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Montelena and Marcoux shine at Benchmark Dinner

33 is the name of a brand of beer I used to drink in west Africa.

33 is the atomic number of arsenic.

33 also happens to be, in French, Italian, Romanian, Spanish and Portuguese, the word a patient is asked to say when a doctor listens to their lungs with a stethoscope (Trente-Trois… Trentatrè… Treizeci şi trei… Treinta y Tres… and Trinta e Três).

More significantly, to readers of this column anyway, the importance of 33 is this: it was the number of very lucky individuals invited to the annual Benchmark Wine Group dinner in Yountville last week.

Fortunately, for these 33, there was no beer, arsenic or stethoscopes present.

“Invited” is such a loaded word because 33 guests “were invited” but they each had to pay $185 to attend the event.

Benchmark Wine Group is one of the Bay-area wine merchants from whom I personally buy a lot of wine…. rare stuff, premium stuff, pre-arrival stuff, and cellared stuff from private collections. But always GOOD stuff. And, for the record, I never get a trade break or inter-winery discount; I pay full retail, or e-tail, like everyone else.

Dave Parker, founder of Benchmark Wine Group.
Hey, Dave, lose the tie! This is Napa Valley!

Benchmark Wine Group was founded seven years ago by Dave Parker, whose earlier claim to fame was that, in 1998, he launched the first-ever, continuous online wine auction house (Brentwood Wine Company). 

Dave’s even earlier claim to fame was success in the high-tech venture world. Some guys buy vineyards with their new wealth; others buy wine companies. Dave, who’s a maverick, did both.

Anyway, back to 33.  For as long as anyone can remember, Benchmark has been holding special event dinners like the one last week. The annual dinner in Napa Valley is held during the first week of June, to coincide with Wine Auction Napa Valley.

And so, 33 guests from Florida, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Minnesota, Arizona, and nearby Bay-area towns assembled for a taste of the good life last Wednesday.

While there were not 33 wines served (too bad you missed that theme, Benchmarkians!) there were more than enough wines opened, all out of the Benchmark cellar.

Dinner was served at Bistro Jeanty, in trendoid little Yountville, which, in case you have been living in a cave, has the highest number of great restaurants on a per capita basis in America. Whitney Farris, from Benchmark, selected a wide range of young and aged wines from many countries to complement the fare.

Here’s what we ate and drank, with my tasting notes added:

Hors d’oeuvres
Gruyere cheese croquettes, pear and endive salad on endive spear

NV Schramsberg Blanc de Blancs

It’s always festive and refreshing to start a multi-course dinner with a great sparkling wine. For starters, this is the only time in the evening when there is no pressure to evaluate the beverage at hand. Why is that?

Another observation: Sparkling wine – and this Schramsberg is a really good one – acts as a sort of transmission fluid, helping lubricate social gears, ease guests forge new relationships, and awaken one’s palate for the courses to follow.

Entree
Salade de latitude or beet and mache salad 

2006 Aubert Vineyards Chardonnay, Lauren Vineyard WA96-98

A pale, straw-colored wine, with the hue of pear juice. Only paler. A very French-style Chardonnay, with good attack, a beautiful balance of acidity and fruit and great length on the finish. 93 points.

One of my observations from dinner, where guests assembled to judge wines, pair them with food, and really get into the analysis of what’s being poured:

EVERYONE AT THE SAME TABLE SHOULD BE POURED WINE FROM THE SAME BOTTLE.

I noticed – and experienced throughout the evening -- that wines poured for guests at our table often came from two different servers who descended on our table at the same time. Or when a bottle was emptied halfway through serving our table guests, the waiter went to fetch a fresh bottle, which was poured for the rest of the table.

This really makes evaluating wine – and sharing the experience with one’s tablemates – frustrating, if not downright impossible.

My glass of wine may have come from a challenged bottle, while the person sitting directly next to me may have a textbook-perfect example of the wine, poured from a different bottle.

Remember, folks: THERE ARE NO TWO IDENTICAL BOTTLES.
There is really just similar wine in similar bottles.

So, at the Benchmark dinner, I started to riff poetically about my Aubert and someone at our table, who was poured from a different bottle, had a totally different reaction to the wine than I did.  When we tried to share what we thought was a common experience, we each first thought that the other guy must have a lousy palate. In fact, I only discovered halfway through dinner that we had been drinking totally different wines with the same name, but poured from different bottles.

2002 Peter Michael Chardonnay, Cuvee Indigene IWC94+


Much more yellow than the Aubert, a New World bruiser with steroidal features: wood, spices, oak all nicely integrated but all of it shouting, cubed to the power of 3, certainly relative to the Aubert. Even so, judged on its own merit, this wine was also a 93-pointer. Or at least MY wine was. I am not sure everyone at my table had the same experience, as some were tasting Peter Michael Chardonnay from a different bottle.

First Main
Coq au vin or Daube de Boeuf

1996 Jadot Bonnes Mares WA94-96
A somewhat challenged bottle, producing a slightly tired wine with touches of saddle leather, sauerkraut, mushrooms on the floor of a forest, a bit of dankness, soy, and then a sweep of sweetness in the middle palate. My wine showed a hint of oxidation. When I tasted the wine served to another guest, poured from a different bottle, the revelation was dramatic. The second bottle was brighter, there were no hints of oxidation, the fruit was stronger, more focused and there were spices in the middle palate that just weren’t evident in my glass of this wine. Overall, I’d score the combo of these wines 92 points. Don’t ask about the math, or algebraic formula, to reach this numerical attribution – it’s lost in the scribbles of my dinner notes.

2004 Kosta Browne Pinot Noir, Cohn Vineyard WS97


Aromas of fresh latex paint (in a good way!) and of leather seats in a new car (also in a good way!). Had a Port-like attack, very syrupy, very BIG, very reduced. Concentrated flavors of fruit, chocolate, but almost a parody of what Pinot Noir should be like. This represents a style of winemaking, which produces over-extracted, over-concentrated, over-alcoholized wines. The finish on the Kosta Brown was mostly hot, rather than pleasant. 90 points.

Of the two wines served with the daube, the Jadot from my tablemate’s glass, was the most complementary. It fed into the rich dish, cleansed my palate, made me want to go back to the beef dish. The Kosta Brown behaved like Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler, attempting to Smack Down the daube and keep it down for the count of three. No let up, no relief. Just a bruiser.

Second Main
Tuna au Poivre or Filet au Poivre

1987 Chateau Montelena Cabernet Sauvignon Estate WA98

I had six bottles of this wine in my own cellar and finished the last bottle years ago, when I thought the wine had hit its peak. When I saw this wine on the dinner menu, I thought, for sure, it would be over the hill.

But the wine poured at dinner exhibited monumental freshness – like the thing has another 10 years to go!

For me, this was the Surprise Wine of The Night. I had so few expectations about this 22-year-old California Cab, yet it exhibited a powerful, fresh nose, with loads of ripe black and red fruit. On the palate, it was delicious, hinting at roasted nuts, cherries, and blackberries. Very youthful. If others at the tasting read these notes and think I am on drugs to make these comments, all I can do is remind them: NO TWO BOTTLES ARE ALIKE and my Chateau Montelena was sensational. Period. 95 points.

1982 Gruaud Larose WA96

Let’s be clear about the filet au poivre. It should have been called “poivre au filet” – pepper with steak. Because there was so many freshly crushed black peppercorns on both the top and bottom sides of my filet that the fiery blackness obliterated the wonderful Gruaud that was in my glass. NOT a successful pairing.

I resorted to Damage Control to revitalize my palate – hunks of bread liberally smeared with butter.

My suggestion to Jeanty – lightly roll only the edge of the filet in crushed peppercorns, not the top and bottom sides of the filet, which provide too much exposure. The beef had way too much pepper for ANY wine that might have been selected to complement the fare.

In fact, the only beverage that might have complemented my “poivre au filet” would have been water forced through a fire hose.

But back to the Gruaud. Leather, pencil graphite, and rose petals on the earliest whiff. But underneath, and certainly evident over time, was the appearance of brett-y, sweaty, vegetal elements that ultimately result in this being the only sub-90 pointer wine of the evening. 89 points.

1996 Gaja Langhe Conteisa WA93-95
This wine, according to Parker (Robert, not Dave), falls well within the window of drinkability, yet the bottle poured at Jeanty was so tight, so young, so closed that there was little over which one might wax poetic.

The nose was tight. The early sips were tight, revealing little. The wine showed no characteristics to reveal origin or age. I found myself asking: “Is this one of those wines that is ageless… or never-ageable?”

Every once in a while, one finds a wine that just never, ever wants to evolve; it kind of gets stuck in time and is either unwilling, or unable, to mature (sort of like me). This Gaja Barolo might just be one such wine. At 13 years of age, there is not a hint of evolution, or movement. 90 points.

2003 Marcoux Chateauneuf du Pape, Vieilles Vignes WA99


Wine of the Night. I predicted it, because almost every time you pour a killer Chateauneuf du Pape, the harmonious Grenache-Syrah blend eclipses all the other wines on the table. This evening’s Benchmark dinner was no exception.

The 2003 Marcoux is still young. It exhibited bright ripe red fruit on the nose, and delivered a BIG Grenache bomb hit on the initial sip. This wine has so much fruit that it hides the 16-plus percent alcohol. The wine has layers of complexity, a rich, pillow-y middle palate which soars, and a finish that makes you beg the waiter to go find another short pour. 97 points.

Dessert
Crepe Suzette or Seasonal Bread Pudding


1932 Massandra Red Port 

Massandra sounds like an Internet radio station, something akin to Pandora. But, in fact, it’s a near-200-year-old winemaking collective near Yalta on the Black Sea, in the area known as the Crimea.

In the 1890s, seven football field-length tunnels were bored deep into a Crimean mountain, creating the region’s largest wine cellar.

Not long after, a certain Prince chose to cellar his private wine collection at Massandra, in the passively chilled underground cellars. The Prince’s library became known as “The Massandra Collection,” which contained thousands of wines from all over the world.

When rich folks weren’t storing wine at Massandra, they were making it there. These locally made wines were notated, as being from the “Massandra Collection,” though “being from the Massandra Collective,” is more accurate.

Wines from the Massandra Collective have always tended to be sweet. The area boasts 4,400 acres of Muscat, Tokay and Pinot Gris vines. There are also a handful of wines made from grapes that sound like the names of Japanese baseball players -- Ekim-Kara, Lapa-Kara and Metin-Kara, to name a few. (Aren’t these the Dodgers’ First-, Second- and Third-basemen?)

For dessert at the Benchmark dinner, two examples of really old Massandra Collective wines were served. Dave Parker had made it a personal quest to get them for the Benchmark cellar. Whitney chose to serve them at dinner.

The 1932 Port is the color of maple syrup. The use of the word “Port,” by the way to describe this beverage is somewhere between modestly inaccurate and poetic license. I, for one, think of “Port” as coming from Portugal and being made from the classic grapes from that region. I tend to treat the word “Port” as I do “Champagne.” Sparkling wines made from Chardonnay or Pinot Meunier grapes from other parts of the world should not be  called “Champagne.” Same, too, for Port, but this is only MY way of thinking.

So this 1932 Massandra “Port,” has none of the color, depth, or intensity of flavor of old, real Ports. (I am thinking specifically of the classic vintage of 1927, which produced “Ports,” of forehead-slapping intensity.)

By contrast, the Massandra is a weak sister (okay, brother, in these gender-challenging times). More like a “curio” from the past, than a “Port” from the past. But when you are lucky enough to be tasting a handmade, 77-year-old, artisanal wine – this is a time to reflect, a time to be humbled, a time to be thankful. Hallelujah. 90 points.

1923 Massandra Kuchuk Usen Madeira

The color of apple cider, this beverage tastes as though the bartender has mixed an old Madeira with some middle-aged tokay, and thinned out the concoction with some fresh Muscat. The bottles poured were imported by Sothebys, resold to Bonhams and bought by Benchmark. They’ve traveled a fair bit from their origin in the Crimea.

This Massandra “Madeira” (again, you can question the appropriateness of the term “Madeira” for a Crimean wine…) has touches of mint, spearmint, and pear. It is another “curio” wine, and I am grateful for the opportunity to taste such an old, rare, world wine. 90 points.

… and just when you thought it was over….

… Whitney brought out one more dessert treasure, another wine, which I  had never tasted. But this one from the New World.

2002 Sine Qua Non, Mr. K Noble Man.
From the ever-inventive Manfred Krankl, comes this sweet dessert wine made from Chardonnay plucked from the Alban Vineyard. The wine was sweet, young, deliciously acidic and, at the end of a very long, very vinous dinner, overkill.

The wine exhibited flavors of maple, and the juice you might get if you crushed fresh walnuts and removed the oils. Sounds weird, I know, but that’s what you find in the inventive wines of M. Krankl. 90 points.

If you were not one of the lucky 33 to attend the Benchmark Private Dinner in Yountville, fear not – your chance may yet come!

Benchmark hosts similar dinners in different cities across the country throughout the year.  In fact, Benchmark has just announced the schedule for the remainder of the year:

Minneapolis dinner September 24. 
Chicago dinner September 26. 
New York City  - the date is not yet firm, but the event will likely be held in October or November. 

You wanna find out more? Contact Whitney at wfarris@benchmarkwine.com.

If you’re a big shot with lots of friends, you might even invite Whitney into your home to conduct a private tasting – no matter where you live. 

“If someone assembles eight to 12 people, I will work with them to co-host a dinner in their home or at their favorite restaurant. I bring wine from Benchmark, and work with the chef, or caterer, to design the menu. The cost of such a private event, to cover the wines, ranges from $150 to $250 per head,” says Whitney.

Sounds like one helluva special birthday gift or unique surprise party. Just make sure you invite napaman!

Auction Napa Valley Gets Under Way…

Call this America’s best (fill in the blank)*.

*(Party? Annual wine auction? Charity fund-raising event? Four-day food and wine love-in?) Some how, each of these definitions is correct.

Whatever you call it, the 29th Auction Napa Valley is half over, having started Thursday. Guests paid $2,500 per person for full-attendance privileges. The climax is always a spirited live auction, which includes individual lots for wines, trips, and even cars, often surpassing $500,000-plus per lot.

Napa Valley Vintners, the non-profit trade association responsible for promoting and protecting the Napa Valley appellation, organizes this annual event to raise funds for local charities.

Since inception, the event, the country’s premier charity wine auction, has raised more than $85 million, pledged by thirsty bidders. While the wines they bid on generally leave the valley, their funds stay here to subsidize local healthcare, youth services and affordable housing.

Napa Valley Vintners, which represents 350 area wineries, invited napaman to attend the first half of the weekend’s events. So consider this a half-time update.

Thursday

 

Under the auspices of Napa Valley Vintners, many local wineries opened their doors for auction attendees. Some offered special events. But every winery poured its top wines and offered complementary appetizers. Auction guests zoomed around the valley, from 11 am to well after dusk, checking out the many winery parties.

Napaman used the opportunity to update tasting notes on the wines of three wineries.

First stop was Round Pond, in Rutherford, the home of judicious Cabernet.

Winemaker Brian Brown and Round Pond owner Miles MacDonnell.

Round Pond is a family affair, owned by a brother and sister team, Miles and Ryan (that’s a her) MacDonnell. They have owned the 360-acre property for some time, but until recently, sold all the fruit to top Napa Valley wineries.

A few years ago, the MacDonnell’s decided to keep five percent of their fruit to craft a signature blend for their own label.

The setting of Round Pond is glorious. The architecture of the main building is memorable, as are the wines.

2007 Round Pond Cabernet Sauvignon
I really liked the barrel sample of 2007 Cabernet, which is Cab and a squeak (three percent) of Petit Verdot. This wine, crafted by winemaker Brian Brown, is beautifully structured, expressive and not overpowering. When released this fall, it will retail for $60.

I would love to find this wine blindly inserted into the July Rutherford Dust Society tasting to which napaman is invited; it would be fun to see if I like it as much then and discover, too, if I can pick it out blind in a line-up of 20 unknown Rutherford Cabs. Don’t know how I’d like it then, but sure did like it Thursday: 94 points.

Next Stop – The Lore of Tor was in Store

I jumped at the chance to attend Tor Kenward’s open-house: More than a dozen different blends of Tor’s delicious wines were poured at one of my favorite victual venues in Napa Valley, Mustards Grill.

Amidst Mustards’ raised organic vegetable beds, Tor Kenward set up tasting tables.

Tor winemaker Jeff Ames and Brittany Savory pour the winery’s top Syrahs, and Cabs at Mustards Grill.

Napaman doesn’t generally love outdoor tastings; gusts of wind whip essential, compacted aromas out of the glass and the heat of a Napa Valley midday sun can makes one’s palate lazy. So my appreciation of Tor’s wines was probably challenged, but of the 13 wines I tasted, two really stood out:

2006 TOR Cabernet Sauvignon, Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard
Love the wine, don’t love the price. You expect a wine of this price -- $150 – to deliver the goods, and this one does. But in this economy, how many wine drinkers are rushing out to buy triple-digit wines?
I found this to be a sensuously rich – ethereal really – wine, filled with fresh ripe red fruit and a hint of Virginia tobacco (given Jeff’s roots, maybe it was Alabama tobacco?). Gawjus jus.  94 points.

2006 TOR ROCK Syrah, Hudson Vineyard
A thrilling wine. The best of the Syrahs poured, a truly pleasurable purple paean. I adore the intensity of this Syrah, the balance and elegance. And, oh yes, the price – back in the ballpark of reality: $60 for this 95-point wine.

Later the same day…

Julie Johnson, owner/winemaker of Tres Sabores

To round out the day, napaman visited a hidden Rutherford winery, Julie Johnson’s Tres Sabores. She hosted a party for friends, and loyal customers from around the country, offering five different wines to taste.

Her 2007 Pourque No? (the question mark is on the label) brought to mind a famous Paul Masson marketing line: “We will sell no wine before its time.” Because this 2007 wine is being previewed, and sold, before its time.

The background: Last year at Auction Napa Valley, Julie offered her 2005 Pourque No?, which was a delicious, solid, 92-pointer. This blend of Zin, Cabernet, Petit Sirah and Petit Verdot is always a crowd-pleaser, especially at the price: $25. I’ve even seen it for as little as $20 in the economic downturn.

After Julie sold out her modest production of 2005 Pourque No?, she introduced her 2006 Pourquoi No?. It was so good that she blew through her entire production before year-end. That was the wine Julie expected to offer guests at this year’s auction party, but there wasn’t a drop to be found in the realm.

So Julie bottled her 2007 Pourquoi No? slightly ahead of schedule to have product ready for the auction crowd (and for restaurant beverage managers, who love this wine and who hate to be out of stock, regardless of vintage).

The result is a wine that, after only a short spell in bottle, needs time to age, put on some fat, gain focus, and broaden its shoulders. The subtle sweetness of the 110-year-old Zinfandel, which Julie gets from Calistoga, and which constitutes 70 percent of the blend, is missing in this young wine. It’s there, but will need several months to show. There are muddled notes of raspberry in the 2007 blend, but the wine is nowhere near as bright and delicious as it will be if this wine is given a few months to recover from bottle shock.

(Many wines go through ‘bottle shock,’ a period when the wine, or some of its component grapes, appear to be dumbed-down; the wine is less exciting, offers fewer, sometimes no, regular flavor characteristics. Winemakers call this effect ‘bottle shock.’ It can occur two weeks, or two months, or even a year after bottling, and can last months in some wines, or as long as years in some Bordeaux wines.)

I look forward to revisiting this wine at the Rutherford Dust Society in the summer to learn how it is evolving.

Friday

Site of the 29th annual Auction Napa Valley – Robert Mondavi Winery

Some 2,500 people converged on the Robert Mondavi Winery for Friday’s indoor/outdoor food and wine fest known as Taste Napa Valley. It was a chance for guests to sample the very best food and wines of Napa Valley and to hobnob with the chefs and winemakers behind the glorious fare.

The day is a bit like a three-ring circus; you don’t know whether to be out at the stalls tasting the best food… or be in the Mondavi chai (where wine is barrel-aged) to see the 112 lots, which will be offered at Saturday’s Live Auction… or hang out in the fermentation room, where 120 wineries are pouring their (mostly) 2008 Cabernet blends from barrel.

Perhaps the best way to share what the day was like, is to present the elements in snapshot format:

Dozens of local restaurants participated, each offering a signature item. Rutherford Grill, where you will ALWAYS find winemakers converging, presented house-smoked salmon, served on pointed toasts, sauced with a remoulade.
 

Auberge du Soleil, the ritzy Rutherford resort, presented toasted rounds topped with an assemblage of fava beans, prosciutto, and Berkswell cheese (English sheep’s milk).


A novel way of presenting an innovative chilled treat – from whom else? The French Laundry. Chef Thomas Keller filled small paper cups with watermelon-flavored, shaved ice, drizzled it with olive oil infused with fresh garden basil, and topped the concoction with – are you kidding me? – chopped black olives.

Dale Ray, the new chef at Mustards Grill, and owner Cindy Pawlcyn, serve the restaurant’s classic smoked ribs.

Thomas Keller, owner of the French Laundry, Bouchon and Ad Hoc, all in Yountville, was present to hand out his butter-rich, super-dense, super-moist, brownie-like Chocolate Bouchons, a signature sweet at Bouchon Bakery.


Love the hat! Hiding beneath it is Lori Narlock, a public relations specialist in the wine industry.

Although bidding began a month ago on 112 auction lots offered only in an online format, guests at the Friday event were still making bids right up to cut-off time at freestanding terminals around the Mondavi property.
The top e-bid lot – for $$13,500 -- was for three 6-liter bottles of Arietta Wine, a case of Arietta library wines, and a private charity auction to be held in the winning bidder’s home, courtesy of winery owner and famed Napa Valley auctioneer Fritz Hatton.

Santa Rosa Caricaturist Doug Shannon sketched guests at the all-day food/fun/frivolity fest – Taste Napa Valley – held on the lawn, beside the vineyards, of the Robert Mondavi Winery.
 

Napa Valley Vintners converted Mondavi’s fermentation room into a full-bore tasting room, where 120 wineries presented their (mostly) 2008 Cabernet barrel samples. These were the wines on which guests bid for cases.
Pouring their glorious Cabernet above are Mike and Treva Harris of Harris Estate Vineyards.
The din in the fermentation room approached that which you’d experience on the flight deck of an aircraft carrier with jets taking off.  An appropriate simile – as bids for many of these wines headed for the stratosphere.

Full use was made of the Mondavi property. The 42 major auction lots for Saturday’s Live Auction were displayed in Mondavi’s chai, where earlier vintages of Cabernet barrel age.

Lot 1 of 42 lots gives an idea of the grandeur and size of the lots in the Live Auction. Lot 1 offers 135 bottles (!) of fine Napa Valley wine, plus a portrait to be taken by Napa Valley Vintners’ photographer Jason Tinacci, plus a special dinner, plus an album of photos.

No wonder Fritz Hatton is smiling – his lot of Arietta wines received the highest bid -- $13,500 – among 112 lots in the e-auction. Celebrating with Fritz (on left), are Anna Simons (Pope) and Mark Pope, AKA The Bounty Hunter.

Friday Taste Napa Valley event is a time for locals to bump into friends whom they haven’t seen for a while. It was great seeing these three amigos and catching up – Margrit Biever Mondavi and Tim Mondavi, partners in Continuum, their new winery project, and Genevieve Janssens, Director of Winemaking at Robert Mondavi Winery.

As napaman was not accredited to cover Saturday’s events, which culminate with the Live Auction, you’ll have to check Napa Valley Vintners website Sunday, after 3 pm, to get Live Auction results and the grand final auction tally.
You’ll find them at http://www.napavintners.com/trade/tm_3_releases.asp

THE Wine Event of the Year - And it’s Only April!

 
Karen Williams and David Stevens, owners of Acme Fine Wines, surround themselves professionally everyday with brilliant wines. For their first-ever “atelier” event, they surrounded themselves with the brilliant winemakers who make them.
Karen and David are pictured here, surrounded by a number of artisan winemakers:
Back row, left to right: Karen Williams, Celia Welch Masyczek, Russell Bevans, Robbie Meyer, Sarah Gott, Mark Herold, David Stevens, Pam Starr, Philippe Melka
Front row, left to right: Mike Hirby, Andy Erickson, Craig Maclean.

Napa Valley wineries and wine retailers will have a hard time this year eclipsing the originality, elevated profile, and attraction of Acme Fine Wines’ first-ever “atelier” event, held this weekend at the merchant’s St. Helena store.

They’ll also have one helluva hard time beating the sheer number and quality of wines poured at the event.

Twelve of the valley’s most talented winemakers were on hand to pour at least three each of their sublimely crafted artisan wines. The winemakers present included, in alphabetical order, Heidi Barrett, Russell Bevan, Andy Erickson, Sarah Gott, Mark Herold, Mike Hirby, Craig MacLean, Philippe Melka, Robbie Meyer, Dave Phinney and Pam Starr. Many poured more than three wines.

Winemaker superstar, Celia Welch Masyczek, was on hand to pour nine of the wines she makes, most on a consulting basis.

Some 100 patrons each paid $175 for the privilege of tasting 50 of Napa Valley’s most treasured wines, the rarest of rare juice. Stuff that you customarily can’t get your hands on even if you have Barack Obama’s cell phone number on speed dial.

Some 120 guests, sommeliers and wine writers crammed into Acme Fine Wines’ small retail space. The food, which was supplied by David Katz of neighboring shop ‘panevino,’ was superb.

The one-of-a-kind tasting was the brainchild of David Stevens and Karen Williams, proprietors of Acme Fine Wines. They felt it was time to host “atelier,” what I’m calling The Triple W – the Who’s Who of Wine.

“At any one time, we stock 183 different wines, of which 65 percent are small production, artisan Napa Valley Cabernets,” says David Stevens. “Today’s event is simply an attempt to let our customers taste what our inventory is all about.”

As there were far too many near-perfect wines being poured, any attempt at scoring them individually seemed nonsensical. You don’t score wines numerically at tastings of this caliber any more than you score the sexy encounters you have on a far-flung beach holiday. You let your memory drift and wistfully think about the highlights of what you tasted….

Okay, let’s say you are a stickler for the point system. Here’s what you need to know:
This was probably the first time I have ever been to such a large tasting where I scored every wine in the mid- to high 90s. There wasn’t anything I rated below 92 points in the group, and there were a lot of 97- and 98-pointers.

From a learning perspective, I chose to focus on the rarest of rare opportunities – a chance to taste all nine offerings crafted by Celia Welch Masyczek, whose wines and talents I have long admired.

Craig Camp from Cornerstone Cellars, winemaker Celia Welch Masyczek and Kelly Fleming from her eponymously labeled Cabernet.

For the record, Celica told me publicly, for the first time, “to drop the ‘Masyczek’ from my name – it’s over! I’m officially now just Celia Welch.”

Thank God. I often found Celia’s last name and that of BV winemaker Andre Tchelicheff to be the two most difficult winemaker’s names to spell right.

What made the Acme tasting special was that it was the first time ever that the consuming public had a chance to taste all nine of Celia’s artisan wines at one time in one place.

The vineyard owners, for whom Celia Welch makes wine, were on hand to support Celia, named Food & Wine’s “Winemaker of the Year” last year.

The striking thing about these wines is their common thread of Celia-ness. You can recognize her DNA in all nine of the wines, eyes closed. They stand apart from all the other exceptional wines poured at the “atelier,” and there wasn’t a dud among the other wines poured.

The hallmarks of Celia’s wines: a core of silk, an abundant ripeness of fruit, impeccable balance and a delicate but persistent lingering finish. These are wines with textbook structure. Each wine is one that you want to “rent” for a few hours, not spit, to let them course through your body, so that you can tell you grandchildren what it was like to drink Perfection.

What’s the secret to your winemaking,” I asked Celia. “You have wines on this table from Stag’s Leap District, Yountville, Oakville, Howell Mountain, Calistoga and St. Helena and they all have an identifiable, common denominator. Call it The Celia touch.”

“The secret is… that I don’t have a secret… or a recipe, for that matter,” Celia told me. “I visit the fermentation tanks several times a day during harvest for each of these wines. The texture I seek – and which you call ‘silk,’ – comes from my winemaking techniques, not from the fruit itself.”

Guests jostled for space at the wine stations

Frank Husic, owner of Husic Vineyards, was at Celia’s station to pour his 2006 Cabernet, crafted by Celia. I found his description of the soil on which he planted his vines – on a ridge above and behind Chimney Rock – worth sharing.

“Until we came along in the mid-90s, our land had never, ever been cultivated. A huge swath was cut into the rock and forest; I tell people that the soil was like a bank into which animals and nature had been making deposits for hundreds of years – you can imagine how rich the soil was!”

Take Frank’s soil… add Celia’s magic… swirl them around in your glass.. and you have a stupendous artisan wine, actually one of my highest scoring wines of the event. But remember, who’s counting scores?

Additional shots from the event:


Winemaker Dave Phinney jokes, holding a bottle of one of his many exquisite wines.

Pam Starr and Charlie Crocker of Crocker & Starr fame kibbitz around

Winemaker Andy Erickson pours for guests

Winemaker Mark Herold pauses pensively for a minute between pours

Winemaker Sarah Gott’s wines are like her pearls -- they stand out in any crowd

Interested in ordering some of these limited artisan wines? Contact David or Karen at Acme Fine Wines, 1080 Fulton Lane, St. Helena, CA 94574. Tel: 707-963-0440

2007 – “The Angelina Jolie of vintages in Napa Valley”

Fritz Hatton, auctioneer at Premiere Napa Valley, gets the room a-rumblin’.

Napa Valley’s winter wine auction for the trade – called Premiere Napa Valley and held this weekend – attracted more than 200 wine buyers from Canada, Japan, China, the UK and, of course from across the US.

One of my favorite wine events of the year, Premiere brings together colorful winemakers and powerful wine merchants. The event is organized by Napa Valley Vintners, a non-profit, trade association representing 350 area wine producers. Dollars raised at the auction are applied to programs, which promote and protect the Napa Valley Appellation.

Saturday’s auction of 200 lots raised $1,487,500, a drop of 33 percent from last year’s all-time high of $2,245,500. Given the state of the economy, auction sales could have been a whole lot worse. While it’s not fair to say that the recent boom in wine sales has gone ker-boom, the wine industry appears to be teetering on the edge.

Wine merchants with whom I spoke at the event, who wished to remain anonymous so that competitors wouldn’t know who was singing the blues confided:

+ “$20 is the new $50 red.” Customers who used to buy $40 or $50 wines have moved down to the $20 range.

+ "Wines priced above $100 per bottle seem to be slightly more immune to the vagaries of the marketplace. Sales are soft but not as precipitous as they are for wines under $100 a bottle." (This is the story merchants tell – whether it’s true is not fact-checkable.)

+ One wine merchant in the Bay area admitted that his January sales, 09 over 08, were down 90 percent for the month. Let me repeat, lest you think this a typo: down NINE-OH percent.

The Food’s as Good as the Wine at Premiere Napa Valley

The winter barrel auction is held at the Culinary Institute of America’s (CIA) Greystone Campus, in St. Helena. Upon arrival, members of the wine trade and press have access to 200 unique blends of wine, poured at stations of the participating wineries. These are the wines, which will be auctioned later in the day.

At noon, a tremendous buffet is served and, each year that I have attended, this turns out to be my favorite buffet of the year. The fare is fabulous and perfectly prepared and presented. Hats off to the CIA for serving food to complement the wines. Oh, and a lot of them are served; it’s a veritable group grape grope as guests reach for any of hundreds of different labels. Guests may return to the wine tables, or food tables, as many times as they like for refills, or diverse taste trials. That anyone is awake for the afternoon auction is a testament to the professional tasting skills of the assembled guests.

Bret Lopez and Mimi DeBlasio of Scarecrow. Their wine, made by Celia Masyczek, received the top auction bid - $80,000 for five cases – or $1,333 per bottle.

Participating wineries at the auction donate a unique blend of wine in quarter-barrel (five-case), half-barrel (10-case), or full-barrel (20-case) lots, which are bought by the assembled retailers and restaurateurs to be resold to their customers.

Winemaker Timothy Milos (left) and owner, Marc Cohen (right) of Howell at the Moon, and, in the middle, the smiling owner of Clos Pegase, Jan Shrem.

Each wine is a one-of-a-kind blend, variety, or from a single vineyard unique to the winery. Or the blend may be a collaborative effort among several winemakers. All wines poured were barrel samples, mostly Cabernet based, and mostly from the 2007 vintage.

Judd Finkelstein of Judd's Hill, and Andrew Schweiger, of Schweiger Vineyards.

Prior to the auction, members of the trade belly up to barrels to sample the wines on which they may choose to bid.

2007 – what a glorious vintage

Premiere Napa Valley is really the first time each year that the trade gets a peak at the next-to-be-released vintage of Napa Valley Cabernet. It’s a collective first chance to assess the vintage and determine how consumers will like the wines and figure out how the wines might be priced.

I posed a common question to wine makers, asking them to assess the quality of the 2007 vintage. I asked: “If your 2007 Cabernet were a movie star, who would it be – and why?”

+ Suzanne Groth and winemaker Michael Weis of Groth Vineyards opined: “Definitely Drew Barrymore. Young and crazy and unpredictable, but old enough to know better. Sexy voice, too.”

+ Tom Farella, winemaker for Farella-Park Vineyards, who makes a delicious, approachable Cabernet (I tried his 2004 at his booth and loved the fruit, balance and ripeness): “2007 was a Catherine Zeta-Jones type of vintage; it is really attractive, it’s a big star, it’s an instant classic!”

+ Daniel Bailey, who is national sales manager for Jones Family Vineyards likened his 2007 Cabernet (which I thought was gorgeous, sweet, in a positive sense, and filled with chocolate) called his offering “The George Clooney of wine. It is strong, has a good heart, is sophisticated and has lots of soul!”

+ Tim Mondavi, of Continuum, says of his 2007: “This wine is definitely like Meryl Streep – it has a beautiful voice, lots of finesse and elegance, and shows great persistence.” (I found Tim’s 2007 spicy, showing lots of grip, power and if anything, feistiness. I am not sure these are terms I would use to describe Meryl Streep. More like Liza Minnelli.)

+ Judd Finkelstein, of Judd’s Hill Winery says that his 2007 Cab is much like Miss Piggy: “The wine shows a lovely femininity… but once you get to know it… you realize there is a lot of assertiveness and power behind the early attractive attributes.”

+ Marc Cohen, who produces Howell at the Moon, says his 2007 Cab is “most like Angelina Jolie – big, plump, luscious, soft and memorable.”

Auction highlights

Premiere Napa Valley raised a total of $1,487,500 on 200 wine lots.

The highest single bid was $80,000 for a five-case lot of Scarecrow (made by Celia Masyczek). This equals $16,000 a case, or a mind-numbing $1,333 per bottle without mark-ups, taxes, or frequent flier miles.

Celia says she took “the sweetest barrel” from the 2007 cellar and made the best wine she could for today’s auction. I thought the wine was memorable, filled with vanilla, cherry and black ripe fruits, loaded with personality, and textbook structure.

The next highest lots:

+ $42,000 for five cases of Ovid
(I tasted: gorgeous sweet fruit, a stunning silken texture derived from fermentation in concrete and not wood, according to winemaker Andy Erickson.)

Both the Scarecrow and Ovid lots were purchased by Nakagawa Wine Company of Tokyo, Japan.

+ $27,000 for 20 cases of Silver Oak

+ $24,000 for a five-case lot of Shafer Cabernet, taken from a block used in the Hillside blend

+ $22,000 for a 10-case lot of Joseph Phelps Cabernet.

Case price results from Premiere Napa Valley Auction

As some of the lots were quarter-barrels, some half-barrels and some full-barrels, the per case price paid may be a more meaningful way of looking at the results:

+ Scarecrow, $16,000 per case

+ Ovid, $8,400 per case

+ Shafer, $4,800 per case

+ Lewis Cellars, $4,000 per case

+ Realm Cellars, $3,200 per case

+ Hourglass, $3,200 per case

+ Continuum, $3,000 per case

I thought you’d never ask

The 2007 vintage in Napa Valley is considered by area winemakers as excellent.

The year began dry with very cold days and single-digit nighttime temperatures and continued dry with about 60% of normal precipitation throughout the appellation.

The summer growing season was on the mild to cool side; very few days topped 100 F. degrees, even in the warmest locations.

The harvest of Chardonnay began in early August in the Carneros and southern Napa, followed by Pinot Noir. Harvest was just a bit ahead of average.

An Indian Summer delivered warm, clear days when vineyard crews completed the harvest.

That answer your question?

Veni, vidi, spiti (I came… I saw… I spit)*

* With apologies to Julius Caesar, who is best known for his Latin conjugations and for his salad dressing; in 47 BC, the Emperor reputedly said “Veni, vidi vici,” wishing to say “I came, I saw, I conquered.” Unfortunately, English hadn’t yet been invented, so who knows what he really said.

About one-hundred wine writers, wine educators, sommeliers, and earnest wine geeks descended on the Rudd Center at the CIA (Culinary Institute of America), in St. Helena, this morning to taste, swirl and spit through a sampling of 60 different Napa Valley Cab-based wines.

The tasting was part of a weekend wine package – Napa Valley is abuzz with wine activities: out-of-town wine writers are on hand for the Symposium for Professional Wine Writers, and the CIA is getting gussied up for tomorrow’s annual Premiere Napa Valley barrel auction, which is only open to members of the wine trade.

To keep assembled guest’s tongues flapping, the Napa Valley Vintners decided to host a tasting of local wines. Their professional panel tasted a large universe of 2004, 2005 and 2006 wines from area producers, narrowing the selection down to 20 producers for today’s tasting.

Guests were asked to taste the 60 wines blind (three wines from each producer – their 2004, 2005 and 2006 offerings). No prices were mentioned, no appellations were identified. All tasters had to go on was their palate, and a few water crackers to soak up the excess alcohol.

The wines presented were priced, on release, in a range from $35 to $132. As one discovers in so many blind tastings, price often has nothing to do with quality, despite the marketing attempts of wine producers to the contrary.

My top four favorite wines in the blind tasting were priced across the board, despite the fact that I scored each of them identically with 93 points. Though I must be developing an affinity for higher priced wines; my favorites this year were in the upper tier of pricing. In tastings past, I have often discovered a $45 gem in a pack of $175 wines. This was not the case today.

Napa Valley Vintners

I salute the Napa Valley Vintners for organizing this educational event, but points were lost on execution:

For one thing, chlorinated water was served for rinsing our stemware. The mere introduction of chlorine into any wine-tasting experience is a serious No-No.

The other observation: all 60 wines had been poured into decanters, which were identified by number only. When a decanter was running low on wine (guests poured for themselves), the very pleasant, and attentive, staff topped up the decanters with wine from new, masked bottles of the same wine and vintage. But this essentially dumbs down the best expression of any wine. The solera system, used to make sherry, is NOT an appropriate method for tasting wines blind. Let me explain.

Given: no two bottles of wine are really alike. You can have really great bottles and really good bottles and sometimes even clunker bottles of the very same wine from the very same lot.

When you mix two bottles, the sum cannot ever be superior than the better of the two bottles. If one bottle is compromised it will dumb down the better bottle. So by topping up the decanters of wine, mixing together two, or three, or even four bottles of a vintage… this can only produce a tasting experience that is less than the best single bottle that might have been tasted blind.

In fact, wine writers often go back in a blind tasting to taste a wine again from a different bottle just to learn if there is significant bottle variation. The hosts of this morning’s tasting did no wine justice by blending different bottles of the same wine in the serving decanters.

I tasted through 60 wines and scored them for color, aroma, mouthfeel, attack, intensity, balance, perceived level of alcohol, food friendliness and overall pleasure output.

For the purposes of this report, I will comment on my top four wines, each which scored 93 points. If you find them in the marketplace, trust me, they are luscious, the winemaking is serious, the pedigree is solid. These are keepers!

In alphabetical order, my four top wines, tasted blind, and each scoring 93 points:

2004 Darioush Signature Cabernet Sauvignon
Bright fruit on the attack with a delicious coffee undertow. Beautiful balance, really a delicious wine. Makes me want to run home and grill some lamb chops to serve with the remaining wine in the decanter.
A blend of 83% Cabernet, 9% Merlot, 5% Cab Franc, 2% Malbec and 1% Petit Verdot. $80 on release.

2004 Jones Family Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon
This is a BIG wine, with a lot of oak still evident on the attack; but there is a gorgeous, silken mouthfeel that comes into play in the middle palate; there is also smoke, chocolate and a very long finish. If this wine were a Broadway play, it would be Phantom of the Opera. It is showy, but you leave the experience humming the main chords and think what a great time you’ve had.
A blend of 98% Cabernet and 2% Cab Franc with Petit Verdot. $80 on release.

2004 Pillar Rock, Cabernet Sauvignon, Stags Leap District
I am not as familiar with Pillar Rock as I obviously ought to be; first time I’ve tasted it blind anywhere and what a discovery! Great fruit on the nose and a rush of fruit on the palate. Perfect extraction, great length, lots of smoky middle notes, and a generous, silken middle portion that is as much about texture as it is about taste. Bravo! $125 on release.

2004 Spottswoode Cabernet Sauvignon
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways: by the attack, by the middle palate, by the finish. My tasting notes conclude: “A tremendous wine!” Coffee, toffee, rich ripe black fruits, all in wonderful balance. “This is an alluring wine” I noted on my tasting sheet. And fabulously food friendly.
97% Cabernet and 3% Cab Franc. $125 on release.

A wine writer’s observation

What is interesting about my top-scoring wines: they were all from the 2004 vintage from these four producers. I am not surprised; I like older wines, find it harder to judge, or quantify, really young wines, which are often filled with young wood, and which tend to be more tannic and less food friendly.

For the purposes of education, here are my scores for the other two wines of each of these four Top of Class producers.

2005 Darioush Signature Cabernet, 92 points
2006 Darioush Signature Cabernet, 90 points

2005 Jones Family Vineyards Cabernet, 92 points
2006 Jones Family Vineyards Cabernet, 90 points

2005 Pillar Rock Cabernet, 92 points.
2006 Pillar Rock Cabernet, 91 points.

2005 Spottswoode Cabernet, 90 points (a heap o’ horse – brett, which put me off)
2006 Spottswoode Cabernet, 90 points (after learning this was the 06 Spottswoode (tasted blind), I would conclude that this was poured from an aberrant bottle; I have had the 06 before and it has shown much better. Lost points for bottle variation.)

Everything Old is New Again!

Well, in the world of wine this week, anyway.

The Rhine House, at Beringer Vineyards, St. Helena.

Beringer Vineyards, in St. Helena, just re-opened its historic, landmark Rhine House, once the private home of co-founder Frederick Beringer.

Begun in 1883, the 17-room mansion was built on land, which Frederick and his brother Jacob had bought to grow grapes and make wine. Beringer is the oldest continuously operating winery in Napa Valley. And the Rhine House, which has been a part of the community for 124 years, is a beautiful measuring stick to remind us how long folks have been making wine here.

The foyer

Frederick’s architectural aim was to recreate the Victorian home in which he and his brother had grown up on the Rhine River, in Germany. Which is how the local structure got its name – Rhine House.
Executives at Beringer, now part of the Fosters Group, decided in 2006 that the dowdy icon needed a facelift, so they hired Architectural Resources Group (or ARG, with offices in San Francisco, Pasadena and Portland, OR) to lead the project and allocated $5 million to spruce ‘er up. The project took two years to complete.

Note the stenciled design and German text on the banner, which runs around the room, just beneath the ceiling, discovered during the two-year renovation.

In addition to seismic upgrades, the project included several phases of restoration; the conservation of 40 gorgeous stained-glass windows, which have meticulously been refurbished and refinished; the restoration of the original hardwood floors; the removal of layers (and years) of wallpaper, which led to the discovery of original banners, which had been hand-stenciled on foyer walls to welcome guests into the house twelve decades ago.

As portions of the hand-stenciled message are still being deciphered, the most anyone has been able to make, to date, of the German salutation drawn on the walls is: “Welcome, who with heart and hand will ever in friendship meet.”

As well, Beringer installed a geothermal heating and cooling system deep beneath the spacious front lawns to neutralize heat loss in the building in the winter and optimize cooling in the summer.

One of the 40 gorgeous stained-glass windows that were refurbished.

To celebrate completion of the project, Beringer hosted a renovation party this week, inviting a few hundred guests. Me too.

In honor of the occasion, some mighty fine Beringer wines were poured, including:

1995 Beringer Cabernet Sauvignon, Chabot Vineyard
Gorgeous nose of roses, cherries and a hint of Virginia tobacco. On the palate, earth flavors, dark cherry notes and a lovely silken texture. 92 points.

1996 Beringer Cabernet Sauvignon, Private Reserve
Deeply complex nose exhibiting aromas of mushrooms, forest floor, tobacco, ripe cerises. On the palate, there is a serial of tastes including those of fruit and – what’s this doing in here? – fresh pine. Not resin, not sappy. More like the scent/taste of fresh fall pine cones. A totally balanced, wonderfully complex wine, with a long cheery (I mean cheery and not cherry) finish. Major yum. Best wine of the evening. A wine just entering its prime. 95 points. 

2000 Beringer Cabernet Sauvignon, Private Reserve
Bright fruit on the nose and a balanced taste that follows. Very rich, too young to be called “opulent,” but this wine could easily grow to fill this description. More earthy notes than I recall on any Beringer Private Reserve Cab, which I have tasted at eight years of age, but not invasive or off-putting, just evident. Full-bodied, with a gorgeous middle palate. 93 points.

2006 Beringer Chardonnay, Private Reserve
Not your typical “Napa Valley Chardonnay,” usually a euphemism for wood-flavored wine. This spicy, racy, totally bright-in-the-mouth Chardonnay is totally food friendly, has a racy acid stripe that runs right up the middle of the tasting experience and lingers through to the finish. Crisp, clean, complex and delicious. And did I say I liked it? 91 points.

The Rhine House is open to the public for tours daily, 10 am - 6 pm from May 30 to Oct 23 and 10 am - 5 pm from Oct 24 to May 29. Beringer Vineyards is located at 2000 Main St., St. Helena, CA 94574. Tel: (707) 967-4412.

My Favorite Kind of Wine Case – 15 Bottles!

For years, one of my favorite annual fall wine events in Napa Valley has been the release of a mixed case of stunning Stags Leap District Cabernets, called the Appellation Collection. It’s a promotion to familiarize wine lovers with wines in this appellation, organized by the Stags Leap District Winegrowers Association.

The group has just announced its 12th annual release and this one is an eye-popping case of 15 different 2004 Cabernets from Stags Leap District, one Cab from each of the producers in the association.

One of my favorite producers in Stags Leap District – Pine Ridge Winery.

This mixed case enables aficionados of these wines to get one bottle of the top, or near-top, wine from 15 different producers without having to run around the valley to each of the wineries. In effect, it’s a one-stop solution to obtain a case (albeit a case of 15 bottles) of the top wines from a top vintage of an entire appellation.

Or maybe I should say it’s a NO-STOP solution, because if you live in a shipment-friendly state, you can order a mixed case online without ever even having to leave your home; simply go to www.stagsleapdistrict.com/appellationcollection and order a mixed case. As there are only 300 mixed cases assembled, however, don’t wait too long to order.

The price for the 15-bottle Cab collection this year is $1,200. And for this princely sum, you receive a case-and-a-quarter of some gorgeous, tooth-staining, purple-red wines, which will easily age six to 10 years.

For the record: I’m just finishing the last few bottles from two full sets of the 1997 Appellation Collection, which I bought years ago upon release. I love the ability the mixed case affords – to go into the cellar and choose a Cab for dinner from any of 15 different wineries.

Site of this year’s tasting of the Appellation Collection – Silverado Vineyards.

The Stag’s Leap District is only 2,700 acres large, about half of which are planted in vines. The District starts seven miles north of the town of Napa on the Silverado Trail (east side of the valley). The northern boundary is the Yountville Crossroad.

Essentially, Stags Leap District, home to fewer than 20 wine producers, is a mile wide and about three miles long.

The hillsides here have western and southern exposures, which are particularly friendly to Cabernet Sauvignon. As is the soil, comprised of rich volcanic sediment and bale loam (with a clay-like substructure). You want complexity? The soil here has it in spades. So no wonder the wines do, too.

The University of California at Davis, the foremost wine research center in the US, has said of the soil in Stag’s Leap District: “We have not seen any valley floor soils elsewhere in Napa Valley similar to those of Stags Leap District.”

Which may be why the Cabernets produced here have an evident similarity in texture and taste and why they are among my personal favorites of all wines produced in the valley.

The Stags Leap District was designated an American Viticultural Appellation (AVA) in 1989, the first viticultural area in the US to be approved on the basis of the distinctiveness of its soils.

At the Association’s invitation, I had a chance last week, at Silverado Vineyards, to taste through the entire collection of 2004 Stags Leap District Cabs. My tasting notes and scores follow. This mixed case is the only Cabernet collection offered by any AVA in all the US. For the wine lover, it’s a simple way to own an assortment of wines that would otherwise be challenging to assemble.

What’s intriguing about the 2004 collection is the relative uniformity in quality, texture and taste in the wines. In the end, yes, each wine a bit different from the next, even though some wineries are contiguous.

“Never forget, there are 15 different Cabernets here… and 15 winemakers… which means 15 different spins on the same thing,” says Silverado Vineyards winemaker Jon Emmerich.

I asked Emmerich how he personally rates the 2004 wines from Stags Leap District among the six vintages of the decade so far.

“I rate it in the top three, probably after 2001 and 2005,” says the winemaker.

You can wait for the winegrowers to offer that mixed case of 2005 Cabs next year at this time… but you’d be making a mistake to pass up the 2004 collection. It’s a stunner.

This year's collection includes:

Baldacci Family Vineyards - 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon
Lovely dark cherry notes and a bit of the aroma you get from red wax lips, which you sometimes get (and can chew) at Halloween. Grown on the family’s 17-acre vineyard, the grapes are 100 percent Cabernet. There are gorgeous flavors of ripe red and black fruits; the wine is elegant and has a focused, long finish. 91 points.

Chimney Rock Winery - 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve
100 percent new French oak adds cacao and cherry notes to the nose. Maybe there’s even a hint of raspberry. Very sweet on the palate, offering seductive flavors and tons of fleshy texture. There is a luscious middle palate and an exquisite finish. 92 points.

Cliff Lede Vineyards - 2004 Poetry
There is a striking nose of dark ripe fruit and also a hint of more wood on this sample of bottled poetry than on either of the two preceding wines (89% new French oak, barrel aging for 24 months). The wine has great grip at the front end a powerful focus toward the middle palate, and a fabulous, focused finish. 95 percent Cabernet, 3 percent Cab Franc, 2 percent Petit Verdot. 92 points.

Clos Du Val - 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon
Ripe red fruit tweaks the nose; blackcurrants, cedar, and briar tease the palate. All these flavors are wound around a core of brightness. The wine is alive in the mouth, exhibiting textures that thrill you; velvet, silk, velour to name a few. A magnificent achievement. 93 points.

Malk Family Vineyards (labeled Griffin Vineyards) - 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon
The first bottle was challenged; it exhibited vanilla and wax on the nose with an imbalance of alcohol. This was a wine of many parts, not one of which sublimated with any other. Disjointed, unfocused, and unfriendly, I thought. 88 points, and only generously so. I thought it only fair to ask for a second bottle.
Second bottle: still a lot of vanilla on the nose, suggestive of too much wood. Bit on the high-alcohol range, as was the first bottle, but this sample had a thick, palpable texture, which had been lacking in the first bottle. Almost like velour in the mouth. But still out of balance with respect to the level of alcohol. 90 points.

Hartwell Vineyards - 2004 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon
Unlike earlier vintages, the Hartwells chose to tweak this year’s Cab with a smidgen of Petit Verdot. And it shows. This is a lush, sensual, alluring wine. The texture is “virtual silk.” This is was the first wine of the 15-wine tasting that I had to swallow, just couldn’t waste it spitting. This is a ripe, food-friendly – and did I say fabulous? – wine. 93 points.

Ilsley Vineyards - 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon
The Ilsley Vineyard abuts Shafer’s hillside on the east side of the Silverado Trail. Some 90 percent of the family’s fruit is sold to Shafer, some of it destined for the winery's One Point Five Cabernet (also part of this Appellation Collection). As David Ilsley is vineyard manager of his family’s vineyards and also vineyard manager for Shafer, no one’s shocked that Ilsley's Cab has similar features to Shafer's Cab.
In this case, the 2004 Ilsley offers deep dark ripe fruit on the nose and a bevy of stunning, complex flavors on the palate. The finish is magnificent, pushing this bottle over the top. 94 points.

Pine Ridge Winery - 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon
Stacy Clark’s tasting notes (she’s the talented winemaker) point out that this wine is 86 percent Cab, 6 percent Merlot, 4 percent Cab Franc, 3 percent Petit Verdot, 1 percent Malbec. She could have added: “And 100 percent inspirational!”
My tasting notes: “Silk on steroids! Gorgeous wine, a stunner!”
To flesh out the notes: coffee aromas leap from the glass as well as ripe cherries, strawberries and raspberries. One of the most aromatic wines in the Collection this year. Penetrating flavors, too, and a memorable texture.
In sum, this wine is even more attractive than the 2004 Rutherford Pine Ridge Cab, which the winery also produces, and which I tasted blind and rated one of the top Rutherford Cabs from 2004. 94 points.

Regusci Winery - 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon
Ripe black fruits and a touch of sweetness on the early attack; very focused flavors, particularly of blackcurrant, briar, tobacco. A really good wine, but somewhat lacking on the back end. Bottle variation? 92 points.

Robert Sinskey Vineyards - 2004 RSV Cabernet Sauvignon
Organically farmed grapes, TLC and patience have produced a really good wine, though slightly on the jammy edge. The nose suggests lushness, bordering on sur-mur, or over-ripeness. The palate further adds to the impression – there is an almost late-harvest quality to the fruit. If they market this as “late-harvest Cab for the Zin-lover” they will attract a large following. 90 points.

Shafer Vineyards - 2004 One Point Five Cabernet Sauvignon
Winemaker Elias Fernandez says this vintage reminds him of the winery’s 1992 Cab. How lucky you are, then, if you are still holding on to a few bottles of the 1992 Shafer Cab. That vintage was stunningly good.  But so is this vintage. I find the nose is actually voluptuous – two layers of ripe fruit compete in a singular whiff for your attention.
This is likely the most sophisticated wine in the case. There is lovely balance, an elegance and a joie to this wine. Blackberry, dark chocolate and herbs dominate. The overall impression is: great wine-growing, great wine-making, great wine-drinking. 94 points.

Silverado Vineyards - 2004 Solo
Winemaker Jon Emmerich opened a bottle of the 1982 Stag’s Leap Cab from this vineyard and at 26 years of age, it blew everything else in this tasting out of the water. Unfortunately, they haven’t thought of introducing a “bonus bottle” enabling lucky buyers to find a surprise, 16th bottle in their mixed Appellation Collection case – this 1982 Silverado Vineyards Cab.
So we content ourselves with the 2004 Silverado offering, which has a lot of smoke and toast on the nose, suggesting that it is perhaps still early to be judging/drinking this wine. Purple fruit, young tannins, herbal notes, and a short finish suggest this wine needs more time than others in the Collection to mature. I hovered – between 91 and 92 points.

Stags' Leap Winery - 2004 The Leap Estate Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon
Winemaker, Kevin Morrisey says 2004 was a terrific vintage and thinks this wine is a showcase for black and red fruit, toasted vanilla, tobacco, violets and charred meat.
I personally found this wine to offer a kaleidoscope of flavors, which rippled over my palate in gentle succession, most of them fruits, and all of them only rolling to a stop long after I’d swallowed. Balanced and elegant. A memorable wine. I wrote  “awesome” in my notes and circled it, then scored the entry 94 points.

Steltzner Vineyards - 2004 Reserve Barrel Select Cabernet Sauvignon
If you ever find me describing anything within the pages of napaman.com as ”nice,” drinks are on the house for all readers! I don’t like the word, and never use it. When used as an adjective, it says nothing about anything.
Take Steltzner’s own tasting notes for their wine: someone has described the 2004 Cab as having “nice acidity.”
Now what the hell is that? Too much acidity, not enough acidity, text-book acidity – any of these I understand. But “nice acidity???”
I don’t know about “nice acidity,” because the bottle we sampled exhibited mostly coffee and vanilla notes and presented a noticeable, jammy raspberry presence on the middle palate. In sum, more like a candied fruit experience than a wine-drinking experience. If anything this wine lacked acidity. 90 points.

Taylor Family Vineyards - 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon
This is the third  vintage, which the Taylor family has crushed for its own label. Lousy luck… a lousy bottle? My sample showed a medicinal nose suggestive of bandages and iodine. Comparing notes with the wine writer next to me, she found them evident, too. I wanted to ask for a second bottle to neutralize my first impression, but we ran out of tasting time. Given the location of these vines, the fruit they produce, and the wineries to whom these grapes used to be sold, I have to guess that this was an errant bottle. 88 points.

STOP THE PRESS!

Following publication of this story, I was contacted by Sandy Taylor Carlson whose family owns Taylor Family Vineyards. She said that I must have been served a punk bottle of her wine at the press tasting and offered to drop off a bottle for me to re-taste.
See the update below – this is a much better wine than noted here.



Unhappy with the tasting notes above, feisty winery owner Sandy Taylor Carlson emailed, asking if I would retry her 2004 Stags Leap District Cabernet. When I learned of her family’s winemaking history, I said, “Of course. Come by and we’ll taste together.”

For 17 years, the Taylors (Sandy’s dad grows the fruit) sold his grapes to Pine Ridge for its sensational Stags Leap District Cabernets. I have bought these wines for years and know how good the fruit is/was, so figured that I needed to revisit the wine, which we’d been offered at the press tasting (above).

2004 Taylor Family Stags Leap District Cabernet Sauvignon
What a difference a day makes. And a second bottle, too. Nothing like the sample served at the press tasting. Winemaker Gustavo Brambila has fashioned a wine with dark cherry, chocolate, cassis and tobacco on the nose. There are perhaps too many intrusive young tannins, but this wine is, for the record, not actually being released for another month, so youthful, bordering-on-aggressive, tannins are to be expected. Certainly tolerated. This wine needs at least two years to shape up, and shut up; the tannins, at this stage, overwhelm the fruit on the palate. Ends with a cranberry finish. Will retail for $60, or $65 (not yet decided) on release next month. 91 points.

2003 Taylor Family Stags Leap District Cabernet Sauvignon
Sandy brought along two previous vintages, hoping to show me how her family’s wine ages over time. I love her spark, faith and optimism. She wasn’t going to take a lousy score lying down… and I’m glad that she didn’t, for I maligned her well-made wine (above) by basing my notes on a single, flawed bottle.
The 2003 is perhaps not as successful as the 2004 vintage. It has many of the same aromas on the nose – mostly cherries, vanilla and a large, looming Asian spice-pack. Lots of oak on this wine, possibly too much, overpowering the lushness of the fruit. This vintage retails for $60. 90 points.

2002 Taylor Family Stags Leap District Cabernet Sauvignon
Ah.. THIS is the daddy. The color alone sets you up for excitement; it is deep regal red, the color of sexy pajamas, the kind Hugh Hefner might wear. A very sophisticated nose, offering scents of blackcurrant and cassis. A lovely wine, with lots of flesh in the middle and a black cherry, raspberry, chocolate, Asian spice dance on the palate at the swallow. Available from the winery library at $65. A steal. 93 points.

These wines and their story can be found at www.tayorfamilyvineyards.com
-- and tell them that napaman.com sent you!

The Best Food in Italy

The food emporium called Tamburini, in Bologna, is a feast for the eyes, as well as for the stomach. Locals call it an antica salsamenteria; for food travelers, it’s a door into our gastrocultural past.

Friends who know Italy well have long told me that the best food in the nation is in Emilia-Romagna, the narrow region that lies atop Tuscany, running west to east. You may know the big towns here: Bologna, Parma, Reggio Emilia, and Modena.

Having just spent two weeks in Emilia-Romagna and having eaten at such places as All'Osteria Bottega, in Bologna, Parizzi Ristorante in Parma, and Trattoria Della Ghiara in Reggio Emilia, I must agree with my know-it-all friends; this likely IS the best food in Italy.

The best single bowl of broth and pasta that I have ever had – at All’Osteria Bottega, in Bologna. You want THE Gold Medal-winning pasta dish? THIS IS IT.

The one dish that seems to separate the GREAT cooks in this region from the just-good cooks, is a regional specialty – small pasta shapes stuffed with a mixture of meats, served floating in brodo, or broth.

In Bologna, at All’Osteria Bottega, I had the single best bowl of broth that I have ever tasted, a perfectly made, rich brodo, which had nearly as much complexity as many Napa Valley Cabernets. Certainly as much texture and finish. The broth that chef Daniele Minarelli makes here relies on capons for flavor. His broth was served with homemade tortellini, tiny, navel-shaped pasta pockets filled with a tasty forcemeat of (equal parts) ground chicken, veal, pork, mortadella, and prosciutto.

Anolini in brodo at Ristorante Parizzi, in Parma

In Parma, about 60 miles west of Bologna, at Parizzi Ristorante, I succumbed to a sensational order of anolini (a variation on tortelli, tiny pillows  each about the size of an oyster cracker; they melt in your mouth) floating in a rich beef broth. How’s this for meticulous care: the anolini are made to order each time someone chooses the first-course soup!

For the record: other highlights of lunch at Parizzi included a tasting of three different prosciuttos di Parma aged 24-, 30- and 36-months, respectively as well as a tasting of three different Parmigiano-Reggiano cheeses, aged 20-, 30- and 44-months.

Cappelletti in brodo at Della Ghiara – “worth the detour.”

In Reggio Emilia, I had the pleasure of dining at Trattoria Della Ghiara, where owners Antonio Giordano and his wife, Marilena Braglia, lighten regional fare, but never neuter it. Marilena’s cappelletti in brodo presents brilliantly; she makes a forcemeat of ground beef, pork, veal, prosciutto, Parmigiano-Reggiano and mortadella and stuffs the mixture into tiny pillows of tender pasta. Her broth is made with beef and capon stock.

In short, if you want perfection at the dinner table, head to Bolgona, or Parma, or Reggio Emilia, to any of these restaurants. They deserve serious attention, not to mention a mountain of Michelin stars. There are many other fine restaurants throughout the region, too, most of them serving variations on these regional dishes.

The one disclaimer that I need to make is what this region lacks in term of cuisine. We always think of Italy as a land of sunshine and tomatoes. Well, Emilia-Romagna has lots of the former, sunshine, but the land is farmed to feed pigs for all that delicious prosciutto and for grasses and hay to feed cows -- to furnish 4,300 area farmers who supply milk to make Parmigiano-Reggiano. So there isn't much land left to farm tomatoes.

In addition to tomatoes, which are missing from the Emilia-Reggiano diet, so are other vegetables. Spending two weeks in E-R is a bit like spending time in Argentina; there, every meal, including breakfast, includes some form of beef. In E-R, every meal offers a selection of ham, prosciutto, or mortadella. Get used to it.

Okay, enough of the overview; let’s get back to Bologna.

Chef/owner Daniele Minarelli speaks with restaurant guest Claude Albertazzi at one of the best restaurants in Bologna, All’Osteria Bottega.

The chef at All’Osteria Bottega is Daniele Minarelli, who has been in business four years, but who has been in the restaurant trade for a total of 23. Recently, Daniele was asked to join the Slow Food movement, honoring his attention for using local, seasonal ingredients, as well as for his ambitious use of organic (biologique) ingredients.

A specialty of the region is the antipasti plate of prosciutto di Parma and slices of culatello, sliced from the heart of the ham leg, usually a deeper red color, usually a deeper meaty taste.

What does a full dinner with wine cost at this Best of Italy restaurant with 24 seats and where the lighting fixtures – bare bulbs – go out time and again during the course of an evening? Answer: 88 Euros ($125), including wine, service and as many digestifs after dinner as you can wash down.

But it is the brodo on which I am still stuck, two weeks after having it. Quite simply, this was the single best broth I have had in 30 years of professional tasting. I have no idea how many capons sacrificed their life for this soup, but they died a noble cause because this broth, were there an Olympic event for broth-making, would take the Gold, Silver and Bronze Medals – all of them – hands down. Think of Chef Minarelli as the Michael Phelps of soup-making and you’ll understand this guy’s drive for perfection and culinary achievement.

At All’Osteria Bottega, Daniele’s at the stove; he’s at the phone; he slices the mortadella (which is excellent by the way), he takes your order, he runs the dishes to your table; he suggests what wine to have with your dinner as he IS the wine list (there is no printed selection).

Daniele is aided by two women on my first visit, and by only one serveuse on a second visit, but Daniele still does most of everything anyway. If you crossbred one of Louis de Funes’ food characters (one of my favorite French film comics) with Manuel, the waiter in Faulty Towers, and added the spice of a knowledgeable Italian cook such as Marcella Hazan, you’d have a good idea of Daniele’s strengths and focus.

Like the Soup Nazi, Daniele has rules. In the kitchen, it’s his way or the highway. He ONLY uses 3-year-old Parmigiano cheese because (translated from his Italian) “it must grate in a very particular way.” He says that if the cheese is younger, it is too moist, and if older than three years, it tends to crumble when grated.

At All’Osteria Bottega, Daniele tells you that you MUST start dinner with a selection of his delicate salumeria items, which Daniele will choose for you, of course. (As they say in the movies, Resistance is Futile!) Daniele’s mortadella is as light and ethereal as the best prosciutto di Parma that I’ve ever had.

In one of the few instances in which I saw tomatoes in a restaurant in E-R, Daniele served a small, complementary bowl of papa al pomodoro (fresh tomato soup, made with organic tomatoes, extra-virgin olive oil, basil and then intensified with an oil-garlic emulsion). It tasted as though the chef had condensed the pulp of a bushel of ripe tomatoes into a single cup of chilled soup. I am not sure that I have ever eaten anything with a more intense tomato flavor; even if I squeezed tomato paste concentrate from a commercial tube onto my tongue, I do not expect that I would experience such an intensity of tomato-ness.

Attention to detail – without being supercilious – is the hallmark of service at Parizzi.

In Parma, the eating highlight was lunch at Parizzi Ristorante, which looks and feels like a Michelin 1-star restaurant. If you are lucky enough in a lifetime to be served ONCE by someone as pleasant and knowledgeable as Mimo (short for Cosimo), at this restaurant, you have had a blessed life, indeed. This is a THRILLING dining room. Nothing is left to chance; every aspect of your meal is looked after by chef Marco Parizzi.

If you head to Parizzi, in Parma, be sure to order the taste trial of Parmigiano-Reggiano.
Here are 20-, 30- and 44-month aged Parmesan cheeses.

Culinary highlights at Parizzi included two tastings conducted at table; the chef chose three Parmigiano-Reggiano cheeses, each of a different age. It was instructional -- I immediately understood how age transforms the acidity, salinity and texture of  this stunning regional cheese. I also now understand why Parmigiano is considered by many to be the King of Cheeses.

Three proscuittos of different age were selected by Marco Parizzi for a tableside tasting; slices of 24-, 30- and 36-month-aged prosciuttos were presented.

The menu also offered a tasting of three different prosciuttos di Parma, each a different age, and again I understood how age affects the taste and texture of this slightly sweet, slightly nutty, totally delicious, cured ham.

Everything on the menu at Della Ghiara, in Reggio Emilia, is delicious, but a favorite dish was the roasted black-eyed rabbit, served with a regional version of ratatouille.

One other regional restaurant on my Best Of list, which must not be overlooked, is Ristorante Cocchi (pronounced Coke-ee), in Parma. Located on the ground floor of the family’s hotel (Hotel Daniel), the restaurant is run by Corrado (front of the house and the one who chooses the fabulous wine list), by his wife Laura (who makes all the pasta from scratch) and their amiable son Daniel, all of whom share the common last name Cocchi.

Corrado’s father opened a restaurant at this location and he took over; and now, in Italian tradition, the son of the son (Daniel) will take over. Everything here is homemade, everything here is delicious. The pasta melts in your mouth, the meat sauces are meaty without being heavy, the wine list and the wine cellar (which Corrado opened for me) are gems for serious wine lovers.

Corrado, Laura and Daniel Cocchi at the family ristorante.

A private tour of the wine cellar at Cocchi reveals all sorts of secrets – where they age their prosciutto and culatello, where they keep their breakfast cereals, and, as you might suspect, where they keep the REAL killer reds.

If you are heading to Emilia-Romagna in the near future, be sure to print out and take this short list of Must-Not-Miss Restaurants.

All’Osteria Bottega, Via S. Caterina, 51, Bologna, Italy
Tel: 39-051-585-111
 
Parizzi Ristorante, Strada Repubblica 71, Parma, Italy.
Tel: 39-0521-285-952

Trattoria Della Ghiara, Vicolo Folletto 1C, Reggio Emilia, Italy.
Tel: 39-0522-435-755

Ristorante Cocchi, Via Gramsci 16A, Parma, Italy.
Tel: 39-0521-981-990


This purple bike has absolutely NOTHING to do with this food story but I so loved the bike, and the color of the wall behind it, that I chose to include it in this story. Taken in Parma, Italy.

A Day in the Life of a Parmigiano-Reggiano Cheesemaker....

This report finds me in Italy, traveling the back roads of Emilia-Romagna, the province, which run west to east, just north of Tuscany. This is a mostly tourist-free zone, and home of some of the best foods in life -- including Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, prosciutto di Parma and Balsamic vinegar.

In my multi-part report (Hey! Napaman has to get out of the Valley every once in a while to explore other winemaking regions of the world… or he’ll get stale as a day-old sourdough baguette…), I am starting with a visit to an artisanal producer of one of my favorite cheeses.

 

On the road to Caseficio San Lucio

The San Lucio Dairy is about 20 km southeast of Parma. The head cheese-maker here oversees production everyday, 365 days a year, and has not missed a day in 40 years on the job! 

On average, this small coop produces 23 wheels of semi-hard gold each day. A wheel of Parmigiano weighs about 80 pounds.

When cheese leaves this coop, and is sold to the first of a line of middleman, or to a broker, or to an aging agent who will further-age the cheese, the coop charges about 7.30 Euros (about $11) a kilo.

Here's what I discovered today... about how they make The REAL DEAL....

 Milk taken from cows yesterday afternoon was delivered to the cheeseworks last night; it sat overnight, enabling the cream to rise to the top; this morning, the cream was skimmed off. This now day-old skim milk was mixed this morning in equal parts with fresh milk just delivered to the facility. This results in a milk mixture that is, in total, about 2.3% fat. By the time this milk is converted into finished cheese, the fat content will rise through evaporation to a level of about 28.4% butter fat -- still much less than the 60-75% level of butter fat in soft cheeses. 

Here the cheese-makers remove just-curdled milk solids in a cheese cloth...

 They let the curdled mass rest about 15 minutes....

 

They cut the mass in half with a special tool (below)... resulting in two blobs, each of which will be molded into a familiar wheel of Parmigiano-Reggiano.

There are 4,300 milk farms in the region supplying 445 cheese makers. To be a True & Proper Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, there can only be four ingredients -- milk, rennet, whey, and salt.

And there are other restrictions and regulations in place: The milk must come from one of four different breeds of cow, and must be BHT-free. The cows must eat a certain diet that is free of pesticides, etc.

 

Each blubbery blob is nestled into a plastic mold to give initial shape to the cheese. This soon-to-be-cheese rests in this plastic mold one day....

Care is taken to fold the cheesecloth EXACTLY over and around the wet cheese so as not to leave marks or indentations on the surface of the cheese.

After one day in the plastic mold (above), the cheeses are transferred to a meshed, stainless steel mold (below), in which they rest another two days.

The famous markings on the rind of Parmigiano-Reggiano are imparted by a reverse stencil, which has been slipped around the edge of the wheel, and which is pressed into place by the tightened exterior stainless steel collar.

The cheeses are then transferred to a rack, which is immersed in a salt brine bath; the cheeses spend 20 days immersed in the brine, which starts the curing process. 

 

Cheeses, removed from their saltwater bath, are housed on shelves in a tall cellar kept at a constant temperature and at 80 percent humidity. 

They will spend one full year here before qualifying for "Parmigiano-Reggiano" designation. (No Parmigiano-Reggiano can be released into the marketplace without at least one year's aging.)

During their year of aging, the cheeses need to periodically be turned over and brushed to remove any spores or bacteria, which might think about growing on the surface of the rind.

Hence the cheesemakers turn loose a robotic "flipper" in the cellar. The robot turns over every single cheese in this cellar every fifth day for a year! It also automatically polishes the rind of each cheese, to remove undesirable bacteria.

I saw the robot in action and laughed when I imagined what it would be like the day the robot goes nuts, creating an I Love Lucy-like moment, flipping, hurling, and flinging 80-pound cheese wheels around the room, as though they were Frisbees.

Some special selection cheeses are aged further; I tasted 20-, 30- and 44-month-old Parmesan cheeses this week and agree with the experts that the cheese tastes best at 30 to 36 months (2.5 to 3 years). At this age, the cheese has a sweetness, a freshness, a noticeable tang, and a stunning Parmigiano-finish, which starts to diminish as the cheese gets yet older than this.

Outside San Vitale Baganza, site of the cheeseworks, I visited a hamlet called Torrechiara, noted for an old castle (closed, like everything else here on Mondays)... but the views from the mountain-top were spectacular....

Another mountain view....

 

And yet another....

There! the Parmigiana Express ride is over. You may remove your seat restraint, stand up and head to the nearest bar (like everyone here does) and treat yourself to a glass of sparkling red Lambrusuco wine (... not so much...) and a plate of perfectly aged 30-month-old Parmigiano-Reggiano. Major yum.

I couldn’t have done this trip, or understood much of what the cheesemaker said, without the expert help of Cristiana Clerici, director of public relations for the Parmigiano-Reggiano consortium of cheesemakers, who spent hours translating for me and explaining the cheesemaking process in great detail.

I trust this shorthand version for napaman.com readers will make Cristiana happy and proud!

  

 

The Spottswoode Annual Garden Party – is it that time of year already?

It seems just like yesterday napaman was crowing about the sensational just-released 2004 Spottswoode Cabernet Sauvignon, marched out to thirsty guests at the now-annual Spottswoode Release Garden Party.

But that was a year ago.

My how time flies when you’re drinking good wine.

So here we are again, hunting down a parking spot on the back streets of sleepy St. Helena to attend one of the most warm and fuzzy family winery release parties in the valley.

John and Beth Novak Milliken, part of the driving force behind the family winery. Beth is winery president.

Guests mingle on the lawn of Mary Novak’s estate home and belly up to a half-dozen stations around the property where amuses-bouches are served, and where some pretty fantastic wines are poured.

Jennifer Williams, Spottswoode’s winemaker and vineyard manager. Her first vintage here was the not-yet-released 2006 Cabernet, tasted from barrel at the garden party. Hold onto your hats, America – it’s a thrilling wine. Welcome to Spottswoode, Jennifer!

Tasting notes:

2007 Spottswoode Sauvignon Blanc
I asked several members of the winery team if they thought I was nuts, proclaiming this quite possibly the best Spottswoode S.B. I’ve ever had. They all seemed to agree, either to make me feel good about my judgment call, or because they really feel the same way.
This is a stunning Sauvignon Blanc, crisp on the attack, lots of flesh in the middle and wonderful citrus-y notes on the finish, especially lemon. This will be terrific with seameats, or served alone on a hot summer’s eve.
In my opinion, the wine is a bit over-priced, as far as Sauvignon Blancs go; they’re asking $32 in a universe in which one can find gorgeous Sauvignon Blancs for $12-18. But as Spottswoode only makes 1,800 cases  -- and they sell everything they make – who can blame the family for asking what the market will obviously bear?
The Sauvignon fruit this year is 40 percent from a mountainside in Sonoma County, and the blend is made more mysterious by the addition of about  five percent Semillon, which comes from Tofanelli’s old vines in Calistoga.
What a wonderful achievement; Jennifer’s second SB at Spottswoode – great work! 92 points.

2005 Spottswoode Lyndenhurst Cabernet Sauvignon
Call this their second label, or go-to-label, or not-quite reserve label. The wine has a lovely bright color, almost neon-ic when one’s glass is tilted toward the sun. Gorgeous soft tannins, with broad top notes of toast and vanilla; give this wine a few years  for the flavors to integrate and your face will be happy. 89 points.

1996 Spottswoode Cabernet Sauvignon
They went into the library to pull out something like 18 bottles of this vintage for the garden party. My understanding is that a few of the bottles failed to pass muster. I certainly detected bottle variation among the bottles finally selected and poured.
I have always loved the 1996 Spottswoode Cab; I have one bottle left in my own cellar from my original purchase and loved each of the five finished bottles.
Today, one bottle poured at the party showed a paling color, notes of licorice, dried plum and black currant. I rated this first bottle 91 points.
Then I tasted from a different bottle and was stunned at how fresh and vibrant the wine was – in color and taste. Tons of verve, nerve and finish. Lots of blackcurrant flavors and a real bounce on the palate. 92 points for this bottle.

2002 Spottswoode Cabernet Sauvignon
A fantastic wine at six years of age. I have a full, unopened 6-pack at home that I must remember to start drinking. This is glorious wine; it’s all there – the attack, the middle palate and the long and winding finish. Silken texture. If you own any of this, consider yourself a lucky sod! 92 points.

2005 Spottswoode Cabernet Sauvignon
They’ve upped the ante with this wine, set a new bar for the estate Cab. The fruit is bright, there is a stunning attack of fruit and an even greater finish of fruit. Yet this is not a Califnornia “fruit-bomb.” It has hallmarks of elegance and balance. Over time, this will be a real dinner winner. I will make a note to start drinking my own bottles in four years, by which time, some of the top notes will have blended within the wine, creating a wholly harmonious beverage. 93 points, maybe 94.

2006 Spottswoode Cabernet Sauvignon, from a barrel sample
Focused for a wine of this age, spicy, has hallmarks of greatness; will be bottled in November 2008, released to the public in September 2009.
Preliminarily, at the very least, a 91-point wine.

To get on the Spottswoode mailing list, here’s what you need to know:
1902 Madrona Ave.,
St. Helena, California 94574.
Phone 707/963-0134,
or email
estate@spottswoode.com

At Groth Winery, when “something bugs you,” it’s a good thing!

A lot of “critters” have shown up on wine labels recently – horses, ducks, fish, moose, bulls, roosters and sheep – used to boost shelf visibility and, hopefully, improve sales. But now real “critters” are actually being invited into the vineyard to improve something more germane -- what’s in the bottle.

These new “critters” include butterflies, ladybugs, and bumblebees, all considered beneficial insects, which prey on natural enemies of the vine.

No one has done a better, or more visible, job at being Noah – bringing these critters onto the Sustainable Vineyard Ark – than Groth Vineyards & Winery, in Oakville. They’ve even gone so afar as to create the valley’s first “Insectary Garden,” an inviting home for desirable insects.

Next month, on four consecutive Fridays, visitors to the winery can have a complimentary tour of Groth’s Insectary Garden, as well as taste some mighty fine sustainable-farmed Oakville wines, also at no charge. (Details below).

 

Suzanne Groth stands in the winery’s Insectary Garden amid colorful flowering shrubs and perennials.

“In our move toward total sustainable farming, we replanted 78 acres of vines, changing their orientation, trellising and ground crop,” says Suzanne Groth, head of public relations for the winery. “And to care for the new vines, we created the Insectary Garden,” she adds.

Here’s what they did: Last year, Groth planted 44 varieties of shrubs, trees, perennials and grasses to attract specific insects, birds and reptiles to increase biodiversity on the property and to control pesky insects biologically, rather than chemically.

In other words, they planted especially tasty stuff to attract good bugs… which would kill off the bad bugs.

The actual idea for the Insectary Garden came from landscape architect Nancy Roche, of Roche + Roche Landscape Architecture in Sonoma.

Groth’s Insectary Garden

In agricultural-speke, this is known as a sustainable farming practice.  Groth planted Achillea Paprika (yarrow), for example, to attract ladybugs, which love snacking on leafhoppers, which are nasty predators of our valley’s best vines.

They planted Ceanothus (California Lilac) to attract lacewings, which flitter about the vineyard noshing on mealy bugs. The mealies (they sound like a group of nasties in a George Lucas film…) wreak havoc on grape vines, spreading mold and viruses.

For the record, sustainable farming is considered one step beyond organic farming, which we hear so much about these days. Sustainable farming practices take into consideration the effects of doing any one thing on the entire surrounding environment. In the case of Napa Valley, it means caring about the health of the entire watershed of the valley.

Buddleia davidii, commonly called the butterfly bush, has sweet nectar that attracts butterflies, hummingbirds and bees, all which help pollinate plants.

At Groth, this has meant replanting estate vines on a north-south axis rather than an east-west axis to profit from winds, which blow north from San Pablo Bay. Air circulation, which is free, natural, and plentiful in Oakville, helps reduce mildew, and mold, diminishing the need for remedial chemicals.

They’ve also encouraged the growth (or should I say “the Groth?”) of cover crops between rows of vines to further establish a healthy insect population to battle bad bugs, as well as conserve soil moisture.

At Groth, seeing weeds between manicured rows of vines is considered a good thing; it’s a smart farming practice and means specific chemicals can be eliminated.

Dennis and Judy Groth, who founded the winery in 1981, are both responsible for spreading this pastoral religion. During his tenure as chairman of the Wine Institute, Dennis established an industry-wide code for sustainable winegrowing practices, which has become a standard for hundreds of wineries across California.

For the release of each vintage of Groth Reserve Cabernet, the winery’s top wine, Suzanne Groth, who is a trained artist, paints a new image; this is her offering for the release of the 2005 Groth Reserve Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon next month.

To showcase the results of sustainable farming, the Groths are inviting visitors to walk among their colorful Insectary Garden and taste estate wines every Friday in September – with tasting fees waived.

Call the winery to register for a free garden tour and wine tasting, offered from 11 am to 2 pm on each Friday in September – the 5th, 12th, 19th and 26th. Reservations are not officially required, but it would be helpful for the winery to know who’s coming and how many might be on hand to sip wines.

I tasted through some of the wines that will be poured on Fridays and had a sneak preview of the winery’s stunning 2005 Reserve Cab, which will officially be released September 20.

Tasting Notes

2007 Groth Sauvignon Blanc
This is the winery’s workhorse, responsible for nearly half of all Groth’s volume. Winemaker Michael Weis insisted a long time ago that this would be a better wine with a touch of Semillon and he was right. This straw-colored, pleasing wine, with 4 percent Semillon, has attractive fruit flavors (largely pear), exhibits bright acidity and has an alluring finish, which makes you want to take another sip. Good as a sipping wine, also ideal with food. In excess of 30,000 cases produced. $18 retail. 90 points

2005 Groth Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon
A rich, charming, compelling wine, reminding me of Franciscan’s Magnificat, another area red blend, which I quite like. About one-quarter Merlot, this wine has a lovely texture, almost silken on the palate. While the wine is plush and plum-y, the Merlot is not overplayed; the Cab shines through with black currant-correctness. Elegant, balanced and fairly priced ($55) – who could ask for anything more? 93 points. 

2005 Groth Reserve Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon
There are only 1,400 cases of this exceptional wine. Look at the color! Regal, the purple of Kingly robes; quick, someone bring me a thrown.
Still young, this wine has a tight nose, but there are hints of plum and black currants, which will evolve over time. Many Asian spice flavors evident – from two years in all-new oak. Yet this is an elegant, balanced textbook achievement. Available to club members and winery visitors at $150/bottle. 93 points.

Groth Vineyards & Winery, 750 Oakville Cross Road, Oakville. Tel: 707-754-4254.

It’s not Gaudí, and it’s not Gaudy – it’s Quixote!

I’ve now visited Napa Valley’s most original and expressive architectural wonder twice and urge visitors to put Quixote Winery on their Must Do list. Certainly if you love architecture as much as you love wine.

This one-of-a-kind winery is owned by Carl Doumani, formerly of Stags’ Leap Winery fame. Exactly 20 years ago, Doumani hired Viennese hippie-artist-turned-designer Friedensreich Hundertwasser to design the whimsical facade and inner office spaces of the winery, which only opened to the public for the first time last year; the result is sort of Gaudí on codeine. Nothing is quite as you might expect it to be. (The Gaudí reference is to Antonio Gaudí, the Catalan architect of the Modernist, or Art Nouveau, style, whose work is a national treasure in Spain.)

Hundertwasser’s buildings are all a bit off-kilter, like what the might find if you took the Blue Pill offered Neo (Keanu Reeves) in the Matrix, or if you shot down the wrong rabbit hole in Alice’s Wonderland. In short, the architecture here is, in a word,  “bizarrentine.” Visiting Quixote is a bit like walking into someone else’s dream sequence and not having the appropriate DNA to decode what you’re seeing.

The winery’s front door.

"There are no straight lines in nature so why should there be in architecture?" asked the aging, now deceased, Hundertwasser. As such, Hundertwasser’s buildings in Europe and Asia, and now this one, his only structure in America, have curvy lines, uneven floors, drooping ceilings and brightly colored columns made of intentionally shattered mosaics.

But wait, there’s more: trees and shrubs, rooted in 30-inches of topsoil, grow out of the top of the winery, resembling a bad ‘do on a windy day. The kind of thing you might expect to find in a Dr. Seuss story.

“Quixote is a reflection of Carl (Doumani), who is a contrarian in just about everything – except for making wine, which he takes seriously,” says Lew Price, the winery’s general manager.

To my thinking, Doumani is a contrarian even about making wine; he has taken some of America’s best Cabernet Sauvignon-producing acres and planted them with his personal favorite grape, Petite Sirah.

Winery owner Carl Doumani resembles Harlan Saunders of Kentucky Fried Chicken fame.

Doumani maintains that the tannins and fruit of Petite Sirah are far more food-friendly than Cabernet and if that’s the grape he likes, well then, dammit, that’s the grape he’s gonna grow.

Which explains why Quixote is moving to a point at which three-quarters of the property will be planted with Petite Sirah. This fruit goes into two different labels produced at the winery – Quixote, basically the reserve wine, and Panza, a lesser (but not much “lesser”) label.

To get an idea of where the winery is: Quixote is east off the Silverado Trail in the Stags Leap District, sandwiched between Shafer and Stag's Leap Winery. Talk about location, location, location.

Writer Chris Colin nailed the description and significance of Quixote in his New York Times article when the winery opened in February 2007:  “Another place to swirl a glass in Northern California would scarcely be news, but this is not just another place. Tucked up in the golden hills, away from the stately villas and incongruously ornate mansions, sits what might seem the creation of a beautifully demented child.”

Hundertwasser was adamant that “German gold leaf – and no other kind” be applied to the single minaret he added to the winery.

Demented child, indeed. Or maybe enfant terrible might be more appropriate. Mr. “Hundred Waters” (Hundertwasser) added many original, out-of-context flourishes, among them a gold minaret, which was not of Russian, or Turkish, origin, but which was his own design.

Inside, all the interior office walls are curvy, with no right angles. No two doors are alike, no two windows the same.

Winery general manager Lew Price leads property tours; he appears here with visitors in Carl Doumani's large, curvy-walled office.

What did this winery cost to build? Doumani has never revealed the actual sum, but says, “Whatever a winery costs – double it.”

Even the wine is a bit maverick here. Screw caps only, and whacko, slightly off-center, colorful labels. That kind of thing.

Wine Distinctions:

The label of the top-tier wine, Quixote, was designed by Hundertwasser himself. As you might expect, it is an unorthodox label, requiring 17 different printing steps.

Wine bearing the Quixote label is made only with estate fruit, it is 100 percent varietal (either Cabernet or Petite Sirah), and is aged only in French oak.

The “second label” of the winery, but not much of a lesser wine; it’s all estate fruit but is a blended wine.

Wine under the Panza label is also always estate fruit, but is a blended wine (Cab + Merlot, or Petite Sirah + Petit Verdot). Panza is aged only in American oak.

The winery, with 27 acres planted, produces 3,500 cases of wine annually.

Disclaimer: The grape to which I refer in this story – Petite Sirah – is NOT the same as the Syrah grape. When vines were brought to California in the 1800s, ag-men thought they were transporting Syrah – and, in fact, some wine pioneers did. But others mislabeled their rootstock and brought – and planted – what we now understand is Petite Sirah, which is, in fact, the Durif grape from France.

Durif is itself a hybrid grape – part Syrah (hence some of the colors and flavors of the offspring) and part Peloursin.

To make matters more complicated: Most Americans spell Petite Sirah with an “i” but given Doumani’s contrarian behavior, he spells it with a “y,” which is why his bottles claim to be filled with “Petite Syrah.”

You got all that? (You can relax: this material is NOT on the napaman.com final exam.)

Wine tasting notes

Afternoon tasting session for visitors at the winery.

2004 Panza Claret
A blend of 80 percent Cab, 20 percent Merlot. A perfect choice for a Tuesday night pizza, Lew Price likes to say about this $40 wine. Medium pale red, spiced with cloves and red juicy fruit. 89 points.

2003 Quixote Cabernet
Aged in French oak 14-17 months, this splendid wine, $60, has a lovely balance of fruit and tannin. Soft at the core, it has a beautiful long, supple finish, suggestive of licorice, tar and briar. A thoroughly food-friendly wine. 91 points.

2002 Panza Petite Syrah
They may not know how to spell Sirah at this winery, but they sure as hell know how to make it! I LOVE this wine, redolent of vanilla, blue and purple fruits. This P. Syrah, $60, is tempered with a touch (5 percent) of Petit Verdot. The wine has a glorious texture, is soft, chewy, and really lovely. 92 points.

2004 Quixote Petite Syrah
Dark color, dark fruit, this elegant $60 wine has gorgeous balance from start to finish.  The middle palate has some soft notes, but the crescendo is focused and long. Hard to imagine this wine was aged in American oak because it has none of the heavy-handed hallmarks, which so many local winemakers impart to their wines using American oak. The stuff of which dreams are made. 93 points.

6126 Silverado Trail, in the Stags Leap District, Napa Valley. Tel: 707-944-2659.
Monday through Thursday, $25 per person for tour and tasting offered at 10 am, 12.30 pm and 2.30 pm. All visits by appointment only.
Friday, Sat. and Sun., only tastings are offered at the same times as tours/tastings above.
$20 per person for tasting-only, refundable if you buy wine.
Tasting sessions last about 45 minutes. Tasting-only visits are by appointment only.

Three Best Wines of 2008. So Far.

We open dozens of wines a week; some for review, which are supplied by wineries, and never fewer than seven to 10 bottles each week, which I have personally bought for our cellar.

I believe that almost all reds profit from 4 to 8 years of cellaring; it calms the nerve of the wine, brings balance to the eventual tasting, and introduces mature flavors.

At the current rate, we’ve probably opened and tasted 25 cases of wine this year.

Despite this volume of wine opened to the halfway mark of 2008, only three bottles jumped out at me, tweaked my nose, painted my palate and screamed, “Pay attention, I am a Perfect wine.”

Drum roll please… the three best wines to the half-year point stand out like giants at a dwarf convention. The winners at the half-year are, in alphabetical order:

2006 Aterberry Maresh Pinot Noir, White Rose Vineyard.
I could write a sonnet, a book, an encyclopedia about my love for this extravagant, balanced, elegant, mature, brilliant Pinot Noir from the Willamette Valley in Oregon. I learned about this wine at The Tasting Room, in Carleton, OR, during a May visit. I have opened many bottles in my home and every one gets a forehead-slapping, “I can’t believe how good this wine is” remark from Napa Valley winemakers, visitors, friends, and knowledgeable sommeliers for whom I pour it.
Available at The Tasting Room, Carleton, OR, at 503-852-6733.
Or speak with the young, talented winemaker Jim Arterberry Maresh, at 503-434-7689.

1997 Beringer Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon.
I have long respected Ed Sbragia’s work as wine director at Beringer and thought that his best-ever achievement (of many brilliant achievements) was his 2001 Beringer Private Reserve Cabernet.
But the 1997 vintage, which we opened this week for out-of-town visitors from Canada and England, was, to my mind, perhaps the single most compelling wine of Ed’s that I have ever tasted and a top-tier winner so far this year; it is rich, rich, rich (did I forget to say rich?) in complexity, flavor, and texture.
To be blunt: it is a textbook-perfect wine at this age and stage of evolution.
You may have read reports in Wine Spectator that the 1997 Napa Valley Cabs are beyond their prime, dried up, finished, kaput. Forget that nonsense. I have opened more than a dozen different 1997 Napa Valley Cabs this year from many different producers and they have been spectacular. In essence, don’t believe what you read, unless, of course, you read it here.
But not a one of the dozen or so 1997 Napa Valley Cabs, which we opened this year, stroked my palate the way Ed’s 1997 Beringer Private Reserve Cab did. A 100-pointer any way you look at it.
The 1997 Beringer Private Reserve Cabernet is occasionally available at www.winebid.com.

2001 Vieux Donjon, Chateauneuf du Pape
The only wine in my life of which I have drunk an entire case and rated every single bottle of the case a near-perfect wine was the 1990 Vieux Donjon. I LOVED THAT CASE.
I was apparently justified in my thinking about the 1990 Vieux Donjon; in a recent issue of Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate, he quoted sommelier Doug Mohr of Vidalia restaurant, in Washington D.C., who marveled that “the greatest wine he had ever tasted was the 1990 Vieux Donjon Chateauneuf du Pape.”
Gentlemen of the jury, I rest my case.
For dinner this week, to complement Carol’s perfectly prepared pappardelle with veal ragout (a variation of a Mario Batali recipe, only she did it better!), I opened the 2001 Vieux Donjon, which offered a near-duplicate experience of the 1990 vintage. Here was a wine of exceptional length, extraordinary quality. This is a perfect wine, a brilliant wine, elegant, rich, balanced. A 100-pointer. There was nothing missing, no flaws, only gemstone brilliance, bright mature fruit, terroir, minerality, and a finish that Burgundian producers would kill to have.
The 2001 Vieux Donjon is long gone from retailer shelves, but look for the 2005 and 2006 vintages, which are helluva good. This is a wine that will improve with age; I like to drink my CDPs (Chateauneufs-du-Pape) with not less than seven or eight years on them.

Silenus: Once a wine sot… now a hot wine spot!

 
If you’re down a quart on wine mythology, Silenus was the teacher and companion of Dionysus, the God of Wine. According to legend, Silenus had a serious drinking problem; he consumed so much wine that he couldn’t stand, and had, in fact, to be carted around on a donkey. In other words, an early day rock star.

Today, Silenus Vintners is one of the newest, sweetest, custom-crush facilities in Napa Valley, offering 18 small wineries a place to make their hedonistic blends as well as serve them to the public.

Silenus Vintners, located on the northern fringe of Napa town, operates a tasting room seven days a week, 10 to 4 pm, where visitors, on a by-appointment basis, can taste a dozen different wines, all handcrafted in small batches at the facility.

I like a lot about Silenus Vintners, including owner Bob Williamson and his dedicated wine team, which includes Scott Turnnidge, who runs the tasting room, and Brian Graham, winemaker for Williamson’s own label, Ideology.

If you are a resident of Napa Valley, you have likely driven by this winery numerous times without knowing that things have changed in the place previously called Koves-Newlan. Silenus Vintners is on Solano Ave., immediately south of Darm’s Lane, in the Oak Knoll District appellation.

If you are a visitor, first-timer or not, you might think about making an appointment to visit and taste through the wines made on this site. Some of them are spectacular and all of them represent significant value, of which wine drinkers can’t have too much in these tense economic times.

Silenus Vintners owner Bob Williamson

“In a way, we’re a mini-Napa Valley Wine Co.,” says owner Bob Williamson, explaining that his custom-crush facility operates like the big custom-crusher in the valley in Oakville, about nine miles north of Silenus Vintners.“

”And by mini, I mean teeny-tiny, mini-mini,” adds Williamson.

In total, clients at this facility collectively produce about 30,000 cases of wine annually, with the average production of any one label in the 300- to 400-case range.

You may recognize some of the brands produced and offered in the tasting room. I sold Brookdale and Ilsley Cabernets on my former website, ilovenapa.com, in 2003. These two brands are now produced, blended and bottled at Silenus Vintners, and they are as good now as they were then – compelling wines at very fair prices. I am extremely fond of these wines and their producers. Five years later, they are still making first-class, heads-up, must-have wines.

My wine buddy, Rob Fanucci, whom I help make Charter Oak Zinfandel and Charter Oak Petite Sirah, is moving production to Silenus Vintners for this coming harvest. Charter Oak will be the 18th winery to join this small-lot production house, supplying the only Napa Valley Zinfandel in the tasting room.

“I don’t think we can accommodate any more winemakers or labels,” says Williamson, aiming to cap enrolment at his facility. Williamson, who was formerly a land developer in Half Moon Bay, knows about building big, but he also knows when to stop building. And in the wine business, it appears to be now.

Scott Turnnidge fills the large tasting room at Silenus Vintners with warmth and knowledge, both which he has by the barrelful.

In the tasting room, Scott Turnnidge, part-Scot, part-Englishman, part-Irishman, is an affable host. He pours wines with gusto and knowledge and fills the room with welcoming laughter. It’s evident, too, that he knows way more about wine than he does about spelling; just ask to see the misspelled tattoo on his left forearm. Blimey!

Brian Graham, winemaker of Ideology, the Blondie Chardonnays and also his own wines under the Ramian and “Jack” labels.

I asked Brian Graham, who is Bob Williamson’s winemaker and who also produces a wine for himself called Ramian, about his winemaking philosophy.

“I believe in hands-off winemaking. Conduct your due diligence in the vineyard and at harvest, then let the wine speak for itself in barrel. I believe in extended barrel aging to soften tannins,” explains Graham.

I participated in a mini-tasting in the elegant Silenus Vintners’ tasting room and have these highlights to share:

2007 Robert Williamson Family Blondie Chardonnay and
2006 Robert Williamson Family Blondie Gone Wild Chardonnay.
Williamson has created a pair of wines to introduce tasting room visitors to the winemaking practice called malolactic fermentation. This is a common practice in which some white wines, like Chardonnay, may be put through a secondary fermentation, converting bright malic acid into buttery lactic acid, which is rich in dairy, and often butterscotch, notes.

I preferred the 2007 non-malo’d Chardonnay. It has a bright, appealing taste and would be ideal with seafood. It retails for $29. I scored it 89 points.
The 2006 Blondie, fermented with wild yeasts, is less exciting, doesn’t have a memorable taste profile, or anything to make it stand out in a crowd of Chards. $35. I scored it 89 points.

The reds are coming

2006 Ideology Cabernet Sauvignon, Oak Knoll District.
Williamson also produces a Cabernet, which is packaged to look like a $75 wine, and nearly drinks like one, too, but which only costs $36. One of the best Cabernet values in the Napa Valley, this is a gorgeous wine with rich, almost opulent, tannins and striking ripe red fruit flavors. 91 points

2005 Ramian Chapter 5.
I love Brian Graham’s sense of humor, as well as his sense of winemaking. His own label, Ramian, is organized chronologically. “Wine is like a story – every vintage is a different chapter,” he likes to say. Hence, this vintage is Chapter 5, his fifth vintage. Scott Turnnidge, in the tasting room, likes to joke – “What’s he going to call his eleventh vintage? Chapter 11?”
We’ll worry about that vintage when we come to it. For now, I’ll plead the Fifth; it is a lovely wine, harmonious, balanced, totally approachable but with evident age-ability. There is a sweet middle palate and a lively floral finish. The wine is 91 percent Cab, with odd bits of Merlot, Cab Franc and Malbec thrown in for good measure. And good taste. 92 points. $54.

 

2004 Brookdale Cabernet Sauvignon.
I have a soft spot for this wine, having sold it on my former website in the early 2000s. It was a winner then and is still a winner today. Big hugs to Kristi Seitz, who continues to manage this label so well after the tragic death of her husband, Mike, whom we all admired. This is a gorgeous, approachable wine filled with raspberries and at the core, a discernible coffee, cocoa note. This is a put-me-down-for-a-case wine, especially given the price, $45. An easy 92 point wine.

2004 Ilslsey Cabernet Sauvignon, Stags Leap District.
What a great story, what a great wine! Brothers David and Ernie make this sensational wine in Stag’s Leap District. Their property abuts Shafer; some 90 percent of the fruit they grow actually is sold to Shafer for its Hillside Select label. It gets even better: brother David is the vineyard manager for Shafer! So who knows better what to do with the magnificent fruit they grow, much of which winds up in one of the most compelling, perfectly made wines in America, Shafer Hillside Select? (That was a trick question. The answer is NO ONE!)
So here’s your chance to have a wine that is only infinitesimally less in texture and length than the $225 Shafer Hillside Select Cabernet… for $55 a bottle! You want great wine and great value? This is it. 94 points.

2004 Gridley Cabernet Franc.
How is it that I haven’t seen or tasted this stunning wine before? Andy and wife Susan Gridley crush Cab Franc here that was grown on a parcel between St. Helena and Calistoga. The wine has a rich, deep smoky scent, there’s almost “blue” on the nose. On the palate, there are bright plum flavors, dark rich ripe fruits; exceptional extraction and deep flavor penetration. Fewer than 300 cases. Hurry, hurry. $45. 91 points.

No wine story is complete without a shot of the most important, influential member of the team and in the case of Silenus Vintners, it’s 11-year-old Hannah, who is as sweet-as-a-Sauternes.

If you’re visiting Napa Valley and hire a limo to take you around to different wineries, just be careful how you pronounce your intended destination. With a Midwestern accent, or deep southern drawl, your driver may hear you say “Salinas,” when you tell him to head to Silenus. In which case, you’ll find yourself traveling 146 miles south to Salinas, the lettuce capital of America and the hometown of one of America’s best-ever writers, John Steinbeck!

Silenus (and NOT Salinas!) Vintners is located at 5225 Solano Ave., Napa.
By appointment, seven days a week, 10 to 4 pm. 707-299-3930.

California may be on fire – but thankfully, the 05 Rutherford Cabs are not!

Winewriters gathered at Rubicon today to attend the annual Rutherford Dust Society tasting.

More than 350 wild fires are burning out of control in California this month, but we still find things to distract ourselves.

Take the 05 vintage of Rutherford Cabernet, for example, revealed today at the annual Rutherford Dust Society Tasting, a media/trade event held at Rubicon (formerly Niebaum-Coppola Estate Winery), hosted by local growers and wine makers.

“For the most part, the 05 Cabs are classically structured, and tightly focused,” says Quintessa winemaker Charles Thomas.

These are not the hot, fruit bombs that Napa Valley wines were starting to become, virtual parodies of Australian Shiraz, with high levels of extraction, high levels of alcohol, enough wood to build a barn.

 “The 05 Cabs are tightly wound and have really desirable structure. They remind me of the 92, 94 and 03 Cabs,” summarizes Garen Staglin of Staglin Family Vineyards.

In short, the 05 Cabernet Sauvignons, tasted blind today, and all from the AVA (American Viticultural Area) of Rutherford are well made, well structured wines. They are not opulent, not fleshy, like their 04 counterparts tasted at this event last year. The 05s are tighter, less flashy, less powerful. Some had an herbaceous quality, some had green olive top notes, others exhibited salty, black licorice flavors.

Hey! It’s a tough job – but someone has to taste all these wines so that YOU will know what to single out for your cellar!

Generally, this is one of my favorite wine-tasting events of the valley, giving me a chance to taste a large collection of local wines in one sitting. Unlike my colleagues who attend, I choose to taste blind, fearing that labels might influence my judgment, if I saw them.

Of 27 wines tasted blind, I rated six with 91 or better points (out of 100). The least expensive of these top-tier wines retails for $45 and at the upper end there is one which retails for $225.

One thing I usually find at this annual tasting is that price is not always a perfect indicator of quality. Almost every year, I blindly identify a $40-$50 wine that scores as many points as a triple-digit-dollar wine. And this year was no exception.

Specifically: I scored the 2005 Rutherford Grove Estate Cabernet 91 points, which is exactly what I scored the 2005 Peju Rutherford H.B. Vineyard Cabernet. Rutherford Grove costs $45, Peju retails for $225.

One of my favorite sommeliers in the Bay-area, Christie Dufault, who is wine director at the precise and elegant neighborhood restaurant Quince, in San Francisco, was invited to today’s testing. She had a sweet way of referring to the wines of Rutherford, which is where I happen to live.

Christie Dufault, wine director, Quince restaurant, San Francisco

“I always think of Rutherford as the aristocracy of Napa Valley wines. I have tasted and enjoyed them for 15 years. They are generally restrained wines with an evident texture – which other appellations in Napa Valley just don’t achieve.”

Thanks for the good word, Christie!

For the record, lest readers think Rutherford is some HUGE appellation, here’s the skinny: Rutherford, which lies at the epicenter of Napa Valley, has a reputation that far exceeds its geographic footprint.

Rutherford, only six square miles in size and planted with barely 3,300 acres of vines, produces less than one-quarter-of-one-percent (that’s .25 percent!) of all the wine produced in America. By comparison, Disney World in Orlando, FLA, at 47 acres, is nearly eight times bigger!

Speaking about the herbaceous flavors in the 05 Rutherford Cabs, Joel Aiken, director of winemaking at Beaulieu Vineyard, says, “I think the Cabernets from Rutherford – in a classic vintage – should show some restrained herbaceous character – or what we call ‘Rutherford Dust.’ If you have too many herb flavors, you taste green bell peppers, which is one extreme; at the other end, without some restrained herb notes, all you have are plump fruit flavors. The essence of a Rutherford Cabernet is a subtle, restrained herbaceous note between these two extremes.”

To my way of thinking, many of the wines poured today exhibited too many of these “herbaceous notes.” I rated some of the wines in the 85 to 89 point range, owing to over-the-top, herbed notes. Where’s the subtlety in that?

“It was critical to watch your crop in 2005,” recalls Charles Thomas of Quintessa. “You had to actively manage your crop. We had a lot of rain in the spring, which caused vines to grow rapidly. If you didn’t cut back this vigor, you were left with herbaceous wines,” he concludes, which goes a long way to explaining why I found so many “green,” or “herbaceous” wines in today’s tasting.

The top-scoring wines in the blind tasting

2005 Quintessa. Another stellar performance from this winery, which produced one of my Top Favorite Rutherford Cabs at last year’s blind tasting of 2004 wines. A tightly structured Cab, which I labeled blindly, “a typical Rutherford Cabernet on the nose and on the palate. An extremely well structured wine with a bulls-eye focus.” 93 points. $135.

2005 Scarecrow. A recent newcomer to the wine scene, Scarecrow is grown on a parcel of 60+-year-old vines, which are adjacent to Rubicon, formerly known as the J.J. Cohn plot.
Cohn, a movie mogul, had a significant role in the production of The Wizard of Oz. Hence the brand positioning for the vines planted on his estate.
The winemaker today is Celia Masyczek, who is one of my favorite winemakers in Napa Valley. I still treasure the 1996 Staglin Family Vineyards Cabernet, which she crafted. I love almost everything she breathes life in to and it is not a coincidence that I ranked her wine blindly, out of 27, so highly. It’s just further proof that her wines speak to me and that she is the IT girl when it comes to making Classic Rutherford Cabs. This one has a richness of texture not evident in many of the wines tasted today, a richness of flavor, splendid elevated fruit flavors, many of them ripe, black compelling fruits. 93 points. $100.

2005 Rubicon Estate. Wow, they’ve crafted another gorgeous wine here, just as they did in 2004. Good rich, ripe fruit, really well structured, a solid wine, an elegant wine. Has a superb profile, missing in many of today’s offerings; this one has an evident attack, a great middle palate and a superb finish. According to the tasting notes, will be released in September. 92 points. $145.

2005 Beaulieu Vineyard, Georges de La Tour Private Reserve. There’s lots of this stunning wine to go around, 12,600 cases, in fact. The name suggests it might be more rare than it is, but the good news is, there is a sufficiency of supply to satisfy the masses. A really great effort by Joel Aiken and his wine team, easily putting him back in the driver’s seat of one of the appellation’s top wines. Really tasty, ripe, pure fruit. Rich in texture, too. I loved the black fruit scents, the olives that were suggested in the middle palate and the ripe fruits on the finish. Trends to blackcurrant in overall taste impression, which is exactly what you want your Cab to present. Not vanilla, not wood, not cherry pie. And none of that is present here – just honest, well made, blackcurrant-oriented Cabernet. Will be released in September. 91 points. $115.

2005 Peju Rutherford H.B. Vineyard Cabernet. Lots of ripe red fruits on the nose, suggesting a pleasurable experience will follow. And it does. Lovely ripe fruit on the early palate, a lovely lively profile follows and then the total package goes into overdrive after you swallow. Sounds like a racing car. Costs like one, too. To be released in February, 2009. Only 358 cases made. 91 points. $225.

2005 William Harrison Rutherford Red. First time I recall tasting William Harrison’s wine at this annual event. It certainly wasn’t present last year. In the blind tasting, I found this a delicious wine with a tight nose, suggesting ripe black fruit. On the palate, very elegant, suitably supple, not a word I used with many of the wines in today’s tasting. A solid performance. 91 points, $80.

2005 Rutherford Grove Estate Cabernet. Blackcurrants and Bordeaux scents waft from the glass, mixed with a bit too much vanilla. But on the palate, the wine jumps into line with a harmony of fruit flavors, blackcurrant, ripe red fruits, a hint of cedar, and the tell-tale note scribbled into the margin of my pad: “very appealing.” First time I recall seeing this wine in the annual tasting. The release date has not been determined. 91 points. Hold on to your hats – only $45.

Napaman.com readers interested in learning more about Rutherford wines, or who wish to get on the appellation's mailing list should contact infor@rutherforddust.org.

This map is available for purchase through the Rutherford Dust Society; contact info@rutherforddust.org

Joseph Perrulli Is Up to his Neck in Glassware!

Not just any glassware, mind you; stemless, plastic, shatterproof, recyclable, elegantly shaped, thin-walled and totally transparent. Oh, and ideal for wine.

The glasses are called Govino, which Joseph, a local St. Helena resident, designed and brought to market this year with financial support from LA partner Boyd Willat, himself a brainiac entrepreneur.

And unlike Govino glassware, which won’t shatter, even if you stand on it, the plastic glasses are a smash hit, breaking all sales expectations.

Boyd Willat and Joseph Perrulli, the inventors of Govino. Boyd’s earlier claims to fame: he invented the daily planner called Day Runner, as well as the easy-to-hold Sensa Pen.

“I always thought of myself as a budding inventor,” says Joseph, now 47, who tried all through the 1990s to bring any number of whacko ideas to market, including a hands-free dog leash.

“I thought I might want to be a stunt driver, or an actor, in Hollywood,” says Joseph who, instead, in 1998, got the bright idea that what the world needed was a better plastic wine glass.

He says that he found those cheap, poolside, snap-on stem, plastic glasses, with lips as thick as Joan Rivers’, totally offensive. “I asked myself, ‘Why couldn’t I make a decent glass out of plastic that looks and feels like a Riedel glass?’”

Joseph and Boyd spent nine years understanding why no one had broken the (injection) mold of poorly designed, poorly manufactured plastic glassware. It was a hard act to pull off.

“We traveled to four continents and visited a dozen plastic manufacturers to find one who could make Govino out of PETG,” says Joseph, summarizing their nine-year odyssey.

In the end, they found a firm, which could make their curved, easy-to-hold glass out of glycol-modified, polyethylene terephthalate.

If that’s a mouthful, you can pretend that you know more than the guy sitting on the barstool next to you; if he’s drinking out of a Govino, tell him he’s drinking out of a new-age plastic called PETG, appreciated for its stiffness, toughness and impact strength.

Better yet, tell the dude on the barstool that his Govino contains no BPA, which, you tell him, is the short form for “Bisphenol A,” which Canada has banned from bottles, including baby bottles, and which is under review by agencies here in the US.

In the last short while, Bisphenol A has become controversial because it is believed to mimic estrogen when consumed in sufficient quantities and thus could induce human hormonal responses. Or so they say.

"We are ready for your close-up, profile shot, Mr. Govino." Notice the indented ridge for your finger, which helps you hold the bulbous, sensually curved Govino glass. Govino looks like it's made of glass, and drinks like it too, but, in fact, it's p-l-a-s-t-i-c!

About the actual glass: I know this sounds stupid, but Joseph and Boyd have actually designed a plastic glass that is stunning, sensual and sexy. These are not terms usually found in the same sentence as “plastic.”

When one picks up a Govino plastic glass, though, there is a certain visual and tactile richness that makes the wine being sipped more compelling than had it been poured into, and sipped from, a regular wine glass.

The one element of use that needs attention is how to wash Govino glasses. They appear to make it through the wash cycle of just about any home dishwasher, but Joseph recommends pulling them out before the drying cycle begins.

In my commercial Hobart glass washer, which heats to 190 F for a 100 percent bacterial kill without soap, I had mixed results with Govino glassware. One load washed and rinsed perfectly, but one load, which hit the highest heat, melted, resembling glassware that might have been designed by Salvador Dali.

Let’s face it: “Melting Govino Glassware” is not ever going to be a collectible the way Dali’s “Melting Clocks” (The Persistence of Memory) has become. So don’t fool yourself about the investment opportunity if you overheat yours the way I did mine.

Joseph’s wonderdog, Miles, has absolutely NOTHING to do with this story, but napaman.com believes that Dogs Make the World a Better Place to Live and so whenever anyone profiled in this space has a Wonderdog, the pooch’s photo is included!

To date, sales of Govino have been brisk, particularly in the Bay area. Joseph says he is beholden to local wineries and retailers in Napa Valley for help in establishing his brand.

“Frog’s Leap started the ball rolling, serving wines at a Leap Year party in Govino glasses,” says Joseph.

“Sunshine Foods Market, in St. Helena, was our earliest retail supporter, followed closely by Leslie Rudd, who put them in his Napa Valley Dean & DeLuca and Oakville Grocery locations,” Joseph adds.

Cindy Pawlcyn became a big fan of Govino and offered one each to 800 guests at her Mustards Grill 25th Birthday Party last week. One of the guests was Christian Moueix of Dominus fame, who took such a liking to Govino that, the next day, he ordered hundreds for his winery.

And that’s how this Govino thing is snowballing; you see ‘em, you touch ‘em, you drink from them and … Presto! You’re a Govino Convert. Who needs Riedel when you’ve got unbreakable, shatterproof, recyclable, SEXY and SENSUAL Govino?

Retailers charge $2 to $3 per Govino glass and Joseph alerts napaman.com readers to be on the lookout for a stemless Govino PETG Champagne flute as well as a Govino PETG decanter. They’re showing up in the marketplace soon. But remember, you read about them here first.

If you are a retailer and want more information about this plastic glass, or if you are a consumer who wants to learn more about this invention, go to www.govinowine.com.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some sexy, shatterproof, see-through drinking to get to…

Happy 25th Birthday, Mustards Grill!

The sign says it all – Sorry, everything is delicious!

Cindy Pawlcyn threw a party last night for 800 friends and her best customers to celebrate the 25 years that she has operated Mustards Grill.

It should have been the other way around; WE should have thrown the party for Cindy, because SHE is the one who has made our lives so rich, so wonderful, so full of taste.

Mustards Grill chef and owner, Cindy Pawlcyn. For the record, the James Beard Award-winning cookbook author also co-created many other Bay-area legendary eateries, including Fog City Diner, Bix, Roti, Tra Vigne, and Buckeye Roadhouse.

I have long argued that Mustards Grill may be “the best neighborhood restaurant in the United States.”

For one thing, it has consistently served perfectly grilled meats and other tasty dishes for 25 years. In the restaurant trade, consistency is the hobgoblin that operators try to wrestle to the ground. Cindy has consistency locked in a full nelson, tied in knots, and has stood victorious over it for 25 years.

Cindy’s pulled pork, for example, is the best example of this classic sandwich on this side of the Ozarks, and maybe the other side, too.

Her hanger steak is, quite simply, the most flavorful and fun steak served in Napa Valley.

And her Mongolian Pork Chop – well, don’t get me started. The sign out front, describing this dish, which has never come off the menu since it was introduced in 1986, says it succinctly: “Almost a Million Sold.”

Those who would disagree with my statement, that “Mustards Grill may be the best neighborhood restaurant in the country,” would probably, at the very least, concur that it is one of our nation’s most important restaurants, in the same way that Alice Waters’ Chez Panisse, in Berkeley, CA, is critical in a gastro-cultural sort of way.

Alice is all about organic fare, sustainable gardening, know-thy-supplier and such; Cindy supports many of the same ideals and has mastered, if not created, what has become known as the California Grill Kitchen. As far as I am concerned, Cindy put California grill cookery on our country’s culinary map.

So last night, to celebrate the 9,082 days that she has opened her doors (and that’s a lot of swinging action on those doors…), thrown hard wood onto the house smoker, and brought smiles to many of us, Cindy Pawlcyn threw a humdinger of a party. In spirit, it was warmer than a late harvest, Indian summer.

Some 38 local wineries poured their wines at outdoor stations set up in the organic garden beside the restaurant. (These gardens produce about 20 percent of all the herbs, salad greens and vegetables consumed at the restaurant.)

Talk about a “garden party!” Cindy’s 25th birthday bash was thrown in the organic garden adjacent the restaurant. Amid haricots verts and beds of lush green herbs, guests sipped killer reds, sparkling whites and quaffed legendary ales.

At other stations, Cindy’s talented cooks and waitstaff served highlights from her 25-year menu; there were sliders (miniature burgers in tiny buns), barbequed pork served with Cindy’s compelling OOOEEE! sauce, succulent baby back ribs and XXL-sized Hog Island oysters.

The wine highlight was a 27-year-old Robert Mondavi Reserve, brought to the party by Michael Oullette, who had once been a general manager at Mustards and who left to start up his fun-named Zinfandel called Blockheadia.

Wineman and former Mustards G.M., Michael Oullette, pours the 1981 Mondavi Reserve Cab, which he brought to the party. Only in Napa Valley does BYOB mean Bring Your Own Bomb – a six-liter bottle!

“I wanted to celebrate the memory of Bob Mondavi (who died several weeks ago), so I brought this bottle, which Bob had given me in 1995,” explained Michael. And what a bottle! Six liters of ethereal juice! The 1981 wine tasted fresh, was well fruited, and wasn’t pale at the rim, or tired. Thanks for sharing, Michael! What a pity Bob wasn’t on hand for the event; he would have had such a good time, having had so many wonderful dinners and wines at Mustards Grill.

As good a customer as Bob may have been, Carol and I probably top his attendance record at Mustards. Over 25 years, I have personally dined here more than 500 times. I think the “odometer” on the hostess’ computer program, which keeps track of guest’s visits, has gone around several times with my reservations, reaching a number that computer programmers never figured anyone at Mustards Grill would reach. It’s a bit like an old Mercedes hitting the 1 million mile mark, causing the odometer to rotate through to 000,001 and start counting miles from scratch, all over again.

Behind every successful man, they say, is a successful woman. The reverse appears to be true at Mustards and at Cindy’s two other Napa Valley properties, Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen and Go Fish. At these establishments, very capable, very talented and very dedicated, men run the kitchen under Cindy’s direction.

Erasto Jacinto and his brother Pablo, the executive chefs of Mustards Grill and Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen respectively. They started as dish washers with Cindy and worked their way up to run the kitchens of the two restaurants.

Erasto Jacinto started as a dish washer at Mustards in 1986 and worked his way up to become head chef; his brother, Pablo, took the same route and wound up head chef at Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen. Three of the most talented chefs in the country help keep Cindy’s fish restaurant, Go Fish, in St. Helena, on even keel, too. In this group I include Sean Knight, Victor Scargle and Ken Tominaga.

Cindy, Emiko Tominaga, wife of Ken Tominaga who is Cindy’s partner in the fish restaurant Go Fish, and Chaco, the oatmeal-colored miniature Poodle.

Cindy had a radiance about her last night that was nearly palpable. She is recently newly married, her three restaurants are full most nights, and she has reached an age and level of achievement that enable her to look back and highlight her best creations. Any one of these reasons would have given Cindy cause to be radiant, but there might also have been this element at work: she was surrounded by 1,200 of her closest friends, allies, supporters and co-workers and they were on hand to celebrate HER. And by my reasoning, they did her proud.

If you have never eaten at Mustards Grill – you must do so at least once in a lifetime. If, on the other hand, you are a regular, you have a long way to go to catch up to me for most memorable meals enjoyed here; I stopped counting at 500 visits. But hope springs eternal and you can always try… call 707-944-2424 for a reservation.

Mustards Grill is at 7399 St. Helena Highway, north of Madison St., the main road off the highway into Yountville.

Oregon Pinot Noir -- Proof that the Best Things in Life are NOT Free!

Just returned from a week's travel in Portland, OR, and nearby Willamette Valley, home of my favorite North American Pinot Noirs. 

If there is a Ground Zero for Willamette Valley Pinot Noir, it is the tiny hamlet of Carlton, at the intersection of two country roads that meet and then go off in divergent directions to never meet again.

It doesn't look like Ground Zero of anything... but it's really the epicenter of fine Oregon Pinot Noir, a converted 1910 bank, home of the Tasting Room, in Carlton, OR.

Here you will find the definitive Pinot Noir outpost, a former rural bank, now called the Tasting Room, which is owned and managed by renegade shopkeeper-turned-winemaker Jay McDonald. The bank’s vault, protected by a huge steel door, houses a different kind of treasure than it once held – verticals of some of the best Pinot Noir made in America.

On my last visit to the Portland area (the Willamette Valley is a 45-minute drive from town) I bought many mixed cases of killer Pinot Noir on Jay’s recommendations. And once I got them home, every one of the wines, opened over the past few years, has been a stellar drinking experience.

On my visit last week, Jay was running out for a wine event, so he put me in the very capable hands of Christie Shertzer, who poured a series of astounding 2005 and 2006 Willamette Valley Pinots. A tasting flight here is $25.

Christie Shertzer pours EIEIO and other small production wines at The Tasting Room, in Carlton, OR.

Of all the wines Christie poured, the wine I repeatedly asked to retaste, thought about for days afterward, and of which I bought a case was the 2006 Arterberry Maresh, Dundee Hills Pinot Noir, White Rose Vineyard.

Don’t ask me how the locals get away with pronouncing Maresh as “Marsh,” but they do. Kind of like the way Newfoundlanders pronounce words with their own spin. On paper, in my tasting notes, I pronounced this mispronounced Pinot a serious 95-point wine.

Call it “Mar-esh” and they’ll know you’re a tourist! Ask Christie for Arteberry “Marsh” (as in harsh) and she’ll think you’re a local – might even give you a second sip!

My first tipple of Arteberry Maresh came from a bottle that had been opened 24 hours. This gave me an idea of how perfectly structured and balanced this wine is; it was a step-up from everything else I tasted that day, a wine of uncanny balance, elegance, power, and weight. The wine, poured from a different, just-opened bottle, exhibited aromas of Royal Anne and Bing cherries and offered a spectrum of classic, textbook Pinot flavors. You know the litany – cherries, dark ripe fruit, Oriental spices. All that jazz.

I also like Jay McDonald’s playfully named, but classically made, Pinot Noirs, which bear his EIEIO label. Get it? He’s a McDonald and lives on a farm.

Jay has acquired fruit from a number of regional grape growers and fashioned some memorably good own-label wines, available only at The Tasting Room, in Carlton, and to mail-list members.

I really liked Jay’s 2006 EIEIO Blackburn Reserve from the Dundee Hills, a gorgeous wine with a lovely, fruited nose, and a surprisingly huge, stuffed, full-bodied finish. 93 points.

If you can’t make it to Carlton, the least you can do to satisfy that gaping hole at the center of your cellar – slotted for near-perfect Pinot Noir – is to contact The Tasting Room and get on the mailing list, which you can reach through the website. The address says it all: www.pinot-noir.com.

Where else to stop for wine in the Willamette Valley

The Willamette Valley is Oregon’s coolest wine appellation, producing ethereal Pinot Noir. The Willamette River runs through the valley south to north and the center of the wine region is about 50 miles east of the Pacific Ocean, providing a subtle, but important, marine air influence.

Domaine Serene, from a distance.

In Willamette wine country, two of my all-time favorite winery pit stops are at Domaine Serene and Archery Summit, which happen to be near-neighbors and from whom I have been buying Members Only wines for close to a decade. To not be on these mailing lists is not only criminal, it may also be insane, especially if you think of yourself as a true Pinotphile.

For me, stopping at these nearly adjacent wineries is like going to Wine Mecca and I could not legitimately be within 300 miles of Portland without planning a detour to these wineries. But be forewarned: call the wineries in advance of your visit because tasting rooms here are NOT open seven days a week, 10-5 pm, as they are in Napa Valley. For one thing, they don’t have the same volume of tourists to support such commerce. This, in fact, is part of the charm of visiting the Willamette Valley – you won’t be fighting traffic, or hoards of other wine geeks.

 

At Domaine Serene, put yourself in the hands of tasting room manager Tara Shepersky and taste through a flight of wines. My top favorite was the 2005 Domaine Serene Pinot Noir, Two Barns Vineyard, which can only be purchased at the winery. This single-vineyard Pinot will leave your tongue clacking for a full minute after you swallow; this is liquid gold, an elixir to put a smile on your face no matter how dull the day (and they get many of them in the Pacific Northwest. I reckon that they had to invent a magic potion like this to help them cope with the rain...)

I scored Two Barns 95 points. It is worthy of being placed in a time capsule to tell future generations of wine-consumers how good we had it in the early 2000s!

Domaine Serene is at 6555 NE Hilltop Lane, Dayton, OR.

Tel: 503-864-4600.

While I wait for my newly purchased Pinot Noirs to arrive from Archery Summit, I content myself with older vintages in the cellar.

 At Archery Summit, my other must-visit winery, A-list membership has its privileges. I love the many times a year that a special bottle is delivered, often not something that can be purchased in retail stores.

On this visit, I tasted two stunning 2005 Pinots – the Archery Summit Renegade Ridge Estate Pinot Noir and the Archery Summit Estate Pinot Noir and scored each of them 94 points.

These are compelling, seriously made, richly structured, classic Pinots that would drive a Burgundy lover insane. Call these two wines the catnip of Pinot Noir… because they are proof that you do not have to spend $350 a bottle for Premier Cru Burgundy to have a breath-taking, gasp-inducing Pinot Noir experience. These are awesome achievements at Archery Summit!

The winery is at 18599 NE Archery Summit Rd., Dayton, OR.

Tel. 800-732-8822.

With respect to Portland

Portland is filled with a thriving coffee culture, lots of heavily tattoo’d young’uns, and one killer bookstore (Powell’s) with several locations. 

Over six days, I ate in seven restaurants, sampled dozens of wines, and tried many local coffee houses. Here are my top-of-mind reflections:

+ Five days in Portland and the nearby Willamette Valley are enough to get an overview of the region on a first visit.

+ I have now stayed at two downtown hotels – the Heathman and the Westin – and can recommend both. At the Westin, on this recent visit, I really liked the accommodation, the helpful and knowledgeable concierge Adam Marland, and the efficient and amiable car valet staff. Would definitely stay here again.

Drink the tap water in Portland and look what happens to you! Actually, he’s a balloon vendor at the small-townish Saturday morning flea market.

+ It’s wonderful to be able to drink the tap water in this town! In most US cities, I feel forced to order bottled water in restaurants because the municipal tap water is so over-chlorinated you could develop black and white prints in it. But the water in Portland is clean, sweet and drinkable. Diners can save $6-12 a meal in this town by not having to buy bottled water. (Spend the savings on a better Pinot Noir – why you came here in the first place!)

+ You save even more at mealtime because there is no state sales tax, no pesky percentage, which creeps onto restaurant tabs, winery purchases, or anything, for that matter. How old-fashioned!

+ At the Peruvian restaurant Andina, in the tony Pearl district, do not miss appetizer dishes, served in a tapas-like format.; they can be ordered in small, medium, or large plates. I loved the Musciame de Atun, which is a plate of cured, thinly sliced tuna loin, served with a drizzle of garlic oil and a guacamole-like criolla, or dip. In fact, our small group ordered a second serving because the first was practically inhaled off the plate.

+ At Andina, also try Pescado “5 Elementos,” a traditional Peruvian seviche, presented with chunks of ono the day of our visit. 

Andina is at 1314 NW Glisan Ave. Tel: 503-228-9535.

+ If I had only three restaurants to visit on my next trip to Portland they would be 1001, Le Pigeon and Blue Hour.

+ At 1001, the maitre d’, Damian, makes sure guests are comfortably seated, while sommelier, Erica Landon, walks guests through her thoughtful, large, and impressive wine list. She is as knowledgeable as she is free of attitude and will happily work with you to pick the best bottle, or two, to complement your food choices. (I keep raving about Oregon’s fabulous Pinot Noir, but while you are here, be sure to try the local Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc and Rieslings. The state produces marvelous whites. Ask Erica to pick her favorites off the wine list.)

+ The food at 1001 is memorable. Do not miss the house-made herbed pappardelle, tossed with fresh peas, threads of tasty pork, liased with Parmesan cheese and a dollop of foie gras. The serving is crowned with a gloriously fresh, sunny-side-up, quail egg.

Restaurant 1001 is located at 1001 NW Couch St., Portland. Tel. 503-226-DINE.

+ Equally as impressive was dinner at Le Pigeon, a quirky, small boite, where sommelier Andrew Fortgang has assembled a kickass wine list. Andrew and his wife said goodbye to New York, where he was THE Wine Guy at Craft restaurant, and moved lock, stock and wine barrel to Portland for a simpler way of life. Lucky are the locals who have this fine restaurant – and Andrew’s phenomenal wines -- in their neighborhood.

Dessert profiteroles filled with foie gras, drizzled with caramel sauce, served at Le Pigeon.

+ The best entrée at Le Pigeon was a richly sauced, beefy Bourguignon made with chunky beef cheeks. Desserts, too, can be worthy of Hall of Fame status. My favorite was the weird-sounding “Profiteroles, made with foie gras, served with a caramel sauce!” As weird as they sound – they were that awesome!

Le Pigeon, 738 East Burnside, Portland. Tel. 503-546-8796.

+ “Blue hour” in French literature refers to a time of day inwhich  one is filled with heightened emotion. In Portland, the term refers to an 8-year-old restaurant, considered by many residents to be one of the top three dining rooms in their city.

+ As good as the food is here, the wine service is also to be commended. Ask sommelier Gaironn (rhymes with Erin) Poole to match your dining selection with her favorite regional wines. You will be pleasantly surprised that you can drink so well for so little.

Blue Hour is at 250 NW 13^th Avenue, Portland. Tel. 503-226-3394.

Coffee time!
Portland, like Seattle, has a rich, thriving, exhilarating coffee house culture. Several new kids on the block are trying to give Peet’s and Starbucks a run for their money. These include Caffe Umbria (which started in Seattle and now has a satellite location in Portland) and Stumptown, which makes serious espresso seriously good.

 

Interior of Caffe Umbria. The small, round, stand-up tables make you feel you are in Italy. So do the espresso and food options.

+ While in Portland, check out Caffe Umbria, in the Pearl district. It's as close to a real Italian cafe as
you're going to find in the Pacific Northwest.

 

I am still thinking about the very thin grilled panini I enjoyed for breakfast with a double-shot cappuccino;
the heated sandwich was loaded with smoky ham and melted Mozzarella, and served with olives – at 9 in the morning! Just as they do in Italia.

 

Stumptown coffee has four locations in Portland; my favorite is the location adjacent to the Ace Hotel on Stark St.

One of the habits, which I looked forward to daily, was to walk five blocks from the Westin to the Stumptown location adjacent to the Ace Hotel. I’d buy a croissant, or other morning pastry, order a double-shot cappuccino, or macchiato, and then walk my morning fix into the lobby of the Ace, where there are papers, books and many visitors with whom one can engage in conversation.

Portland, in general, is still one of those American cities where the locals are pleasant, easy to engage in conversation, and where they're truly concerned that you, as a visitor, are having a good time in their town.
Which makes a visit here as memorable as the wine and food.

An Icon is Dead. But Even More Upsetting, so is My Friend.

You will have read it elsewhere first, so the news on this screen is not so dramatic, yet it is still so fresh in my mind.

Robert Mondavi, known as Bob to his friends, has died today at the age of 94.

If it weren’t for Bob, I wouldn’t live in Napa Valley and you wouldn’t be reading this.

He built this...

… but he did so much more. Bob Mondavi influenced EVERYONE in Napa Valley wine circles and is the Dean Emeritus of Wine in Napa Valley, if not America.

Bob called in 1980, urging me to come report on a new promotion, The Great Chefs of France Cooking School. He wanted to prove that American wines were every bit as good as classic French wines from Bordeaux and Burgundy and that his Mondavi wines paired exceptionally well with great food.

I was then Food Editor and Restaurant Critic of the largest newspaper in Canada (The Toronto Star, one of the five largest daily circ papers in North America), Bob stated his intention – that he wanted to convince food writers like me that his wines were on par with the Great Wines of France.

Exactly 28 years ago this very week, I flew to Napa Valley to cover the cooking classes of Jean Troisgros, whose family ran – and still runs – what is considered by many the single greatest restaurant in the world (Restaurant Troisgros, in Roanne, France).

We cooked with Jean for three days in Oakville, at the epicenter of Napa Valley and late into the night, I sat with Bob and Jean in the winery’s Vintage Room, swirling and sipping the greatest Bordeaux and best young Burgundies and Bob put his own Cabs and Pinot Noirs up for comparison.

Jean and I were incredibly impressed at the quality of Bob’s wines and I was so overwhelmed with the three-day writing assignment that I called home and told my wife that “one day we are moving here to Napa Valley.”

The place, the people – and particularly Bob Mondavi – had shook me to the core; I was not a greenie off the boat, struck by big lights or celebrity. I had traveled the world, been a foreign correspondent for years in Africa, had enjoyed dinners at the homes of world leaders and had spent time with some of the world’s top chefs, researching and writing profiles for various media.

No, what Bob introduced me to was a lifestyle, a persistence for “excellence,” and Napa Valley resonated within me in a way that no other place had ever done before, or since.

It took me 17 years to make the move to Napa Valley happen; we first had to get our kids to and through college but when the coast was clear, we upped and moved and became permanent fixtures of Napa Valley in 1997.

And I owe my life today to Bob and his dedicated and wonderful wife Margrit Biever Mondavi, who invited me to this valley, who became friends over the years that we have lived here, and who showed America how wine could become an instrumental part of the dinner table. And how good wine could be made in this nation.

Tonight, the wine industry mourns a fallen leader, a giant, an icon. But I mourn the loss of a friend and mentor.

My first glass at dinner tonight will be raised in Bob’s memory. He showed me – he showed us all – a way to live our lives; to not give in, to follow one’s passions and do it kindly and with humility.

I already miss you, Bob. Big time.

Honk if you love Zinfandel & Art!

I love his wine.

I love her art.

Art and wine merged – on a double magnum of America’s best Zinfandel!

“And now, for the first time ever, they are available together!”

Sounds a bit cheesy, like an infomercial offering two things merged, which previously had only ever been available separately.

But trust me, this pairing of wine and art is original. And what a stunning gift it makes.


To honor the sounds of Joni Mitchell, Layla Fanucci etched and painted this portrait of the singer on a double magnum of Rob’s 2005 Monte Rosso Zinfandel.

The Wine: Charter Oak Zinfandel, my all-time favorite Zin, is made by Rob Fanucci, in St. Helena. By day, Rob is a lawyer; on weekends and nights, he is an old-fashioned, hands-on winemaker, like his grandfather Guido Ragghianti, who taught him how to make wine.
Until now, Rob’s wine has only been available in 750 mL bottles, but for this new, husband-wife, wine-art project, Rob is bottling double magnums of his top wine.

The Art: Until recently, Rob’s hyper-talented wife, Layla, mostly painted cityscapes on canvasses so large that you needed your own personal cathedral in order to be able to hang one. These are stunning, large images. But now Layla has started to work on nano-sized (at least for her!) projects – personalized, etched-and-hand-painted wine labels – of any image you ask her to paint – applied to Rob’s double magnums.

So now you can get the best of Rob and Layla.

The pair will introduce their collaborative work at ZinArt, a casual party they are hosting at the winery on Charter Oak Ave., in St. Helena, Saturday May 24. The party starts about 4 pm and runs until they run out of Rob’s wine. Rob and Layla have asked me to extend an invitation to readers of napaman.com, so we’ll see ya there.

In the interest of remaining an honest, objective, reporter, I need to disclose my relationship with Rob and Layla, who over the last five years have become close friends.

Rob Fanucci, winemaker

Five years ago, I fell head-over-heels crazy for Rob’s Zinfandel when I discovered it at a tasting. It was so profound that I approached Rob, asking if I might help him pick fruit and make wine at the next harvest. This annual event has become one of the highlights for me of living in Napa Valley. And the Zinfandel and Petite Sirah that Rob make are among my all-time favorites. He has a knack for turning these otherwise badass, high-alcohol bruisers into elegant wines. As you know, “elegant” is not a word commonly associated with Zinfandel, or Petite Sirah.

Layla Fanucci, artist

As for Layla, she has an infectious spirit, a boundless amount of energy and do-goodness about her. For 25 years, she taught guitar; then one day, eight years ago, she put down her guitar and picked up a paintbrush and started to paint. Like Forrest Gump starting to run and run and run some more, she hasn’t stopped painting since.

Layla is set to start painting her largest-ever canvass – measuring 14 feet wide. “It will take me a year to complete!” she predicts.

For all these years, Layla has painted outside on a back porch, braving cold winds on winter days, and braving birds on warm summer days, which try to hit her colorful linen canvass targets with their droppings. Friends can hardly get through to Layla when she is in her paint trance; in this mode, you can’t stop her, or peel the paint tube out of her hands.

Today, two galleries represent Layla nationwide – Walter Wickiser Gallery in New York (210 11th Ave # 303, Tel: 212-941-1817) and Christopher Hill Gallery in St. Helena (1235 Main St., St. Helena, Tel: 707-963-0272).

Layla’s interpretation of Wall Street, NY.

Layla has two basic themes; she does massive cityscapes with layers of paint in which the light and color seem to radiate from out the back of the painting. She has painted such diverse cities as Barcelona, Paris, Berlin, Istanbul, Chicago, New York, San Francisco and Florence.

The Zinfandel Mind # 8

Her other theme is a series of richly colorful, hallucinogenic images, which bear a common wine theme. She calls the series, with numerical coefficients, things like Zinfandel Mind # 11, or Zinfandel Mind #8.

Wanting to bring her art and Rob’s wine closer together, Layla recently got the idea to put her images on his wine bottles.

The project has been an immediate success and as Layla is willing to customize the images she puts on bottles for clients, there appears to be no end to the commissioned bottles she may etch and paint.

Here’s how it works: if you buy a double magnum (that’s four bottles of Rob’s killer Zinfandel) and Layla finishes the label with one of her own images, the bottle is $1200.

If you give Layla a photo of someone you’d like painted on the label (makes a great birthday, wedding, anniversary, or Christmas gift), the cost is slightly higher. How much? As they say on menus for the daily catch – price available on request.

l
Great art (Layla’s), great wine (Rob’s), commemorating great naan (Fabulous Flats) and a great guy (Sam), my bakery partner.

In fact, I couldn’t think of a more original, or more personal, gift than Layla’s painted bottles to give to my bakery partner, Sam, who turned 60 in February.

I also wanted to commemorate a significant milestone in the bakery we co-founded four years ago – we’ve just baked our 30,000,000th hand-stretched naan (Indian flatbread) after a year of production!

So I hired Layla to personalize a bottle of Charter Oak Zin and apply a hand-painted portrait of Sam holding a package of our International Fabulous Flats™ Tandoori Naan.

Rob filled the bottle with his glorious 2005 Charter Oak Monte Rosso Vineyard Zinfandel. The fruit comes from 100+-year-old vines on a slope in Sonoma County. Only a handful of old-time winemakers can get their hands on this premium-quality hillside fruit, today owned by Gallo.

Sam Ajmera, my bakery partner, proudly displays his birthday gift. “The bottle made turning 60 painless!” says Sam.

Sam was tickled with the gift, as Charter Oak Zinfandel is one of his favorite-ever wines.

Or as they might say in a MasterCard TV ad:

Wine: $200 (equivalent of four bottles of Charter Oak Zin)
Original, personalized, etched and hand-painted label: $1,000
Total cost: $1,200
Look on the face of the person you gift: PRICELESS.

Layla and Rob Fanucci

Going forward, any etched bottles, which Layla hand paints, will be filled with Rob’s exquisite 2006 Napa Valley Zinfandel, grown on his family’s vineyard in St. Helena. This wine is tweaked with a touch of nearby Fulton Vineyard Petite Sirah.

For the record, Rob bottled some of this 2006 Petite Sirah on its own (only 125 cases of this exceptional elixir) and every time I taste it, I slap my forehead, recalling how good it is. In fact, I have yet to spit out this wine any of the dozen times that I have now professionally tasted it.

If you are free Saturday, May 24, come to the ZinArt party. Layla’s canvasses will be on display (and for sale). Rob will be pouring his wines, also for sale.

If you wish to read more about these local art and wine heroes, go to:
www.laylafanucci.com or www.charteroakwine.com

As a PS, let me add these tasting notes to the wines that Rob will be pouring at ZinArt. Because even if you choose not to get an etched, hand-painted double magnum, the wine, in 750 mL format, is a MUST HAVE for your cellar.

Tasting Notes

Overall, I believe that the 2006 Charter Oak wines may turn out to be the single greatest vintage Rob has have ever produced. There is a purity of fruit, a finesse and elegance, which are uncommon even in his normally marvelous wines, which show a balance not typical of most California Zins.

In my opinion, Rob’s 2006 Zinfandels surpass his previous Zin zeniths. And he has knocked the ball right out of the park with his 2006 Petite Sirah.

In fact, the 2006 Charter Oak Petite Sirah is one of the best wines that Rob has ever made. For sure, it is the best Not-Zinfandel that he has ever made, hands down.

Even though this wine has recently been bottled, it is an expressive, big-but-surprisingly-balanced wine. Tons of ripe black raspberry on the nose and palate; there is a pleasing crescendo of ripe fruit flavors through the swallow and then a hint of dark, 70% cocoa and a whisper of black cherry on the finish. I scored this Petite Sirah 97 points, but for the life of me, I can’t explain why I didn’t rate it 100.

(What is it with wine writers that forces us to restrain our enthusiasm for a “lesser grape” like Petite Sirah, saving the really big, perfect scores for Cabernet, or Chateauneuf du Pape?

When I think about it now, at the time of writing this piece, I have never tasted a more perfect Petite Sirah… so YOU go figure what the score should be!)

Rob’s 2006 Charter Oak Napa Valley Zinfandel is made with fruit from vines planted in St. Helena, where his grandfather planted vines nearly 100 years ago. Stumpy and spindly (the vines, not his grandfather!), they have been pruned to produce small, highly concentrated, grapes. This wine has a generous hint of ripe blackberries and a spicy, tweaky finish from the addition of some killer Fulton Petite Sirah. 96 points.

Rob’s 2006 Charter Oak Monte Rosso Zinfandel, made with fruit from the famed Monte Rosso vineyard, in Sonoma County, has bright red and black fruit flavors, shows no prunish edge (in some vintages, Rob adds second- or even third-pass fruit, but not in 2006 and it shows). 95 points.

Oxbow Public Market – Top New Attraction in Napa Valley!

For years, Napkins (the residents of Napa, as I like to call them) have drooled when they visit San Francisco’s famed (and did I say Wonderful?) Ferry Building Marketplace on the Embarcadero.

Well, they’re not drooling any more. The same mind that brought life, artisans, chocolate, a wine bar, caviar, oysters and a bookstore to the revitalized Ferry Building in San Francisco has done it again, this time in the town of Napa.

That mind, by the way, belongs to Napa Valley resident Steve Carlin.

Steve Carlin, the spirit, brains and brawn behind Oxbow Public Market

At the turn of the year, Steve, who is founder and CEO of Oxbow Public Market, along with a small team of smart guys and smart money, opened the Oxbow Public Market on a bend in the Napa River beside COPIA (the American Center for Wine, Food and the Arts). The team dreamed up, built and populated the property over a two-year period. Total cost to open the doors? About $11 million, a sneeze compared to the near $70 million that was needed to open the doors at COPIA next door.

Hallelujah! The still-in-its-infancy Oxbow Public Market is a charmer, a disarmer, a welcome divertissement for downtown Napa. EVERY SINGLE TOURIST WHO READS THIS MUST ADD A PIT STOP AT OXBOW MARKET TO HIS/HER “EATINERARY” OF NAPA VALLEY.

Oxbow Market is a collection of (eventually) 14 interior stalls and five exterior, or adjacent, businesses supplying mostly local, mostly organic, mostly sustainably produced foods. The good stuff, the tasty stuff, for visitors and locals alike.

Carlin has said that his goal was to recreate, albeit on a more compact scale, the great markets of North America – San Francisco’s Ferry Building, Seattle’s Pike Place and Vancouver’s Granville Island. A month after the formal opening, I’d say he’s succeeded beyond anyone’s expectations, certainly mine.

Oxbow Public Market is a statement about tasty, sustainable, mostly organic foods, it’s about locally grown produce (farmers in outdoor stalls complete the interior stall offerings) and about Bay-area- and Napa Valley-based artisans selling what they make, treasure, or revere. I guess you could summarize and say, above all, it’s a Place about Passion.

About Oxbow Public Market

The 40,000-square-foot marketplace, which includes a scenic outdoor deck with seating along the Napa River, is open seven days a week, 10 to 7 pm weekdays, 9 to 6 pm Saturday and 10 to 5 pm Sunday.

Currently open at the Market

The smartest way to review the stalls and stores at Oxbow is to group them geographically.

While Oxbow is small, you’ll want to stay for a bite, meander through the various stalls and generally lose yourself in sensual pleasures – food, wine, chocolate, tea, coffee, cheese and ice cream. So plan on spending a few hours at the very least.

To help plan your visit, here’s an overview of what’s at the market on a geographic, not alphabetic, basis:

Stalls on the west side of the Market

Pica Pica Maize Kitchen

Arepas, which are grilled white corn flour flatbreads, are the national food of Venezuela. And given their popularity at Pica Pica, and the line-ups they create, they could soon become the national dish of Napa.

Adriana Lopez Vermut and her family, who run a number of restaurants in Caracas, decided to take the plunge and open the first restaurant in North America serving arepas, and their sweet culinary counterpart, cachapas. For the record: both are made daily on site from corn flour and both are wheat- and gluten-free.

Luis Sosa, general manager of Pica Pica, presents a breakfast cachapa filled with cheese and ham. For the record, Pica Pica means “magpie” – the bird.

Arepas can be lined with ten different protein, or fruit, fillings, including chicken salad, skirt steak, black beans, tofu and plantains, cheese and ham, or even a poached egg.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
A Pepeada arepa, which is a freshly pressed corn cake heated on a griddle, sliced and filled with a chicken and avocado mixture seasoned with cumin, garlic, and Serrano chile. $7.25.

Fête

For those who don’t speak French, fête is both a verb and a noun, meaning “to celebrate,” or it’s the event itself, a celebration.

And what a fête this stall is, filled with charming accessories for home entertainment. Need to pamper yourself, or find a killer hostess gift? You’re likely to find it here. Consider: Heath ceramics from nearby Sausalito, or a set of exquisite Laguiole cheese knives. Maybe madame would be interested in a stunning argent (silver) tray from Argentina… or some gorgeous hand-etched Venetian glassware? Or consider fine table linens from France and Italy…?

Shop owner Jackie Caldwell-Rhoades advises customers to “buy once, and buy well,” because you will keep the items that you acquire here for a long, long time. There is something timelessly elegant about the items she selects to sell.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
It’s difficult to identify one thing that fits all needs, or all homes, so Fête manager Kathleen de Vries suggests “the elegant paper celebration crowns,” which can be worn at parties, or dinners by the celebrant of the event, the person having a birthday, or who is celebrating a major achievement. $16 a crown.

Five Dot Ranch

When the butcher at the stall of Five Dot Ranch tells you the family history, it makes you think of Ben Cartwright and his sons on the Ponderosa.

Five Dot is a seventh generation cattle ranch run by the Swickard family, today based in Susanville, Lassen County, CA.

The original brothers, so the story goes, called themselves “dots,” for no apparent reason. Hence the origin of the ranch’s name.

Folklore aside, what Five Dot brings to Oxbow is 100% northern California beef from Napa, Solano and Sonoma counties. The cattle are range-fed and all-natural, free of hormones and antibiotics. All the beef, with the exception of thin cuts like flank, hanger, and skirt steaks, is dry-aged 21 days.

Richard Barlow, a master butcher who has been in the meat and restaurant business for 35 years, came out of retirement to “have some fun” and work at the Five Dot stall. “This is by far the best beef that I have ever eaten!” he says. He’s holding what he says is his tastiest steak – a well-marbled, dry-aged, rib-eye.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
The 21-day dry-aged, heavily marbled rib-eye steak at $22.95/pound. “It’s one of the best pieces of steak you will ever eat!” says butcher Richard Barlow.

Three Twins Organic Ice Cream

This two-year-old, novel ice cream company, based in San Rafael, makes organic ice cream in flavors and colors as original as the story behind the venture.

Neal Gottleib, returning from a Peace Corps assignment in Morocco, moved in with his twin brother, Carl, and Carl’s then-fiance Liz, herself a twin. Neil started referring to the threesome as “The Three Twins,” and when he later decided to start America’s first organic ice cream chain, that’s the moniker he applied to the enterprise.

A dozen different organic ice creams are offered daily, though there is seasonal rotation coming from a total selection of some 30 flavors. All inclusions are also organic – the cookies and fruit snippets. The waffle cones, too, are organic, made, as you watch, on a small kitchen-sized waffle griddle that sits upon the counter.

I love the playfulness of the stall at Oxbow, the whacko signs and the inventive overhead conveyor contraption.

But I also love the ice cream and what Neil is attempting to do. By this summer, Neil intends to move his ice cream-making operation from San Rafael to Oxbow.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
Dad’s Cardamom Ice Cream. Why? For one thing, it’s totally different than all other commercial ice creams. It’s a very clean, delicate tasting vanilla that is scented almost more than being flavored with freshly ground cardamom, which Neil gets from his neighboring Oxbow stall, Whole Spice.
The cardamom ice cream, like all flavors, comes in a “Teensy” size for $2.25, a single scoop for $3.25… and runs on up to that $85,000 price tag on the sign above. Who ever said organic ice cream was cheap?

Heritage Culinary Artifacts

Lisa Minucci, the owner of this sweet stall, must have a screw loose. Or, at the very least, a corkscrew loose.

Lisa, who was sommelier at the very popular Martini House, in St. Helena, decided to sidestep her career and start something new. Now, in addition to writing a newsletter for sommeliers, Lisa hunts down wonderfully whimsical vintage farm signs and antique kitchen implements on her travels and then offers them for sale at her Oxbow stall.

Looking for an unusual gift? How about a heritage corkscrew, a weird bottle opener, a well-used serving utensil, or culinary curio? Chances are you’ll find something at Lisa’s Heritage stall.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
Not really a valid question here as there is total rotation of inventory and no two pieces are alike. This is one of those times when the answer to this common question is probably “everything!”

Whole Spice

Talk about a real mom and pop shop – this is it! Ronit (mom) and Shuli (pop) Madmone are taking their first gamble at retailing by bringing their exquisite line of freshly ground spices to the Oxbow Market.

Shuli Madmone opened Whole Spice with his wife, Ronit.

Shuli, who grew up in a family of spice traders, grinds and blends his spices in nearby Petaluma and offers about 300 different spices and 50 proprietary blends at his Oxbow stall.

Looking for paprika? Shuli has five different types including Hungarian, Spanish, Israeli, a smoked paprikash and a sweet paprikash.

Looking for salt? Look no further. Shuli has 12 different kinds including gray, pink, smoked, Hawaiian gold, and Hawaiian black.

Want to turn that cup of black coffee into something exotic with no added calories? Add ¼ teaspoon per cup of Shuli’s Hawaj blend, a tasty chai equivalent for java consisting of ground ginger, cinnamon, cloves and cardamom.

Whole Spice offers 300 spices in bulk, or pre-packaged in jars.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
Zhug, a fiery Yemeni blend of tianjin chile, garlic, coriander, cloves, cilantro, salt and cardamom, which is to be sprinkled over salads, fish, soup or grilled meats. A 50 gram packet of zhug is $5.50.

Stalls on the east side of the Market

Anette's Chocolate Factory

Shopkeeper Lisa Pike helps customers sort through snack options – beer brittle, chocolate truffles, or ice cream toppings, what’s it gonna be?

For 17 years, sister and brother Anette and Brent Madsen, have been making chocolates down the block on 1st Street. You see their tasty Beer Brittle and assorted line extensions (Fiery Beer Brittle, Wine Brittle, Kentucky Bourbon Brittle) all over town in independent grocery stores. The couple figured they needed to reach out to the 4 million visitors we attract in Napa Valley, many of whom will make the pilgrimage to Oxbow Public Market.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
Beer Brittle. It has a playful yin-yang flavor thing going on with salt and sugar duking it out on your palate for dominance, and there’s a pleasing peanut-y finish, which draws you back for more. $9.95 for a half-pound bag.

Kitchen Library

Photographer Steven Rothfeld, many of whose books grace my shelves (he shoots the photography for Patricia Wells’ cookbooks, and I have long treasured a book that he did on French signs called Entrez, which I bought long before I ever met Steven) decided he needed more mishagas in his life; so he opened a very personal, tiny stall, offering books, curios, culinary and stationery accessories, which he personally loves. If an item is sitting on Steven’s table, it has his personal endorsement of being wonderful, unique, and ownership-worthy.

Steven also sells prints and images – of his own work and of others – and has lots of hand-made things, which you won’t find at other retail stores.

Steven Rothfeld.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
“That’s like asking me which of my children do I like more, or which book that I have produced do I like more?” says Steven, responding to the common question.
“I’ve chosen every single thing in the store for a personal reason. These are things I love and live with.”

Folio Enoteca and Winery

What a claim to fame – the smallest bonded commercial winery in America! The man behind the concept is Michael Mondavi, whose family ran one of the largest wineries in the country. Michael, whose gone from big to small, actually makes wine on site and, as well, serves a number of brands from his Folio portfolio.

Oh yeah, and there’s great food, too.

Gregg Lamer, manager at Folio, says that they make more than 1,000 cases per year of Cabernet Sauvignon and Sauvignon Blanc in the 80 square feet devoted to winemaking on site. That’s a neat trick - like displaying all of Imelda Marcos’ shoes in a phone booth!

At Folio, you can sip through different flights of wine, or order a glass, or bottle, of the wines made by Michael Mondavi’s family -- I’M, Hangtime, or Oberon. Better yet, marry them to tasty offerings created by one of my favorite Napa Valley chefs, Sarah Scott. I’ve long encouraged Sarah to go out on her own to start her own restaurant; until she does, this is one of the few spots in the valley where you can taste her splendid work.

Sarah Scott, executive at Folio Enoteca.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
A Past (04), Present (05), and Future (06 – from barrel) flight of Oberon Cabernet Sauvignon, $12, with a side of Sarah’s scrumptious, southern-style, 3-cheese, Mac & Cheese, $5.

Tillerman Tea

David Campbell, former CEO of a popular Stags Leap District winery, decided to follow his passion, which was his second favorite beverage – tea.

David Campbell, founder of Tillerman Tea.

Last year, David left the wine world and started Tillerman Tea, sourcing more than 35 whole-leaf teas through the entire color/flavor spectrum – white, green and black. The teas are sourced in China and Taiwan, some are sold loose, others are encased in silken sachets.

At the Oxbow tasting bar, five organic house teas are poured free daily. David Wong, who has the formal title “director of tea culture and education,” will graciously lead you through your tasting, which you will find as detailed as any tasting you may have had at a local winery.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
“Chen Huan Tang is a tea master from Taiwan, one of the world’s great tea specialists,” says David Campbell with reverence. “We offer his Alishan Oolong tea, which looks peculiar but which has an exceptional taste.”
After the leaves of this tea are oxidized and roasted, they are dumped into large muslin sacks, which are rolled by hand, forcing the leaves inside to curl into small clumpy balls that look a bit like green nasturtium buds. In a way, the Alishan Oolong resembles wet clumps of grass that have been scraped off the blades of a lawn mower used on a dew-stained lawn and left to dry. They’re that shade of green. Anyway, when you add water, the curled-up balls relax, swell and release their tasty tannins. $11.50 per 25 grams, which will make at least 20 cups of tea.

Rôtisario

Perhaps you have been to France and seen those rotisserie trucks roll up to a local farmer’s market and wondered aloud, as I have, “why hasn’t anyone brought these trucks to America?”

Thomas Odermatt, “The Prince of Chicken,” as he is now called, sends his chicken rotisserie trucks to 25 Bay-area farmers’ markets weekly during the warmer months.

Thomas Odermatt must have been standing beside me and heard me speaking to myself, because in 2002, the Swiss-born, son of a master butcher founded his Bay-area business RoliRoti. You have likely seen Thomas’ trucks parked at the Ferry Building Farmers Market or have seen them roll up to most other weekly Bay-area farmers markets. They’re the trucks with an open side of juicy, turning, “rotisserizing” Fulton Valley free-range chickens.

Now Thomas has brought his clever rotisserie system to Oxbow Market, opening his first land-based, chicken-on-wheels business, but without the wheels.

Come and get it! Thomas says this Fulton Valley chicken is perfectly cooked. The potatoes he offers are cooked in the hot natural fat that drips off the rotisserie’d chickens onto the spuds below.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
The signature dish; the Rôtisario Chicken Plate for $9.50, which includes your choice of white or dark meat (but not both), a green salad with leafy organic greens, and roasted potatoes richly flavored with chicken juices.

The Olive Press

When we first moved to Napa Valley in 1997, once of the first things we did was to harvest our olives and make oil. As we had a rather small crop, we sought out a competent source to help us custom crush and in the process were introduced to The Olive Press, then located in Glen Ellen.

It was a tiny operation then, staffed by a few knowledgeable people. Today, the business has moved to a new building on the property of the Jacuzzi Family Winery on Arnold Drive (Hwy 121) and now it’s staffed by a lot of knowledgeable people.

Coming east to Napa County, and shedding their Sonoma-only presence, The Olive Press offers Oxbow Public Market visitors a chance to taste through seven different olive oils (some are flavored, some are blends, some are varietals).

On any day, you can taste through a selection of four different olive oils, three proprietary blends and three fruit-flavored olive oils. The tasting is free.

Not down a quart of oil? Looking for olives instead? Shopkeeper Cynthia Morgan is happy to walk you through a selection of cured olives.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
Arbequina olive oil, pressed from those little brownish olives that are often put out in Italian restaurants. “I like the flavor of this oil,” says shopkeeper Cynthia Morgan, “it’s not too strong, not too mild.” A sort of Goldilocks of oil, if you permit, not too big, not too little. Just right. $26/500 mL bottle.

Exterior/adjacent retailers

The Oxbow Wine Merchant and Wine Bar

It’s the best – if not longest – honkin’ wine bar in Napa Valley. I love the thick, 70-running feet of white oak, cut from a single 100-year-old tree; I love what they serve on top of it, too. Great food and great wines in tasting flights. And like those at an airport – these are flights you do not want to miss!

The menu changes regularly and seasonally as do the wines, so without being specific to the image above, just understand that the three amigos who run this place (and the San Francisco Ferry Plaza Wine Merchant, as well), inherently nail the food/wine pairing in spades. Choose a platter of cheeses, nuts and fruit and you will be amply rewarded with a flight of wines suggested by the barkeep.

It’s hard to imagine that you are in Napa Valley and have run out of wine, but let’s pretend that you have. Your cellar is bare. So you head to the Oxbow Wine Merchant and ask them to fill up your fridge, your pantry, your cellar, and maybe your garage, too. Because they can; they stock more than 1,000 different wines, every one of which staff members have tasted and know. It is from this inventory that the flights and by-the-glass wines originate.

The Wine Merchant hasn’t been open a month and already weekend nights are starting to be THE meeting place in Napa town; you may have thought that Five Dot Ranch, next door, was THE place to go for alluring meat… but on Friday night, that bulls-eye moves west about 20 feet… to the Wine Merchant Bar.


The amazing smoked salmon BLT on Model Bakery whole-wheat.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
The signature sandwich, which can be paired with a flight of tasty Pinot Noirs, is the Smoked Salmon BLT (pictured above). Here’s a generous mound of smoked salmon, apple wood-smoked bacon, lettuce and tomato, sandwiched between toasted slices of Model Bakery whole-wheat, which have been brushed with a zippy pesto mayo. $12 for the sandwich, wine flight extra.

The Oxbow Cheese Merchant

Riccardo Huijon, Melissa Crosby and Lassa Skinner, the cheery cheese mongers who will greet you in the northwest corner of the Oxbow Wine Bar.

The owners of the wine bar also decided to offer a small selection of retail cheeses. They pulled in some serious talent, cheese mongers who know cheese the way the guys behind the bar know their wines; and they encouraged them to purchase more than 100 different cheeses from around the world. Their personal favorites, stuff that is seasonal, sensational, sensual.

It is good to finally catch up, by the way, with Riccardo Huijon, who disappeared off the radar screen at Dean & DeLuca, where I used to patiently wait in line for his attentive, enthusiastic, cheese service. Now he’s at Oxbow Cheese, inside the structure that houses the Wine Bar.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
The three cheese mongers said that it was really difficult to name just ONE cheese to answer this question, but in the interest of identifying one cheese out of a hundred that they would suggest to customers, they named Goat’s Leap as THE cheese to try. This is the only cheese made in Napa Valley, produced in St. Helena. I love the creamy, goat-y, rich and balanced taste of this fromage, an equal to many of the French goat cheeses you have tasted in your life.

Taylor's Automatic Refresher

Rare, rare, rare, like the ahi tuna they serve here; you are not likely to ever see this sight in your lifetime – NO lineup at Taylors! This is what the Oxbow location looks like one minute after they open the doors. By two minutes, you’ll feel like you’re in Disneyworld during spring break, it can get that crowded.

One of Napa Valley’s original food concessions is on a tear. After the Gott family took over Taylor’s Refresher about eight years ago in St. Helena, they built a satellite location at the San Francisco Ferry Building. The two locations vie for which one has the longer line-ups for burgers, a killer ahi tuna sandwich, and the best milkshakes this side of the Rockies (Do Not Pass Go, Do Not Collect $200, Do not do anything else until you have had Taylor’s espresso bean milkshake; that’s not a suggestion – that an order!).

Now there’s a third, new location – at the Oxbow Public Market and who’s surprised? The line-ups are just as long here! The public has an unquenchable hunger for good, inexpensive food, beer and wine, and Taylor’s fills this need.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
We send all our visitors from out of town to the original Taylor’s location in St. Helena, which is closer to our home. The signature dish and signature beverage are: Seared rare Ahi tuna filet with ginger wasabi mayo and Asian slaw on a toasted egg bun. $13.99. The signature beverage is the espresso bean milkshake, described above, and large enough for two to share. $4.99.

Just west of the Oxbow Market, yet still part of it, are two retail stores that must not be overlooked – The Model Bakery and The Fatted Calf.

The Model Bakery

This will give you some idea of the selection of baked goods they make…

… and of the tasty breads, too, which rival the best made anywhere in the Bay-area.

One of my favorite pit-stops in St. Helena, after I finish my morning exercise, is at The Model Bakery on Main St., where they serve a mean Peet’s latte and some of the tastiest baked goods in Napa Valley.

Under the direction of Karen Mitchell and Sarah Mitchell Hansen (mother and daughter team), The Model Bakery is turning out hearty country breads that are in the league of those baked by Steve Sullivan at Acme Bread in Berkeley, or of those baked by Thomas Keller’s crew at Bouchon Bakery in Yountville. Many Model breads even surpass these exalted benchmarks.

The Model breads are exciting, crusty, they are breads with superb “crumb” as the soft center is called. There are times at home, when we have a slice of the pain au levain, that we recall that in all the dinners in France on our last trip, we didn’t have a bread as good, as crusty, as memorable as the Model pain au levain. Hats off to Karen and Sarah and to their new wizard head baker, Philippe Garcia.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
Karen Mitchell has a hard time identifying the one thing you have to try; “I’d say try any of the breads made with organic flour – we’re making baguettes, boules, batards, probably 20 different breads. We bake seven days a week; there has never been a bakery in the town of Napa offering this quality, or freshness, of breads.”
And just when I thought this was her choice for “must-try,” she hmmmmed out loud to herself and added, “but maybe I should say the “must-try” is a freshly baked English muffin, which we serve for breakfast, filled with fresh scrambled eggs, Tillamook Cheddar and lean Canadian bacon. (NY chef) Mario Batali ordered a few dozen at Christmas, claiming that he’d heard these were the best English muffins in America.”

The Fatted Calf

Sunlight glares off the refrigerated display case at The Fatted Calf – but that’s not all that glares here; there is a glaring fact that you are in the presence of some very knowledgeable, very dedicated, very caring charcuteristes.

Remember the names Taylor Boetticher and Toponia Miller. Yes, they are uncommon names but then, this husband and wife team have an uncommon profession – they are serious charcuteristes in a country that is obsessed with leanness, diet, and avoidance of fat.

That’s Toponia above, displaying a tray of just-made crepinettes an artisanal sausage – hand-pattied, wrapped in pork caul. It is a fabulous forcemeat of rabbit, lamb, walnuts, shallots and herbs that are hand-slapped into patties.

Taylor and Toponia met at the CIA (Culinary Institute of America), in Hyde Park, NY, and decided to move west for adventure. Toponia became chef at San Francisco’s MOMA (Museum of Modern Art) and Taylor oversaw meat sales at the Meat Market at Café Rouge, in Berkeley. They knew that one day, they would make their own line of sausages, and when Steve Carlin came a’callin’ (or in their case, a’caulin’), they rose to the self-imposed challenge.

Sausage maker Antonio Jeronimo smiles, having just made two types of small salami. The meats, pates, terrines, and sausages change daily at The Fatted Calf.

What’s the one thing you insist visitors try when they ask, “What’s special?”
We let Toponia off the hook on this question, for like a few other merchants at Oxbow, she answered that it would be impossible to single out just one of her artisanal products.
“Today I might say that THE thing to try is our terrine forestiere, made with rabbit, duck and black trumpet mushrooms, but tomorrow it could be one of 30 other sausages that we make – like our summer Basque Sausage, which is ideal for grilling.”

Opening in late Spring:

Kanaloa Seafood

A full-service seafood purveyor that will provide premium-quality shellfish and locally caught fish.

Ritual Coffee Roasters

Many say Ritual makes the best coffee in San Francisco. We’ll find out just how good it is when the Mission district coffee purveyor opens at Oxbow.

Opening in early Fall:

Hog Island Oyster Company

Modeled after its oyster bar at the San Francisco Ferry Building, Hog Island Oxbow will serve premium-quality, fresh-raised oysters on the half-shell, as well as baked oyster classics, organic salads and a daily changing seafood entrée.

For further information on any of the merchants above, contact Oxbow Public Market at 707-226-6529, or visit the website at: www.oxbowpublicmarket.com.

My Favorite New Breakfast - Overnight Organic Oat Groats!

Okay, so I’ve changed my mind. What’s wrong with that? Even Linus, our wonder dog, loves the new breakfast porridge! Earlier this winter, I told readers that I was enjoying the best breakfasts I could recall eating – McCann’s Oatmeal, prepared in a method that my dad had made famous in our family, starting the porridge the night before. I mentioned this to Mark Graham over dinner. He’s one of Starbucks’ head product development chefs, and he was in Napa Valley last month to steal winemaker secrets – to find out how we make Manifesto! Sauvignon Blanc so tasty without giving it any wood. (Actually, he was here for a food conference.) Mark told us to check out his favorite oatmeal – Coach’s Oats (go to http://www.coachsoats.com), which we did. We ordered a sample, cooked it up and assessed. Hmmmm… damn good, cooks quicker than McCann’s, and has a pleasing, oat-y flavor. But it is NOT our household’s favorite new breakfast. The New Breakfast of Champions This top honor goes to a grain mixture that Carol has perfected. She calls the porridge Overnight Organic Oat Groats. It’s made with two natural grains that probably cost a tenth of what the branded cereals mentioned above cost, and tastes ten times better. I love the texture, crunch, and resistance, which the oats deliver. The short-grain brown rice adds a detectable nuttiness to the porridge. You want tasty, ultra-simple, ultra-healthy? THIS IS IT. Only two major ingredients in this stunning porridge – whole oat groats and short-grain brown rice. Add water and salt, that’s it. We usually make enough to last two days, refrigerating what we don’t eat on Day One to be revisited the next day. While you can sweeten with brown sugar, my personal preference is to add a top-quality maple syrup, which brings the porridge into symphonic harmony. Here is Carol’s recipe: 

Overnight Organic Oat Groats 

Many oatmeal recipes call for steel-cut oats, but this one, our new family favorite, uses whole oat groats, which are whole oat kernels that have been hulled. For the record, steel-cut oats are oat groats that have been thinly sliced lengthwise with sharp blades and, because they’re sliced, they cook faster. In this recipe, you essentially “soak” the hard oat groats overnight so that in the morning, all you have to do is heat on low heat for 20 to 30 minutes, or until you have a thick mixture that tastes delicious and sticks to your ribs. You can buy organic whole oat groats and short-grain brown rice at a heath food store or wherever they sell organic grains. I prefer to get them out of the bulk bins, where there’s a lot of turnover and grains seem very fresh. 

¾ cup organic whole oat groats, rinsed and drained 

¼ cup organic short-grain brown rice, rinsed and drained 

4 cups filtered water 

1/2 tsp coarse sea salt 

The night before: Combine oat groats and brown rice in heavy stainless steel saucepan. Add water and salt. Bring to boil, reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Turn off heat, cover and let sit on stove overnight. 

The next morning: Stir oat mixture and bring to boil. Reduce heat to low and cook, stirring often. (At this point, I usually put some type of flame disperser on the burner so the mixture doesn’t burn or stick to the bottom of the pan. If you have a gas stove, you can take the grill off another burner and place it on top of the burner you’re using to put a little more distance between the pan and the flame. Or place a pair of tongs on the burner and carefully place the saucepan on top of the tongs.) 

Continue to cook, stirring often, until mixture is thick and “goopy.” 

If mixture gets a little too thick, add a splash of boiling water from the teakettle and stir. Serve hot with brown sugar (my preference) or maple syrup (Jim’s preference). Makes 3 or 4 servings. Note: You can refrigerate leftovers and heat in the microwave the next day. Add a little boiling water to thin out mixture, if required. Or refrigerate in the original pan and place the pan back on the burner the next morning, adding a little bit of boiling water from the teakettle, and stirring for a few minutes until heated through.

Enlightened about Darkness! 6th Annual “Death by Chocolate” Festival at COPIA

There are 199,000,000 links to “chocolate” on Google and there were just about as many references – and chocolate samples – at COPIA this weekend, where the 6th annual “Death by Chocolate” Festival was held.

Children who attended the day-long chocolate event loved the chocolate fountains – one gushing dark chocolate, one gushing white chocolate.

COPIA, in case you have been in a chocolate-induced coma for the past decade, is the American Center for Food, Wine and the Arts, in Napa. How appropriate that the center, known mostly for wine, hosts this annual deep, dark, delicious chocolate event, because it turns out that chocolate has many of the same properties as wine.

For starters, dark chocolate has many of the same antioxidants as wine and the raw ingredient – cacao – even has healthful antibacterial agents.

“Our roasted chocolate nibs have nearly 65 times more antioxidants than broccoli,” says Shawn Askinosie, who attended the event. You’re going to hear more about this extraordinary chocolate maker from Springfield, MO, in the paragraphs that follow, so pay attention. Hint: He’s on the final exam.

What’s more, chocolate is easily as complex as wine; taste any three of the hundred small-batch, artisanal chocolates sampled at COPIA and you’d be shocked at the differences in mouthfeel, flavor, attack, release, length and finish – terms customarily used to describe wine. But they work just as well for chocolate.

The Festival this year was punctuated by a series of seminars, panels, and workshops, and concluded with a three-hour walk-around wherein 800 attendees sampled the best premium chocolates and chocolate-based confections made in America. Imagine – no limits, as many of the best chocolates as you could eat for nearly half-a-day! This was an assignment that Napaman had been dreaming about for weeks in advance.

In fact, I found myself in training for the event, having purchased a kilo of premium chocolate (70% cacao) from Italy to better understand what American chocolate makers – and chocolate consumers – are up against.

Napaman’s Gold Standard

The chocolate that I hold as a standard to beat is the tablet from Amedei, in Tuscany, whose Venezuelan-based chocolate, called Chuao, is a gold-medal winner in my humble, cacaoic opinion. (I made that word up, so don’t look for it in your online dictionary.)

I love the unctuous, complex, caramel reveal as the Chuao slowly melts on your tongue; I love the chocolate’s gorgeous, velveteen mouthfeel, and long, lingering finish filled with plum and dried fruits. Like a good wine. The acidity in the Chuao chocolate is perfect, too. It leaves your palate clean and you hankering for another gnaw at the bar.

My pleasure at COPIA was finding three stunning American-made chocolates that, in their own way, are also standards to beat, and one of them is quite simply, the best chocolate in America.

# 1 bar in America, according to Napaman

The Askinosie 70% cacao dark chocolate made with beans from San Jose Del Tambo, in Ecuador, is a stunning chocolate achievement, particularly as this single-origin chocolate contains no lecithin (an emulsifier usually added to commercial chocolates for mouthfeel) or vanilla (natural or artificial, usually added to boost flavor and length of finish).

The ingredients of this exceptional bar are simply: cocoa beans, sugar, cocoa butter. Period. You start with great stuff, you wind up with great stuff.

Shawn and Caron Askinosie produce what I believe is the best chocolate made in America. Caron’s blue gloves, by the way, are NOT a fashion statement, but were worn so that she could hand out single-origin chocolate drops that were the size of rhinestones that Dolly Parton would wear.

Shawn Askinosie, a former criminal lawyer, recently left a successful 20-year law practice to start making chocolate (he never lost a case – so watch out Hershey because he’s approaching chocolate-making with the same energy and determination!). Shawn’s M.O. is to find small, regional bands of cacao growers, encourage them to grow, ferment, and dry their beans in a particular way, and then actually share the revenue stream with them on an open-book basis. A one-man version of Ben & Jerry. Though it’s hard to tell if Shawn is the Ben or the Jerry in this scenario. What we do know is that his chocolate brings as much pleasure -- and as wide a smile – to one’s face as any Ben & Jerry flavor.

My tasting notes on the Askinosie Ecuador-based bar: “Light cigar aromas on the nose and early on the palate as the chocolate starts to melt; on the attack, flavors of forest floor and deep unsweetened cacao, followed by a rifle barrel-focused intensity of ethereal dark chocolate robed in velours. Sensationally complex from start to finish. This is the Romanee-Conti of American Chocolate.

Gary Guittard, 4th generation family member, President of Guittard.

I rediscovered my favorite San Francisco-made chocolate, brought to COPIA by fourth generation chocolate maker Gary Guittard. I recently conducted a thorough tasting of virtually all the premium chocolates in America for a consulting project and rated Guittard’s 65% cacao, Sur Del Lago, Venezuelan chocolate in my top three.

Sorry for the opened bar; I needed a chocolate fix and opened this bar, which I’d bought for the photo shoot.

I love the complexity of this bar, the rich, red fruit aromas, the stunning, slow release of different chocolate notes and the acidity, which zips up the finish. And then, after that very last swallow, there’s a twinkle of lingering astringency, as though you’ve just had a cup of great Irish breakfast tea.

Often I find that food and wine writers, who are always chasing the “next new thing,” forget old friends and former favorites. I am as guilty as the next writer. I recall writing a story about John Scharffenberger and his sidekick/partner Robert Steinberg just after they started up Scharffen Berger Chocolate. I recall loving their energy, dedication and chocolate. The pair went on to reap a huge public following and last year, Hershey bought them out.

At COPIA, I revisited the “blue label” Scharffen Berger 70% Cacao dark chocolate, which is a blend of eight different beans. This bar has great length, is extremely satisfying, and strolls to the finish line with a measured, well paced, chocolate intensity. It has what you might call a chocolate cadence, a sequence of perfectly paced tastes throughout the melt, chew and swallow.

Discover Chocolate Seminar

Before they let guests loose on the 39 chocolate makers, vendors and retailers who were present, COPIA hosted a series of morning seminars and panels to help consumers better understand the world of chocolate.

Clay Gordon, who calls himself “the Robert Parker of chocolate,” leads a morning tasting session at COPIA. Five kinds of chocolate at 10 am – my kind of schooling.

Clay Gordon, originator of chocophile.com and author of Discover Chocolate, led a tasting of different chocolates and confections to explain different methods of manufacturing and offered hints of what to look for when tasting chocolate.

About the growing use of numbers to sell chocolate (you often see a 65%, or 70%, or even 85% figure, in the corner of many premium bars, proclaiming the percentage of cacao in the bar), Gordon had this to say:

“This is strictly a marketing gimmick. The number tells you nothing about the quality of the chocolate. At best, this is a disingenuous practice, at worst, deliberately misleading.”

Gordon went on to give a wine analogy. “You wouldn’t go to a wine store and ask for a 15.5% alcohol wine, or a 14.7% alcohol wine because it tells you nothing about the quality of the wine… so why would you go to a store and ask for a ‘70% cacao’ chocolate bar?”

Gordon said that somehow, marketers have convinced consumers that 70% cacao is a relevant and important number and that bars containing smaller percentages of cacao are to be dismissed.

Gary Guittard had much to say about the same subject in his seminar, which followed.

Guittard Tasting Seminar

Gary Guittard

Guittard said that the rush to use numbers to quantify the percentage of cacao in chocolate bars, a practice of which his own company is guilty, is both meaningless and misleading. (Give the guy credit for two things: He makes great chocolate and he’s also bluntly honest.)

Guittard dispelled another myth in his seminar that is worth sharing: “There is no industry-regulated use of the terms ‘semi-sweet’ and ‘bittersweet.’ One company’s ‘semi-sweet’ chocolate may be another producer’s ‘bittersweet.’” Essentially, these are (mostly) subjective expressions of sweetness levels in chocolate. The federal labeling requirement that touches on this matter says that chocolate called 'dark,' 'bittersweet,' or 'semisweet' must contain a minimum of 35 percent cacao and less than 12 percent milk solids (more milk solids than this and the chocolate has to be called milk chocolate). Beyond this, labeling is left in the lap of the manufacturer, which is why the terms 'semi-sweet' and 'bittersweet' appear to be interchangeable once the minimum levels are met.

The Future of Chocolate - Expert Panel

From left to right, Shawn Askinosie, Timothy Childs, Gary Guittard and Chuck Siegel; their respective affiliations are listed on the slide above them; they assembled to discuss fair trade and issues related to organic certification.

In one of the morning’s more interesting sessions, four chocolate experts gathered to discuss relevant issues that are alarming the industry.

Foremost is the increased demand for chocolate and the shortfall in world production.

Clay Gordon, who moderated the panel, said: “The world produced 3 million metric tonnes of chocolate last year – but this was a shortfall of some 250,000 metric tonnes.”

Interpretation: Look for dramatic price increases for your favorite brown treat.

And the price increases are only going to get worse as China and India become mainline chocolate consumers. The experts are talking about a worldwide demand for chocolate that may grow by 50 percent over the next few years.

And no one’s planting more Theobroma cacao trees to meet the anticipated demand. They probably couldn’t even if they wanted. For one thing, cacao trees only grow in a narrow band about 15 degrees north and south of the equator. No matter how much the super industrious wine growers in Napa Valley and Sonoma want to convert their vines to grow cacao, it just ain’t gonna happen.

During the session, Timothy Childs, of TCHO Chocolate, pointed out that “most cacao farmers never taste the finished chocolate whose raw materials they supply. We intend to change this.”

Childs, like Askinosie, takes a hands-on approach to producing chocolate and wants to rewire the way chocolate commerce has traditionally been conducted. These producers want to know their farmers, want to share revenues with them, want to oversee production from farm to finished good. They are mavericks in a world dominated by “the big guys,” like Hershey, Nestle, Callebaut.

But every industry has a pioneer or contrarian, and often times, they go on to great success. Look at Michael Dell, who transformed the way computers were sold. Maybe, just maybe, these boot-wearing, forest-stomping, chocolate contrarians will start a revolution to change the chocolate industry’s dynamic.

The good news is that even if they don’t succeed in changing an entire industry, consumers can still enjoy the labors of their work; their bars are world class, as the tasting at COPIA proved.

Other brown highlights at COPIA

Mona Keady, the bright light behind Raffiné, a Danville, CA-based confection company, makes filled chocolates. Note: Mona, like many exhibitors at the COPIA chocolate event, doesn’t make her own chocolate; she buys chocolate from producers and further adds her own touch – liquid centers, ganache fillings, etc. Within the “chocolate industry,” a distinction is made between “chocolate makers,” who take cacao beans and process them into finished chocolate, and “confectioners,” who take some one else’s finished chocolate and further process it to make their own tasty creations. One such chocolate confectioner is Michael Recchiuti, of San Francisco, who did not participate in the COPIA event, but who is a stunning – and glaring – example of someone who takes chocolate from “chocolate makers” and turns it into some of the most flavorful chocolate confections made in America.

Timothy Childs, chocolate maker, and Zohara Mapes, assistant chocolate maker, at Tcho Chocolates. They are conducing a crazy, vote-on-line focus group, asking consumers to register their comments about several un-launched chocolates. The chocolates displayed for comment at COPIA, two rather granular, Ghanaian offerings, were not inspiring. But word is that TCHO will launch several formal, packaged chocolates this spring, and we look forward to reviewing them then.

Kelliann Reginato and Jessica Bell from LaLoos Goat’s Milk Ice Cream Company were on hand to serve two flavors of chocolate ice cream – Deep Chocolate and Chocolate Cabernet – made with goat’s milk at the Sonoma Country dairy. I know, sounds weird, “chocolate-flavored goat’s milk ice cream.” But it tasted great and was a pleasing intermezzo from all the heavy-duty, industrial-strength, astringent chocolate everyone else was serving.

REAL Oatmeal – The Breakfast of Champions!

Let’s hear it for John McCann!

No, not the Presidential hopeful. That’s not a typo.

I’m talking about John McCann, the elder, the guy who started making steel-cut Irish oatmeal 150 years ago and whose commercial descendants still produce the tasty breakfast cereal the same way today.

My dad, Bill, loved making REAL oatmeal on cold winter mornings when I grew up. As we lived in Westchester County, north of New York City, whenever it snowed, or dipped into the minuses, my dad would either make us REAL oatmeal, using McCann’s, or he’d pan-fry some minute steaks. One breakfast menu lowered cholesterol, the other raised it. Either way, though, breakfast was a major taste hit when my dad cooked for us!

The problem that most people have, though, with making McCann’s is that the hard-as-BBs oat grains take 30 to 45 minutes to make from scratch and you have to stir much of the time, or the porridge burns. And who’s got that kind of time to spend on breakfast?

My dad, Bill White, LOVED making oatmeal – the night before!

But my dad developed his own method of preparing this exceptionally tasty, exceptionally healthy cereal, an oatmeal shortcut, which he passed on to me:

Start the oatmeal the night before! In a saucepan over high heat, bring 4 cups of water and a pinch of salt to boil. Add 1 cup of McCann’s Irish oatmeal, stir once, remove the saucepan from the heat and cover. Say goodnight, Gracie.

In the morning, simply reheat the swollen grains, which will have absorbed ALL the water! They’re fully precooked, have all the natural goodness and flavor of the oatmeal that you otherwise would have spent 45 minutes making.

To serve, simply reheat the porridge over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, for about 6 minutes… and you have REAL, authentic, unprocessed, non-GMO, whole-grain oatmeal on your table. In six minutes!

Prepared this way, McCann’s oatmeal loses a bit of crunch that is apparent when you make the cereal from scratch in 45 minutes, but the trade-off -- to let the porridge make itself while you sleep! – is worth this very slight loss of textural bite. Besides, who ever said oatmeal had to be al dente anyway?

My dad’s “shortcut oatmeal” has tremendous nuttiness; if you’ve added enough salt, it has a clean, ocean-like flavor, a perceptible minerality, an ethereal, camp-like outdoorsy-ness.

Add golden brown sugar, milk, cream, maple syrup, or raisins to complete the dish to your liking.

Over the years, it hasn’t always been easy finding the 28-oz. tin can of McCann’s steel-cut oatmeal; not all grocers carry it. And when they do, many charge too much.

These days, though, Trader Joe’s, which is growing ubiquitous across the country, carries this sensational oatmeal and I haven’t found anyone getting below Trader Joe’s price -- $4.99 a tin.

When it’s snowing, blowing, cold, rainy, gray, sleeting, hailing, or pitch black outside, who ya gonna call for comfort? Forget Ghostbusters! Call for McCann’s steel-cut Irish oatmeal – it’s the only way to survive winter’s bleakness!

Santa Fe: The times they are a changin’…

Or maybe they already have.

This southwest town, an early magnet to bohemians and renegade artists, has slowly, seamlessly, become part of the global, corporate, art market. Works seen on Canyon Road, the heart of this community’s art colony, are now likely to be found in galleries in Basel and New York, too.

The New Mexican capital, which has also traditionally attracted faith healers, spiritualists and massage therapists (there are 1,200 licensed massage therapists in this town of 75,000!) is about to undergo yet greater internationalization.

“You won’t recognize this place in three years,” predicts Peter Weiss, a knowledgeable guide whom we hired to take us on a 3-hour walking tour of town.

Peter Weiss takes visiting groups on a 3-hour walking tour of Santa Fe. Along the way, he points out the home where the narrative for “Oklahoma” was penned, where Randy Travis lives, where the really “hot” art galleries are and where the oldest church in America stands.

“The government is laying track for a fast train (it won’t be “high speed,” but it won’t be Amtrak, either) that will link Santa Fe and Albuquerque,” says Peter, suggesting that this may create one large urban corridor, making already high-priced homes even higher. The rail line should be completed by the end of 2008.

Peter’s guided tour was one of the highlights of a five-day visit to Santa Fe. On our tour, we learned that Spanish colonists settled in this area in 1598, some 22 years before the pilgrims ever landed at Plymouth Rock. The irony of America’s contemporary issue with 11 million illegal immigrants, most of them Hispanic, is: they were here first!

For the next 387 years, Santa Fe remained mostly off-the-beaten-path. But all that is changing, posits Peter, our guide. Santa Fe is now accessible by direct South West Air flights. This is a new development because, until now, visitors and residents have had to fly out of Albuquerque, 60 miles away, the only center that could handle larger planes.

Oldest Church in America

Santa Fe is home to the oldest church in America (not the first church in America, mind you, but the oldest still standing). While you can find the church by yourself, we came across it with Peter; he has loads of colorful stories to share about everything you will pass. In fact, you will learn more in a few hours with him than you ever will from a pile of travel books.

Anyone visiting Santa Fe should think about hiring Peter for a three-hour guided tour. As Peter travels extensively during the year, check with his website to determine his availability. A bonus: you will LOVE his online photos and diaries. Go to www.peterweiss.com.

Georgia on my mind…

You can’t think of New Mexico and art without thinking of Georgia O’keeffe, whose abstract interpretations of the flora of this region earned her international acclaim during her 99 years of life.

The Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.

One place that is a MUST on your visit is the Georgia O’keeffe Museum, which offers a rich collection of her abstract work. I particularly enjoyed three of her watercolors, a medium that I have never associated with the artist.

You’ll only need an hour to see the displayed canvases and framed watercolors; also, don’t miss the 12-minute (or so) film playing in the first gallery. It’s a compact, well filmed, historical record of Georgia O’Keeffe -- who she was and who she hung out with (mostly Alfred Steiglitz).

Georgia O’keeffe Musuem, 217 Johnson St. Tel. 505-946-1000.

Rather than give a history lesson, or a diary entry of everything we experienced on our visit, let me continue by commenting on the one element that I am qualified to speak about – the food of Santa Fe.

No More Mark Miller’s Coyote Café

The big food story here is that chef Mark Miller, who codified, quantified and kick-started what we now call Southwest Cuisine at his sensational Coyote Café 20 years ago, has just sold his business and moved on.

The new owner/chef is Eric Distefano, who for 11 years has been executive chef at nearby Geronimo. He has some mighty tall boots to fill, given Mark’s reputation, though locals and visitors in online chat rooms report that the food at the Coyote Café has gone down hill the last few years, likely as Mark has become a sort of absentee landlord, looking after properties in other US centers, including Las Vegas.

Best Food in Town

If you really want to know who’s swinging the heavy bat in this town… head over to Aqua Santa…

Going….

…. Going….

…. Gone….! Aqua Santa chef/owner Brian Knox hits the ball out of the park each night in his small, 12-table dining room. Hearty, country-style, house-made breads, complex entrees, fabulous pastries, and a solid wine list all contribute to the occasion; of five dinners in Santa Fe, my two best were at Aqua Santa, hands down.

Aqua Santa is run by chef/owner Brian Knox, a talented, self-trained chef from Milwaukee, WI. The staff is super friendly and cordial (say Hi to Whitney for us…) and the room radiates casual warmth, which is mirrored in the plated dishes.

Everything is made on premises including the dense, country breads, which look and taste as though they have been flown in from the Model Bakery, in St. Helena (the best breads in Napa Valley).

On each of out visits, I ordered a shoulder of lamb that had been braised “round the clock,” as the menu suggests, one of the most memorable preparations of lamb that I have had this year.

The succulent meat, flavored with an almost Moroccan spice pack rich with cinnamon and citrus notes, was served with broccoli rabe and a creamy polenta. The dish was like a great novel; I found myself going more slowly as I worked through the opus, wanting the pleasure to last longer and not end. When was the last time you had this kind of relationship with a plate of food?

On our two visits, we ordered Italian and Spanish red wines. One of my favorites was the 2004 Emilio Moro from Spain’s Ribera del Duero region. It was a perfect accompaniment to the lamb, filled with plum, dark cherry, and smoky notes. From start to finish, a delicious wine. 92 points.

If you only have time for one dinner in Santa Fe, Aqua Santa is the place to book your table.

Aqua Santa, 451 W. Alameda St. Tel. 505-982-6297.

Best chocolate store in America

If you are a devout chocolate lover and have been to Paris, you have perhaps sought out the most unusual chocolatier in the world – Denise Acabo – who specializes in finding, and selling, the best chocolates in France.

Denise travels around France, identifying the one item that each of her nation’s best chocolate artisans make; she takes one producer’s chocolate truffle and takes ONLY this small work of edible art from this artisan. Then she heads off to another region to find an artisan who, among his many confections, may make the best nougat, or caramel, or palette d’or, which is all that Denise will take from that artisan – one item.

In this fashion, she identifies the very best producers of different works of edible art and assembles them all at her tiny store in the 9th arrondissment (30 rue Fontaine).

Hayward Simoneaux, the extremely knowledgeable owner of Todos Santos.

I get the sense that chocolate geek Hayward Simoneaux, who moved here from New Orleans 14 years ago (well before Katrina), just may be the Denise Acabo of America.

Hayward’s chocolate store, Todos Santos, is in a beautiful, old Spanish building in downtown Santa Fe. He has assembled the best of the best chocolates from a half-dozen different American chocolate artisans. Dedicated producers like Michael Recchiuti (San Francisco), who I think is the best artisanal chocolate maker in America, and like Fritz Knipschildt, a Dane who settled in Norwalk, CT, where he makes exceptional chocolate confections.

Not quite a Willy Wonka chocolate works in size… but Todos Santos is phantasmagorical, nevertheless.

Hayward turned me on to what may be the very best chocolate bar made in America, a new item from Askinosie Chocolate in Springfield MO. If there is only one chocolate that you pass between your lips in 2008, make sure it is the Askinosie bar made with Ecuador beans from San Jose del Tambo. This is a rich, complex, exceptional chocolate, packaged in a most unique manner.

You can get the bar from Todos Santos or from the Askinosie website – but YOU MUST TRY THIS CHOCOLATE IF YOU CALL YOURSELF A CHOCOHOLIC.

Todos Santos, Chocolates & Confections, Sena Plaza Courtyard, 125 East Palace Ave., #131. Tel. 505-982-3855.

Or get Askinosie chocolates on line at www.askinosie.com.

Another passion expertly fulfilled… espresso

Barrista Bill Deutsch, an espresso renegade from Seattle, stands outside his tiny espresso bar. When he’s absent, his wife Helen makes an equally good espresso.

The best espresso in Santa Fe is served in what must be the smallest espresso bar in town, if not the entire United States. Bill’s La Marzocco espresso machine takes up most of the footprint of his store, which itself is not much larger than an ATM machine.

This is THE place to head after a big meal, before a big meal, for breakfast, after breakfast… you get the picture… for a smashing double espresso with great crema.

Bill serves Caffe D’arte beans from, Seattle, where he and his wife, Helen, started out.

Holy Spirit Espresso, 225 W. San Francisco St. Tel. 505-920-3664.

For breakfast and dinner

Café Pasqual’s is a legendary local restaurant serving three squares a day. And large-portioned squares at that. We ventured in for breakfast to sample the renowned huevos motulenos, but you could zigzag into this downtown spot for an equally tasty (and large) lunch, or an organic dinner and also have a story to write home about.

Huevos motulenos are eggs over easy, served with black beans, sautéed bananas, feta cheese, green peas, salsa fresca and a red (mild), or green (hot) chile with a tomatilla salsa. I can’t think of anything they left out… except maybe capsulated Pepcid AC tablets to go to work an hour after you finish your breakfast.

We preferred the Durango omelet, a fluffy egg confection filled with snippets of tasty ham, jack cheese, scallions, guacamole, fresh sautéed mushrooms; the dish is napped with a zippy red/green (medium/hot) sauce. The combination of the two colored sauces is known locally as “Christmas chile.”

We had dinner at Café Pasqual’s one night, too. The menu is large, dishes are tasty and the wine list is very appealing, well thought-out and fairly priced. For your wine needs, speak to Derek, the wine buyer/sommelier who will help you choose a wine to complement the fare. I liked his tableside manner as much as I liked the wine list.

Café Pasqual’s, 121 Don Gaspar Ave. Tel. 505-983-9340.

For lunch

“I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday for a roasted pork burrito at Tia Sophia’s today….”

Tia Sophia’s is ONLY open for breakfast and lunch. Don’t expect to be fed after 2 pm.

Don’t miss Tia Sophia’s, an institution in Santa Fe, serving authentic regional cuisine. Don’t miss the roasted pork (carne adovado), an overly generous portion of lean pork cuts topped with chile and cheese, served with rice, beans and a side of sopaipilla (puffy, fried beignets, for lack of a better description; these are best enjoyed with a squeeze of honey and a sprinkle of cinnamon sugar, both on your table – major yum). A single order, for $7.25, is enough to feed three, but out of deference to the cook, it’s best to order individual plates.

Tia Sophia’s, 210 West San Francisco St. Tel. 505-983-9880. Open for breakfast 7 to 11 am, and for lunch, noon to 2 pm. No dinner, not ever. Closed Sunday.

Pssst: Wanna learn how to cook southwest cuisine?

One of the highlights of our visit to Santa Fe was the cooking class we took at the Santa Fe School of Cooking.

For about $75 a person, you can sign up for a half-day class and join about 30 others (you don’t need to book a whole table, or come as a group; sign up individually and join the class) to learn about the essence of southwest cuisine. What goes into it, how it’s spiced and prepared.

We were thoroughly entertained by Rocky Durham, a professional chef who led us on an exploration of techniques, methodology, tips about food preparation and storage, and then fed us a full lunch from the labors of his instruction.

Chef/instructor Rocky Durham led our cooking class; I can’t wait for his pending series of cookbooks to be published – he gives great, informative, illustrative and – oh yes! – fun instruction.

If you are in Santa Fe for a few days and love cooking, one of the more unusual, certainly original, things you can do is sign up for a cooking class here. The instruction and ensuing lunch more than justify the cost of the class.

Santa Fe School of Cooking, 116 West San Francisco St., 505-983-4511 or check out the website: www.santafeschoolofcooking.com.

Love books?

One of my favorite finds on any trip is a sensational independent bookstore and – who’s surprised? – Santa Fe has one. The bigger surprise for me was that Garcia Street Books is operated by Ed and Eva Borins, whom we knew when we all lived in Toronto, Canada.

Eva Borins, owner, with husband Ed, of Garcia Street Books.

Garcia Street Books is part of a just-off-the-main square strip mall of four very artsy stores; there’s a small but dedicated indie photography gallery, a great indie café, an indie photo bookstore and Garcia Street Books. This strip mall, if you pardon the image this phrase conjures up, is definitely worth the three minute (by feet) detour if you are downtown.

Garcia Street Books, 376 Garcia St. Tel: 505-986-0151.

Best new pizza in San Francisco!

The good news – we’ve discovered the best new pizza in San Francisco.

The bad news – now that we’re telling the world, not a one of us will be able to get in to the cozy 16-seat (interior) boite known as Piccino, Italian for “tiny.” Which this place most certainly is.

The pixie pizza perfectionist behind Piccino is Sheryl Rogat, 41, who formerly worked, among other places, at Pizzetta 211, which, until now has been one of our favorite pizza hangouts in the city.

But wanting to set out on her own, instead of being an employee all her life, Sheryl partnered with Margherita Stewart-Sagan (always a good idea to have a Margherita on your pizza menu – and one in the office, too!), rented space and opened a place of her own.

The line-up of seven pizzas changes every three weeks. Ingredients are wholesome, fresh and did I mention – helluva tasty.

The crusts are thin as a cracker, perfectly baked. They exude flavor, warmth and care. The toppings are alluring, not in the least oily (Molto Mario Battali – take a lesson!) and I was SO into the nettle, roasted garlic, mozzarella and fresh ricotta pizza that I was already trying to figure out when we could get back to Piccino for another visit – and we weren’t even half-way through our nettle melt.

The stunning “white” pizza of the week – nettle, roasted garlic, mozzarella and ricotta. A six-star pizza in a five-star universe!

Favorite New Pizza

There is pleasure in the nettle pizza that is both textural and sensual. It has deep roasted garlic notes, spiffy, spicy top notes of red chili, and then there’s this green-y taste, nettle-y thing, that dances on the middle palate. Sort of like a complex wine that doesn’t stop gifting your senses. Except that with the pizza, there’s also a textural crunch/chew that is as wonderful as the topping tastes.

The marjoram-dusted, sensually arousing Margherita pizza. If you can stop at one slice – you may be clinically dead.

The other pizza we tried (and loved) is “boring old Margherita,” which at Piccino is anything but boring. Or old. I love the way Sheryl has added a dusting of marjoram to the tomato sauce; it dances on the palate, gives depth to what is often just a “plain sauced” pizza.

Like the nettle pizza, this one has a purity of flavor that transcends what you normally expect in a “pizza parlor.”

The beer list is short – two brew, each at $4. We tried, and loved, the offering from Sonoma County Ales; their hand-brewed, Bear Republic Racer 5 India Pale Ale, which hales from Healdsburg, makes your mouth happy. ‘Nuf said.

The Oh-No’s

Parking in Dogpatch, the neighborhood, is a pain in the ass, to put it bluntly. If you tell someone you’re going to meet them at Piccino and you’re driving – leave today for tomorrow’s rendezvous because it just may take that long to find a parking spot.

While Piccino is open for breakfast, lunch and dinner, even with hours as long as 7 am to 9 pm a few days of the week, WHAT HAPPENS TO US WHEN WE GET A PIZZA URGE AT 11 PM ANY NIGHT OF THE WEEK, HUH? Sheryl, if you really cared about us, you’d open the first 24-hour pizzeria to satisfy our nocturnal cravings.

Piccino is at 801 22nd St., in “Dogpatch, San Francisco. Tel: 415-824-4224. No reservations. No parking. No valet. No worries – you’re still going to want to go!

How do you spell Gary Danko?

A-R-R-O-G-A-N-C-E would be good for a start.

This multi-starred restaurant in San Francisco, where we have eaten six times and really liked the fare on most visits, has firmly moved into a zone, which can only be described as rigid and not fun.

Point in question: four of us from Napa Valley made the trek last week to Gary Danko, usually ranked Number One on restaurant dining lists in San Francisco. Maybe the departure of long-time sommelier Jason Alexander (his real name!) had something to do with our treatment, but surely, the knowledgeable and professional Maitre d’ had the authority to resolve our issue but chose not to.

Background: Being part of a winemaking team in Napa Valley, and having spent 30 years writing about food and wine and professionally reviewing restaurants, I often bring my own wines to dinner.

I have no objection to pay a corkage fee and when restaurants are extremely gracious and don’t charge corkage, I ALWAYS include what would have been the cost of the opened wines, which I brought, when calculating the tip, because why should the waitstaff get short-changed when management is gracious enough to waive the corkage fee? In this fashion, there are many meals in Napa Valley where the tip we leave equals the price of the food on our bill! We are, if anything, generous to a fault with waiters; for the record, we are not cheap, we are not whiners, we are not bumpkins.

And so, we took three bottles of wine to Gary Danko, where our foursome intended to spend the bulk of a Saturday night. Our reservation was for 9.30 pm.

I was told at the door that the corkage policy is that you may ONLY bring two bottles to dinner and that Restaurant Gary Danko charges $35 per bottle opened. I agreed to the terms and pointed out that the third bottle was simply a back-up – in case one of our primary wines was flawed, or corked, which happens these days with too much frequency.

Oh oh... the fun is about to end...

For starters, we ordered three glasses of Billecart-Salmon Rose Champagne at $32 a glass; we ordered one martini at $15. We ordered three bottles of sparkling water at $7.75 each. We ordered a delicious 2004 Vincent Girardin Puligny-Montrachet for $112. We asked the sommelier to open our two wines: a 2004 Leroy Vosne-Romanee and a 1997 Guigal La Landonne Cote-Rotie, which is considered by serious wine lovers to be one of the great wines of the world (maybe not the 97 vintage, but in general, this 100 percent Syrah Cote-Rotie is one of the wines you would choose to take to a desert island).

I have cellared the 1997 Landonne for some time, but contemporarily, if you wanted to replace it, you would have to pay $400 for the bottle. Even so, when we opened the wine, it was not a charming example; I have had this wine many times, even been to the cellar in Ampuis, France, and tasted different vintages of Marcel Guigal’s single vineyard Cote-Roties from cask with him. In short: while this was a modestly flawed bottle, I did not feel the wine would complement the delicious fare at Gary Danko. If anything, it was a comment about the quality of the food and the wine not being able to keep up with it.

So I called over the server and asked him if he would please open our third bottle, to replace the undrinkable Cote-Rotie, which we were not going to drink. Note: I was not asking for a bottle to be opened as a third beverage – I was asking for a replacement to be opened to take the place of the flawed Landonne.

I was told that this was an unusual request – we’d already reached our limit of two BYO bottles; I said that I understood, but that we wanted to open the third bottle (a 1991 Philip Togni Cabernet from Spring Mountain) to replace the less than perfect 1997 Landonne.

Ultimately, we were told that "Restaurant Gary Danko" (they always talk about themselves in the third person, which increases the drama and makes employees feel – and, I presume act – more important) would permit us to have a third bottle opened – but just this one time – (they underlined this part with great inflection in their voice) and then informed us that we would be charged an additional $70 corkage to open this third bottle!

How can you have "Highway Robbery" when you're not in a car?

I queried the charge, citing the fact that they were simply replacing an already opened bottle… and even if they felt compelled to recharge me for opening another bottle, why were they PUNISHING ME for the poorly made wine that I’d brought? I hadn’t walked in with a bottle of Two-Buck-Chuck, I wasn’t a novice at this game; I have, in fact, eaten at many three-star French restaurants to review their fare and not a one of them has ever attempted to make me, or other patrons, squirm in their plush seats by PUNISHING guests with an aggressive, unreasonable, elevated corkage fee.

In the end, our bill for the evening came to $848.47 for four people. And, for the first time that I can ever recall in 30 years of eating at, or reviewing, restaurants, I was compelled to leave NO TIP.

Rather than generously over-tip the mostly brilliant waitstaff here, I felt I had to make a statement – to “Restaurant Gary Danko” and the Matire d’ who insisted we be charged the extra fee – that they are part of the hospitality industry, not the in-hospitality industry, and that until “Restaurant Gary Danko” understands this, I refuse to contribute to the corruption of the morals of its staff for instituting and maintaining an offensive, and impudent, corkage policy.

Imagine; had the waiter, or maitre d’, simply agreed to open our replacement bottle and not made a fuss about it, we would have come away from our dinner feeling like kings. We would have told our friends to visit the restaurant; we would have planned to return ourselves. We would have graciously left a large tip. We would have returned many times in the future to spend thousands of dollars.

But from a point of shortsightedness, and the stupidity of charging an unwarranted step-up fee to open a third bottle -- replacing a flawed bottle for which we’d already been charged corkage – we will not go back to Restaurant Gary Danko.

There are many fine top-tier restaurants, and many sensational neighborhood restaurants, in San Francisco, which want our business, which go out of their way to get it and keep it.

There is no place in my life for a restaurant that heaps haughty, effete, belittling or arrogant behavior upon any of its patrons, me included; because, sometimes, the customer just actually happens to be right.

My Favorite New One-Pot Dinner!

Carol White, on our recent tour of Tuscany

Living with Carol, my wife of 35 years, has been like living with a personal, private chef all this time.

We both became interested in food in the early 70s and then our paths slightly diverged; I became a writer about food and wine, and a reviewer of restaurant fare, while Carol, who worked as an editor for one of Canada’s most popular magazines, passionately devoted herself to learning about cuisine. Over time, she became one of the best home cooks I have ever known.

As time went by, Carol evolved a style of cuisine all her own; friends call it “cuisine carolaise,” though it is not French, per se, but rather a wine-country cuisine (if you have to give it a name), based on the freshest, best-quality ingredients, sympathetic amounts of oil and lots of fresh vegetables and herbs, many from Carol’s large organic garden.

As a professional food editor, Carol is the first one to acknowledge that very few recipes are truly 100 percent original. Rather, each cook puts his, or her, “imprimatur” on a dish and sometimes their updates, or small “inspirations,” will turn a good dish into an outstanding one.

Which is what happened to the recipe below for Sausage & Bean Soup with Tuscan Kale. Carol prepared it two months ago; I was bowled over by the texture and flavors… and by the joy, which this dish brought me. I begged her to give me the recipe for napaman.com readers.

But Carol wouldn’t budge. “I’m not comfortable publishing a recipe until I’ve made the dish enough times that I fully understand it and what the possible pitfalls might be,” she explained. (Trust me: I’ve heard this rationale before whenever I’ve tried to get her to give me a print-out of some supernal dish she made the previous night!)

She doesn't give up recipes easily... but if you bug her enough... they are forthcoming!

So, in order to get napaman.com readers this recipe, I first had to encourage Carol to make the sausage and bean soup several more times – for scientific accuracy. We invited friends over for dinners; they went gaga for the dish the same way I had… and then they started begging Carol for the recipe. This was just the proof that Carol needed to sit down and work out the details.

Lucky are you who make this soup/stew, or whatever you want to call this one-bowl dinner. It’s seriously delicious and, according to Carol, very easy to make.

I like to serve 4- to 5-year-old Spanish, or Italian, reds with this hearty dish. They tend to complement this spicy sausage and bean stew. But a good Napa Valley Syrah, Petite Sirah, or racy Zinfandel will complement the dish beautifully, too.

Sausage & Bean Soup with Tuscan Kale
Tuscan kale, also known as dinosaur kale, lacinato kale or cavalo nero, is a dark leafy green that adds rich flavor and great texture to thick and hearty bean soups. If you can’t find cavalo nero at your local market, you can substitute Savoy cabbage or other greens of your choice, such as Swiss chard.

I often make this soup early in the day and let it sit at room temperature for several hours before serving. Or you can make the beans in the morning and prepare the remainder of the dish several hours later. After you’ve made this a few times, you’ll develop your own rhythm and your own variations. For example, if you have fresh tomatoes in your garden, you can use them instead of the canned variety. Or try using different sausages than the hot and sweet Italian sausages listed in the ingredients.

Although I call this soup, it’s really more of a stew and I always serve it as a main course. Follow with a salad of mixed greens.

1 lb dried navy beans
4 whole cloves garlic, peeled
4 tbsp (approx.) good-quality olive oil
6 to 8 fresh sage leaves
Kosher salt
2 or 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
Pinch dried red pepper flakes (optional)
1 large cooking onion, coarsely chopped
2 hot Italian sausages, casing removed
2 sweet Italian sausages, casing removed
1 can (28 oz.) whole tomatoes, drained and coarsely chopped
5 or 6 fresh carrots, peeled and thinly sliced
3 bunches Tuscan kale, stems removed and leaves sliced in 2-inch ribbons
1 to 2 cups (or more) chicken stock, preferably homemade, or boiling water
Freshly ground pepper
6 to 8 thin slices day-old bread, such as pain au levain
Whole cloves garlic, peeled
1 cup freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano

Rinse beans and place in medium-sized heavy saucepan with 8 cups cold water. Bring to boil and immediately reduce heat to low so that beans cook, uncovered, at a gentle simmer. Add 4 whole cloves garlic, 6 to 8 fresh sage leaves and 2 tbsp olive oil. Simmer, uncovered, for about 20 to 30 minutes, stirring periodically, then add 2 tsp kosher salt and continue cooking and stirring until beans are nearly tender, about 1 hour. Turn off heat and cover pot. (There should still be a small amount of liquid in pot.) At this point, you can let beans stand at room temperature for several hours without refrigerating. Or continue with next step.

In large heavy saucepan or soup pot, heat 2 tbsp olive oil over medium heat. Add dried red pepper flakes, if using, finely chopped garlic, onion and sausage meat. Cook, stirring and breaking up sausage meat, until sausage is no longer pink. This should take about 8 to 10 minutes. Add tomatoes and continue cooking for a few minutes. Add carrots and kale and continue cooking, stirring often, until kale is wilted.

Add beans and their liquid to soup pot and continue cooking until heated through. Add 1 to 2 cups of chicken stock or water, depending on desired thickness, and continue cooking, over low heat, for about 20 to 30 minutes or until carrots are tender. Season with salt and pepper to taste. If making soup early in the day, turn off heat and let sit on burner until serving.

Prepare garlic toasts: Preheat oven to 400F. Place bread on baking sheet and place in oven for about 10 to 15 minutes, turning halfway through, just until bread is toasted. Check frequently so bread doesn’t burn; it should be golden brown and crisp. Remove from oven, let cool just until you can comfortably handle bread, and rub on both sides with whole cloves of garlic.

To serve: Place a slice of garlic toast in each soup bowl. Ladle hot soup on top. Sprinkle with grated cheese.

Makes 6 to 8 servings.

L.A. Story… the Glory and the Gory

Just spent a long weekend in the City of the Angels to check out the food and wine scene and get in some culture too. Not just the Arts kind, but the Frozen Yogurt kind, too.

The big story, or controversy, in LA about Fro-Yo is Pinkberry. Remember the name, because I suspect you are going to see a whole lot more of them opening across the nation.

Pinkberry is the 2-year-old brainchild of South Korean Shelly Hwang who came to America in 1992 for business school at USC. Shelly turned her dream, to open a single frozen yogurt stand, into a mini-chain; there are already 28 locations in southern California and four in New York.

The Pinkberry location I visited, a pastel-colored walk-in on Sunset Boulevard, offers two flavors of frozen yogurt – plain or green tea – to which you can add up to three toppings (candy trappings, or for the health-conscious, a selection of fresh, or previously frozen, fruits, including pomegranate, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, black berries). A medium-sized cup with three toppings is $4.95.

The fro-yo is clean tasting, somewhat soury – but a pleasant soury – and has none of the sugary, or artificial flavors, that one often finds in commercial frozen yogurt. The tart treat, which has a cult following, is often called "Crackberry," given its addictive quality.

Marketed as “frozen yogurt,” Pinkberry ran into a controversy with California’s Department of Food and Agriculture over the definition of Frozen Yogurt; Pinkberry’s version either does, or doesn’t, contain enough live bacterial culture to qualify for the title. The jury still appears to be out.

According to a story on Wikipedia, the LA Times sent samples of Pinkberry’s frozen product to a lab and reported that Pinkberry did contain active yogurt cultures, just not enough of them to call the product Frozen Yogurt.

Apparently, Pinkberry's Fro-Yo had 69,000 bacterial cultures per gram; the National Yogurt Association maintains that refrigerated “yogurt” products must contain at least 100 million cultures per gram at the time of manufacture, and frozen yogurt products must contain 10 million cultures per gram at the time of manufacture.

As I didn’t head to Los Angeles for culture anyway, I wasn’t upset to learn all of this; the bottom line is that Pinkberry makes one helluva tasty, appealing, frozen treat. In fact, it is sufficiently addictive that we drove out of our way on two successive days to have one.

Check Google, or www.pinkberry.com to find a location in Los Angeles or New York.

Something cold… then something HOT!

Talk about cult status! Intelligentsia Coffee is THE talk of coffee geeks on the Internet. The Chicago-based coffee house has just opened the first of what will be several LA storefronts.

The espresso is damn-near perfect, what geeks call a “Godshot.” Intelligentsia’s espresso is a blend of Arabica beans from three coffee-growing regions, including Ethiopia. It is dark, it is delicious, it is addictive.

The pastries, muffins and croissants at the West Sunset Boulevard location need work, but their deficiency is compensated by the outstanding coffee, the funky setting, the fabulous, dedicated barristas who LOVE their work, and who LOVE talking about coffee with patrons.

This may have been what Starbucks was like at the beginning, 30 years ago, when barristas on duty where there because they LOVED good coffee, wanted to share their vision of what makes a “Godshot.” Certainly the staff at Intelligentsia make the grade in flying colors; I didn’t meet a barrista with as much passion for the Art of Coffee Making on my last visit to Seattle, which claims to be the most coffee-centric city in America.

Intelligentsia is at 3922 W. Susnset Blvd., LA, 90029.

But Wait … There’s More!

The BIG treat in LA this visit wasn’t for the mouth – it was for the eyes. I took the 1-hour (or so) self-guided audio tour of the Walt Disney Concert Hall, home of the LA Philharmonic.

The stainless steel-clad building, with its loopy, droopy, highly polished roof and sides, is the work of Frank Gehry, whom I had to pleasure to meet this past summer (see my napaman.com archived story on Hall Winery, St. Helena).

From every angle, from every elevation on the self-guided tour, you see something that you can’t see from the street. There is no doubt in my mind that the tour IS THE BEST THING YOU CAN DO FOR FREE IN LOS ANGELES!

I can’t even fathom why they don’t charge a buck, or two, for the privilege of being able to take the tour – but it’s totally free!

Many napaman.com readers will be familiar with Gehry’s best-known architectural achievement, the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, but few will know that he actually designed the Walt Disney Concert Hall BEFORE he built the Guggenheim! As sponsors of the LA music hall ran into financial difficulties, their project was completed AFTER the opening of Gehry’s Bilbao masterpiece.

Also for the record: the curvy-walled Guggenheim in Bilbao is covered in reflective sheets of titanium; the Walt Disney Concert Hall is covered in (almost no-two-alike) sheets of stainless steel.

Here are a few additional shots from my hour of bliss touring the WDCH, as locals call it:

I love the garden that Gehry planned and executed on the upper reaches at the back of the concert hall; I especially love the fountain, shaped as a rose, that he crafted out of broken Delft Blue china as a visual poem for Walt Disney’s’ widow, Lillian, who ante’d up the first $50 million to get the concert hall designed and built in her late husband’s name.

The Walt Disney Concert Hall is smack downtown at 111 S. Grand Avenue. Call 323-850-2000 for information, or check out the website http://wdch.laphil.com/
The free self-guided audio tour is offered most days from 10 am to 2 pm, but check this page for the date you’re thinking of visiting: http://www.musiccenter.org/vtc/toursched.html

Can You Believe It… There’s Still More!

While you’re in the neighborhood visiting the Walt Disney Concert Hall, walk one block northeast to the stunning Cathedral of our Lady of the Angels, the 5-year-old Catholic Cathedral. Wow! A modern-day update on a 2,000-year-old concept.

The first Roman Catholic Cathedral to be erected in the western US in 30 years, the Cathedral of our Lady of the Angels is the third largest cathedral in the world.
Spanish architect, José Rafael Moneo, fueled with a budget of $300 million, designed a dynamic building with virtually no right angles. This geometry reputedly contributes “to a feeling of mystery and an aura of majesty,” according to Cathedral spokespeople. And also to expense, according to any architect or contractor, you might ask.

The Archdiocese, aiming to fill the Cathedral with striking elements of contemporary art, contracted leading artists to create original works. Of particular note are the tapestries, which hang on three sides of the sanctuary. They are mind-boggling. Created by artist John Nava, the tapestries retell important stories and actually help to reduce echoes in the 11-story house of worship.
Of three tapestry groupings, the most prominent is the Communion of Saints along the south and north walls of the nave. Twenty-five fresco-like tapestries depict 135 saints and blesseds from around the world, including holy men and women of North America canonized by the Church.
Using modern digital imaging and Old Master tapestry-making techniques, artist Nava made weavable digital files, which were sent to Bruges, Belgium, where they were turned into woven tapestries.

One other art highlight is the crucifix behind the altar, created by Los Angeles sculptor Simon Toparovsky, who happens to be a close personal friend. Simon chose to create a Christ of human proportions and size – so that worshippers could truly relate. As such, his interpreted Christ is 6’ 6”, made out of bronze cast over a sculpture made of wax, burlap, clay, wire, foam and tubing.

From Musts … to Busts...

Sorry to say that the big disappointments on this LA visit were the Food Venues. We had high hopes for our dinner at several high-profile restaurants, including Osteria Mozza, Mario Battali’s new cult culinary mecca, featuring a Mozzarella Bar. Mario’s partners are Nancy Silverton, the hot-shot behind the ultra-successful La Brea Bakery, and Joseph Bastianich, a hyper-successful New York restaurateur and wine guru, both close friends of Battali.

I had dinner at Otto, one of Battali’s New York restaurants, three weeks ago and many of the dishes at Osteria Mozza are summer reruns in flavor or fashion. Mario’s food is starting to taste very corporate, like there is not a real chef in the kitchen, just someone following a road map.

And if you were down a quart of oil when you got to Osteria Mozza, you certainly would be topped up a quart by your dinner’s finale. The amuse-bouche is a pinwheel slice of mozzarella drizzled with olive oil, studded with an olive. Our first course is a selection of great tasting items from the Mozzarella Bar, but each is heavily drizzled (make that OVER-drizzled) with olive oil.

Pasta courses are just okay, prepared with excessive olive oil. There is so much oil, in fact, that if you close your eyes and taste the guinea hen and the braised beef, you would be hard-pressed to identify which you were eating. Oil covers all kinds of cooking sins (poor cuts, imperfectly prepared food, etc.) but when there is too much of it, this is itself a sin.

“Roasted potatoes with rosemary” come from the kitchen soaked in oil. These are “roasted?” Other contorni ordered, like turnips and flageolets, are also liberally swimming in oil.

And just when you thought you might find a course without olive oil comes the dessert menu with this offering: olive oil gelato! I kid you not.

This ice is actually on the menu at one of Mario’s New York restaurants and while it is good, it is not worth the price of admission nor the potential surgery that your gall bladder may require after finishing a meal in which every single course, every single dish, appears to be a product placement for some mysterious “Got Oil?” campaign that hasn’t yet surfaced on TV.

For those who won’t take NO for an opinion, you will find Osteria Mozza at 6602 Melrose Ave. Tel: 323-297-0100.

For 10 Days, I thought of myself as… tuscanyman!

Every once in a while, napaman takes a break from living in Paradise and travels to other wine-producing regions to get a dose of reality – to check out what’s happening in the hinterland, or the winterland (if I travel in December).

Having just returned from Tuscany, Italy, I can report that there IS life outside our mountain-sided valley (the Mayacamas and Vaca ranges hug Napa Valley like the parentheses around this partial sen