Food and wine night at Succulent Café

A recent dinner at stellar Solvang CA restaurant, Succulent Café, provided an opportunity to catch a glimpse of the Calluna Vineyards 2009 Culluna Vineyards Cuvée. I've been a fan of this newer Chalk Hill producer for a couple of years. Chalk Hill in Sonoma County, being cooler than either Napa/Calistoga to the east or Alexander Valley to the north, can provide an opportunity for enhanced structure and elegance in Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot-based wines.

Calluna Vineyards 2009 Calluna Vineyards Cuvée, Chalk Hill is an estate-grown right bank-style Bordeaux blend featuring Merlot & Cabernet Franc as the primary varietals, with barrel aging in about 40% new French oak. It's a great representation of Calluna's very classically-styled Bordeaux varietal wines. With dinner it showed very well, quickly coming to life with notes of violet, red currant, olive, cocoa, spice and mint throughout the palate- deftly balanced and highlighting the floral and red fruit notes. Polished with fine/firm tannin and a full finish. Excellent overall and even better for the price (selling for around $30), with the structure suggesting longevity (Rating- I like+!).

A word about Succulent Café- it's beautifully done low-key farm-to-table cuisine; French technique and southern influenced. A wonderful cheese plate with fresh local ingredients and main courses of braised short rib and duck confit cassoulet accompanied the wine. The restaurant does charge a corkage, but after offering our server some of the Calluna he responded very kindly by opening up two interesting local wines to taste.

Both of the local wines were Bordeaux varietal wines from Santa Barbara County. The first was Cuatro Vientos Vineyard 2009 "CS/CF", Santa Barbara County- a Cab Sauv/Cab Franc blend. It was a lush blend of fig paste, dates, anise and spice- with round and ripe blue & red fruit and secondary notes of toffee & chocolate along with round full tannins (rating- I like!). This seemed more influenced by the Cab Franc, showing a nice ripeness and depth without the trappings of overly green notes that Santa Barbara County Cabs and Cab Francs can sometimes have. I believe this wine is made by Margerum Wine Company, but I couldn't find any info online.

The second wine was Baehner Fournier 2009 Petit Verdot, Santa Ynez Valley. Baehner Fournier grows Bordeaux varietals in the eastern hills of the Santa Ynez Valley. The Petit Verdot sells for $42 with only 58 cases bottled. It started with aromas of brioche, cassis and slight notes of bell pepper. The palate added dried herb, spice and currant before finishing with round and firm tannin and ample finishing notes of sagebrush and spice (rating- I like!). Enjoyable and interesting indeed- would love to have some more time with this one.

A look at Rita's Crown and Radian Vineyards in Sta. Rita Hills

I went out Friday with Chris Bratcher of Bratcher Winery looking at some of his vineyard blocks in Sta. Rita Hills. It was an interesting check-in on the progress of the 2012 vintage here- one that based on my observation has had plenty of sunshine, moderate temperatures and no frost worries.

The first site was Rita's Crown Vineyard, which sits atop a ridge on the Santa Rita Hills side of the Santa Ynez River overlooking Mt. Carmel and Sea Smoke Vineyards. Located in the center of the Sta. Rita Hills AVA and planted to Dijon clones of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, it's a wind-swept and cold high-elevation vineyard with varying exposures. The soils are sandy and clay loam with diatomaceous earth.

The second site was Radian Vineyard, located in the Santa Rosa foothills in the far southwest of the AVA. It's also a very cool site, with flowering running behind the progress at Rita's Crown. Radian is a newer vineyard in the AVA, with vines at about five years old on average. The exposures vary and the soils are shale and clay loam. It's also planted to Dijon clones of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.

It was a great look at two emerging cold-climate sites in Sta. Rita Hills.

Below are some photos of the day-

Driving up Rita's Crown past the old abandoned monastery

At the top of Rita's Crown

Flowering Chardonnay at Rita's Crown

Pinot Noir blocks on an extreme slope at Rita's Crown

Bratcher Chardonnay block at Rita's Crown

Leaving Rita's Crown- overlooking the monastery and Mt Carmel vineyard across the valley to Sanford and Benedict

Looking back at the extreme slope of Pinot Noir at Rita's Crown

On the way out, looking back at Sea Smoke Vineyard. Chardonnay is in the foreground and you can barely see Pinot Noir in the background slopes.

The obligatory shot of the Sea Smoke sign.

Bratcher Pinot Noir block at Radian- NE facing back toward Rita's Crown on the peaks in the far distance.

Flowering Pinot Noir at Radian.

Radian-looking west.

Chappellet Signature '07 vs '06 and notes from Tercero tasting

Retailing in the low $40 range, Chappellet's Signature Cabernet Sauvignon is a good place to look for ultra-premium value in Napa Valley Cabernet. The wine is estate grown in Chappellet's vineyards on Pritchard Hill- located in the Vaca Mountains just east of Rutherford.

It's a big wine with mountain tannins, full fruit and oaky depth. It's typically a blend of just over 75% Cabernet Sauvignon with the remaining portion split among the other Bordeaux varietals, with substantial new oak on the profile. At its best it adds extra focus with notes of mineral acidity and tertiary flavors like tobacco and herb, and can rival Chappellet's flagship Pritchard Hill Estate Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon at about a third of the price. The 2006 Signature Cab was such a wine and was very well recognized critically.

I recently opened a 2007 Signature Cab and found it to be structured and bold, but lacking the extra oomph of the 2006. To me the 2006 had the acid and mineral components to give balance to the huge fruit and oak, as well as giving the wine a sense of having a life ahead of it. It also had those leafy tobacco flavors that I love in a Cab. In contrast, the 2007 was just huge currant and oak flavors. It did have huge tannins and structure that could resolve and bring more into the picture, but I just didn't get the sense that there was much there beneath the surface. It was an enjoyable wine, but not quite memorable or distinctive at this time. Also interesting in the 2007 vs 2006 is the much higher percentage of Malbec in the blend in the 2007- in the 2006 the secondary component of the blend was Merlot.

~Notes on Chappellet 2007 Signature Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley- 3+ hour decant. Opaque garnet color with lightening edges. Notes of cassis, lavender, currant and cedar throughout. The fruit is ripe on the palate yet backwards. The oak notes expand with cedar, espresso and cocoa. There's a nice silky tea note throughout. It drinks polished and plush with fine tannins that are very firm. The finish is dry and with good length along with plenty more dark fruit and oak. It's enjoyable at this stage, but tight overall and centered around black fruit and oak. The depth and length is there, and I could see this maybe developing a little more with oak integration- give another couple of years. (rating- I like!)

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I also recently tasted through a lineup with Larry Schaffer of Tercero Wines here in Santa Barbara County. Larry makes balanced and elegant Rhône varietal wines from single vineyards in Santa Barbara County- mostly located in the Los Alamos area. The tasting room is in Los Olivos.

The wines are all about pure focused fruit with naturally balanced spice and savory notes. They are very judiciously oaked with just partial neutral on the whites and neutral oak only on the reds. There's a seriously high enjoyability factor on these wines, and they are very fairly priced.

Here's a link to my notes from many wines tasted with Larry.

More good luck with Incredible Red

I've had good luck with Peachy Canyon's Incredible Red Zinfandel as a very solid everyday red wine showing great value. The wine is a blend of Zinfandel, Petite Sirah and Syrah from Peachy Canyon's various estate vineyards in Paso Robles. The 2010 features a striking new red label that stood out from the Albertson's deli case. At $8.99 the deal was sealed.

Peachy Canyon 2010 Incredible Red Zinfandel, Paso Robles- Bouquet and palate of mulberry, blueberry, black pepper and mulled spice. The ripe fruit on the palate is pleasantly bright and not overly jammy. Medium bodied, clean tannins and a peppery finish. This is a pleasant and enjoyable quaffer- it offers hints of depth without belying its juicy simplicity. Solid value. (rating- I like!)

Stumbling across some gems from Ampelos

My Sunday afternoon gig in the Lompoc Wine Ghetto at Arcadian begets fantastic opportunities to taste the latest and greatest of Sta. Rita Hills wines.

Yesterday was a fantastic end-of-the-week barbecue put on by Jalama Wines featuring a broad assortment of BYO leftover wines from the various tasting rooms. And although I only was able to be there for a brief moment in time before personal duties called, I tasted these two gems from Ampelos-

Ampelos 2007 Pinot Noir Rho, Sta. Rita Hills Ampelos Vineyard- Aged for 24 months in 50% new French oak. Biodyamically farmed. The wine was impactful and bold yet subtle and alluring. Bold fruit, earth, floral and spice were all there but you couldn't really tell where one started and another one ended. Polished and fine in structure but still gritty and alive. This is Sta. Rita Hills Pinot Noir to love. (rating- I like++! - I love!) $42

Ampelos 2007 Grenache Delta, Sta. Rita Hills, Ampelos Vineyard- 31 months in barrel. Biodymanically farmed. Another wine with personality. This had a pleasing pungent "grapiness" and blackberry fruit throughout. Peppered with lively spice and earth flavors and firm juicy tannin along with a just a hint of Grenache heat on the finish, this left a mark. (rating- I like+!) $35