Winelog #1 Clos du Val

I have the day off from touring today, so am visiting wineries with some other guides, Brett and Greg: many thanks to Brett for his expansive sommelier insights and connections in the valley and to Greg for being such a sport and hauling us around!

Where did we go? 

Clos du Val/ Chappellet/ Joseph Phelps/ Regusci

Clos du Val: 5330 Silverado Trail, Napa, CA. 94558 (707) 261-5251

Fantastic tasting! If you have been driving by this spot in favor of smaller, lesser-known wineries and vineyard tasting rooms, drop in next time. Call ahead for better service. There's a good reason why some wineries get famous. 

Clos du Val, only 2 years after French owners Bernard Portet & John Goelet's first grape purchase and with their very first vintage, entered in the Judgment of Paris and placed #8 for Cabernet, behind only Heitz, Martha's Vineyard 1970 and Stag's Leap 1973! 

Jim Wilkinson is cool! He's a farmer here in the Valley. He and his partner own their own farm down the Silverado Trail, Omi's Farm. He hunts with a bow and arrow; killed 10 boar and 22 turkeys last January. He came to wines from trucking. He had worked for the military. Intending to go into special ops, he had a bit of a fall and, unable to keep driving, found a job here doing something he loves; wine hospitality. He knows his wines and the terroir of the plots where they grow them.

Jim and me. He bagged 10 boar last January, bow and arrow.

CDV offers four tiers of tastings. 

1) Harvest Whites for white wine lovers. Good one to know in the valley!

2) Current Releases Tasting 15 bucks. 

3) Reserve Reds Tasting 25 bucks, includes a mini vertical of the Stag's Leap District Cabs '07 and '06.

(I have lately taken to starting with the more recent year in vertical tastings, rather than starting with older vintage, so as to follow the aging of the wine. Maybe that's the way it should be done, but I have seen it the other way 'round).

2000 Reserve Cab

1997 Reserve Cab Bernard Portet Signature. Yes!

4) Romance package for two in the private olive grove paired with chocolate and roses. I figured since there were three of us, we would skip this one today.

Here's what we tasted. 

   

Three Graces Chardonnay: This is a very friendly and approachable white blended from 3 of the vineyard's Carneros blocks. It's a 50% malolactic, stopped halfway through the 2nd fermentation with sulphur (guess that's how they do it); 10 months french oak, 20% new, creamy enough to enjoy on it's own and not at the expense of good acidity. At 35 bucks, I'd take it home. 

Merlot '08- Napa Valley- Bright red cherry notes on the nose with a little smoke to back it up on a nice solid mid-pallette. Little earth and fungus. About an eighteen to twenty-second finish. I counted on the second hand.;-) 12% cab franc.

Reserve Pinot Noir '07-  earthy and light violet, red fruit, fussy, hay, mustard and white pepper on the nose. (I am not copying tasting notes, I promise!) 

Vertical 06 and 07 Stag's Leap District Cabernet Sauvignon - A rich, deep nose of black fruit, lilac, earth and tobacco on the 07. Complex, generously open tannins are soft enough to enjoy without food. 20 second finish. -06 is surprisingly more open, softened and mellow after just one year. (When you do a vertical, be sure to mark the years with a dry erase on the base of the stem to avoid confusion. Brett did this and I was really glad;-)).

2000 100% Reserve Cabernet. Gone so much in the Bordeaux style, green peppers, olives, wet clay, and volcanics seem to rule the nose, which was described by a friend as a rain shower over damp earth on a hot day. I like that! French would say "petroleum", Jim says, which he would describe as raisin oil. One thing I could definitely pick up both on the nose and pallette is graphite...pencil lead!?!? 

Jim says that our nose picks up alcohol, then barrel flavors, then toast. Now there's a test for you! First, try to pick up (through the alcohol) whether the wine was aged in french (predominated by vanilla and spice) or american (caramel, as evidence by the higher sugar content and oxygen of american oak). Then behind that try to pick up the toast on the nose and pallette. Easy to confuse the barrel flavors with the toast, and the toast with the more primary notes that may come from smoke on the fruit, but possibly discernable from the order on the nose where we pick it up. Ahhaha!!!!

If you are thinking that you would like to be more familiar with the wines of Stag's Leap District but you don't want to run around so much, Stag's Leap District Winegrowers Association is currently offering through Clos du Val an eighteen-bottle sampling from all the core wineries called "The Appellation Collection", 18 Cab Sauvs from the member wineries. $1450.00

Ulysses is the Marketing Director here. I have to extend thanks to you for the invitation and to Jim and Debra for the tasting. Hope you like your picture, Ulysses!!

Thank you for the invitation, Ulysses!
I promise to come back with many guests;-)

Thank you for reading and stay tuned as I chase the vine?!?!