07 Cabs Finally Arrive!

2007 is one of those vintages that we will be talking about 20 years from now. It is opulent, complex, and age-worthy. And I have been waiting for 2 years to share it!

The first of the vintage to be available is also one of our best: the 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon - Ghielmetti Vineyard, Clone 4 is the first of our two Premier Cabernet Collection wines to debut.

The Premier Cabernet Collection is comprised of the best expressions of 100% Cabernet that the Steven Kent Winery produces. In this vintage only 8 barrels out a total of 127 (6.3%) were deemed of great enough quality to earn the Premier Cabernet Collection classification.

Just 4 barrels each (roughly 90 cases of each wine, packaged in 3-packs) were produced. Based upon the response to the 2006 vintage, these wines will not last long. Click Here to Order this Wine before it's gone!

Cabernet Sauvignon - Ghielmetti Vineyard, Clone 4 Notes:

This powerhouse wine emphasizes aromatic notes of semi-sweet chocolate, graphite, mocha, cassis, and black cherry liqueur. On entry, rich and viscous flavors of dark fruit, licorice, and cocoa unfurl slowly (much more organoleptic complexity and clarity of structure come through after several hours of decanting) leading to a broadening of tannins through the mid-palate. On the finish, the full tannic scope of the wine comes through as the flavors show lengthy persistence. The 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon, Clone 4 is less herbaceous than it was in 2006, trading in a subtle exotic wood for more power and age-worthiness. This Cabernet will benefit from several years of bottle age, beginning to show all of its grandeur in 2014. With care, this wine should age effortlessly through 2020.

This is no time for tasting. I will be drinking my wine tonight.

This is no time for tasting. I will be drinking my wine tonight.

There are times when the shadows are long and soft in the evening, and the city is laid out before you so clearly each building shines, and the trees sough as if the ocean breezes are caught up in their crowns, and the day leading up to this, broke so green it hurt your eyes, and the grapes hang, dew-covered and rampant as the rows proceed to the horizon; and you realize you are in Northern California, in wine country, and it is a balm. And you don't think cases to be sold, or distributor problems in the mid-west or the effects of recession or over-supply...you think how perfect this Cabernet tastes, how its fruit and tannin and texture and finish are each perfect, and their aggregation is perfect, and the wine (it doesn't matter which one, really...just that you are drinking it now, in this perfect spot, in this perfect time) is perfect.

That's what today felt like. And that's why I drink tonight. I drink (an act of feeling, no thinking tonight) to that ineffable perfection that was the Livermore Valley today...to the fruit coming in that will be wine in two years, to the caring touch of our winemaking team, to all of you for whom Steven Kent and La Rochelle are a part of your wine drinking life.

This is no time for tasting. I will be drinking my wine tonight.

2006 Single Vineyard Series Cabernets - A Preview

There's nothing like being able to taste our trio of Single Vineyard Series Cabs side-by-side to demonstrate how singular each is, and how profound.

Two traits cut through the myriad differences of flavor and aroma in these three wines: intensity of fruit and richness of structure. Each wine displays that hallmark of great Livermore Valley Cabernet (deep dark/rich fruit on entry) very clearly. The rich fruit entry is where Livermore sets itself apart from the more austere, less opulent Napa Valley wines.

Along with the fruit comes toasty oak, chocolate and mint notes in the Home Ranch. This wine is dramatically complex in the nose...cassis, black cherry, raspberry, chocolate, mint; after sitting open for about 2 hours, the chocolate has morphed into less sweet cocoa powder, the fruit notes are darker and the tannins have blossomed to show both greater breadth and more edge than when the wine was first open.

The Smith Ranch is the most austere of the three wines. Structure is the watchword with this wine. Newly opened, the wine shows notes of "Liquid Smoke," toasty oak, and black fruits. There is a gorgeous, focused streak of tannin that runs through this wine in a straight line, all the way to a lengthy finish. Black fruit notes begin to show themselves after the wine sat, and a structural earthiness and tobacco notes were also evident.

The Ghielmetti Vineyard (a blend of three different clones) was the wine that showed the most dramatic change. Early, the wine showed intensity of red and black fruits, graphite, and milk chocolate in the nose. The medium tannins were confined to the mid-palate, and the wine didn't have the length of finish that it has shown before. With time, though, this wine became much bigger: red fruit turned black, chocolate took on a much less sweet aspect, and most significantly, the tannins opened up, becoming harder and longer.

All three wines share a depth and breadth of tannin that will allow them to age 10 years; each wine is very individual, and each wine writes the continuing story of world-class Cabernet from the Livermore Valley.

Fewer than 30 cases remain of the Home Ranch Cabernet. Smith and Ghielmetti will make their debut at The Table in the second half of September and will be available to purchase then. Only 50 cases of the Smith and 100 cases of the Ghielmetti Cab were produced.

Premier Cabernet Collection - 2007 Ghielmetti Vineyard - Clone 4

The 2007 vintage of Cabernets is the best we have yet produced.

While this growing year offered that extremely rare combination of world-class quality and higher-than-average volume for California as a whole, for the Steven Kent Winery, this vintage will once and for all dispel any doubts of the Livermore Valley's ability to grow Cabernet equal in quality to any other growing area.

The two Premier Cabernet Collection wines that will be released in 2010 achieve a level of richness and complexity that we not seen yet.

The Cabernet Sauvignon - Ghielmetti Vineyard, Clone 4 is significantly denser in fruit with a broader mid-palate and lengthier tannins than the 2006 PCC release. The richness and dark fruit on entry and in the mid-palate in 2006 is magnified substantially in 07. There are more non-fruit aromatics at play in the new wine, and there is significantly more structural tannin on the finish to balance out the viscosity of the wine's front end and to insure great longevity.

Only 240 three-packs and a small number of magnums were produced in this vintage. First priority for ordering is given to those who purchased last year's wine. The next priority is reserved for those who have signed up on our INTEREST LIST. The ordering period will begin on September 17th for those on the Interest List.

20 years from now, we'll still be talking about this vintage. Don't miss out.

If You Look Hard Enough You Can See the Wine

Practically everything related to the making of wine is anticipatory. The grapes are picked and crushed and fermenting and you anticipate what the wines will taste like. You have a favorite wine in the cellar awaiting that special meal or special someone and you hope that the wine will match the picture you have of it in your head.

This time of year, if you look hard enough you can see the next wines. We are a way off for Bordeaux varieties, but the Sangiovese in the Home Ranch vineyard is just beginning Veraison, that time when grapes turn color, skins get softer, and the growing of fruit is moving toward the end point (ripeness and balance between sugar and acid) having overcome the hump of its incipience.

In about 60 days, assuming the weather cooperates, we should be harvesting Sangiovese and anticipating the next great vintage of Vincere.

Greatest Meal Ever

As I've written many time before, the best glass of wine I have ever had is inextricably tied to the people with whom I was sharing it. Same goes for the best meal. And when I can share the best food I have had in a very long time with one of my kids, the "special-ness" of the occasion increases exponentially.

On our family vacation in Las Vegas last week, my son, Aidan, and I ate at Bar Charlie on our second-to-last night. Bar Charlie is owned by Charlie Trotter and is a smaller venue inside Restaurant Charlie. The Bar specializes in kaiseki style of Japanese cuisine, think Asian tapas...small plates of exquisitely prepared food, mostly fish, some raw.

Aidan works Saturdays in the La Rochelle tasting room and is a big fan of sushi...Kawa Sushi in Livermore is one of our frequent haunts. I promised Aidan we'd devote a night in Vegas to the pursuit of raw fish and I'd heard good things about Bar Charlie.

I can't speak highly enough of the level of service and the deliciousness of the meal. We splurged and had the 14-course meal. I also had the beverage pairing accompanying each dish.

To simply list the dishes would do a disservice to the greatness of it all, but here are a few highlights:

Hawaiian Big Eye Tuna with Umeboshi and Seawater - (Aidan's favorite) a raw preparation of tuna, one section of which was wrapped around a cake of Umeboshi (a salted Japanese plum).

Tasmanian Ocean Trout with Pearled Barley & Miso - each part of the trout was used from the skin (cooked as a chip and put into Trout ice cream...really delicious!) to the roe.

Diver Sea Scallop with Chocolate & Bloomsdale Spinach - (my favorite) puree of Spinach sauce, Coffee oil (unbelievable!), and chocolate ganache cut into strips brought out the sweetness of the perfectly cooked scallop.

I admire any company that sets very high standards and that works hard to meet them. Restaurant Charlie certainly fits into this category. There's a graciousness and elegance to the way they approach food and service that is both testament to their philosophy as well as an inspiration to those of us who want to be able to provide the seemless, unparalleled, Extraordinary Experience to all who visit us.

2008 Wine X - Step 2

I described in an earlier post the first step in the process of creating our flagship wine - Wine X - a blend of the 5 classic grapes from Bordeaux. Continuing in that vein, below is a bit more about how the other grapes get incorporated into the Cabernet Sauvignon base.

Over the last several weeks, I systematically went through each lot of wine making notes regarding the aromatic and gustatory qualities of each barrel then assigning a grade and a possible disposition for each barrel. If it was of great enough quality, perhaps it might make the SVS (Single Vineyard Series) level or even the PCC (Premiere Cabernet Collection). And if it was truly special, it might be destined for Wine X level.

After tasting through 118 barrels of the five varieties, I narrowed down the contenders to just a couple per variety. On Friday, I siphoned 375ml samples of each of the varieties (if there were multiple contending barrels for a variety, part of each such barrel went into the sample). After making notes on the wines, including a sample of the base Cabernet Sauvignon I created in Step 1, I went about blending the five samples together.

I am looking for greatness in this wine. I am looking for a wine with power, elegance, complexity of aroma and flavor, and an over-arching structure that holds all the pieces together and that will allow for age. In short, Wine X is supposed to be the greatest red wine from Livermore.

The first sample I made was in the same percentages as in the first Wine X. Then I made samples on either side, a bit more Cabernet Sauvignon and a little less CS. With each blend, I am trying to home in on just that one wine that expresses all of the grapes - the rusticity and mid-palate heft of Malbec, the color and tannin of Petit Verdot, the wistful aromatics of Cabernet Franc and a hint of her acidity - but does so in a unified way.

Generally, I make a series of samples, 5-7 or so, and let them sit for a while before I taste them for the first time. You want to give the wines a chance to sort things out some before you attach an impression to early.

So far, the wine that made the most favorable impression, the one that has the most power, grace, and ageability, contained 80% CS, 10% Cabernet Franc, 5% Petit Verdot, 3% Malbec, and 2% Merlot. This, of course, is not necessarily where the the final blend will reside.

Now that I have a firmer idea about the percentages, I go back to determine what those percentages mean in terms of needed gallons of each wine to make the number of cases I want to produce. When I know that, I will remake the blends with only the best barrel or two (depending upon the gallons needed) from each lot. I will remake a series of blends with different percentages of CS again and determine my favorite. Then the process gets really interesting... More in Step 3.