Posts Tagged napa

Cliff Lede is a relative new comer to Napa Valley. He bought the S. Anderson Vineyards and transformed it into a wine oasis outside of Yountville. Complete with a large tasting room and inn, he’s working towards crafting high-end Bordeaux-style wines with “depth and concentration” as the label would suggest. He’s hired esteemed winemaker Michelle Edwards from Colgin Estates, a Napa cult-level winery, as well as the respected David Abreu to oversee the vineyards. He’s also brought in consultant Michel Rolland, who has his hands in nearly every big wine around the world. In case you were wondering if he was serious, he definitely is, and his wines are already becoming a hot commodity.

Cliff Lede SLD Cab

I decided to open up one of his Stag’s Leap Cabs over the weekend and here were my notes:

This is a big, rich cab for starters. Priced around $50, its already worth the price. The nose is full of mushroom, cassis and raspberries. There’s already a nice aged smell with some earth and tobacco. The initial decant for this wine was around 1 1/2 hrs. The flavor is smooth and rich, with blueberries and raspberries, along with a nice smattering of tobacco and leather mixed with burnt sugar.

Even after 3 hrs open, there are still some pretty solid grip from the tannins, which would suggest this wine has a number of years left before it hits its peak. The finish is strong, yet smooth, with a great deal of length. Probably a good 30-40 second finish to the wine. Very meaty and manly wine, with lots of earthy and hearty elements. Paired up with a thick steak, you can’t go wrong. Overall, this is a solid, well-made wine with some years yet to go. Lede obviously has assembled a solid team that will look to continue to make very high-quality wines, and score well with the critics. I’ve been won over as well, giving this wine an outstanding mark.

From one of our favorite wineries comes the Thieriot Vineyards 2006 Chardonnay. This chardonnay tends to exhibit a rich creamy toffee flavor and is in most years a very rich buttery Napa Chardonnay. This wine however seems to be a little more acidic then those we’ve had in the past. I’ve been impressed with aggressive nature of the wine. Its definitely a wine that needs a little air before you can appreciate its full potential.

Early on, it possesses alot of lemon custard and green herbaiousness. After about 4 hrs however it start to mellow out and becomes more buttery and possess carmel coloring and flavors. There still considerable acidity however. That seems to be a constant here.

Neyers Thieriot Chardonnay

Overall, it might not be the strongest showing for this wine. Not sure if was an off year, but it seems that the push towards Burgundy-style has made this wine a little too austere. I’ve got to put this wine somewhere between Drinkable and Brick Solid. Its not a bad wine by any means, but I think at the $45 price tag, its hard to say this is quiet living up to its cost. I still love Neyers but this one missed a little for me.

As you drive along the Oakville crossroad in Napa, you’re bound to come across a number of well-known and high-quality wineries. Names like Groth, Rudd and of course Silver Oak standout, but I’ve found that Plumpjack towers above them all. This is not to say that Plumpjack isn’t a big name or widely known. Of course, it’s the product of the partnership between Gordon Getty, venture capitalist and philanthropist, and Gavin Newsome, current mayor of San Francisco. Starting a wine shop in San Fran, the empire quickly grew into a number of restaurants and both the Plumpjack Winery and newly opened CADE winery. The later is a “green”-focused wine making effort. You can try some of their wines at the location in Oakville.

What I do find interesting is that for all of the money and expansion that the Plumpjack group has done, you’d be hard-pressed to find any sense of extravagance at the winery and tasting rooms themselves. Instead of a large stone entrance, there is just a small sign indicating the wineries presence. A long gravel driveway leads down to an unassuming low-slung series of buildings. Even the tasting room has the feel of being in an old barn or farm building, and while it might be for effect, it works.

Tastings are $10, and when we last went, we tried four wines. It varies throughout the year based on availability so check before you go. We tried a CADE Sauvignon Blanc, Plumpjack Chardonnay, Plumpjack Syrah and they Estate Cabernet. Being the only ones there that day, it was a very relaxed experience chatting with the helpful staff. I’ve been a fan of their wines for a few years and these latest examples didn’t disappoint. Their standard estate quality can complete with the $100+ bottles on the market, and while they are not cheap by any means, they tend to provide a better high-end value.

Below are tasting notes from a recent bottle of the 2004 Plumpjack Estate Cabernet. After purchasing the 2007 on this last trip, I can only hope it to be just as good.

The nose was very large and rich, filled with raspberries and black fruit notes. There was some cedar and tea spice scents, along with an earthy lavender fragrance.  Initially, the taste is tight even after 1 ½ hrs of decanting. After 3 hrs, the body becomes smooth with just a hint of tannins. The tannins are present as you swallow creating a rich powerful flavor with earth, smoke, and tar. Building on the mid-palette, the blue and black fruits wash away to a powerful dry finish coating the mouth and really amazing strength even after 4 hrs open. Bell pepper, mushroom and Asian spice are the dominate flavors. I’d say this wine had a number of years ahead of it, even if it was delicious already now.

Highly Recommended

There are new places to crash, after a day of wine tasting, popping up all over the Napa Valley area. On my recent trip, I had the chance to stay at one that’s been getting a lot of press, not just for the quality but also the “green” focus of their hotel. My wife and I stayed 3 nights at the Bardessono Hotel in Yountville. We chose this hotel due to its proximity to Yountville’s great selection of restaurants and the local wineries in and around the town. We’d stayed twice before in Yountville at the sister properties Villagio and Vintage Inn, and thought we’d try something new.

Bardessono Entrance

First impressions: the hotel is gorgeous, more modern in style with contrasting construction of wood, glass and steel. The style is very Japanese zen-like with gardens and stone paths leading around the property. You pull down a long driveway to the front door, where friendly bellhops help you with your bags and car. Valet is complementary and basically mandatory. I’ll get to more of that in a minute. We walk into the lobby and are greeted by the hostess, who stands at a podium rather than a big front desk. She gives us a quick walkthrough of the properties and its amenities. They have an on-site restaurant (we didn’t try), a nice bar area (one of the few bars in Napa), a roof top pool (complete with cabanas), meeting areas, concierge desk, and other areas to lounge. Continental breakfast was included with the room and they were running a special that with the assortment of pastries, coffee and fruit, you could also order one of the hot breakfast items, which were all very good.

Entrance to Balcony from Room

The hotel is certified LEED, which basically means everything and I mean everything about the place is “green”. They’ve used recycled materials for the construction. They have tanks that save and reuse water. They use solar power to heat the hotel. And their pretty serious about keeping it green. We had picked up some plastic bottled water for the room. They didn’t seem to keen on our bottles, and quickly reminded us that each room had glass bottled water in the room complementary and that we could request more at anytime.

Anyway, on to the rooms – we booked a second floor king. There’s a small foyer area that then opens to the main room with a seating area on one side and bed area on the other. There’s a small desk for laptops or writing. On the far stone wall, there is a 40” Sony LCD TV and a gas fireplace. There is also an entrance onto the balcony. The room area is very spacious and open, with stone floors and high ceilings. The room has a refrigerator, wine opener and Riedel wine glasses for your enjoyment.

The really selling point however is the bathrooms, which are almost as big as the bedroom area. Each has two separate vanities on either side, a huge bubble jet tub, separate toilet area and big standup shower. There is also a two large closets and an area for changing or for your bags if you don’t want to unpack everything. This area is also used for in-room massages if you want. They have a massage table in each room. The balcony is also huge, complete with umbrella and a number of chairs. Most of the rooms on the second level seem to have good views of both sides of the valley.

So the other cool thing about the rooms – there’s some serious technology going on here – all at the touch of a button. There are motion sensors in the room so that if you leave for 20 minutes, all of the lights and other electronics will automatically shut off. When you come back in, they will reset to where you had them before you left. Also, all of the windows have automated retractable blinds that move up, down and tilt to let light in. Throughout the room, there are buttons to control all of these functions in the room. Even the tub has an auto-sensor that tells if when wet and a fan come on to dry it out. Also, there’s a connection port that hooks into the entertainment system so that you use your laptop on the TV or hook in your iPod. It’s sure to get the “tech geek” hearts racing.

One of the two Bathroom Vanity

So overall, we really enjoyed our stay at the hotel. It’s definitely different from some of the other hotels we’ve stayed at in Yountville before. It’s maybe not quite as rustic and doesn’t quiet have the “wine country” feel. But it’s more luxurious and really for the price (currently running about $40 higher than the Vintage/Villagio), the hotel almost a bargain. The staff is still a little rigid and trying to figure out exactly what the hotel wants to be. Also a note on parking; there happens to be no parking onsite except for valet. So each time you want to get your car you’d have to go through the valet. Not a big thing but if you are in and out a lot, you might opt for street parking. Aside from those small complaints, and they are really small ones, I put this hotel as one of the best I’ve ever stayed in. Between the quality of the rooms, the extra perks (their bottled water was very good), and of course the location (directly behind Bouchon, Bistro Jeanty), it’s really hard to find too much wrong with Bardessono.

In planning a recent trip to Napa, I’d been looking for a few new places to head out to, being this, my third trip to the Valley. I also promised not to drag my wife up and down the twisty roads of Spring and Howell Mountains as I’d done the previous trip. And since we were staying in Yountville, I was also looking for a few places that would be good towards the end of the day to unwind with before dinner and that we could walk to.

I also wanted to try wines that I couldn’t readily get a hold of. Maisonry is a wine collective working with various smaller producers to offer a tasting room area for them to promote and sell their wines through. At the time, they offered wine from 15 different wineries. Most of these wineries were either too small to have their own tasting rooms or were considered “boutique” wines. This aspect really appealed to me in that you could go to a relaxed situation where you had a ton of choice with probably a little less pressure to buy.

I’d made a 3pm reservation for a tasting, though since it was a little bit quieter time of year, we probably could have just walked in. I’d definitely recommend just making the reservation if you know you’re going to go. It is just better if they know you’re coming, and I think they tend to give you a little better treatment when planned, versus showing up spontaneously. If you are just interested in purchasing without tasting however, I don’t think there should be any problems.

The building is located just a block away from the French Laundry, and few blocks north of the main part of town. It’s a beautiful two story stone building with parking on the side. A young guy met us at the door and introduced himself, and quickly grabbed my wife and I a half glass of their house Viognier. He walked through the basics for their tastings and their setup. The place is part tasting room, part art gallery, and part store. Everything is for sale top to bottom, including the art and a number of interesting “coffee table” books. So we walked through the two stories, my wife checking out the interesting art, and me, of course more worried about what wine I’d be tasting.

We came back downstairs and made our selections on which wines we’d try, and then proceeded out to the back patio area where they had various couches and tables setup amongst more art, sculptures, and gardens. There are two things to point out here: One – we happened to be blessed with a very nice day when we came. That was good because there really isn’t a ton of seating inside. It’s much better to sit outside where they have plenty of tables. Also two, the place serves wines two ways. They have structured flights of the various wineries including verticals for some. You can also taste by half glass, full glass or bottle. Either way the concept is to grab a glass and lounge in their “backyard”. They are also open late (9pm I think) so it becomes almost like a wine bar.

So on to the wines! My wife opted for just a glass of the 2007 L’Angevin Russian River Pinot Noir, which was very nice. Medium bodied with a little bit of funk to go with the soft fruits and earthy tones. I went with the Collector’s Flight which was four wines including the 2004 Husic Cabernet, the 2006 Blackbird Contrarian, the 2006 Rivera Cabernet, and the 2006 Lail J. Daniel Cuvee. Each glass was about 2 and ½ ounces or about a half a glass of wine. All of these wines were phenomenal, and of course the setting made it even better. As the flight went on, the wines seemed to get better and better, with the two really standouts being the Blackbird and the Lail. Additionally, the employee helping us and I were talking about the Blackbird wines, and he mentioned that he thought the 2007 was even better, and actually allowed me to try that along side of the ’06. (He was right about the ’07)

Overall, I was really happy with the experience. The wines were great. The atmosphere was very laid back and relaxing. And the service and people were very friendly. I had read a couple of reviews that made me a little hesitant going in. Would they be snobby? Would they not give us the time of day? Happily I can say that I didn’t see any of that here, and would recommend a visit for anyone hoping to try something a little different. So a fair warning here – a flight is basically two full glasses of wine, and I must say either prepare to drink these slowly or spit or make sure you’re walking afterwards.

http://www.maisonry.com/
http://www.maisonry.com/included/docs/flights/MNV_Flight_Portfolio_Spring2010.pdf