Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2000 Mini-Retrospective

I remember the 2000 vintage as a whirlwind of excitement. This was before the Tech Bubble Burst, Enron imploded, 9/11, and eight years of Bush Part Deux. At the time, bridges were literally for sale. But the Napa Valley 2000 vintage hit the market with a lame thud. There was very little excitement for it, with most professional wine writers comparing it to 1998. In other words, a loser. So I spent very little time and money on Napa 2000, which in retrospect was a mistake.

By comparison, Bordeaux 2000 was hailed as virtually the greatest vintage of the century, despite the fact that the century had just barely begun. Prices for both banks of Bordeaux soared in spite of the fact that NASDAQ lingered around the same figure as the vintage. I have never bought Bordeaux en primeur, and 2000 is the one vintage I regret not having done so. But I bought the wines with abandon as they appeared on shelves, and I drank them young, and that in a nutshell is how I taught myself about Bordeaux.

Nine years later, Napa's wines are coming into focus while Bordeaux is still closed, and I find that there is much to enjoy from both sides of the Atlantic, with Napa Valley cabernet proving to be the better value. The best wines from 2000 exhibit density, semi-sweet dark chocolate notes and mellow raspberry. And in comparison to Bordeaux prices and today's prices for California Cult wines, the 2000 Napa wines were (and in many cases still are) a bargain.

2000 Sloan Estate Napa Valley **** The first release from this small, family run estate, featuring a high percentage of cabernet made by Martha McClellan. Unctuous and opaque. Extremely concentrated dark fruits, most notably blueberry, with shaved graphite notes and thick sweet tannins. To my taste, a marvelous wine, but I think it's worth noting that Sloan is probably not to everyone's taste. It's been slammed by some CellarTracker users as, "bitter, astringent, over extracted, [and] so rustic and void of any real fruit that i am shocked." This is the only Sloan wine I have ever tasted, and it was one of the best wines I've ever had (Scarecrow and Schrader included).

2000 Corison Winery Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon *** I didn't figure this would (or could) be any better than the 1997 *** (previously reviewed). I was wrong. Almost iridescently dark, with sweet cream and briarpatch notes, strawberries and Burgundian Zzzzing! on the finish.

2000 Far Niente Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon ** Always reminds me of St. Julien. Ink color, not a purple wine. Neither translucent nor opaque. Tight and searing at first under the gums, then very fluid with a couple hours decanting, soft dry tannins with notes of blackberry and currants on the finish.

Previously reviewed:
2005 Far Niente Cabernet Sauvignon Oakville **
2004 Far Niente Napa Valley Chardonnay **/***
2005 Nickel & Nickel Manzana Vineyard RRV Pinot Noir *
2005 Nickel & Nickel “Bonfire Vineyard” Zinfandel *
2004 Nickel & Nickel Copper Streak Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon ***

1988 Ridge Vineyards Monte Bello ***

This wine put the 1989 *** to shame. Oppulently opaque, but this is most likely mature. Left a hefty amount of black residue in the bottle. You can smell the twenty-one years on this. Decanted, an hour later, the wine smelled like an old forrest, very reminiscent of old Bordeaux, then sweet blackberries. The most succulent twenty-one year old wine I have ever tasted. From 95% cabernet sauvignon, with 3% merlot and 2% petit verdot...makes me think they should add 2% petit verdot to the final blend of the 2008, in an attempt to recreate the longevity of the sweetness here.

Also tasted:

2004 Kongsgaard Chardonnay Napa Valley *** Lush, full-bodied, a touch sweet, with underlying salty minerality reminiscent of young German riesling. The tropical fruits and granite notes that I loved in this two years ago have given way to a more traditional Cali-fruit-bomb. Still delicious.

 

Sine Qua Non The Hoodoo Man **** A straight edge white blend with uber pineapple and coconut and amazing Zing!!! underneath. This was perfect (and made me regret saying anything negative about SQN) until it fell apart after a half hour. Still, this wine is enormously endowed. It should be enjoyed young, undecanted, just pour this sucker up. It cannot get any better than it is now.

2008 Monte Bello Futures Tasting

After a 72-hour whirlwind weekend trip through San Francisco, north to Knights Valley, south through Napa, Berkeley, Santa Cruz, and Monte Bello, I feel a little like splattered road meat sitting at my desk in Manhattan, a little like Dante, who, upon sitting down to translate his journey through Heaven, Hell, and everything in between, realized just how ill-prepared he was for the task. Upon reaching Paradise, after his tortuous journey upon Mount Purgatory, Dante wrote:

His glory, by whose might all things are mov'd,

Pierces the universe, and in one part

Sheds more resplendence, elsewhere less. In heav'n,

That largeliest of his light partakes, was I,

Witness of things, which to relate again

Surpasseth power of him who comes from thence;

For that, so near approaching its desire
Our intellect is to such depth absorb'd,

That memory cannot follow. Nathless all,

That in my thoughts I of that sacred realm

Could store, shall now be matter of my song.

Similarly, the trip up Monte Bello Road is a wine lover's purgatory: The road is much too narrow, the mountain is much too high, and it is impossible to travel faster than a snail. Wooden crosses line the road, where, I presume, luckless travelers have fallen. This is a white knuckled trip, but I can never wait to just get there.

As is obvious, I have a certain fondness for Ridge Vineyards. Why? There is no short answer. I grew up drinking Kendall Jackson cabernet sauvignon at home and Montepulciano d'Abruzzo out. I always appreciated wine, but it was a 1995 Pagani Ranch Zinfandel that hooked me when I was working as a stock boy in a fancy wine and cheese shop during college. Ridge wines have been a part of my life ever since. Thus, every trip up Monte Bello Road is a lesson and an adventure.

The 2008 Monte Bello *** will (probably) be made from just cabernet sauvignon and merlot for the first time in twenty-five years. The wine is an iridescent purple color with woodsy notes emanating from the glass and mild ripe raspberry, loam and ground dark cocoa in a very elegant package. Difficult to compare to recent vintages (which have all included at least some cabernet franc or petit verdot) this is less flamboyant than the 2006 and 2007, and will benefit from extended cellaring.

We also barrel tasted a 2008 Monte Bello from a Taransaud barrel (there are only three in the chai, purchased each year as an experiment with French oak) which was slightly more muted, as opposed to the Canton (Kentucky) barrels, which were all vanilla and spice.

By contrast the 2005 Monte Bello *** which we tasted from bottle is darker, more profound; a surprisingly succulent wine at this stage, with good viscosity in the mouth and old school verve.

The Monte Bello team was also pouring the 1999, 1997, and 1995 Monte Bellos. All are superb. The 1999 is still edgy with more woodsy notes and succulent strawberry and cream. The bottle of 1997 I tasted was the best I have ever tried. Previously linear, yet elegant, on Saturday, it was perfect. The 1995 still has a long way to go, with mellow dried herb and vegetal notes remaining and tannin to shed for another decade. The 2007 Santa Cruz Mountains Chardonnay *** (which recently received 93 points from Wine Spectator) is lightly steely with minor tropical fruit and strawberry-bubblegum notes. This chardonnay, like Eric's previous two vintages, is impossible to resist.

From barrel, we also tasted the 2008 Geyserville *** Tightly wound, young, but still elegant, with spice and cedar and tight red fruits. This is a teenage River Phoenix in a bottle. The 2007 Lytton Estate Syrah/Grenache ** is also tight, almost light, almost too searing, with blue fruits and tons of tannin. It needs air and space to let loose and will improve significantly in bottle. This wine is Kevin Bacon in Footloose.

Eric Baugher said Ridge may be phasing out its syrah and grenache programs from the Lytton Estate. The rationale is that Ridge wants to focus exclusively on cabernet, chardonnay, and zinfandel. This is terribly disappointing news. These Rhone wines need time to evolve. True: they may never develop the sweet, blueberry and vanilla notes which trade critics laud. But these are distinctive, mineral driven wines which, in the best years, have fully integrated, svelte tannins and polished floral notes, and even in poor years, produce nicely quaffable wines. I would hate to see the end of Ridge's syrah and grenache program.

At the end of a long day, Eric Baugher opened a bottle from a barrel experiment of the 1991 Monte Bello ***** vintage, aged exclusively in new (mixed) French cooperage. An opaque purple color, with violets on the nose gave rise to a concentrated, broad wine, with succulent blueberry and fully integrated oak notes. Without question, this was a once in a lifetime event, and a once in a lifetime wine.

1989 Ridge Vineyards Monte Bello ***

If it weren't for Monte Bello, I wouldn't believe in that greatest of vinous marketing stunts, the theory of terroir. Of course, that could just be because Monte Bello is the only wine I drink consistently enough to know it when I smell it. Perhaps if I drank La Tache often enough I would understand terroir differently. Having never tasted La Tache - I will just have to make do with Monte Bello.

On the subject of terroir, and how little I know about it, I might as well confess that I have never tasted a Bordeaux that struck me as having a sense of place as much as any bottle of Monte Bello. Despite trade critics assertions to the contrary, I just don't understand how a 200 acre vineyard (e.g., Mouton Rothschild) can have terroir in the same sense a 15 acre vineyard can (e.g. La Tache). (And that's not a knock at Mouton Rothschild -- which I adore .)

Thus, the application of the traditional definition of terroir to anything but small vineyards in specific areas is oxymoronic. It's pure marketing. And hence, it is purely worthless. But then I taste this ... and I realize how wrong I am. Monte Bello, which is comprised of roughly 82.7 acres of cabernet sauvignon, merlot, caberent franc and petit verdot consistently displays its own unique terroir. But it is certainly larger than the miniscule vineyard sizes that make up plots of grand cru Burgundy to which the term should only apply.

And thus we come to the real genius of marketing terroir: it can refer to anything and everything provided it refers to terroir.

Now switch gears. It's 1989, and the country is about to enter a brief recession. Our new president, Bush The First, is about to invade Iraq. He is slightly less engaging and much less entertaining than our previous president, Reagan.

Now it is today, and the country is in another recession, and we have a much more engaging president than our last one, Bush The Second, who also invaded Iraq.

In retrospect, it doesn't seem like all that much has changed in 20 years.

Looking at this decanter full of 1989 Monte Bello ... It's a transparent, purple color, with major bricking. The nose holds the promise of wet earth, mushrooms, and mild wild berries. There are notes of strawberry and vine leaves on the palate. The acidity has held this together for twenty years. The tannins are fully round and this bottle, at least, has evolved and begun its "inevitable decline." After an hour, sitting out on our terrace overlooking Brooklyn Heights, it mellows and reveals sweet berries and cream notes.

Love Letter to 2007 Linne Calodo Sticks and Stones ****

Dear Sticks and Stones,

Ever since that night we had together I haven't be able to get you out of my mind. It's true. I'm not playing coy. No more games. I miss you. I miss your husky blackberry concentration, your heady fancy French perfume, your notes of sage and orange rind and clove. In this world gone mad I want you all to myself.

You think I'm playing games -- drinking around -- what can I say? I am who I am. I'm not a one wine kind of guy. I told you this. I never lied. You knew where I stood.

I've been checking you out, behind your back, drinking with your friends from Paso Robles without your knowing about it. Mostly west side wines, where that limestone earth seduces me. Making sure you're for real. Making sure you're legit.

It's true I spent a week with Tablas Creek. And I ordered some old vines wines -- they had nothing on you. But I don't regret it. I can't say I ever will. But I was thinking of you the whole time.

You think I don't mean it. You think I prefer those blueberry-syrahs with their overtly vanilla profiles, but let me tell you something, they've got nothing on you.

I heard from Sine Qua Non not so long ago. That husky tramp with her sexy perfume and wily Moulin Rouge ways. She allocated me two bottles of white wine and told me I was lucky to get just that. Ha! A two bottle allocation is a slap in the face. It's an insult. I told her to get lost. Two bottles. What a joke.

You're the one I want. Come back to me. It can be the way it was.

I promise ...