking "score" from Wine Spectator critic James Laube.  You know how some "dog whistles" are inaudible to humans, but dogs supposedly can hear them?  Well, Laube has trained himself to have this super-sensitivity to a cellar condition which about 99% of wine tasters cannot smell or taste.  As a result he blasted the 2001 BV with a shocking score of 69/100!  A friend of ours was explaining that while dogs may have an especially sensitive range of hearing, we don't send them to the symphony to critique the musicians.  

The 2002 Private Reserve is rather showy.  Nice and woodsy, typical of this bottling of BV.  It is drinkable now, with food, but is also likely to develop additional complexity and soften with a decade in the bottle.

The 2005 Private Reserve is their "current" release.  Nicely oaked, fairly deep and worth its sale price.

 

 

 

My Letter From Andre.

Currently in stock:  

2005 BV Tapestry SALE $29.99
1996 Clone Six Cabernet (please inquire)
2001 BV Private Reserve SALE $89.99 
1994 BV Private Reserve $139.99 (a few bottles available presently)
1997 BV Private Reserve SALE $109.99
1999 BV Private Reserve magnum (list $205)  SALE $179.99

2002 BV Private Reserve (list $90)  SALE $84.99
2005 BV Private Reserve (list $120) SALE $69.99

 

 

BECKMEN

Not many red wine drinkers look to Santa Barbara County to satisfy their cravings for a good Cabernet Sauvignon.  We certainly have not thought of Bordeaux varieties and Santa Barbara as being remotely related (though we do recall a Cabernet made by Rick Longoria back in 1979, but that was then and this is now).

The Beckmen estate, further, specializes in Syrah and other Rhone varietals, so it's really remarkable to find them producing one of the best Cabernets of the region and a wine worthy of comparison with Napa and Sonoma wines.

The Beckmen family purchased an existing winery and vineyard in the 1990s and they did their homework and uprooted many of the vineyards on the estate.  They realized they "inherited" vines which were perhaps not best-suited to their vineyard sites, so the Beckmens set about changing and upgrading.  

We tasted their 2005 Santa Ynez Valley Cabernet and were delighted to find a wine showing lots of dark fruit notes and good, cedary oak.  The wine may have a few years of cellaring potential, but there's not a lot of astringency, so you can easily enjoy this in its youth.

It's quite reasonably-priced, too.  

Post script:  A long-time friend and Santa Barbara Rhone Ranger mentioned the Beckman wines on a recent visit.  I told him we loved their Cabernet.  
"Oh," he said, "That's one of the few unsung gems in our area."

 

Currently in stock:  2005 BECKMAN Santa Ynez Valley Cabernet Sauvignon (List $28)  Sold Out

BEHRENS & HITCHCOCK

This small enterprise has gathered a lot of steam over the past few years, combining the resources of Les Behrens and Bob Hitchcock.  

Behrens was in the restaurant biz and put together an impressive wine list to go with Mrs. Behrens' cuisine.  
Bob Hitchcock used to work counting beans.  I suppose he still counts them as part of his contribution to the B&H endeavor.  

We've been fans since their early days when they were true "garagistes."  Now they have a winery atop Spring Mountain, complete with a cave (so they remain "an underground" winery).  

The wines, so far, have been wonderful.  Behrens, thanks to his restaurant background, seems to strive for balance and "drinkability" in their wines.  Wines we've tasted don't have the maximum tannin nor are they hugely oaked.

 

As they produce but a few hundred cases of the various bottlings, wines from this property tend not to hang around for very long.  Cellar treatment is minimal, fining and filtering being handling the B&H crew is allergic to.  

Currently available: 
2000 Napa Cabernet $59.99
2000 King of the Gypsies  $99.99
2000 Petite Verdot  $49.99
2000 Kennefick Cuvee Magnums  $139.99
2002 Dr. Crane Cabernet $64.99
2002 Les Chats du Monde $64.99  (last bottles)

2003 Les Chats du Monde $64.99




BERINGER

This winery was founded by the German-born Beringer brothers, who came to the U.S. in the 1870s from Mainz.  Jacob and Frederick built the "Rhine House" and had a cave or two excavated for wine production.  Jacob went to work for Charles Krug across the street until their own digs were dug and ready for wine-making.

 

The family ran the place until about 1970 when it sold the winery and tremendous acreage to a Swiss firm called Nestlé.  Back in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beringer was probably most famed for a rather modest red wine called "Barenblut" (Bear's Blood!) which was a curious blend of Grignolino and Pinot Noir.  Bears must have thin blood!  The winery also put out a fortified wine of Malvasia Bianca.  

Nestlé set about improving the winery and hired a guy named Robert Pecota as a 'big wig' along with a fellow named Myron Nightingale as its winemaker.  They made all sorts of wines, from Grey Riesling to Fumé Blanc to Cabernet Sauvignon.  A second label was created called "Los Hermanos," the nickname given the Beringer brothers by their Spanish neighbor, Señor Tiburcio Parrott.    The Los Hermanos label featured jug wines and single-serving bottles which came complete with plastic cup!  

The winery plodded along for many years, never really competing seriously in the realm of connoisseur wines until about the early 1980s.  We recall being stunned to taste a 1984 Reserve Cabernet that was seriously better than the ordinary plonk Beringer had been known for making.  The winery continued on an upward spiral with winemaker Ed Sbragia at the helm.  

The Nestlé folks, with a seller's market easily in view, surprised many industry folks by divesting itself of the Beringer winery and its various brands (Chateau Souverain was the Sonoma "sister" and "Napa Ridge" was a secondary label).  Today Beringer is part of the vast "Beringer Blass" empire and Ed Sbragia remains in some capacity, over-seeing the wine production.

This property makes a range of wines, from marginal "plonk" to deluxe, top-drawer Cabernets.  

Owning substantial property in neighboring Sonoma County, Beringer's standard bottling of Cabernet wears the Knights Valley designation.  The 1998 and 1999 are nothing special...in fact, a bit disappointing.

The Private Reserve wines (don't confuse these with the poor stuff called "Founder's Reserve," a replacement for their bulk-production Napa Ridge label which they sold to another company) are usually pretty good.  Expect to lay out some cash for these.  And they're sometimes really tops, though the 1997 was less-than-stellar, 1998 was sold off cheaply to Morton's Steak Houses and the 1999 was good, but not fantastically so (despite its elevated price tag).

Currently in stock:  
1999 "Montagia" Cabernet Sauvignon $74.99
1995 Napa Valley Cabernet "Reserve"  Sale $99.99
1996 Napa Valley Cabernet "Reserve"  Sale $99.99
1997 Napa Valley Cabernet "Reserve"  Sale $99.99

BURGESS CELLARS
2004 Burgess Cabernet  Sale $29.99

This modest winery is located in an old stone cellar on the road towards Angwin and Pope Valley in the eastern hills of the Napa Valley.  It was the original Souverain winery when Souverain was a small, artisan producer back in the 1960s.  Lee Stewart sold the Souverain name to Pillsbury (I don't think they made that much dough in the wine biz) and the facility was acquired by former airline pilot Tom Burgess.   Bill Sorensen was the winemaker for Burgess' first vintage and he's still at the winemaking helm today!

They've made good wines over the years,  but have never really managed to capture the attention of wine critics or wine geeks.  They don't sing and dance and so marketing has not been a major strength.  Further, Burgess is not one of those wineries which ask astronomical prices so customers "will know they're getting a good bottle of wine."  

Over the years, we've found their wines to be good, solid Cabernets.  Every so often, we've had one of their "library" releases as the winery holds back a portion of each vintage for additional aging.

It has been a few years since I've bought a bottle and, on a lark, I purchased a bottle of Burgess' 2004 Napa Cabernet in early 2009.

Wow!  What a pleasant surprise!

The wine comes from their Howell Mountain area vineyards, but the elevation is actually below that of the "official" Howell Mountain appellation, so it's "merely" Napa Valley on the label.  

Merlot, Petit Verdot, Cabernet Franc and Malbec all play a role in the 2004 Burgess Cabernet Sauvignon.  It was matured in French oak and the wine shows a beautiful balance of wood and fruit.  The tannins are rather soft here and the wine is, we think, remarkably good.   This can be served immediately and we suspect the 2004 will cellar nicely for another 5-10 years.  

Given what some vintners ask for a bottle of Napa Valley Cabernet, this is a gem!  It's a real pleasure to get to know, once again, some "old friends."

CALAFIA CELLARS
1999 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon $29.99

Calafia Cellars is the work of Randle Johnson, winemaker at the Hess Collection facility in Napa.  Randle has worked at a number of wineries, honing his skills along the way.  Early Calafia wines were idiosyncratic.  We recall a number of bottlings which were just plain funky.  This always left us wondering how this fellow could make some pretty nice wines under the banner of others, while his own products were not nearly of the same caliber.  This situation has changed, for whatever reason.   Johnson was affiliated, in case you're keeping score, with the old Souverain winery in Napa, Mayacamas, Stags Leap and, presently, Hess.  The past few vintages of Calafia Cabernets have been terrific!  I suppose since his "roots" (so-to-speak) are in the Mayacamas Mountains and the Mount Veeder area, it's no wonder that area is the source of the Cabernet fruit.  The wines are "mountain" wines, too--big, intensely colored and deep in fruit.  They tend to have a bit of tannin, so it's wise to pair a Calafia Cabernet with something like beef, duck or lamb.   As his wines are becoming "discovered," availability is rather limited.

The label was dormant for the 1998 vintage, one of the main vineyard sources having been uprooted and re-planted.  The 1999 marks a good return to form, though the fruit source is quite different.  While the previous wines came from Howell Mountain, this one is from the Rozzell Vineyard in Pope Valley.  Johnson credits the rocky soil there limits vine vigor, producing small berries and a high skin-to-volume ratio.  (More color, hopefully more character in the wine.)  Aging was in half new French oak and half once-filled barrels.   The wine displays good fruit of Cabernet, blackcurrants...the structure suggests another 5-10 years of cellaring, though it may be paired with rich foods today, if you like.

 

 

CAKEBREAD CELLARS
2005  Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon SALE
$71.99

For years the Cabernets from this property have been merely big and burly.   We've seen a definite (in our opinion: improvement) refinement in the wines in the last vintages and today they're making wines even fussy folks such as ourselves even consider to drink!  

I just don't like paying so much for them...but a lot of people find the wines to be priced fairly and pop for a bottle.  


The 2005 is a fairly-full bodied wine, typical of Cakebread's work.  Oak is not a major component, though about two-third of the barrels are new.  French oak only.  A tiny bit of Malbec and Cab Franc are used and about 12% Merlot makes its way into the blend.  The vineyards range from the cool Carneros in southern Napa up to the warm climes of Calistoga in the northern part of the valley.  
The wine shows a bit more complexity than you'd find in a Cakebread Cabernet of a decade ago, or so.  Part of this is simply greater experience on the part of the winemaker.  Another factor is their use of a wider variety of clones, grape varieties and vineyard sources.

The 2005 is young now, but a few more years in bottle will repay your being patient.

  CLICK HERE TO SEE MORE CABERNETS.

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Last modified: May 1, 2009