The final masterclass of the day at the 2026 Decanter Fine Wine Encounter New York began at 4pm.

Despite a full day of tasting already behind them, attendees packed the room for a retrospective look at Heitz Cellar hosted by Master Sommelier Carlton McCoy, president and CEO of Lawrence Wine Estates, which owns this benchmark Napa Valley winery, among others.

The lineup of wines spanned nearly five decades, and guests were encouraged to taste while McCoy and I discussed the history of this iconic producer.

One of the more interesting topics was how little the winemaking itself has changed over the decades.

McCoy explained that Heitz continues to ferment its Cabernet Sauvignons in large neutral wooden tanks, blocks malolactic fermentation in the reds, and ages wines in large oak foudres.

The objective, he said, is to preserve freshness and 'express site character above all'.

While some American oak was used in the first few decades of Heitz’s founding, today, it’s French.

Scroll down for notes and scores of the 10 Heitz Cellar wines at the DFWE NYC 2026 masterclass

Heitz Cellar, Martha's Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Oakville 1979

Heitz Cellar, Martha's Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Oakville 1985

Heitz Cellar, Martha's Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Oakville 2010

Heitz Cellar, Martha's Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Oakville 2021

Heitz Cellar, Trailside Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Rutherford 1999

Heitz Cellar, Trailside Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Rutherford 2013

Heitz Cellar, Trailside Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Rutherford 2021

Heitz Cellar, Linda Falls Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Howell Mountain 2015

Heitz Cellar, Linda Falls Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Howell Mountain 2016

Heitz Cellar, Linda Falls Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Howell Mountain 2021

Standouts from the line up

It was a rare opportunity for Masterclass attendees to experience mature and current Heitz releases side by side, including the 1979 and 1985 Martha's Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignons.

I've tasted the 1979 Martha's Vineyard on three separate occasions, and it continues to impress for its freshness, complexity, and unmistakable aromatic profile.

The bay laurel, mint, and eucalyptus notes that have become synonymous with the wine remain remarkably vivid nearly 50 years after harvest.

Two of the three oldest wines stood out on the day: the aforementioned 1979 Martha's Vineyard as well as the 1999 Trailside Vineyard.

The 1985 Martha's Vineyard, poured from magnum, showed a touch of cellar funk on the nose, but broadened beautifully across the palate.

The younger wines were equally compelling, though still firmly in their developmental phase.

Martha's Vineyard

Located in Oakville, Martha's Vineyard remains one of Napa Valley's most famous Cabernet Sauvignon sites.

When founder Joe Heitz first put ‘Martha’s Vineyard’ on the label of his 1966 bottling, it was the first time in Napa that the name of a site appeared on a wine label.

Martha's Vineyard takes its name from Martha May, the wife of vineyard owner and grape-grower Tom May.

The Mays purchased the Oakville property in the early 1960s. The roughly 34-acre (13.7ha) vineyard is known for producing wines marked by freshness, structure, and the distinctive bay laurel and eucalyptus character that has become its hallmark (eucalyptus trees line the perimeter).

While the fruit from Martha’s was exclusively sold to Heitz for decades, McCoy revealed that, for the first time in the vineyard's history, Heitz will not purchase the entire crop from Martha's Vineyard.

'I'm excited to see what other producers do with this exceptional fruit,' he said.

Trailside Vineyard

Purchased by Heitz in 1984, Trailside Vineyard is planted to 85 acres (35.3ha) in the Rutherford AVA, divided into 16 distinct blocks, based on a diversity of soil types, of gravelly loam and clay-loam.

The site is farmed organically, with biodynamic inputs. Several Cabernet Sauvignon clones are planted, along with Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Musque clones.

Trailside often shows a rusticity and dusty mineral character of red fruits, plus notes of sage, dried herbs, and fine tannins.

The 1999 Trailside, from a small, concentrated crop, showed the power and intensity possible from the site. Judging the wine on colour alone, you would think it was produced in the last five years.

The flavours, though, were so profoundly layered with loamy earth and tobacco nuances, along with the site’s characteristic freshness, that, save for those emerging secondary notes, it was almost hard to believe the wine was 27 years old.

Linda Falls Vineyard

Linda Falls represents Heitz's mountain-expression Cabernet Sauvignon.

Purchased and planted in 2002, at 1,500 feet (457m) elevation on Howell Mountain near the Linda Falls Preserve (a popular hiking destination with locals), only seven acres of the 42-acre (16.9ha) property are planted to vines.

The volcanic soils and higher elevation produce a markedly different profile from the valley-floor vineyards.

Dark fruit, conifer accents, crushed-stone minerality, and a firmer, more robust tannic structure define the wine, marked by the freshness so characteristic of Heitz and perfectly in place with the wines, thanks to the deft cellar work of winemaker Brittany Sherwood.

The library vintages across all three vineyard sites tasted in this Decanter Masterclass offered a compelling look at the longevity of Heitz Cellar’s iconic Cabernet Sauvignon wines.

Heitz Cellar masterclass: Five decades, back to 1979

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Readers should bear in mind that the 2023 growing season offered Napa producers the luxury of time: a long, relatively mild growing season with extended hang time for grapes and above-average yields – the kind of year that’s being widely described as ‘the vintage of a lifetime’.

And while official narratives can be rhapsodic, a more straightforward description might be that 2023 represents the ideal Napa Valley vintage: a year when the vines had everything they needed without the pressure of damaging heat or rain.

Many 2023s will end up among the era’s greats, but a small percentage of wines bear surprising lightness, likely a result of overcropping and extraction choices that over-taxed the tannins, leading to dilution.

I’ll add that there is also a compelling argument that the denser, more inherently concentrated 2021s may give the 2023s a run for their money, even if only long-term cellaring will settle the matter.

Rain at the right time

Nevertheless, the stage was set for an exceptional vintage, with winter rains helping ensure the vines were in a really good place to kick off the year, with good moisture in the soil.

More than 457mm of rain fell across Napa Valley between October and December of 2022 – double the typical amount.

Another 324mm fell in January, 121mm in February, followed by 249mm in March, just before bud break.

Temperatures from December 2022 through the end of March 2023 hovered between 10°C and 18°C in the daytime, dipping to 2°-7°C at night.

That coolness held consistent from spring through summer and into harvest. Daytime highs ranged from the low to mid-20s°C from June through October, with only one day over 38°C in early July.

Peak highs reached about 36°C just a few times between August and October. Most notably, September was unusually cool, with no days above 32°C, meaning growers had to be extra patient, hopeful for an Indian summer with no rain.

Thankfully, nothing beyond a centimetre or so of rain fell in October.

Canopy management

Rombauer Vineyards’ Richie Allen recalls a cold spring, with bud burst quite delayed, which put back flowering and pushed harvest out several weeks into late October and early November.

‘It never got quite warm, and we thought it was going to be another 2010 or 2011, with tons of rain and everything not getting ripe,’ he says.

Instead, Mother Nature was kind. Orin Swift’s Dave Phinney said 2023 reminds him of 1997 in Napa when there was ‘no weather pressure or rush to free up fermentation tanks’.

Nickel & Nickel winemaker Joe Harden says: ‘It was a dream for winemakers. If you managed your canopy, kept enough leaves to the end to maintain dappled sunlight, you got polished, silky tannins and supreme elegance, and it was incredibly welcome after the hot, challenging 2022 vintage.’

‘Abundant’ and ‘friendly’ are the two words that describe the 2023 vintage for Dominus Estate owner Christian Moueix.

‘If you have good growth, you let the ends of the vines grow to get out excess growth and arrive at a certain balance in terms of the size of the canopy,’ he says.

‘In every berry, you have all of the universe of the vintage, and you want each berry to get over the finish line.’

Too much of a good thing

For some, bigger canopies are welcome and easier to maintain. ‘I knew early on that there was a decent amount of fruit,’ recalls Arkenstone’s Sam Kaplan, ‘and I saw cooler days, so crop adjustment was the storyline of the season.’

Consulting winemaker Thomas Rivers Brown agrees that mitigating crop load was essential to success.

‘If there’s a downside to 2023, it was a big crop year, and if you had a site that couldn’t handle that size of crop, there would be dilution in the wines if you didn’t thin,’ he says.

‘Berries never shrivelled in 2023,’ meaning fruit concentration couldn’t come from selective raisining – it was all about reducing the number of bunches appropriately.

Indeed, during the four months I spent visiting producers and eventually tasting more than 600 wines, I found that just 10% of wines or so felt somewhat diluted, lacking the structured, ripe tannins I’d expected to find in abundance across all wines.

And while certainly pleasant, they lacked the integrity of the vintage and resulted in my lowest-scoring wines (having said that, low scores were very rare, likely because of the calibre of producers who presented wines).

Marcus Notaro of Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars says that as late as September, there were ‘some lingering green berries through veraison, so you needed extra-long hang time’.

He adds: ‘For us, we had a nice combination of ripe grapes – not super-sugar-loaded grapes, because of the coolness, but the length of time let us get the tannins to a nice, ripe level.’

Jonathan's wines of the vintage

• Kinsman Eades Anjea, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Yountville) (100)
• Dalla Valle Vineyards, MDV Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (100)
• O'Shaughnessy Estate Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Mt Veeder) (99)
• La Pelle Wines Reserve, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (100)
• Monsieur Etain (by Scarecrow) Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Rutherford) (98)
• Merryvale Profile Napa Valley (St Helena) (98)
• Robert Mondavi Winery 60th Anniversary Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (98)
• The Debate Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (100)
• Bryant Estate Bryant Family Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (99)
• Freemark Abbey Sycamore Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Rutherford) (98)
• Cathiard Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (100)
• Facets Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (95)
• JCB Surrealist Napa Valley (97)
• Larkmead Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Calistoga) (96)
• Nickel & Nickel Winery, Element 28, Napa Valley, Cabernet Sauvignon (99)

Back to the old ways

Over and over, during the many weeks I spent tasting at wineries, winemakers across the valley commented on the psychological shift required after 2022.

‘We felt deeply scarred by the 2022 vintage,’ said Brown. ‘We had a really wet winter, so there was plenty of groundwater, and we had a pretty big fruit set, and we just kept holding our breath for bad things to come, and they never came. You had to learn to be patient again. You had to pay attention to tannin maturity because if you harvested any grapes too early, you’d be harvesting unripe tannins.’

Jason Moulton, winemaker for Whitehall Lane, was reminded of 2016, when ‘the crop load was heavier, but you had perfect [flavour and tannin] extraction during fermentation, to the point that you’re not forcing a post-ferment protocol to extract more’.

Michael Scholz, vice president of winemaking and vineyards for St Supéry, noted that the moderate temperatures ‘allowed vines to keep working through the season without stopping for any heat spells’, thereby aiding both ‘flavour and phenolic development, giving us great flavours, ripe tannins that were not big and not so aggressive, and above all, vibrancy and freshness in the wines’.

‘We learned that tannins and colour are heat sensitive, and when we don’t have those issues, we have darker-coloured wines with beautifully fine-grained, resolved tannins,’ said Freemark Abbey winemaker Kristy Melton.

Cathiard Vineyard winemaker Justine Labbe echoed that sentiment, noting, ‘we had integrated tannins right after fermentation’, a structural factor that has clearly played out even with time in bottle.

For Sullivan Rutherford Estate winemaker Jeff Cole: ‘This vintage felt like the way Napa Valley operated years ago, when you weren’t thinking about picking Cabernet in September.’

Luc Morlet of Morlet Family Vineyards, was reminded of the excellent 2016s, which benefited from rains that finally ended the drought years of 2013-2015.

‘The wines have energy and freshness that will make them a true vanguard that we’ll be able to cellar for multiple decades.’

Cristaldi’s pick of the top 2023 Napa Cabernets to buy – and to keep

The wines below includes a representative selection scored between 93-100 points. For all of Jonathan Cristaldi's scores from the vintage, click here.

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Buying a fantastic bottle of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon from an exceptional vintage, while ‘on a budget’, may require a bit of a mental recalibration.

Most of us think of budget-buys as great bottles under $30 or $40 per bottle.

And while those exist, certainly in supermarkets and many retail shops, for most high-end producers of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon, you have to approach buying on a budget with the mindset that somewhere between $50 and $100 is more the norm.

Here are a few reasons why: The cost of grapes alone is formidable.

The California Grape Crush Report cites a 2023 weighted average of over $8,770 per ton of Napa County Cabernet Sauvignon, before barrels, bottle, labour, and sales even enter the frame.

Bear in mind that one ton of grapes amounts to roughly 150 gallons of wine, or about 60 cases (720 bottles).

Factoring in additional production costs means that you’re looking at a per-bottle price of around $85 and up.

But The Valley’s best grapes cost winemakers between $15,000-$60,000, per ton. And these costs trickle down to the bottle price, which has been steadily trickling up since the early 2010s.

Meanwhile, broader Napa Valley pricetags have climbed too – the average basic tasting fee ranges between $40 and $100+ per person.

Tightening the lens

So, here’s the practical takeaway from my 2023 Napa Cabernet taste-through.

While the median price per bottle of all the Napa Cabs I tasted is around $150, a solid value-play would steer us into the under‑$100 lane.

So, I tightened the lens again to $85‑and‑under (around 70 wines total), and then chose the best bottles on quality, not just thrift.

What emerges is a consistent pattern: the best values tend to be broadly sourced Napa Valley blends rather than single-vineyard wines or those bearing a single appellation on the label.

They come from largely tried and true producers who have extensive holdings or long-term grape contracts that allow them to source from multiple sites throughout the valley to create harmonious blends that, simply put, don’t break the Napa Valley bank.

20 featured 2023 Napa Cabernets at $85 and under

1. St. Supéry Estate Vineyards & Winery Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (91, $63)
2. Black Stallion Estate Winery Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (92, $35)
3. Argot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (93, $75)
4. The Vice, The House, Cabernet Sauvignon, Batch #181, Napa Valley (94, $36 )
5. Charles Krug, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $40)
6. Raymond Vineyards, Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $50)
7. Force & Grace, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $55)
8. Robert Mondavi Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (94, $55)
9. Ashes & Diamonds, Cabernet Sauvignon, No. 2, Napa Valley (97, $70)
10. Materra, Cunat Family Vineyards, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $72)
11. Freemark Abbey Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $75)
12. Cliff Lede, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $80)
13. Rombauer, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $80)
14. Jax Vineyards, Cabernet Sauvignon, Oakville, Napa Valley, (94, $80)
15. Merryvale, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $82)
16. Mi Sueño Winery Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (94, $85)
17. Burgess, Contadina Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (95, $50)
18. Blackbird Vineyards, Arise Red Wine Napa Valley (95, $60)
19. Pott Wine Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (95, $80)
20. Louis M. Martini, The Gryphon Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (97, $85)

For all of Jonathan Cristaldi's scores from the vintage, click here.

More from this report

For all of Jonathan Cristaldi's scores from the vintage, click here.

Napa Valley 2023 Cabernet Sauvignons: 100-points

Napa Valley 2023 Cabernet Sauvignons: 99-points

Napa Valley 2023 Cabernet Sauvignons: 98-points

Napa Valley 2023 Cabernet Sauvignons: 97-points

Napa Valley 2023 Cabernet Sauvignons: 96-points

Napa Valley 2023 Cabernet Sauvignons: 95-points

More from this report

Spend enough time outside the wine industry and a curious pattern emerges: almost no one thinks about buying wine to open decades from now.

Among the parents of my daughter’s friends and most people I meet outside professional wine circles, the idea rarely even comes up.

Wine is something to drink tonight, maybe this weekend, perhaps next year – but 20 or 30 years down the road? That seems almost unimaginable.

Part of the hesitation is practical. Many people assume that aging wine requires a wine cellar.

In reality, all it takes is a thoughtful purchase and a cool, dark place to store a bottle properly. If you want to make the effort truly worthwhile, look for wines in large formats – magnums, double magnums, or even larger.

These bottles age more gracefully because the ullage (volume of air to liquid) is so small, making oxidation even slower, while the flavors and textures evolve more slowly and beautifully over time.

Buy a bottle from the birth year of your grandchild, store it carefully, and hold onto it for two decades or more.

But don’t wait 20 years to tell the story. When your grandchild is eight or nine years old, show them the bottle and explain why you bought it.

Tell them about the people who grew the grapes and the place where the wine was made.

Explain that wine is simply fermented grape juice that – if all goes well – transforms with time into something extraordinary.

The joy of old bottles

One day, perhaps at a wedding, an anniversary, the purchase of a first home, or another milestone worth celebrating, that bottle will be opened.

The cork will ease out, the wine will swirl in the glass, and the aromas will rise: savory, expressive, captivating. The flavours will be layered and complex, the textures deep and hauntingly delicious.

That is the gift of aged wine—the taste of something remarkable shared at a moment that matters.

I would not have understood this myself had it not been for the family I married into.

My wife’s parents quietly held onto special bottles for decades, keeping them at proper cellar temperature until the right occasions arrived.

When we married, they brought some of those bottles out, and the experience added a certain magic to the evening.

I can still remember one in particular: a bottle of 1982 Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin Carte Or Brut we enjoyed over dinner at Gary Danko in San Francisco in 2008 (a 26-year-old Champagne!).

The wine had turned a deep golden hue, the bubbles were fine and persistent, and the aromas exploded from the glass – toasted hazelnuts, truffle, and something wonderfully savoury and complex.

I remember the elegance of my soon-to-be bride, her joy and joie de vivre, and the pride her mother took in sharing a bottle she had patiently saved for years.

That is what a well-chosen bottle can do. It captures time, preserves a story, and waits quietly for a moment when life deserves to be celebrated.

I hope you consider creating that kind of memory for your children or grandchildren.

To help you get started, here are a few 2023 vintage wines worth buying – ideally in large format – and setting aside for the future.

18 Napa Valley 2023 Cabernets to cellar

1. Dalla Valle Vineyards, MDV Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (100)
2. Harlan Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (100)
3. Lokoya Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Spring Mountain) (100)
4. The Debate Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (100)
5. Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (100)
6. Ad Vivum Sleeping Lady Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Yountville) (99)
7. Bond Pluribus Red Wine Napa Valley (99)
8. Cliff Lede Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (99)
9. Colgin Cellars IX Estate Red Napa Valley (99)
10. Louis M. Martini Bruadair Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Mt Veeder) (99)
11. O'Shaughnessy Estate Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Mt Veeder) (99)
12. Annulus Cellars Vine Hill Ranch Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (99)
13. Stony Hill Côte Rouge Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Spring Mountain) (99)
14. Spottswoode Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (St Helena) (98)
15. Corison Winery Sunbasket Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (St Helena) (98)
16. William Selyem Beckstoffer Vineyard To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley
17. Mt. Brave Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Mt Veeder) (98)
18. Impensata Las Posadas Vineyard Proprietary Red Napa Valley (Howell Mountain) (97)

For all of Jonathan Cristaldi's scores from the vintage, click here.

More from this report

In past vintage reports, we have published separate features highlighting select Napa Valley sub-appellations – often eight or so of the valley’s 17 nested AVAs – typically focusing on those regions that submitted enough wines to warrant deeper exploration.

This year, with the 2023s, we are taking a slightly different approach, highlighting the 'Stars of the AVAs' in a single list, again guided by the regions with the strongest representation in submissions.

These are wines worth seeking out because they capture, in crisp detail, the defining characteristics of their respective appellations.

Top Coombsville 2023 Cabernets

Coombsville is situated at the southern end of Napa Valley, and among the coolest of the sub-AVAs, strongly influenced by marine air and fog drifting in from San Pablo Bay.

The best Cabernet examples tend to be dark-fruited yet bright and energetic, with lifted aromatics, ultra-fine tannins, and a sense of tension and length that distinguishes the wines of this windswept corner of the valley.

• Favia Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• La Pelle Wines Ceniza Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Paul Hobbs Nathan Coombs Estate Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Rewa Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• AXR Bennett Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (97)

Top Stags Leap District 2023 Cabernets

Vines in the Stags Leap District AVA are planted from near valley floor elevations up to about 123 metres, with the craggy, exposed palisades of Stags Leap rising dramatically above the region.

The wines are often defined by finely sculpted tannins with a polished, fine-grained texture, supported by a typically volcanic mineral edge alongside red-fruit notes and warm spice nuances.

• Cliff Lede Poetry Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Stag's Leap Wine Cellars SLV Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Robert Mondavi Winery WH Vineyard, The Estates Cabernet Sauvignon (96)
• Chimney Rock Estate Cabernet Sauvignon (94)
• Lithology Steltzner Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (96)

Top Oakville 2023 Cabernets

Cabernet Sauvignons from Oakville characteristically deliver concentration and depth, layered with complex aromas, flavours, and textures.

The best examples combine muscular structure with a sense of poise and refinement, achieving a balance between power and perfumed elegance that has made the AVA synonymous with some of Napa Valley’s most celebrated wines.

• Amici Cellars Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (100)
• Harbison Estate Horseshoe Cabernet Sauvignon (100)
• Harlan Estate Cabernet Sauvignon (100)
• Dalla Valle Vineyards Estate Cabernet Sauvignon (99)
• TOR Wines Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (99)

Top Rutherford 2023 Cabernets

Cabernet Sauvignon grown on the benchlands and ancient riverbeds of Rutherford often expresses the hallmark 'Rutherford dust', a quality evident both aromatically and on the palate.

This signature character can appear as dusty earth, dried rose petal, or unsweetened cocoa powder, lending savoury nuance to wines that typically show generous fruit and structured tannins.

• Scarecrow Cabernet Sauvignon (99)
• Dana Estates Helms Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon (99)
• J.H. Wheeler Beckstoffer Georges III Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon (97)
• St. Supéry Estate Vineyards & Winery Rutheford Estate Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (96)
• Whitehall Lane Winery Millennium MM Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (96)

Top Mount Veeder 2023 Cabernets

High on the western Mayacamas range, Mount Veeder’s steep slopes and rugged terrain produce some of Napa Valley’s most structured mountain Cabernets.

The wines typically display powerful, muscular tannins and a deep forest-berry profile, underscored by earthy woodland notes and a spectrum of blue- to black-fruited intensity.

A distinctive graphite-like minerality often runs through the best examples, giving the wines both gravity and lift.

• Pott Wine Incubo Cabernet Sauvignon (99)
• Lokoya Mount Veeder Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Mt. Brave Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Pilcrow Archer & Byrd Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Hess Collection 'The Lion' Cabernet Sauvignon (97)

Top St. Helena 2023 Cabernets

Situated near the narrow 'hourglass' point of Napa Valley, the St. Helena AVA tends to experience warmer daytime temperatures and relatively limited wind flow.

The resulting wines often show a ripe, dense fruit profile with generous texture, yet without angular tannins, offering a plush, approachable expression of Cabernet Sauvignon.

• B Cellars Beckstoffer Las Piedras Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (100)
• Stewart Cellars NOMAD Beckstoffer Georges III Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (97)
• Rombauer Stice Lane Cabernet Sauvignon (96)
• Patria A. Price Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (96)
• Whitehall Lane Winery Leonardini Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (95)

Top Howell Mountain 2023 Cabernets

Perched above the fog line, Howell Mountain encompasses an array of slopes, rolling hills, and diverse microclimates.

Its well-draining, rocky soils encourage small berries and concentrated fruit.

The wines are known for their formidable tannic structure, often presenting a broad, textured mid-palate supported by excellent fruit concentration and a distinctive mineral elegance.

• Arkenstone Estate Red (100)
• Salty Goats Wine Co. Cabernet Sauvignon (99)
• La Jota Vineyard Co Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Sylvan Lake Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Moone Tsai Wines Hillside Blend Red Wine (97)

Top Calistoga 2023 Cabernets

At the northernmost end of Napa Valley, Calistoga sits at the foot of Mount St. Helena, nestled between the Mayacamas and Vaca mountain ranges.

The AVA is typically warmer during the summer months than most other parts of the valley, allowing tannins to ripen fully.

The best wines offer ample mouthfeel and complexity while maintaining balance, delivering richness without excessive heaviness or over-concentration.

• Hourglass Bluelne Estate Cabernet Sauvignon (97)
• Donelan Cabernet Sauvignon (97)
• Venge Vineyards Igneous Cabernet Sauvignon (96)
• Baldacci Family Vineyards Stella Knight Vineyard (94)
• Davies Vineyards Oliven Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (94)

For all of Jonathan Cristaldi's scores from the vintage, click here.

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The wines for short-term pleasure

For the most part, the 2023 Cabernets are built for a long life.

However, they are also immensely joyful, easy to drink, and expressive in their youth, thanks to the long growing season, which produced refined tannins that are already well integrated at this early stage.

I combed through my notes to find those wines that speak most clearly of pure deliciousness—the kind that are very hard to put down.

This short list highlights some of my easy-drinking, enjoy-now favourites, though they should drink beautifully over the next three to seven years.

• Schrader Cellars Old Sparky To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (100)
• Argot Sage Ridge Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (97)
• To Kalon Vineyard Company HWC Napa Valley (Oakville) (98)
• Tres Perlas Barber Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (98)
• Fait-Main Wines Beckstoffer Missouri Hopper Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (97)
• Castello di Amorosa Manley Lane Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Rutherford) (93)
• B Cellars Star Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Rutherford)
• Clos du Val Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Stags Leap District) (94)
• Desiree Wine Company Out of Sight Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (St Helena) (93)
• Coronet Wines Lady Liberty Vineyard, Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (95)

The wines with mid-term appeal

We’re moving into wines you may be tempted to drink right away, but which will benefit from additional time in bottle.

So when that shipment arrives, do your best to hold off – or buy enough that you can pop a cork now and hold the rest for a few more years before diving in.

These wines possess immensely powerful, chewy tannins, and while they soften with a solid four to six hours of decanting, you really owe it to yourself to tuck them away until the tannins integrate further and the drinking experience becomes pure enjoyment.

• Morlet Family Vineyards Cœur de Vallée Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (100)
• Nickel & Nickel Winery Element 28, Napa Valley, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (99)
• Paul Hobbs Beckstoffer Las Piedras Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (St Helena) (99)
• Pott Wine Incubo Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Mt Veeder) (99)
• Rudd Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (99)
• Venge Vineyards DLCV Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (99)
• Bure Family Wines Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (St Helena) (98)
• Burgess Quartz Creek Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (98)
• Dominus Napa Valley (98)
• Vine Hill Ranch VHR, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (98)

The wines for long-term reward

And now we arrive at the pièce de résistance – the moment de vérité. The wines that follow are the true heavyweights of the vintage: deep, structured, and destined for long lives in the cellar.

Even where there is surprising early charm, these wines possess the structural hallmarks of longevity: a firm tannic backbone, a vibrant spine of acidity, judicious use of oak, and layers of flavours and spice that unfold with complexity and precision.

Not all the usual Napa icons appear here, either—several newcomers have earned their place, signalling brands to watch and collect over the coming years.

And because the 2023 vintage produced such a wealth of cellar-worthy Cabernets, be sure to see the section on wines to buy for your grandchildren for additional long-haul candidates.

• Pahlmeyer Pièce de Résistance Napa Valley (100)
• AXR AxR1 Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (100)
• Harbison Estate Horseshoe Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (100)
• Keplinger Wines Vine Hill Ranch Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (100)
• CADE Winery Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Howell Mountain) (99)
• Cardinale Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (99)
• Pilcrow Granite Lake Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Howell Mountain) (99)
• Estate 8 Iconic AVA Mt Veeder, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Mt Veeder) (99)
• Favia Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (99)
• Simon Family Estate Reserve, Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (100)
• Beaulieu Vineyard Georges de Latour Private Reserve, Cabernet Sauvignon (98)
• Freemark Abbey Sycamore Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Rutherford) (98)
• Julien Fayard Wines Sleeping Lady Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon (Yountville) (97)
• Spottswoode Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (St Helena) (98)
• Gamble Estates Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville) (99)

For all of Jonathan Cristaldi's scores from the vintage, click here.

More from this report

A visit to the Opus One website reveals the slogan: ‘Two families. One Vision’.

Which somewhat reminds one of the opening lyrics to Queen’s 1986 hit, It’s a kind of Magic:

‘One dream, one soul

‘One prize, one goal

‘One golden glance of what should be

‘It's a kind of magic’

Joking aside, Opus One was very much a pioneer in its fusion of classic Bordeaux and upstart Napa Valley winemaking heritage.

Born of a collaboration between Baron Philip de Rothschild of Château Mouton Rothschild and Robert Mondavi, it was meant to harness the potential of the ‘New World’ with the know-how of the ‘Old’.

Furthermore, it was based around not just the Bordeaux blend but also the idea of the Bordeaux estate, a winery surrounded by its own vines in a single appellation/American Viticultural Area (AVA).

This was unlike a common model used in Napa Valley, both then and now, of buying grapes from across multiple sites/AVAs.

The pair had begun discussing the project in the early 1970s after a meeting in Hawaii. The first wine, the 1979 vintage, was released in 1984 and a dedicated winery in Oakville was opened in 1991.

The wine was priced high right from the start, and quickly became a marker of the swelling tide of ‘icon’ and ‘cult’ wines beginning to emerge from various corners of North and South America in this period.

With its French connections, however, Opus One was one of the rare few to have widespread distribution beyond the US.

As such, it remains one of the Napa Valley labels most non-American fine wine enthusiasts will know best.

Secondary market overview

Looking back over the winery’s last 10 releases, it’s worth pointing out the glaring omission of the 2020 vintage.

This is not an error! After the devastating forest fires in the region in 2020, Opus One decided not to release any wines from that vintage due to smoke taint issues.

The winery’s output in terms of both scores and prices remain incredibly consistent. A case of 12 bottles costs just under £3,000 on average, with an average score from Decanter of 97-points.

This compares favourably with some of the leading Bordeaux estates that have been examined so far.

The average score is the same as Château Cheval Blanc and Château Haut-Brion, and it’s considerably cheaper on average than all of the First Growths and Cheval Blanc.

Fine wine marketplace Liv-ex includes Opus One in its ‘California 50’ index. Like so many other indices, it is far from the peak it attained in 2022.

However, among all the other wines in the index (Harlan, Screaming Eagle, Ridge Monte Bello and Dominus), it is the vintages of Opus One that have seen the most gains over the past year.

Opus One vintages

For any buyer looking to add Opus One to their collection, an obvious starting point would be the 2022 vintage.

A solid 97-points from two Decanter critics – Georgie Hindle and Jonathan Cristaldi – it is also the cheapest vintage currently available, with a Market Price of £2,590 (12x75) according to Liv-ex.

Two older vintages may also be of interest. The trio of 2018, 2019 and 2021 yielded three vintages Decanter rated 98-points across the board.

However, the 2018 is currently available at a discount of around £100 per dozen versus the other two, a neat little discount for a wine called ‘striking, elegant and precise’ by Hindle.

Curious buyers may want to not hang around. The wine recently gained 4.2% month-on-month according to Liv-ex. Maybe others have spotted the gap too?

It feels odd to say that there’s a 2013 vintage rated 100-points. But while that particular vintage was rather less than legendary in Bordeaux, it was one of the all-time greats in Napa.

Opus One’s 2013 is striking enough to have earned it a triple-digit score from Jane Anson.

At a tasting in 2019 when she described it thus: ‘Dark deep rosemary spice and black olive paste deepens the flavours through the mid-palate and you just have to hang on as this goes spiralling through, drawing the flavours out to a lengthy finish.’

And at £3,050 per dozen, it does not command a serious premium over other available vintages either.

The 2012 vintage was equally famous and, of the two, is currently the more expensive (though its Decanter score is only 97-points).

Like the 2018 though, the 2013 gained 4.2% MoM according to Liv-ex, meaning it may be a vintage drawing attention again.

And finally, it will be interesting to see the price of Opus One 2023 when it's released through La Place de Bordeaux this autumn.

Rated 98-points by Jonathan Cristaldi in his recent review of the vintage, a price equal to or even below that of the 2022 would surely make it an attractive proposition?

Opus One: Selected tasting notes

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The buzz for Napa Valley’s 2023 Cabernet Sauvignon wines began circulating during the 2025 Premiere Napa Valley Barrel Auction.

I recall several producers belting the phrase ‘over the moon ecstatic,’ and gushing over the ‘plentiful tannins’ and ‘bright, grippy acidity’ that seemed to mark the wines in their early maturing phase.

Hardly anyone I spoke to had harvested Cabernet grapes in September—certainly unusual if we look back over historical picking dates from the last decade.

In 2023, most began harvesting in October and continued well into November.

Early on, the Napa Valley Vintners promoted 2023 as ‘the Vintage of a Lifetime.’

My own verdict, after tasting more than 600 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignons from the year, is that the phrase, while catchy, may not quite capture the deeper truth of the season.

A more accurate description might be that 2023 represents the ideal Napa Valley vintage: a year when the vines had everything they needed – including time itself, without the pressure of damaging heat or rain.

Heavy winter rains replenished soils depleted by several drought years, placing vines in a strong physiological position as the growing season began.

Soils rich in moisture and microbial life provided vines with the resources to produce healthy canopies and excellent fruit set.

Once the season began, Napa Valley experienced something increasingly rare – stability in the weather, with moderate temperatures throughout spring and summer, and well into harvest time.

As Michael Scholz, Vice President of Winemaking and Vineyards of St. Supéry, observed, these moderate conditions allowed flavour and phenolic development to progress together, yielding wines with, ‘great flavours, ripe tannins, and above all vibrancy and freshness'.

The finished wines possess deep crimson colours, yet striking luminosity, layered fruit purity, and silky, finely structured tannins supported by vibrant acids and graphite-tinged minerality.

Managing yields

If there is any criticism of Mother Nature in 2023, it is that September might have benefited from a handful of warmer days.

A brief stretch of additional heat could have accelerated ripening by roughly a week or ten days and pushed the vintage into truly historic territory.

Even so, growers across the valley widely described the year as a dream scenario.

Nickel & Nickel winemaker Joe Harden called it ‘a dream for winemakers,’ noting that careful canopy management yielded polished, silky tannins and remarkable elegance in the finished wines.

Of course, a great growing season does not guarantee great wine. What winemakers do with the fruit ultimately determines whether a vintage lives up to its potential.

In 2023, vineyard management was critical. The abundant water and healthy canopies led to generous yields, meaning producers who failed to thin crops risked dilution in the finished wines.

As I tasted through hundreds of wines, only a small percentage showed signs of that kind of lightness.

The overwhelming majority displayed the structure, freshness, and depth expected of a great Napa year.

What is perhaps most exciting is how 2023 will sit alongside the extraordinary 2021 vintage.

A compelling duo

The wines of 2021 are dense, inky, and powerfully structured – born of a shorter growing season with reduced yields and vines combating hydric stress.

By contrast, the 2023s lean towards a brighter, fresher profile, are almost relaxed, yet framed by equally powerful tannins that are so extremely fine-grained they are already seamlessly integrated, making for incredibly easy enjoyment.

For collectors and traders of high-end Napa Cabernet, that pairing is particularly intriguing.

The muscular grandeur of 2021 and the poised elegance of 2023 will likely age on parallel trajectories for decades.

If the wines evolve as expected, the coming years may see these two vintages spoken of together as defining benchmarks of the modern Napa Valley era.

Together, they may form one of Napa Valley’s most compelling back-to-back collector vintages.

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Arguably, no wine region – not Bordeaux, not Burgundy, not even Champagne – has pursued luxury as deliberately as Napa Valley.

When winemaker Ivo Jeramaz arrived from Croatia in 1986 to work alongside his uncle, Miljenko ‘Mike’ Grgich, Napa was a quieter, humbler and unmistakably agrarian place.

In the decades that followed, the region was transformed, he recalls.

An influx of outside capital ushered in showpiece wineries with chandeliered tasting rooms. The hot pursuit of 100-point scores introduced cult wines and tightly held allocations.

‘Napa became a very exclusive place,’ says Jeramaz – a region, and wines, defined by luxury, polish and power.

The model worked for a while, he says, but today it’s clear that it’s under strain.

Inflexion point

Signs pointing to an unprecedented market correction are unavoidable across Napa Valley.

Wine sales have slowed, leaving excess inventory in their wake. Layoffs and facility closures have become regular and climate volatility is an operational constant.

Confidence levels at Napa wineries are among the lowest of any major US wine region, according to a recent survey by Silicon Valley Bank.

At every turn, there’s talk of a reset – a new era for Napa framed in terms such as authenticity and accessibility.

Wineries are leaning into storytelling and digital outreach. Wine tastings are being recast as wellness experiences.

But beneath the tactical adjustments, there are signs of a deeper, more structural shift emerging, too.

In a region that has largely exhausted conventional markers of luxury, a more durable expression of prestige may lie in the vineyard itself.

Prestige reconsidered

For many growers, this recalibration begins with a correction of the narrative.

Annie Favia, the viticulturist and co-owner of Favia Wines, recoils slightly when I suggest that Napa can, at times, resemble a Disneyland for wine lovers.

‘Napa has this very shiny veneer,’ she says, ‘but underneath it, it’s always been about farming.’

The valley’s agricultural core, she argues, may have been overshadowed by a commercially sexier narrative of luxury, but its backbone, built on family-run estates and generational stewardship, never disappeared.

For Favia and her husband, winemaker Andy Erickson (of Screaming Eagle and Dalla Valle fame), farming has always come first.

Since 2012, they’ve produced wine from organic vineyards certified by California Certified Organic Farmers (CCOF), incorporating biodynamic and regenerative principles.

‘We’ve had our heads down, working towards this goal for over three decades,’ Favia says.

What feels different now, Erickson suggests, is the growing momentum around those principles. ‘[Now] we have a chance to be a voice in a new chapter for Napa,’ he says.

At Vine Hill Ranch, a heritage estate situated on the slopes of the Mayacamas mountain range in Oakville, Bruce Phillips (pictured, above) – whose family has grown wine grapes there since the late 1950s – poses the idea similarly. What if Napa’s new luxury was rooted in a grower movement?

It’s a question that points to Champagne as a reference – a reorientation of currency away from grandes maisons and brand marketing, and toward wines crafted by growers, site expression and generational stewardship of land and community.

These recalibrations align with broader cultural currents. The rise of quiet luxury in fashion, for example, displaced logos and overt displays of wealth with a renewed reverence for craft, origin and sustainability.

In Napa, sustainability has similarly emerged as a marker of changing value systems.

Translating that impulse into a cohesive movement, however, hasn’t been easy.

A greener Napa

Among many wine-growers, there’s a shared conviction – if any wine region should take the lead on stewardship, why not Napa?

It’s one of the world’s most prestigious wine regions, with some of the highest land prices and operating budgets in the world, explains Jeramaz.

‘And yet, we’ve pretended that what we put in the soil has no bearing on wine quality,’ he says.

Grgich Hills, along with pioneers such as Neal Family Vineyards and Spottswoode Winery, were among Napa’s earliest adopters of organic viticulture and the trio are the only estates in the valley to hold silver-level Regenerative Organic Certified status, a standard that extends beyond organic regulations to include things such as soil health metrics, biodiversity benchmarks and labour protections.

Jeramaz argues that Napa should be further along, with stronger commitments to organic certification, wider adoption of regenerative practices and a full ban on synthetic herbicides, pesticides and fertilisers.

Organic certification, often considered a baseline standard for meaningful sustainability, has grown in Napa, especially in recent years.

According to CCOF data, about 12.5% of Napa Valley’s vineyard acreage is certified organic.

The Napa County Department of Agriculture reports that there were 138 certified organic wine grape growers in Napa Valley in 2024.

Yet even those numbers may understate actual practice. Napa Valley Grapegrowers estimates that the number of organic grapegrowers would double if uncertified farms practising organic methods were included.

Long-term benefits

The pursuit of sustainability rarely follows a single blueprint in Napa. Cathy Corison (pictured, above) of Corison Winery farmed organically for nearly three decades before obtaining CCOF certification in 2023, prompted largely by her daughter Grace.

‘I started farming organically long before it was fashionable,’ explains Corison, recalling a time when the label could even be viewed as a liability.

Cost and administrative burdens delayed the decision, but her daughter’s influence helped Corison to understand the greater value and recognition that certification carries, particularly for the next generation.

Also, she says, a growing sense of greenwashing in the industry – when companies use terminology related to sustainability to make misleading, vague or exaggerated claims about the supposed environmental benefits of their own operations – made the decision feel timely.

Indeed, the idea of sustainability is increasingly central to Napa’s messaging, but it’s a notoriously elastic term lacking a consistent definition or standards.

As environmental virtue begins to function as prestige currency, the absence of cohesion leaves consumers navigating a wide spectrum of approaches, often with varying shades of greenwashing.

On one hand, certifications provide invaluable benchmarks for assessing and communicating farming practices, but on the other, debate persists over which standards carry the most weight, and how much legitimacy should be afforded to vineyards operating outside formal certification.

The sheer number of certifications and competing claims from wineries can be difficult for consumers to parse, acknowledges Caleb Mosley, the executive director of Napa Valley Grapegrowers.

Yet if the shared objective is the long-term health of soils, vines and the people who work the land, ‘the certification conversation might become a little more ancillary’, he suggests.

It’s possible that even imperfect or incremental moves toward sustainability, which are often dismissed as greenwashing, may still signal a shift in values.

Long-term view

If farming is indeed becoming the new marker of luxury in Napa, Joseph Phelps Vineyards offers one of its clearest expressions.

Following its sale to luxury group LVMH’s Moët Hennessy division in 2022, the estate launched one of the valley’s most ambitious regenerative projects to date.

Unveiled in 2024, the Borgo Project represents a sweeping redesign of vineyard systems around agroecology principles.

The initiative incorporates everything from an intensive study of soil health to hydrological mapping and the creation of ecological corridors to restore biodiversity.

The plan operates on a capital-heavy, nine-year horizon before wines even reach the market.

CEO David Pearson describes the Borgo Project as ‘a new paradigm and a new basis for agriculture in Napa’, a model he hopes others in the region will follow.

Pearson is candid that he doesn’t intend to pursue third-party certification. The goal of the project, he says, was always to produce the best possible wines.

Certifications, he argues, neither guarantee that outcome nor necessarily align with the estate’s specific needs.

Building resilience

The Borgo Project underscores a reality many growers face – cost remains a significant barrier to structural change.

Regenerative certification, for example, requires paying all workers, including seasonal grape pickers, a set living wage – a minimum in Napa of roughly $36 an hour, instead of the more typical $20-$25, explains Aron Weinkauf, winemaker and vineyard manager at Spottswoode.

The upfront costs are high, acknowledges Spottswoode’s president and CEO Beth Novak (pictured, above).

‘[But] we look at it as an optimisation of profit rather than a maximisation,’ she says.

Over time, those investments amount to business resilience, Novak explains – a healthier environment, as well as longer-lived vines that require fewer inputs, less labour and ultimately, lower operating costs.

‘You make those investments because you intend to be here decades from now,’ she says.

Napa is in a tough place right now, Napa Valley Grapegrowers’ Mosley acknowledges, but it’s a reset that has offered clarity, ‘recalibrating toward people making not only positive business decisions, but positive viticultural and land-use decisions, too’.

Approaches to a greener, more resilient future for Napa will vary, as will the metrics used to assess them.

Ideally, what will endure is a fundamental shift in values and a return to farming as the region’s most credible expression of identity.

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At the table with Katie Vogt

Katie Vogt will be attending Decanter's Fine Wine Encounter in New York on 6 June, along with top Pahlmeyer wines.

Travel tips: New York to Napa

Food and wine

Join Katie Vogt and taste top Pahlmeyer wines at the Decanter Fine Wine Encounter New York 2026 on 6 June.

The general consensus holds that Californian Chardonnay is at its best in those areas where cooler climes and Pacific Ocean breezes temper hot days.

And there’s no shortage of winemakers who baulk at the idea of Napa-grown Chardonnay, seeing it as too warm.

The reality, however, is that it can be done. And done well.

Chardonnay is a variety that bears little tolerance for excess heat, and it can easily tip into the realm of plush, soft, full-bodied white wine lacking in tension.

Grown in the right sites in Napa Valley, and in the right hands, the results can be as riveting as top white Burgundy – as pleasure-packed, as contemplative, and as potentially ageworthy.

Yes, I said it, but can I back it up?

Looking back over the 8,000+ wines I’ve reviewed for Decanter in the last five years, I’ve given some pretty high scores to a handful of Chardonnays that defy expectations.

And here’s their little secret: Location, location, location.

A reliable source

Los Carneros, a sub-appellation spanning Napa and Sonoma counties, south-west of the city of Napa, remains the most reliable source of world-class Chardonnay in Napa Valley.

Here, the cooling influence of San Pablo Bay draws fog and wind deep into the southern reaches of the valley, slowing ripening and preserving natural acidity.

It is no coincidence that some of my top scorers below originate from the Hyde and Hudson vineyards, sites that have proven capable of producing Chardonnay with both richness and tension.

David Ramey’s Hyde Vineyard Chardonnay shows the site’s classic profile: layered orchard fruit, citrus oil, and a firm acid spine shaped as much by picking decisions as by place.

David Ramey has long championed acid balance over opulence in his Chardonnays, and so many of his Chardonnays are still bright and lively a decade after bottling because of it.

Back in 2019, during a tasting of his Chardonnays, he felt compelled to remind me of something I imagine he has had to repeat often.

‘It’s a dream that Old World is somehow better or more natural. Do the lab analysis. Stop romanticising things you don’t understand – great producers are great no matter where they are, just as with film and art. Why do we value Château Latour? Experience.’

Ramey has been making wine for more than five decades. In the grand scheme of California winemaking, that’s experience.

Tor Kenward, who works with winemaker Jeff Ames, also makes a stunning Chardonnay from Hyde called Cuvée Susan, which is more textural with extended élevage bringing a deeper mid-palate weight, yet still anchored by Carneros freshness.

A Hyde Vineyard Chardonnay from Nid Tissé, produced by Marie-Laure Ammons, offers another interpretation – more tightly coiled, mineral-driven, and inspired by her upbringing in rural Limousin and by her own winemaking approach, shaped by work for the likes of Philippe Melka, Julien Fayard, and Pierre Seillan.

Do the right thing

And then there is Hyde’s neighbour, Hudson Vineyards, established by Lee Hudson in 1981.

Lee decided to start making wine in 2004, and he asked Chardonnay legend John Konsgaard (who I have yet to taste with, and hence, none of his wines make this list), to make sure, ‘I didn’t do anything stupid,’ Hudson told me while riding a four-wheeler around his nearly 2,000-acre ranch.

‘I wanted to make Chablis. And John said: "Well, move to France. We don’t make that here. We make wine that represents the sun."'

Hudson’s site, with its shallow Hair Clay Loam soils, with a mix of volcanic and marine sediments, and exposure to the Bay’s marine influence, consistently produces fruit with ample concentration and structure – with the style idling between power and finesse, largely determined by picking decisions.

Heading further in

But Carneros is only part of the story. In Coombsville, just east and south of the city of Napa, cooler temperatures and volcanic soils create a markedly different expression of Chardonnay.

Coombsville’s persistent morning fog and afternoon breezes delay ripening, allowing for extended hang time without sugar accumulation racing ahead of phenolic development.

The result here is a wine of remarkable detail – citrus, stone fruit, saline mineral tones – held together by a natural acidity that is so bracing it’ll take the paint off the deck of your boat.

Nearby, in the western Oak Knoll District, the Linda Vista Vineyard Chardonnay from Matthiasson Wines illustrates another model for success.

Steve Matthiasson has built his reputation on restraint – earlier picking, moderate alcohol, minimal intervention – and the Linda Vista bottling reflects that philosophy.

Oak Knoll’s slightly cooler temperatures compared to mid-valley sites allow for freshness, but it is Matthiasson’s farming and timing that define the clarity and lift of his Chardonnay.

Then there are the wines that challenge the assumption that Chardonnay belongs only in Napa’s cooler southern or low-lying zones.

On stony ground

Stony Hill, established by the McCrea family in 1943 on the eastern slopes of Spring Mountain above St. Helena, remains one of Napa Valley’s defining Chardonnay estates.

The 2023 Chardonnay, drawn from vines planted in 1988 using massal selections from the estate’s original Old Wente plantings, shows classic Stony Hill restraint underpinned by a firm, saline acid structure that signals long ageing potential.

Similarly, winemaker Chris Carpenter’s W.S. Keyes Vineyard Chardonnay from La Jota demonstrates what is possible across the valley, on Howell Mountain.

Mountain fruit tends to ripen more slowly, with smaller berries and thicker skins, resulting in wines with greater concentration and grip.

Back on the valley floor, but pushing ripeness boundaries, Pahlmeyer’s Savoir Faire Chardonnay from Hyde Vineyard shows how clonal selections matter too – the 2024 release is entirely Calera clone.

The Calera selection is a low-yielding clone, producing small clusters and berries that deliver naturally high acidity and taut minerality.

And then, there’s Old Wente selections – a heritage clone marked by millerandage (‘hens and chicks’) that produces large and smaller berries (the small are typically seedless), contributing to richness, textural depth, and a broad, creamy mid-palate with ripe orchard fruit.

Putting it all together

Above all, what unites these exceptional Chardonnay wines is not style, certainly not typicity, which is something I don’t believe in, but a combination of factors: slightly cooler climes, water-retaining, yet well-draining soils, good aspect with protected pockets that can mitigate afternoon heat, and farming to ensure canopy management, yields, and soil health all influencing how those Chardonnay berries develop.

Get these elements right, and Napa Chardonnay can result in one of the best wines you’ve ever tasted in your life.

Oh, I didn’t do the obligatory Rombauer ‘cougar juice’ mention, so here it is: I’d happily drink a glass of Rombauer’s Carneros Chardonnay any day.

Listen: If you haven’t tasted it in recent years, you won’t believe how that wine is now built on – wait for it! – balanced ripeness and more nuanced oak.

My goodness, it's delicious.

Below are 12 brilliant Chardonnays from Napa that you’ll want to stuff in your cellar or wine fridge.

My 12 all-time Napa Chardonnays

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Setting the scene

The masterclass coincided with publication in Decanter’s March issue of an interview with Barrett, where he recalled the early days of Montelena and the impact that the victory of the estate’s 1973 Chardonnay at the legendary competition had – both on Montelena itself and on California more widely.

After a reception to welcome guests – where Montelena’s only non-Napa wine was served, the 2022 vintage Potter Valley Riesling, made from Mendocino fruit – the masterclass proper commenced.

This featured three vintages (2020, 2014 and 2009) of the famous Chardonnay, all poured from magnum, and three vintages of its Estate Cabernet Sauvignon: the incredibly youthful and exuberant 2021; the ‘Goldilocks’ 2017 vintage, where everything went right; and the fascinatingly evolved 2007.

Montelena's territory

The pair explained that the Calistoga AVA, where the estate is situated, at the foot of California’s Mount Helena (hence Montelena), has unique properties.

Located at the northern end of Napa, it’s both a valley appellation and a mountain appellation, said Barrett. (It’s also a great place to visit, he added, more relaxed and welcoming than some other parts of the county.)

The Montelena fruit grows on geologically diverse soils and enjoys the afternoon sun.

And yet despite the obvious California generosity of fruit flavour, there is a hallmark acid line to these wines that keeps them fresh for decades.

Also, explained Crafton, a marked sense of place and vintage.

‘We work hard on the winemaking side to make ourselves disappear,’ he said. ‘We want you to taste the character of the year, and the place.’

History makers

Bo Barrett was only 18 when his father Jim established Chateau Montelena in 1972, but remembers clearly the excitement when the team in California found out that the 1973 Chardonnay was the top-scoring white at the Judgement of Paris.

‘The phone was ringing off the hook, with everyone wanting to buy our wine,’ he recalled.

‘Without the Judgement of Paris, we’d just be a red wine estate, and it would have taken much longer for us to get to where we are today.’

The original intention was for the estate to produce a single wine, the Estate Cabernet, but it produced a Chardonnay at the start too, to help with cashflow.

After the triumph in Paris, it was inevitable that Chardonnay would take its place permanently alongside the Cabernet.

Chardonnay thankfully remains firmly in the fold today, and the estate has doubled down on its commitment to the grape, buying a new vineyard three miles south of the current one.

The winemaking style with the Chardonnay is to never use malolactic fermentation, and again this serves to accentuate the purity of fruit, the precision and the freshness.

‘At the end of the day, we want tasting our wines to make you happy,’ said Crafton. And judging by the audience reaction, and smiles as they left the class, the team at Montelena continues to achieve that goal.

The Montelena masterclass wines:

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A seismic tasting 50 years ago

When a small group of California wines triumphed over France’s finest at the 1976 Judgement of Paris, few could have imagined the global shockwave it would set in motion.

Staged by the late Steven Spurrier (Decanter Consultant Editor for 25 years), the tasting event was meant to be a bicentennial celebration, pitting upstart American producers against benchmark French estates.

Instead, it redefined the hierarchy of fine wine and altered the course of California’s future.

The result – Burgundy’s most esteemed whites being bested by a Napa Valley Chardonnay from Chateau Montelena (a bottle of which now sits in an exhibit in the Smithsonian in Washington, DC) – cemented not only the estate’s reputation but also the credibility of an entire region.

Half a century later, the story still reverberates.

The event remains a symbol of innovation, resilience and the restless spirit that continues to drive Napa Valley.

For Bo Barrett (current CEO and son of Jim Barrett, the late winery founder), who was just 18 when the winning 1973 Chardonnay was bottled, the tasting was a catalytic moment – one that transformed his family’s modest dream into a global legacy.

In this conversation, exclusive to Decanter, Barrett looks back on the early days of Montelena, his father Jim’s improbable leap from law to wine, and the unvarnished realities behind a victory that helped reshape the American viticultural dream.

Decanter, in conversation with Bo Barrett

You were only a teenager when your father bought Chateau Montelena in 1972. What do you remember about those early days?

I remember that it was all quite remarkable.

Two factors stand out in my mind that led my dad to Montelena. The Vietnam War was going really badly at the time, and top income tax rates in the US were extraordinarily high.

My dad was a real estate and tax attorney for a company that built malls around the world, and when he saw that President Nixon had introduced new incentives to revive American agriculture – which was struggling – he spotted an opportunity.

The administration had just expanded major investment tax credits and accelerated-depreciation rules for agricultural projects.

In effect, if you were a high earner, you could either hand a huge portion of your income over in taxes, or you could invest that same money into American agriculture instead.

My dad’s business partner always called Montelena ‘the tax dodge that got out of hand’.

Were you with him when he first set eyes on Montelena?

I was with him on the second trip.

My dad was a pilot, and we’d fly around together looking at pomegranate and citrus groves, cattle ranches, all these different things.

I was probably 17 when I came with him on his second trip to check out Chateau Montelena.

This lake was totally overgrown. It was a total jungle. The vineyards were completely run down.

When did you realise this wasn’t just a family project but might be your life’s work?

I didn’t know I was going to be a farmer until that first summer. I came up and started working in the vineyard and kind of just took to it.

The vineyard manager was an Italian-American named John Roll. He’d ploughed with a mule for Madame [Hélène] de Pins at Beaulieu vineyard.

He taught me how to hunt deer, collect abalone and forage for mushrooms – all this good stuff. He taught me the joy of the mason, which is the pride you take in a hard day’s work.

What do you remember about that famous 1973 Chardonnay around bottling time?

From the summer of 1973 and all the way to ’76, my whole family was here. The bottle that’s in the Smithsonian – I know I filled that bottle.

My brother Mike put the nitrogen on the bottle, and my little brother Kev put the bottles in the case. My whole family’s fingerprints are on that bottle.

Tell us about the day that Steven Spurrier visited the winery.

I remember [the winemaker] Mike Grgich being very nervous and making us get the cellar pristine, super-spiffy clean. It was a VIP tour, same as when Robert Mondavi was coming – everything had to shine.

We had to pull the magic disappearing act: all the staff go away, no one’s around. I wasn’t there watching Steven taste.

Mike probably sent me to the vineyard. Honestly, we didn’t pay that much attention until later.

What about when the results of the Paris tasting came in?

When the telegram came in, we were in the cellar working, filling barrels, and the doors were wide open.

Grgich was out in the gravel parking lot, dancing and waving this piece of paper and yelling, ‘We won! We won!’ So we turned off our pumps and walked out. We were all joining him in this little Yugoslavian victory dance.

It was a hell of a surprise. George Taber [then a Time magazine reporter and the only journalist present at the event, and subsequently author of the 2006 book on the topic] called my dad, and my dad gave him a quote. He didn’t want to insult the French: ‘Not bad for kids from the sticks.’

In what ways and how quickly did things change for Montelena after the article in Time came out?

It was immediate. Suddenly, we had distributors calling from all over the country.

The people who had said, ‘No, we don’t carry California wines’ the week before called us up and said, ‘Hey, we’d like to sell your wine.’ The phone was lighting up.

We didn’t have a general manager, but the California ‘attention’ didn’t change that much.

The first immediate change was that the rest of the country recognised that California was making good wine.

You’ve said before that the Judgement of Paris was a catalyst rather than a miracle. What do you mean by that?

All the ingredients were there: the land, the light, the people, the willingness to do the work.

If there had never been Prohibition, California would’ve buried Europe a century ago.

The most important thing is, it made quality such a driving force for everybody’s goal and mission.

So it had that drive towards improved quality, which then drove consumers to seek out a superior product. And so it became a self-perpetuating thing.

How do you see the next 50 years for Napa Valley?

It’s going to be as tough as the last 50. Work harder than anybody, pick the steep hill and keep climbing.

When you think about legacy, about Chateau Montelena’s place in history, what comes to mind?

I do think about what we’ve accomplished with just trying to do the right thing – to make something special out of a special place. The drive to express American excellence is what we’re the proudest of.

And I just hope that the people who fall in behind us in this business understand that you have to do the hard work and keep your nose to the grindstone and have the right philosophy, which is always to reward people’s faith.

They’re taking a bet on buying your product and your job is to make that bet pay off.

Three of my four grandparents were immigrants. The other was born in a covered wagon. No wine experience at all. The opportunity that was presented to us by this great country – it’s been a good thing.

We’re just quiet about it. People ask, ‘Are you going to retire?’ I say, hell no. I love what I do.

I’ve got a beautiful place, friendly people to work with and a fantastic crew. It’s a nice little ship. I don’t want to give it up.

Benchmark Napa: A taste of modern-day Montelena

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Having tasted extensively across the contrasting 2022 and forthcoming 2023 vintages of Napa Cabernet – the former early-drinking, riper with softer tannins, and the latter a cellarworthy year marked by vivid, fresh fruit and structured tannins – it made me consider the concept of ‘ripeness’

I asked a handful of Napa’s top winemakers to reflect on their approach and perspectives on ripeness in any growing season.

I wanted to know what it means to achieve ripeness today. How do farming choices shape ripening, whether ripeness is measured beyond numbers, and what does it mean in the context of balance?

What emerged was a familiar wine-world paradox: everyone agrees that achieving ideal ripeness – and ultimately a balanced wine – is paramount. Yet no one agrees on any fixed definition of that ideal.

‘The American palate has evolved towards less sweetness and more appreciation for acidity, bitterness, and a diversity of flavours,’ says Julien Fayard, of Fayard Wines, Covert, and Gemstone.

‘Culturally, as the food in our country changes, so do the wines. Napa is following a slower path, but reinventing and re-adjusting itself to better align its wines with what we’re eating today.’

For Aron Weinkauf of Spottswoode, it’s more personal and subjective. ‘I appreciate more subtlety, beauty, and freshness than I did 25 years ago,’ he says, echoing many others interviewed for this article.

Across conversations, the notion of achieving an ideal ripeness reveals no straight line to a target number. Instead, it follows a curving path, with overlaps between freshness and richness, hedonism and restraint, lab numbers and intuition – shaped by farming decisions, soil, vine material, climate, and stylistic preferences.

Evolution of the Napa style

From the higher-acid, tannic, long-lived wines of the 1970s, to the full-bodied, lush, sweet-fruited, richly oaked wines of the early aughts, and back toward a more nuanced middle ground today, the winemakers I spoke with consistently traced Napa’s ripeness conversation to historical planting decisions in the vineyard.

Rebekah Wineburg of Quintessa points to the 1990s as a defining moment: ‘The phylloxera crisis forced wide-scale renewal of vineyards,’ she says, explaining how it brought new clones and rootstocks selected to enhance physiological ripeness and bold flavour development.

At the same time, she continues, winemakers were ‘rejecting the vegetal flavours’ of earlier wines and seeking a style aimed at pleasure and immediate appeal.

By the 2000s, vineyard design and winery tools reinforced that shift. ‘Winemakers were chasing concentration, and the path to it seemed clear: lower yields, later picks, and absolute selectivity,’ Wineburg says. Advances in cellar technology made later harvesting feel safer – and, for a time, stylistically rewarding.

The alcohol fallacy

Rarely was ripeness framed in terms of potential alcohol levels.

Matthew Crafton, President and Winemaker of Chateau Montelena, explains: ‘I’ll see a picking window where the potential alcohol is in a good place, and the flavours are really nice’, explains , ‘but wait a day or two, and those numbers shift, and so do the flavours. You’re not measuring alcohol for balance—you can’t use alcohol as a proxy for ripeness.’

Meanwhile, Jean Hoefliger, of JH Consulting and AXR asserts: ‘You can’t be fooled into thinking a wine should always sit at a specific alcohol level.’

‘One of the greatest wines ever made – the 1947 Cheval Blanc, which came in at 14.4% ABV. Which was over two points higher than was typical for that wine. As for Napa Cab, in the late 1990s and early 2000s, consumer desire for more immediately approachable, pleasurable wine led to picking late, no acid or tannin additions, and ultimately to higher-alcohol, flabbier wines. That trend is now in reverse.’

Weinkauf emphasises how changes in vine material alone have altered ripening dynamics. ‘Today’s vine structure and vine vigour are very different. Trellis and vineyard infrastructures have changed.’

He notes that vertical shoot positioning differs radically from California sprawl or head-trained vineyards, with implications for yield, flavour concentration, and tannin development.

Climate change has added further complexity. Since 2015, Napa has experienced three of its warmest vintages on record. Nile Zacherle of David Arthur Wines argues that growers must adapt structurally, ‘rethinking row orientation and canopy architecture so wines are not shocked by climatic swings’.

Tasting ripeness

Despite access to unprecedented amounts of data, none of the winemakers describe ripeness as something determined solely in the laboratory, either. ‘Ultimately, it still comes down to taste,’ says Celia Welch of Scarecrow fame, and Celia Welch Consulting, with winemakers leveraging data as ‘checkpoints,’ above all else – as Rebekah Wineburg put it.

‘I literally ask myself: Do I want to eat this grape? Is it delicious?’ says grower, winemaker, and winery owner Steve Matthiasson.

As Aron Weinkauf explains, ‘we do measure sugar per berry,’ but he stresses that those numbers are weighed alongside ‘evaluating vine health, watching the weather, and tasting.’

Grapes growing on the vine give tangible cues such as ‘firm clusters versus limp, flaccid ones’, says Zacherle, ‘and a healthy canopy is one that provides dappled sunlight,’ for even-keeled ripening, ‘as harvest approaches.’

Wineburg describes ‘brown flavours’, bruised fruit, and a loss of freshness in grapes that are overripe.

By contrast, Jonah Beer of Pilcrow Wines (pictured above) frames under-ripeness biologically, suggesting that until the vine believes the seed can survive, ‘the vine keeps the acid high and sour’ in grapes.

Farming towards balance

‘Vines are pretty great at adapting to and reading their environment,’ says Weinkauf, ‘but our actions as the farmers can confuse them.’ He avoids early watering and excessive intervention, preferring to ‘guide rather than control’.

Matthiasson describes a season-long approach – cover crops, compost, pruning, shoot thinning, leaf thinning, irrigation – designed to deliver fruit that ‘makes the winemaking job easy’ and improve wine quality ‘without having to harvest later at higher potential alcohol’ (his Cabernet-based wines usually come in around or under 13% alcohol).

Chelsea Barrett talks of site-specific decisions. ‘In high-vigour blocks, we may plant permanent cover crops and [grow] larger canopies’, to control ripening, while ‘in lower-vigour sites, we might drop down to one cluster per shoot’, aiming at finding balance.

Fayard, by contrast, notes that, ‘we have been steadily lowering our alcohol by picking slightly earlier’. He adds that increasing yields at certain sites has improved hang time, slowed sugar loading, and led to ‘lower alcohols and better refined tannins’.

As an example, Fayard cited his Les Vins Julien line of wines, which are made with deliberately lower alcohol levels (as low as 11%).

Pendulums, preferences, and diversity

At a broader level, Napa’s ripeness story follows more of a pendulum swing. From pre-Parker elegance to power-packed Cabernets, now veering back toward a newer version of balance, based on how the growing season shapes a vintage. ‘There is no wrong or right, just diversity of style and taste,’ says Beer.

‘Remember those crazy-ripe Cabernets that had alcohols in the high 16% range?’ asks Welch, echoing Hoefliger that: ‘In recent years, the trend seems to be in the opposite direction.’

Continuum’s Tim Mondavi describes how smarter farming has changed the equation. He says: ‘In the past, we harvested late, in order to ameliorate the harshness of the wines.’

But better farming has allowed him to achieve ideal ripeness earlier in the season, thereby mitigating pressure from potential late-season extreme heat or fire.

‘Harvest is unpredictable,’ says Chelsea Barrett, ‘you make the best decisions you can with imperfect information,’ which is why better farming often comes with some capital-intensive technological improvements.

During the major heat event of 2022, wineries that had spent money to install vineyard misters kept canopy temperatures 15-20 degrees cooler on extremely hot days, thereby limiting sugar spikes and staving off higher potential alcohol levels.

‘We observe various movements – organic, biodynamic, regenerative farming, natural winemaking, on and on – but we do not commit to any single philosophy,’ concludes Fayard. ‘Instead, we prioritise transparency and customising our farming approach to each site.’

Wineburg summarises the collective mood best: ‘Ripeness is important, of course,’ she says, ‘but the intent has shifted.’

And that recalibration – toward balanced wines, expressive of site – suggests Napa Valley will never abandon its signature ripeness so much as refine it, just as regions such as Bordeaux and Burgundy did over generations.

Related articlesHeitz Cellar: Six decades of a Napa Valley icon

Meet the next generation at four legacy Napa Valley wineries

Mining for value in the Napa Valley: Over 20 of the best wines for under $75

The road that winds its way to Heitz Cellar and the historic property, which includes a barrel house built in 1898, is a trip back in time. A quiet slice of the old Napa, tucked amid sprawling oak trees away from the tasting room traffic on the Silverado Trail.

Founded by Joe and Alice Heitz in 1961, Heitz quickly established itself among America’s great producers.

A pioneer in many ways, Heitz created America’s first single vineyard-designate, the 1966 Martha’s Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, becoming the first to champion terroir in Napa and the US.

‘There have only been three winemakers in Heitz’s history,’ Carlton McCoy MS tells me. ‘Joe, his son David and Brittany Sherwood.’

Joe passed the baton to David in the late 1970s. Sherwood, the current director of winemaking, has been at the helm since 2018, when the property was acquired by Lawrence Wine Estates, of which McCoy is CEO. (She worked for six years alongside David Heitz, taking the lead in the cellar with the 2016 vintage.)

See Jonathan Cristaldi’s pick of Heitz Cellar across six decades

Less about the barrel

The ‘Heitz style’ has always been about flavour from fruit, eschewing extraneous tannin from over-extraction or overt oak.

‘Joe felt that it [overtly tannic wine] was just an excuse, a lazy way of making Cabernet,’ McCoy explains.

‘Oak can give you an illusion of opulence and pedigree, but you’re not assessing the density and length of the wine. So we taste the wines a year after harvest, before they see any oak.

‘That’s when we choose the single-vineyard wines over the Napa Valley designate. It’s also when we decide on ageing regimes and oak to finish the wines, based on what we think they need.’

The single-vineyard Heitz wines are released four years from harvest, and the Napa Valley designate is released three years after harvest.

‘At some point in the transition between Joe and David, I can only imagine as an attempt to “modernise”, they began using a higher proportion of barrique and, more importantly, a much greater proportion of new barrique,’ says McCoy.

‘For us, it was critical to return to the original style, but with larger casks. We have reduced the proportion of barrique and new barrique and now use a much larger percentage of 1,000- to 2,000-litre foudre.

‘We also still use the large casks that are 10,000 to 20,000 litres. We think the wines are fresher, and it allows us to secure density in the mid-palate, which you lose in smaller barriques.’

As the rest of Napa Valley moved towards new oak, and plenty of it in the form of smaller barriques, David Heitz veered Heitz Cellars a little in that direction, before correcting course after a few years.

‘We’ve taken it back even further,’ McCoy explains, in terms of minimising the oak impact.

‘We have to ask the question, if Joe were still here, would he be making the wines the same way? No, he wouldn’t; he’d want to focus on making the wines better.’

For McCoy, Sherwood and the Heitz team, that improvement is mostly gained in the vineyards, through a series of small tweaks to polish what is already renowned as classic.

Freshness in the vineyard

‘We’re making wines now that are closer to the alcohol levels from the 1970s. But we’re not doing it by picking early,’ McCoy clarifies, ‘it’s a combination of factors that help with the maturity of the fruit.’

By moving completely to biodynamics – conversion began after the 2019 vintage and Demeter certification was achieved a few years later – and significantly reducing irrigation, as well as bringing in a reduced- or no-till approach and interplanting between vine rows, the team at Heitz is seeing a concentration married to freshness in the fruit as it’s harvested.

This means that much of the work is done before the winemaking begins.

‘When you irrigate and have a big crop hanging on the vines, it slows down the maturity of the fruit,’ McCoy says.

‘For Cabernet, it’s not about picking earlier; it’s about balancing phenolic, or physiological, ripeness [relating to the grape skins, seeds and stems] with lower sugars [ie, potential alcohol].

‘After 24° Brix [a standard measure of sugar content in solution], it’s no longer sugar accumulation, it’s the concentration of sugar through dehydration and raisination.’

The Heitz team is committed to picking at a level of 24°-24.5° Brix at most, and aiming for full phenolic ripeness at that sugar level.

They achieve fruit concentration through lower yields [quantity of fruit per vine] and largely by dry-farming. This means the fruit comes in balanced yet concentrated.

The Heitz Cellar vertical

If there is a signature of the Heitz wines, it’s that they are shot through with forest character, whether it’s described as bay leaf, pine resin, spearmint or even eucalyptus.

The lively and elegant arboreal essence is the calling card for Heitz, both in the wines made today and indeed back to the 1969-vintage Lot C-91.

As a central part of our preparation for this article, McCoy presented a dazzling array of Heitz wines, 43 in all, for me and Decanter’s Napa correspondent Jonathan Cristaldi (see his tasting notes on a selection of 10 of them, below).

A dramatic case was immediately made regarding Heitz’s freshness as we nosed our first wine, the 1978 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon: remarkable, and still exuberant, 47 years in.

The throughline was pronounced as we tasted a range of vintages, some of them regarded as hot, others rainy, wet and difficult.

Yet a consistency was evident: balanced, fresh and light on their feet, even in hot years; lively throughout, persistent forest elements that framed taut, fresh violets and blue/black fruits in each and every vintage.

In his day, influential US critic Robert Parker would write off an entire vintage, particularly one like 2011, yet today this is a Heitz wine that’s showing dazzingly, overtly floral, fresh and vibrant.

Many of the farming changes at Heitz were initiated in 2019, and McCoy believes this work will be clear to see in the wines moving forward.

The Linda Falls Vineyard Cabernet from that vintage is now tasting focused and precise, with a pronounced clarity and heightened fruit intensity.

And going back, the 1979 Martha’s Vineyard designate bottling is perfect (as per Cristaldi’s 100-point score), showing elegance and structure that is evocative of Barolo, or even Burgundy, with that forest-driven complexity and brilliant tension – a timeless Napa Cabernet that sets a benchmark for the region among the world’s great wines.

Restoring balance

For McCoy, one of the primary missions is to set a course for a return to a classic Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon: more honest, authentic and balanced.

Joe Heitz had a notoriously difficult relationship with Robert Parker, famously once sending him a box of handkerchiefs after Parker had described the Heitz wines as lacking in aromatics.

Yet it’s Parker’s outsized impact on Napa’s wines as a whole that McCoy feels as if he’s still pushing back on today.

‘Philosophically, my biggest challenge with so-called modern Napa is that it wasn’t driven by the winemakers, or climate,’ says McCoy. ‘The style that came about in the late 1980s is thanks to one man. It’s a style that is still very much around today.

‘But the fact is, wineries did what they did at the time in order to stay afloat. It may seem hard to believe, but the wrong score from one guy could essentially put you out of business back then.

‘A lot of wines, and this isn’t just in Napa, but throughout the world, were made to cater to one man’s palate. And this is the result: you have a lot of winemakers who don’t like to drink the wines they’re making. That’s a real tragedy, in my opinion.’

McCoy concludes that ‘freshness’ is perhaps an overused term. ‘But we’re talking about a balance between acidity and the rest of the structure of the wine. Your mouth waters, and you want more. That’s been missing in too many wines for too long.’

The team at Heitz wants to remind the wine world why Napa was considered great in the first place.

A taste of Heitz across six decades: Cristaldi’s 10 highlights

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• Wines of the Year 2025: North America
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Of all the many thousands of wines tasted by Decanter every year, only a small handful ever gain the very highest score of 100.

This year, in fact, a mere 30 wines (tasted between 1 October 2024 and 30 September 2025) gained that coveted triple-digit score. In the immortal words of Cilla Black, let’s look at what they are and where they come from.

Top-scorers by country

As two countries that feature heavily both online and in print, the bulk of this year’s top-scoring wines came from France and the US.

France had the higher number of 100-point scores by far – 15 wines (50%) versus 12 (40%) from the US – while Italy with two 100-point wines and Australia with just one made up the difference.

Top-scorers by region

Drilling down into the regions things get a little more interesting. We can see that the French wines are split among several regions, with Bordeaux taking the largest share of 100-point wines (nine wines overall or 30% of the total).

However, the largest single region for top scores was California, with 11 wines (36.7%) that received a 100-point score.

The Rhône Valley was the third most-awarded region with five (16.7%) of the top scores, while Western Australia, Burgundy, Oregon, Tuscany and Piedmont all picked up one perfect score apiece.

Top-scorers by appellation

The most-awarded appellation overall was the Napa Valley, which had 10 wines with a 100-point score (mostly from one standout vintage, which was also the case with many of the Bordeaux wines as we’ll explore below).

There were three wines from Châteauneuf-du-Pape as the second highly rated appellation – though probably not wines you would expect – followed by Cornas, Pauillac, Pessac-Léognan, Pomerol and St-Emilion which all had two 100-point scores this past year.

The remaining appellations were Barolo, La Tâche, Margaret River, Margaux, Sonoma County, Toscana, and Willamette Valley with one 100-point wine apiece.

And now let’s briefly look at those wines.

France

Bordeaux

Many of the vintage reports published this year have focused on the very difficult 2024 vintage, which has not yielded many exceptional wines overall.

However, Bordeaux editor Georgie Hindle also reviewed the recently bottled and shipped 2022 vintage from Bordeaux which was a different story altogether.

In her report published in March, she said of the vintage: ‘The 2022s have emerged as wines out to please. As a group they are highly charged and powerful with an impressive amount of fruit, tannins and alcohol, yet they are refined and balanced with a sense of classicism.’

She gave six wines a score of 100-points – three each from the left and right banks.

She also gave a perfect score to the ‘monumental’ 2016 vintage of Château Latour, finally released from the estate’s cellars this spring.

Two wines from the 2015 vintage, Château Margaux and Château Lafleur confirmed in their majesty 10 years on.

Rhône Valley

Matt Walls covers the Rhône extensively for Decanter and this February he wrote about an especially memorable tasting at Château de Beaucastel in Châteauneuf-du-Pape, which yielded three 100-point wines.

These were not the estate’s reds though – but rather its ‘masterpiece’ of a white wine, the Roussanne Vieilles Vignes.

Tasted while scenes from Netflix’s Drops of God adaptation were filmed in the background, Walls was thoroughly seduced by what he calls ‘one of France’s greatest Mediterranean whites’, with many high scores given including three digits for three vintages: 2020, 2014 and 1988.

There was room for a couple of top-scoring reds though, notably two 2010 Cornas from Domaine Clape and Vincent Paris, which are among Walls’s favourite vintages from that appellation to drink now.

Burgundy

For a region with such a sterling reputation, there was just one wine that claimed a ‘perfect’ score in 2025. Maybe the standards of expectation from the Côte d’Or are that much higher?

Nonetheless, the unsurprising top-scorer was from Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, with the domaine’s La Tâche 2022 getting the seal of approval from Charles Curtis MW during his in-bottle tasting this spring.

US

Napa Valley

Like Bordeaux, the bulk of top scores for Napa Valley this year came from the 2022 vintage, which was also not necessarily a straightforward growing season but from which some true gems have emerged.

Jonathan Cristaldi wrote in his report: ‘Compared to more structured, long-ageing vintages such as 2021 or 2019, the 2022s are approachable, plush and opulent.

‘Tannin structure varies, with some wines showcasing excellent granular grip and ageing potential while others exhibit a smoother, more fruit-driven profile that leans toward early drinking.’

Cristaldi ultimately gave six wines from the 2022 vintage 100 points, alongside another four from the 2021 – giving Napa its rather awesome tally of 10 top-scores this year.

Sonoma and Willamette Valley

The only US wines breaking Napa’s stranglehold on the crown were a Pinot Noir and Chardonnay duo.

In her report on the wines from the Sonoma Coast in 2022 (there’s that vintage again), Ana Carolina Quintela gave 100-points to the Cuvée Elizabeth Pinot Noir from Occidental. A true ‘wow-moment wine’ she noted.

And our North America editor, Clive Pursehouse, awarded his very first 100-point wine to the ‘captivating’ Bethel Heights’ The High Wire Chardonnay 2023 from Willamette Valley in Oregon.

Best of the rest

Italy

A rather diplomatic split of one 100-point score each for Italy’s premier regions of Piedmont and Tuscany this year.

Michaela Morris dished out a top-score to Giacomo Conterno’s Montfortino Riserva 2019 in her review of that newly-released batch of wines.

And Italy editor, James Button, couldn’t help but give 100-points to the ‘impeccably harmonious and long-lived’ 2006 Masseto during a vertical of the Super Tuscan at the start of the year.

Australia

And to wrap things up, while reviewing the wines being released through La Place de Bordeaux this autumn, Hindle gave top marks to the Cloudburst Chardonnay from Margaret River.

She wrote: ‘Round, utterly moreish from the first sip – this is engaging, mouthwatering, alive and so utterly enjoyable. I’d never tire of drinking this wine.’

Decanter’s 100-point wines of 2025:

Related content

Bordeaux 2022: The 100-point wines

Napa Cabernet Sauvignon 2022: Vintage report and buyer’s guide

‘This is my first 100-point wine after nearly 4,000 in my three years at Decanter’

Among the handful of Napa estates still steering their own course, we find a firm conviction about what it means to build for the long term. Younger heirs have their challenges and must stay relevant to an audience that drinks differently, travels less, and scrolls or swipes at bewildering speeds.

For these families, legacy isn’t something you simply inherit, so much as something you work for, keep working for, with an urgency to innovate, and stay relevant.

Dunn Vineyards: Holding the line on Howell Mountain

Mike Dunn remembers the moment the family business called him home. ‘I walked into a bookstore in Mendocino one weekend and picked up a book on wine and read about my family,’ he says. ‘I thought I should probably learn how to make wine at that moment.’

His stepfather, Randy Dunn, wasn’t so sure the two could work together. ‘He recognised that I was kind of my own boss, and didn’t want to work for him’, Mike recalls – but after the sudden loss of Mike’s sister, the family rallied, and Randy ‘embraced my return’.

When Mike joined the winery in 1999, he brought both pragmatism and precision to Howell Mountain, softening pressing, shortening pump-overs, and reducing the amount of new oak.

He pushed back against de-alcoholising the wines if the finished alcohol was under 14%, a practice Randy had adopted without apology. Still, Mike is in favour of removing alcohol if it’s over 14%.

The tannic power of Dunn’s mountain wines has resulted in numerous critics describing them as ‘undrinkable young’, a phrase Mike meets with good humour. ‘It may have been that way in the past, but today, they are approachable earlier, and still in our style,’ which is surprisingly elegant and powerfully built.

Mike Dunn’s challenge is to ensure he doesn’t spread himself too thin dealing with the viticultural demands atop Howell Mountain while maintaining a loyal client base and prized wholesale accounts. To ease some of the burden, in 2020, Ted Kizor joined to assist in the cellar, along with Lily Mirabelle Freedman, as General Manager in 2023.

Mike’s son, Alex, is also getting involved on the farming side – yet another generation of Dunn comes into the fold.

Corison Winery: Grace and the art of continuity

Cathy Corison once remarked that she never fully understood the term terroir until she realised ‘people are part of the equation.’

That belief underpins her four decades of championing elegant, lower-alcohol Napa Cabernet – at times seen as out of fashion, occasionally unprofitable, but unwavering in integrity.

‘I never got the business memo; this girl just wants to make wine, ’ she says.

But there came a point when she and her husband, William Martin, began talking to their daughters—Grace and Rose—about a succession plan. If neither daughter wanted to take it on, ‘We might choose to stop buying any fruit and concentrate on our estate vineyards, making less wine and living happily ever after,’ muses Cathy.

‘This is a very difficult business, and I didn’t want either Grace or Rose to come back into the business unless they really loved it.’

Grace, who trained in acting and lived in New York City before returning to St Helena, caught the winemaking bug while home on a kind of forced leave during the pandemic.

Her creative background makes her acutely aware of ‘what’s around you, and [how you ] then shape it into something that tells a story,’ she says. Her generation, she adds, values transparency as much as terroir.

‘People my age want to know not just what’s in their glass, but how it was made and what values are behind it.’

Meanwhile, Cathy is learning the art of letting go after nearly four decades. ‘This project has always been so personal,’ she admits. Yet in Grace’s growing stewardship, she finds reassurance: ‘We haven’t wanted to make more wine, just better wine. If we have a long enough runway, there should be great continuity.’

Cliff Lede Vineyards: From rock ’n’ roll to rhythm and balance

Few wineries blend serious winemaking with tongue-in-cheek playfulness quite like Cliff Lede. ‘We take winemaking seriously,’ says Cliff’s son Jason Lede, ‘but don’t take ourselves too seriously.’

Since 2002, Cliff Lede’s portfolio of wines from Bordeaux varieties is set against a backdrop of a shared love of classic rock, complete with vineyard blocks named after favourite songs.

Today, Jason leads the company his father founded. ‘Initially, there wasn’t necessarily the intention to be a multi-generational winery,’ he says. ‘I spent 10 years building my résume, and officially joined in 2015.’

That same year, the winery obtained its Napa Green certification, and Jason describes the transition as equal parts pride and pressure. ‘With the current state of the industry, we’ve made it a priority to eliminate noise and focus on what drives our business forward.’

He’s expanded the estate, deepened focus on Stags Leap District Cabernet, and brought in new audiences through music-driven tastings, DJ events, and two new wines – Rhythm and Crossfade.

Director of Winemaking, Chris Tynan, leads a tight ship in the cellar, with a strict focus on farming and making wines to enjoy with meals, at moderate alcohol levels – like their flagship poetry, which clocks in at impressively modest mid-13s.

Founder Cliff Lede remains confident about the handover: ‘We’re ready to weather the storm. We’re refining our winemaking techniques to redefine what balance means to us. I am confident that not all recent industry changes are fundamental, and that wine will persevere as an essential part of a life well lived.’

Rudd: Flexibility and focus in challenging times

When Samantha Rudd took over the winery her father established in the 1990s, she was keenly aware of his legacy. ‘Rudd is about craftsmanship. It started in 1996 with a lofty goal of creating a world-class estate.’

Rudd has thrived under her helm, but she’s not one to rest on family laurels amid shifting tides. ‘All my father was able to accomplish in his life is incredibly impressive,’ she says. ‘However, that is literally the past.’

In 2021, Rudd promoted Natalie Bath to Head Winemaker. Bath, who interned at Petrus in Pomerol and first joined Rudd in 2014, has dialled back ripeness, tightened the white wine program, and brought a renewed focus on organic farming with some biodynamic practices. As a result, the wines are livelier and fresher than ever before – and attractive to a younger clientele.

It’s an oft-repeated mantra, but for Rudd: ‘Making the best wines possible from our land every year,’ is the goal. And to do that, she has surrounded herself with a comfortable team asking what they need to do to, ‘keep finding consumers, and not get stuck in our ways.’

She sees today’s economic and global consumption challenges as a chance to cultivate new wine lovers. ‘I remind our team to practise gratitude with customers,’ she notes. ‘Now more than ever, we need to make them feel special. I worked at [Bordeaux’s Château] Margaux during its 200-year celebration. If we are truly in this for the long haul, we will need to be able to adapt.’

Up Next in Napa Valley:

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There are few winery destinations in the world as magical as OVID, perched atop Pritchard Hill 426m above Oakville on Napa’s eastern side.

From this vantage, the estate offers breathtaking views across the valley floor and nearly the entire span of the Mayacamas Mountains.

Rooted in the volcanic uplift soils, the estate was established 25 years ago by Dana Johnson and Mark Nelson, who had careers in technology and sciences.

In 2017, they sold their prized estate to the Duncan family of Silver Oak.

One thing has remained absolutely constant: OVID’s standing among Napa’s blue-chip estates is deliberately understated – a quiet reverence, coveted by collectors and exhilarating to those who chance upon it in their quest for America’s finest wines.

While its bottlings command the kind of prices suited to readers in the highest tax brackets, the estate projects a polish and sophistication that feels entirely at ease with its place among Napa’s elite.

Profound and perfect

Today, winemaker Austin Peterson is crafting wines of profound depth, structure, and complexity. Peterson is a thoughtful winemaker, equal parts philosopher and craftsman.

He spends most of his time in the vineyard as opposed to the cellar. He is astutely aware of each and every vine and bares an innate sense of compassion for the plants – fully attuned to their needs.

The vineyard itself is just 6ha divided into 17 distinct blocks, home to Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, and Petit Verdot, including abundant plantings of Clone 4 Cabernet.

It is this clone, Peterson insists, that imparts the savoury character and polish evident in such vintages as the 2021 Ovid Proprietary Red – a wine I found to be totally enthralling, extraordinarily complex, and just remarkable in its depth, savoury quality and mineral freshness, worthy of a perfect 100-point score.

An exclusive dinner

On the evening of 1 November 2025, I’ll be hosting a multi-course wine pairing dinner at OVID.

It will be an intimate affair, with guests invited to tour the winery, perhaps the vineyard, and converse freely with Austin and myself throughout the night.

We’ll be pouring the 2021 Hexameter, 2021 Syrah, and the 2021 OVID Proprietary Red – three bottlings that showcase the mind-boggling terroir that is OVID.

Alongside these, we’ll debut the 2023 Experiment White and open a surprise older vintage from the library, a rare chance to see how these wines evolve with time.

This is the night you didn’t know you were dreaming of.

Secure your tickets now – places are limited.

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That this is a list should come as no surprise. The title, dear reader, gives it away. What matters most, however, is what you do with it.

The search for value in Napa Valley is not a fool’s errand; it can still be done!

As someone who has written wine recommendation lists for years across various publications, I’ve found they usually fall into one of two camps: wonderfully practical and helpful, or gloriously hedonistic and almost useless.

Scroll down for Jonathan’s best value Napa wines under $75

What I can promise is this: I’ve tasted every wine on this list, rated it, and logged each one into Decanter’s online reviews. These are wines worth your attention – delicious, even enviable.

Not that I envy a wine for simply being wine; rather, I imagine consumers envying those fortunate enough to already own or drink them.

Still, take a cue from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1933 advice to his 11-year-old daughter: ‘Don’t worry about anybody getting ahead of you – worry about efficiency [and, intriguingly, ‘horsemanship’ – Ed.].’

Efficiency matters here because you do need to worry about wines that have become impossible to find. At the time of publication, each wine is still available directly from the winery.

Though, I can’t guarantee you’ll find these in local retail shops or restaurants, especially if you live outside the US 

But let’s say you reside in a fashionable London neighbourhood, a posh Parisian arrondissement, or near a charming enoteca in Dogliani in Piedmont – print this list, hand it to your local wine buyer, and demand they import as many as possible.

The task ahead

Because here’s the truth: finding excellent Napa Valley wine that travels beyond Napa, that you can drink now, and that costs under $75 a bottle, is no small feat. (And yes, I fully expect my inbox to fill with suggestions for other sub-$75 wines I’ve missed, forgotten, or couldn’t squeeze in.)

But remember my caveat. These wines must:

• The wine must be available outside of Napa Valley.
• It must be excellent, more than a casual ‘sure, I’ll have a glass.’ These are bottles you’ll want to finish to the last drop. At least, I do.

Napa Valley has around 475 physical wineries and over 1,000 brands, so a list of 25 is but a drop in the proverbial bucket.

Wallace Stevens found 13 ways of looking at a blackbird; I’ve found 25 Napa wines under $75 in the past six months that are as enticing as they sound.

Here they are – from whites to reds.

Cristaldi’s pick of the best Napa wines for under $75

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Set against rolling hills with views of Mt St. Helena, a luxurious Napa Valley estate near to downtown Calistoga that includes almost 2.7 hectares (6.6 acres) of Cabernet Sauvignon vineyards has recently found a buyer after being listed at $13.475m (£10.04m).

Lying on site of a former school, the sprawling 18.6-hectare estate (46 acres) features vines that gently slope down to a natural, spring-fed lake.

It also features heritage oak trees and an outdoor swimming pool, plus several buildings ranging from a main residence to a poolside cottage and bell tower, showed a listing by Arthur Goodrich and Federico Parlagreco, of Sotheby’s International Realty – St. Helena Brokerage.

A wine cellar underneath the main house is capable of storing at least 5,000 bottles, and has a ‘tasting nook’, according to the listing.

News of the recent sale constitutes the most expensive residential property deal in this part of California wine country since 2023, according to Mansion Global. The estate was previously listed at $18.5m a few years ago, and at $14.95m earlier this year.

A report by San Francisco Standard linked the purchase to a company managed by philanthropist Lyna Lam, wife of crypto billionaire and leading Silicon Valley entrepreneur Chris Larsen.

Listing agent Goodrich told Decanter it was his policy not to comment on the identity of buyers or sellers, however.

Of the luxury vineyard market in Napa Valley, he said, ‘It is definitely an ideal time to be buyer in wine country and while the wine industry may be experiencing a slowdown, these events are typically cyclical in nature.’

It wasn’t clear how involved the new owners wished to get in the vineyard operation, if at all, but the listing noted that the estate is eligible for a micro-winery permit.

Its Cabernet Sauvignon vineyards are split into four distinct sites and collectively produce 1,200-plus cases annually.

Highly regarded winemaker Thomas Rivers Brown is in charge of producing wine from the estate’s harvest, with vineyards managed by Hardin-Clark, and the listing said this has resulted in a growing wine club.

Alongside the underground cellar space in the main residence, there is a library wine collection going back to the property’s first vintage in 2002.

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Masseto 2022 is set to be released for the first time via La Place de Bordeaux in September, but collectors will also have an opportunity to delve into the SuperTuscan estate’s back catalogue via a large private collection coming up for auction.

Christie’s said it will offer Masseto wines spanning vintages from 1986 to 2020 inclusive, and featuring magnums, double-magnums and imperials alongside 75cl bottles, at its London-based online sale (2 – 16 September).

‘This is probably the largest and most comprehensive offering of Masseto from a private collection that we’ve offered,’ said Noah May, head of Christie’s wine and spirits department for Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), noting the pre-release 1986 vintage is labelled Ornellaia Merlot Toscana Vino da Tavola. 

’It’s a lovely thing to see, along with other rare vintages from the 1980s and 1990s.’

SuperTuscans have risen to become a greater force on the fine wine secondary market, although demand tends to be focused on a small group of top names, as discussed in the Market Watch pages of Decanter magazine’s upcoming September issue.

Despite current wine market challenges, May said Tuscany had stayed ‘pretty strong’. He cited a 2024 Christie’s auction of Tignanello wines sourced from the estate. 

Forty vintages of Napa’s Spottswoode

A Christie’s online auction based in Los Angeles (4 – 18 September), meanwhile, will offer a vertical collection of Napa Valley’s Spottswoode. 

Forty vintages of Spottswoode Estate Cabernet Sauvignon running from 2021 back to the debut 1982 wine have been sourced directly from the private cellar of this Napa estate’s owner, the Novak family.

To be offered as a single lot, the collection has a price estimate of $10,000 to $20,000 and the winning bidder will also be invited to attend the winery’s annual vertical tasting, hosted by CEO and president Beth Novak with winemaker Aron Weinkauf. 

Auction sale proceeds will go to environment-focused, non-profit group Napa Green, Christie’s said.

Zachys lands in Delaware

In other US auction news, Zachys announced in August that it would now hold its auctions out of Delaware, where it said purchases are tax-free. 

‘This is a game-changer for our clients,’ said Eileen Rizzo, CEO of Zachys. ‘The tax benefit allows collectors to stretch their budgets and compete for the bottles they truly desire. 

‘It also enhances our ability to remain competitive with other auction houses already operating out of Delaware.’

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Decanter was alerted to the sale by Markham Vineyards in an email this morning (26 August).

It marks a significant expansion for Dominus, owned by Bordeaux‘s Moueix family, and a symbolic reunion of land first granted to Napa Valley pioneer George Yount in 1836.

Strategic location

The Yountville Ranch lies on the southern edge of the Rutherford Bench in the Yountville District. Its neighbour Dominus, founded by Christian Moueix in 1983, currently cultivates 41.6ha (103 acres) at the Napanook vineyard and produces three wines from the estate.

Both properties share a distinctive terroir of gravelly loam, fine-grained silt and clay at the foot of the Mayacamas range.

In 2008, the family added Ulysses, a 16ha (40-acre) site in Oakville purchased from Clark Swanson. With the new acquisition, the Moueix family now controls more than 80ha (200 acres) of contiguous vineyards stretching across the western side of Yountville and Oakville – a rare concentration of prime Napa terroir.

Deep roots

The Yountville Ranch itself carries significant history. Originally part of George Yount’s 1836 Mexican land grant, the property was acquired by Markham Vineyards founder Bruce Markham in 1975 and became the source of the estate’s first Cabernet Sauvignon in 1978.

Farmed continuously for more than a century, it has been a cornerstone of Markham’s portfolio and a model for sustainable viticulture in Napa, with cover crops, composting, and sheep grazing long in place to enrich the soils and control growth.

Historically, Yount sold part of the original land to his friend Charles Hopper, forming the Hopper Ranch. Dominus’ acquisition effectively brings a large portion of the historic estate back under single ownership.

Looking ahead

Describing the move as a ‘natural extension’ of Dominus, Christian Moueix confirmed that the estate will take over management of the vineyard after the 2025 harvest and, from the 2026 vintage, grapes will go into producing Dominus, Napanook and Othello.

Much of the site is expected to be replanted in the coming years, with the vines eventually integrated into Dominus’ long-term programme of adaptive viticulture.

The purchase underscores both Dominus’ ambition and its long-term commitment to Napa Valley at a time of growing pressure on land and climate, when the wine market is subdued and several estates have scaled back tasting room operations or shifted focus.

‘This acquisition represents a bold new chapter for Dominus Estate. A long-term project, it reflects our passion for the vineyard, our confidence in the future of the Napa Valley, and, above all, it affirms our love of wine with its life-enhancing qualities’ said Moueix.

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It’s fair to say that the use of oak is among the most important influences on a wine’s flavour and overall character.

In recent years, many winemakers have been dialling back their oak use, in search of more freshness and ‘terroir transparency’, but what if you could change the flavours imparted by the oak itself?

Scroll down to see notes and scores of 12 glittering Cabernets from Silver Oak

The fundamentals

To make a wine barrel, the oak is first turned into long, narrow staves, which are then left outdoors to ‘season’, the purpose of which is mostly to dry out the wood.

After the staves have been shaped, bent and bound together to form a barrel, the inside is ‘toasted’, using a small fire to heat the wood, caramelising its natural sugars and bringing out complex compounds.

The two main types of oak used in winemaking are French and American.

French oak (mostly Quercus petraea and Q. robur), which typically has a tighter grain, is generally considered to add a subtle, refined taste profile to wine, with hints of vanilla and spices such as clove, cinnamon and nutmeg.

American oak (mostly Q. alba), on the other hand, is known for its bold aromatics and flavours, which include vanilla, coconut, caramel and dill.

In search of more nuance in home-grown barrels, the team at Silver Oak in Oakville (fittingly) in Napa Valley and Healdsburg in Sonoma has added the roles of cooper and researcher to that of winemaker.

Close scrutiny

In 1973, the Duncan family, Silver Oak’s owners, partnered with American oak cooperage A&K in Higbee, Missouri.

After taking a 50% stake in the company in 2000, they acquired it outright in 2015 and immediately began making changes (including renaming it the Oak Cooperage) and conducting precision trials of both seasoning and toasting.

In the process, director of winemaking Laura Oskwarek (pictured, below) has made a pivotal discovery: the time spent seasoning American oak is more critical to its effect on wine than the toasting process.

‘Seasoning is important because it finds the balance of all the compounds that we like, which are then going to be affected by toasting,’ she explains. ‘Our trials have taught us that there is a definite minimum and maximum amount of seasoning that works for us.

‘We discovered there was a “too long” period of seasoning where it didn’t deliver what we wanted in the finished wine, and a “too short” period where improper seasoning occurred,’ Oskwarek continues.

‘Under-seasoning can result in barrels with a very “raw” style that doesn’t elevate the wines and can be too dominant. Extended seasoning, in the realm of 36 months, strips so much character from the wood that we find the barrels are too “soft” and don’t offer much added structure.’

Ultimately, they settled on 24 months – just over two winters – as the sweet spot, delivering a ‘Goldilocks’ balance.

‘The fluctuation that the wood experiences, in terms of temperature, rain, humidity and microbial impacts, is the most dynamic over two winters,’ Oskwarek says.

The trials have enabled the creation of American oak barrels that behave more like French oak. Yes, you read that correctly.

Toasting success

My tasting notes reveal wines that have more savoury characteristics and a freshness that I believe will enhance their ageability.

‘The idea that American oak imparts sweet herbal notes has more to do with a lack of seasoning in the barrel,’ Oskwarek says.

‘With proper seasoning, followed by toasting, we find the more favourable and classic notes of American oak, like toasted coconut, vanilla and sweet baking spice. Of course, the level of toasting affects those sweeter notes.

‘Most importantly, a properly seasoned barrel with a moderate toast can do wonders for elevating the red fruit character in red wines like Cabernet. For us, American oak complements our style.’

Toasting trials have revealed that very light toasting is universally unwelcome. Without the deeper sweetness and caramelisation that’s achieved through longer toasting, the wood imparts bitterness to the wine.

‘We found that with American oak, a medium-plus toast was an excellent complement,’ explains Oskwarek. ‘The aromas became darker, with added sweetness, and there was a fuller mid-palate. The trade-off, however, was more tannin.’

The first Silver Oak wines to benefit from these fine-tuned American oak barrels will be from the 2023 vintage, set for release in 2027.

Ongoing explorations

The team recently tasted the 2022 cooperage trials ahead of bottling the 2022 Napa Valley and Alexander Valley Cabernets.

‘We included an additional trial on this vintage of a heavy toast, and it turned out to be a great success as a component of our barrel programme,’ says Oskwarek.

‘This discovery has taught us that there is still much to learn about how toast can enhance our wines, and we will be continuing to run trials as we aim to achieve the best toast profile for each of our Cabernets, the way we did with our seasoning trials.’

There’s a major analytical component alongside Silver Oak’s sensory evaluations.

Independent wine laboratory ETS Labs runs oak ‘aroma panels’ for Oskwarek, using gas chromatography and mass spectrometry to measure levels of nine different aroma compounds.

Oskwarek then compares the data with sensory assessments of each trial on each vintage. ‘Our hope is to find trends and connections between the science and what we perceive,’ she says.

The aroma panels reveal the chemistry that underlies the different seasoning and toasting regimes.

‘We see how toast levels affect the expression of lactones [esters that contribute to aromas such as coconut, vanilla, caramel and dried fruits] and vanillin within the wines – how an increase in toast levels enhances some compounds while decreasing other compounds,’ she explains.

‘Each toasting profile brings something a little different aromatically and texturally to the wines.’

Breadth, depth & character

Oskwarek can run these experiments because the winemaking team blends before barrelling down (the process of transferring a finished wine from fermentation tanks into barrels), so the oak trials are carried out on the final blend, rather than on the various components.

‘After acquiring the cooperage, we immediately began to understand how best to craft American oak barrels that complement our wine style,’ she says.

‘By the 2021 vintage, we had confidence in our seasoning preferences; by the 2022 vintage, we had discovered that we had yet to hit a toasting maximum preference.’

She says that they’re still exploring how barrels with increased time over the fire may complement the wine in the long run.

‘Currently, we have staves from forests that we own seasoning, and we will soon make barrels from that wood,’ Oskwarek concludes.

‘Our story is very much rooted in tradition, but our curiosity drives us to continue exploring how to move the needle on quality.’

Cristaldi’s view: Two sides of Silver Oak – Napa & Sonoma

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Her passion for horses began at the age of six after her babysitter took her for a ride. She was hooked, spending every free moment at the barn. By 10 years old, she was participating in dressage competitions.

Dalla Valle’s initial disinterest in wine was understandable. ‘You’re entrenched in the industry, and as a rebellious kid, you think, “This can’t be my destiny.” Turns out I was wrong,’ she says, laughing.

It felt personal as she watched world-class equestrian centres such as the Silverado Horseman’s Center and Wild Horse Valley Ranch close, turning into wineries as Napa boomed through the 1980s and ’90s. Her parents, Naoko and Gustav, were part of that wave, opening Dalla Valle Vineyards in 1986 just off the Silverado Trail, near Oakville. In 1987, the year she was born, they planted a 2ha plot of Cabernet Sauvignon and called it Maya’s Vineyard.

They crafted the legendary 1992 Dalla Valle Vineyards Maya, their flagship blend, from that vineyard. The wine went on to earn 100 points from Robert Parker in 1995, the year that Gustav passed away. Naoko has continued to operate the business.

Being no stranger to chasing a dream, Naoko encouraged her daughter to do the same. ‘My mom has always said, “This is your one life, and you should do what you want with it. Do something that makes you feel fulfilled and gives you a sense of purpose.”’

Route back home

Dalla Valle took her mother’s advice and explored, pursuing a degree in international relations before picking up a harvest gig that solidified her love of wine. She came to realise that both winemaking and riding required a commitment to technique that she thrived on. ‘Dressage is highly technical,’ she says. ‘And winemaking mixes science and artistry with a high level of technicality.’

She decided to travel the world, earning wine-related Masters degrees from Cornell University and Bordeaux Sciences Agro before making wine in Bordeaux and Tuscany. Then, in 2017, her hard work landed her the role of director at the family winery; in 2021, she was appointed winemaker.

Commitment to success

Today, Dalla Valle pursues both dreams. She competes regularly and trains five days a week with her chestnut Dutch Warmblood Jeronimo. Her joy over Nimo is palpable: ‘Just tell me when to stop talking about my horse,’ she says with a chuckle.

Dalla Valle is typically at the barn by 6am; she describes her mornings as a form of self-care. ‘Horses can pick up on any distraction or emotion you bring to the ride,’ she says. ‘It forces you to clear everything and focus on the task at hand.’

She brings that clarity to her day job, which she jokingly calls chef d’equipe, a term from team dressage to describe the manager who prepares each rider for success. ‘It’s my job to ensure everyone has everything they need to do their best,’ Dalla Valle explains. ‘There’s no way we can excel at this level of farming and winemaking without them.’

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The 2022 vintage from Howell Mountain delivered wines that reflect the AVA’s signature power, structure and high-altitude freshness, yet with a notable degree of elegance and accessibility, despite the challenges of the vintage.

These included the significant heat dome that settled over Napa for a week from Labor Day on – many wines benefited from the higher elevation above the fog line.

There, longer days of sunlight and warmer nights helped vines ripen at an even-keeled pace, and temperatures never reached the soaring levels as that of the valley floor below.

To read all coverage of the Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage use the code NAPA22 for a 20% discount off an annual Premium subscription

Howell Mountain 2022: The top-performing producers

Arkenstone

Impensata

Nickel & Nickel

Ink Grade

Howell Mountain wines in 2022 lean towards a dark, mineral-rich fruit profile, with dominant notes of blackberry, blackcurrant, cassis and spiced plum, often accented by blueberry, redcurrant and cherry pit.

Many wines reveal a distinct mountain herbal quality, with nuances of bay laurel, sagebrush, unsmoked tobacco and wild thyme, as well as earthy elements like loamy soil, graphite and ironstone.

The spice spectrum is broad and engaging, featuring white pepper, cedarwood, allspice, cinnamon and espresso bean, often layered with florals like violets, lavender and pine resin.

Napa Valley Cabernet 2022: Full vintage report and top-scoring wines

Tannins remain a key defining trait of Howell Mountain wines, with most expressions exhibiting firm, mineral-rich, and structured tannins that contribute to serious ageing potential.

Wines that underwent extended maceration tend to feature mocha-rich, chocolatey tannins, reinforcing Howell Mountain’s signature grip.

Acidity remains bright and energetic, providing lift and ensuring these wines stay fresh despite the warmth of the vintage.

Howell Mountain at a glance

Climate Located above the fog line on the eastern side of the valley, the AVA is warmer and drier than other AVAs. This mountain appellation has more hours of sunshine and very little, if any, maritime influence.

Soils Predominantly volcanic, shallow and infertile. Drainage is high, and soil fertility is quite low.

Elevation 427m-792m

The most structured wines, particularly those from estate sites with deep volcanic soils and extended ageing in new oak, will benefit from long-term cellaring (10- 20+ years). These often showcase a tightly wound, coiled power that will unfurl beautifully over time.

Wines like Ink Grade’s The Prophet’s Water, Ipmensata’s Las Posadas Vineyard red, and Cade Reserve Cabernet stand out for their firm, age-worthy mountain tannins and mineral depth.

Some wines, especially those showcasing more red fruit, higher acidity and gentler tannins, are beautifully balanced for near-term drinking (up to 8 years). Examples include Nickel & Nickel’s Hawk’s Cradle Cabernet and Ink Grade’s Third Circle.

If you prefer opulent, instantly plush Napa Cabernets, Howell Mountain’s profile remains firmly structured, savoury and mineral-driven – more about power and restraint than lush fruit-forwardness.

Whether drinking now or laying down for the long haul, these wines represent some of the most complex, terroir-driven expressions of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon.

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

Cristaldi’s 2022 value picks from Howell Mountain

Ramond Vineyards, District Collection Cabernet Sauvignon

Stressed Vines Cellars, Cabernet Sauvignon

Nickel & Nickel Haw’s Cradle Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon

Howell Mountain 2022: The top-scoring Cabernets

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The 2022 vintage in Oak Knoll District demonstrates why this AVA is one of Napa’s most versatile and exciting sources for Cabernet Sauvignon.

The region’s cooler climate and alluvial soils helped preserve balance and energy, ensuring freshness despite the heat.

To read all coverage of the Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage use the code NAPA22 for a 20% discount off an annual Premium subscription

Compared to riper, more opulent expressions from further north, Oak Knoll’s signature finesse, bright acidity and finely structured tannins are fully present in 2022, even as the wines carry more muscle and depth than in some prior vintages.

Oak Knoll 2022: The top-performing producers

Kanpai Wines

Eleven Eleven

Ashes & Diamonds

Sequoia Grove

Black Stallion Estate 

Napa Valley Cabernet 2022: Full vintage report and top-scoring wines

Expect black cherry, blackberry, cassis and pomegranate framed by lifted floral, herbal and mineral nuances.

Cool-climate spice and savoury notes of bay laurel, spearmint, white pepper, tobacco and cedarwood enhance complexity.

The tannins are more pixelated, fine-grained and elongated compared to some broader Napa Cabernets, providing structure without excess weight.

Black Stallion’s Gaspare Vineyard and Materra Cunate Family’s Vine 1 are densely packed wines; both will reward upfront and also age for up to 12 years.

Consumers looking for mid-term drinking with balanced fruit and structure, and wines of immediate pleasure, should look at Clif Family’s Valle di Sotto, or Sunshine Valley Vineyard’s Cabernet, as both are bright, fresh wines with food-friendly appeal.

For collectors and sommeliers, the best Oak Knoll wines are likely to last little more than a decade, so buy to drink now and often, as opposed to cellaring long-term.

Oak Knoll at a glance

Climate One of the coolest appellations in Napa owing to its southern locale and proximity to the bay, Oak Knoll can hold onto marine air and fog until late morning, leading to a cool to moderate climate.

Late afternoon breezes frequently occur, maintaining slightly cooler temperatures than the upper, northern parts of the valley.

Soils The valley’s largest alluvial fan, formed by Dry Creek, is Oak Knoll’s defining feature. The northwest area is composed of volcanically derived soils, with stony or gravelly consistency. The south and east areas transition from gravel to silty clay loam.

Elevation Oak Knoll spans quite the range, from 40m to 305m.

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

Cristaldi’s 2022 value picks from Oak Knoll

Kanpai Wines, Hi No Tori Cabernet Sauvignon

Patent Wines, Cabernet Sauvignon

Oak Knoll 2022: The top-scoring Cabernets

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In 2022, Calistoga’s wines reflect the AVA’s characteristic warmth, intensified by the extreme heat dome that defined the vintage.

However, despite the challenges, consumers should look for names like J. Davies, Arkenstone, Perliss and Venge. These producers harvested grapes from sites in the northern end of Calistoga, where there’s a cool wind corridor.

Their wines achieved balance, maintaining freshness and structure, while showcasing the appellation’s hallmark boldness.

Scroll down for notes and scores for the the top-rated Calistoga 2022 Cabernets

The wines predominantly lean into a dark-fruited profile, with blackberry, black cherry, cassis and plum as the dominant fruit expressions.

Some wines introduce red-toned elements – raspberry, red cherry, pomegranate and strawberry fruit leather – offering an energetic lift. Blue fruit notes also emerge in select bottlings, adding brightness.

Calistoga 2022: The top-performing producers

Arkenstone

Perliss

B Cellars 

Venge Vineyards

Impensata

J Davies Vineyards

Larkmead

Napa Valley Cabernet 2022: Full vintage report and top-scoring wines

The influence of oak ageing contributes layers of mocha, dark cacao, espresso and Mexican chocolate, while spice aromatics range from cedarwood, sandalwood and warm brown spices to exotic nuances like white pepper, sassafras and Indian spices.

The wines deliver power, density and opulence, yet many also reveal surprising finesse and freshness.

Tannins vary from super-fine and pixelated to firm and powdery, with many wines showing elongated, structured finishes that support their fruit concentration.

While some wines are immediately approachable, others remain coiled and structured, requiring time to unwind.

The interplay of plush fruit, layered complexity and structural integrity suggests that many wines will be enjoyable in the near term.

Calistoga at a glance

Climate Calistoga sees the most rain in the Napa Valley and has the highest diurnal variation, meaning the difference in temperatures from daytime highs to nighttime lows. The region is cooled at night by breezes from the Pacific Ocean through the Chalk Hill Gap.

Soils There is a uniformity of volcanic origin to the soils in Calistoga, though they may vary from heavier clay-silt in the valley’s centre to stony, cobbly soils on the hillsides.

Elevation Calistoga has a serious range in elevation, beginning at 92m and peaking out at up to 370m at the higher elevation sites.

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

Cristaldi’s 2022 value picks from Calistoga

Jax Vineyards, Estate Block 3 Cabernet Sauvignon

B Cellars, Kenefick Ranch Cabernet Sauvignon

Larkmead, Cabernet Sauvignon

Calistoga 2022: The top-scoring Cabernets

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Many wines from 2022 are ready to enjoy sooner than usual, thanks to silky tannins, generous fruit and plush textures.

Unlike more structured vintages like 2021, 2019, 2018 and 2016, which demand years of cellaring, 2022 delivers immediate pleasure, while still offering the potential for medium-term ageing.

It’s a vintage defined by plush fruit, soft tannins and upfront drinkability.

Savvy consumers looking for the best value from the vintage should be thinking about wines to buy and drink early, and often.

To read all coverage of the Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage use the code NAPA22 for a 20% discount off an annual Premium subscription

What defines value in 2022?

While top-tier bottlings will always command high prices, buyers will find exceptional quality at more accessible price points – think $50 to $100, though up to $150 can be considered a value wine from the right producer and appellation.

But value in 2022 isn’t just about price, it’s about smartly crafted wines that deliver balance, freshness and pleasure, even in a warm year such as this.

Those wines simply labelled as Napa Valley AVA offer the best bang for your buck, but there are plenty of value gems to be found from Coombsville, Oak Knoll, Stags Leap District, Oakville, Rutherford, Howell Mountain, St. Helena and Calistoga, where careful farming and winemaking decisions allowed quite a number of wines to retain freshness, structure and balance, despite the vintage’s heat issues.

Napa Cabernet value 2022: The best Napa Valley AVA bottlings

Maxville Winery, The High Valley Cabernet Sauvignon

Grounded Wine Co., Steady State Cabernet Sauvignon

Raymond Vineyards, Reserve Cabernet

The Vice, Batch #142

Honig Vineyard & Winery, Cabernet Sauvignon

AXR, Cabernet Sauvignon

J Davies Vineyards, Cabernet Sauvignon

Macauley Vineyard, Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon

Shafer, One Point Five, Cabernet Sauvignon

Ackerman Family Vineyards, Cabernet Sauvignon

Flora Springs, Trilogy Red Wine

Force & Grace, Cabernet Sauvignon

Gallica, Cabernet Sauvignon

Jayson by Pahlmeyer, Cabernet Sauvignon

Sequoia Grove, Cabernet Sauvignon

Silverado Vineyards, Cabernet Sauvignon

Stone the Crows, Three Twins Vineyard, Fallen Feather Cabernet Sauvignon

Keever Vineyards, Inspirado

Michael Mondavi Family Estate, Animo Cabernet Sauvignon

Purlieu, Le Pich, Cabernet Sauvignon

Spottswoode, Lyndenhurst Cabernet Sauvignon

Black Stallion Estate, Cabernet Sauvignon

Whitehall Lane, Cabernet Sauvignon

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

AVA breakdown

Coombsville

Cooler temperatures preserved vibrancy and structure, leading to wines with refined tannins and mineral depth – standouts include Di Costanzo’s Caldwell Vineyard, Farella Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon and Castello di Amorosa’s Butala Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon.

Oak Knoll

Wines from Kanpai Wines (Hi No Tori) and Patent Wines showcase this region’s ability to produce supple, red-fruited and elegant Cabernets with food-friendly acidity.

Stags Leap District

A classic for silky tannins and perfume-driven Cabernets, with Cliff Lede’s Wild Fantasy Red Wine, B Cellars’ Stagecoach Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon and Chimney Rock’s Clone 4 Cabernet Sauvignon offering excellent refinement and balance.

Oakville & Rutherford

These AVAs still deliver power and richness, but smart picks like Favia’s Oakville Cabernet and Force & Grace from Rutherford maintain structure and freshness for long-term value.

Howell Mountain & Calistoga

Mountain-grown fruit offers impressive structure and ageability – wines like Nickel & Nickel’s Haw’s Cradle Vineyard Cabernet (Howell Mountain) and Larkmead’s Cabernet Sauvignon (Calistoga) provide depth and energy.

The 2022 vintage presents an excellent opportunity to buy and drink now, while also cellaring selectively.

Wines from Coombsville, Oak Knoll and Stags Leap offer refinement and freshness, while Howell Mountain, Rutherford and Calistoga selections provide depth and structure at more reasonable price points.

Value in 2022 isn’t just about price, it’s about smartly crafted wines that deliver balance, freshness, and pleasure, even in a warm year.

Napa Valley 2022: The top value Cabernets

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Known for its ageability, Napa’s Cabernet Sauvignon is typically a wine to lay down for years.

In the heat affected 2022 vintage, you’ll find wines of warmth and generosity that won’t need time to come into their own, Jonathan Cristaldi offers a guide on wines to open now, what to sit on for a year or two and which wines produced in this hot year are built for the long haul.

Scroll down for Jonathan’s suggestions on when to drink his favourite Napa 2022 Cabernets

Short-term pleasure

These are wines for the hedonist. Immediately pleasurable, these 2022 Cabernets may get better, but are certainly ready now.

They offer a mix of just-ripe red and black-fruited profiles, typically are medium-to-full-bodied, and have plump, soft tannins that are so well-integrated the drinking experience is effortless, like accepting an invitation to dine at The French Laundry on someone else’s dime.

Paul Hobbs Cuvee Sophia Proprietary Red, Napa Valley (Coombsville)

Perhaps the most approachable at the pull of the cork this wine will ever be, with plenty of tannins for potential cellaring, but really, it is accessible early on.

Amici Cellars Hirondelle Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (Stags Leap District)

With softer tannins than typical vintages, this is a wine to enjoy early and often.

Moone-Tsai Cor Leonis Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley

Balanced valley-floor juiciness and rich fruit with fine, grippy tannins and loads of brown spices, begging for lamb and burger pairings. Those spices will evolve nicely in the next 5-7 years.

Duckhorn Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley

With early, upfront appeal, the wine’s gentle tannins and integrated cedarwood spices create a smooth, approachable texture, making this an easygoing yet refined Napa Cabernet.

V. Sattui Winery Vittorio’s Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (St Helena)

Extremely gentle tannins further enhance its upfront juiciness and approachable, easy-drinking nature.

Grace Family Vineyards Reliquus Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (St Helena)

Reliquus is crafted from a blend of fruit sourced from Grace Family’s estate vineyards in the St. Helena AVA. Designed to be approachable and easy-drinking. 93/100

Maxville Winery The High Valley Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley

Fantastic depth and concentration, supported by a framework of robust, well-structured tannins.

The Vice Batch #142 Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley

It is a well-structured, food-friendly wine with depth and approachability.

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

Mid-term appeal

These wines are for collectors at ease with their current stash—those content to lay bottles down for a year or two before pulling the cork. That extra time in the bottle will yield a finer integration of tannins, which, in the end, is all about mouthfeel.

Do you favour satin or velvet? Silk or cotton? These are meticulously made wines that arguably ought to have been held back by the winery for another vintage or two – yet when cash flow calls, who can afford the luxury?

Tuck them away and start enjoying their emerging complexities come next summer.

Morlet Family Vineyards Passionnément Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville)

Full-bodied and densely packed, the palate is layered with robust, compact tannins that thread seamlessly into a long finish, and still, Morlet’s 2022s are all well-suited to pairing with lengthy meals and are a pleasure to enjoy early and often.

Inglenook Rubicon Napa Valley (Rutherford)

Really impressive for its classic dusty mineral and earth character, full body, and balanced tension. Easier-going than 2021 and 2019 and ideal for earlier enjoyment. 95/100

Eleven Eleven XI Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (Oak Knoll)

From Oak Knoll, where wines enjoyed cooler temps, leading to structure, powerful tannins, and still compact and coiled up.

Dalla Valle Vineyards Maya, Napa Valley (Oakville)

Right out of the gate, at the cork’s pull, it is medium-bodied and so approachable in 2022. This wine is a real treat for collectors because it offers youthful exuberance with easy-drinking upfront appeal, but it has the structure to cellar as well. Best to let 2021 and 2019 keep slumbering.

Realm Cellars The Bard, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley

This wine delivers the rich, dark fruit signature of Realm, layered with the kind of density and concentration not quite characteristic of the warmer vintage.

Hoopes Dante’s Block Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (Oakville)

This barrel selection offers a complete wine with all the hallmarks of great Napa Cab, from ripe fruit to leather and tobacco spice and a medley of dried herbs matched by cool minerality, all traits that will reward with secondary and tertiary notes later.

Long-term reward

Whether you’ve a home cellar, a reliable high-end wine fridge, or off-site storage, these are the bottles that merit long-term cellaring. Ideally, you’d have at least three, six, or a full case—tasting them young, again in five years, and then enjoying them steadily after seven or eight years of rest.

These are the finest-crafted wines from a hot vintage—wines made by winemakers who, during the latter stages of harvest, tended their vines more devotedly than their families.

The result is unmistakably in the glass. They offer immediate appeal, but will reach their peak between eight and 10 years from vintage.

Ad Vivum Sleeping Lady Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (Yountville)

Not enough wines from Yountville were tasted in 2022 to produce an AVA-specific report, but this wine from Chris Phelps is pure magic, with suave appeal and Bordelais-like building tannins atop a juicy centre.

Matthiasson Phoenix Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley

One of the most complex wines of the vintage, leading with spicy Calabrian chilli oil, blue fruits and loads of spice with assertive tannins underscored by an electric sense of energy and tension.

Cathiard Vineyard Founding Brothers, Napa Valley

Super compact and driven by tension and vivacious fruit, a real vintage standout with incredible freshness.

Annulus Cellars Vine Hill Ranch Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (Oakville)

Stylish, suave, and expressive, sporting superfine tannins infused with an iron-scented minerality. Juicy and approachable now, but worth holding

Arrow&Branch Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (Oakville)

Compact, tension-filled, vibrant, energetic, and built for the long haul. Best from 2027 and on.

AXR V. Madrone Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (St. Helena)

From a site at the base of Spring Mountain, this wine offers the magical upfront pleasure of dark ripe fruits, superfine tannins and energy. Because forests surround the site, the microclimate created helped mitigate the impacts of the 2022 heat spell.

Harlan Estate Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (Oakville)

There’s an incredible freshness and tension, and compared to 2021, despite the earlier harvest, the clarity, generosity, and crunch of the bright fruit stand out. Arguably hedonistic and one you can revel in at the pull of the cork.

Napa Valley 2022: The drinking windows

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The 2022 vintage in St Helena delivered wines with a signature polish, depth and elegance despite the challenges of the heat dome.

Due to its location in the warmest part of the valley floor, St Helena tends to produce rich, fruit-forward wines.

To read all coverage of the Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage use the code NAPA22 for a 20% discount off an annual Premium subscription

However, this vintage saw remarkable balance, freshness and vibrant energy across many bottlings.

Winemakers who harvested strategically before the extreme heat preserved bright acidity and structure, leading to wines that retain both immediate appeal and ageing potential.

St Helena 2022: The top-performing producers

Colgin Cellars

AXR

Vida Valiente

Bure Family Wines

Corison

Morlet Family Vineyards

Memento Mori

Patria

Annulus Cellars

The fruit profile of St Helena wines in 2022 is defined by a mix of ripe black cherry, blackberry, cassis and spiced plum, often accented by red-fruited lift – raspberry, pomegranate, and cherry pit – bringing vibrancy and freshness.

Some wines showcase blue fruit character, a notable trait for this AVA.

A mineral streak of graphite, crushed rock and saline elements runs through several wines, highlighting the diverse soils of the AVA, from alluvial fans to deep gravel beds.

Notes of sagebrush, bay laurel, and tobacco reflect the influence of nearby mountain slopes and forested areas, contributing to a savoury and structured edge in contrast to the lush fruit core.

St Helena wines in 2022 exhibit well-integrated tannins, ranging from silky, plush and velvety in more approachable bottlings to firm, pixelated and tension-driven in the most structured examples.

While some wines show classic Napa richness and density, others surprise with a taut, refined structure reminiscent of Bordeaux.

St Helena at a glance

Climate Due to greater protection from western hills, St Helena is warmer with less fog or wind incursions from the Bay. This narrowest part of the Napa Valley floor reflects more heat off the hillsides.

Soils South and west borders are more sedimentary, gravel-clay soils; further north and to the east, soils are volcanic in origin.

Elevation 61m-145m

Acidity remains impressively fresh, particularly in wines sourced from Beckstoffer Dr. Crane, Beckstoffer Las Piedras, and high-elevation parcels near Spring Mountain, ensuring balance in this warm vintage.

Wines from Dr. Crane, Las Piedras and sites near Spring Mountain will benefit from five– 20+ years of ageing, thanks to structured tannins, deep fruit complexity and firm acidity.

These include Beckstoffer Dr. Crane (Sam Kaplan, B Cellars), Las Piedras (Vice Versa, Annulus) and select estate Cabernets from Tychson Hill and Bure Family.

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

Many St. Helena wines in 2022 are beautifully polished and ready to enjoy now, with ripe fruit, soft tannins and elegant textures.

Wines from Morlet, Spottswoode and select estate bottlings are balanced, expressive and enjoyable over the next 10 years.

Consumers who prefer high-acid, cool-climate Cabernets, may want to skip over the St Helena wines in 2022 as they lean into fruit-driven depth and richness, rather than a more restrained, structured style.

Cristaldi’s 2022 value picks from St Helena

J Lohr Carol’s Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

Corison Cabernet Sauvignon

Salvestrin Dr. Crane Vineyard, Estate Cabernet Sauvignon

Crocker & Starr Wines, RLC, Cabernet Sauvignon

Napa Valley Cabernet 2022: Full vintage report and top-scoring wines

St Helena 2022: the top-scoring Cabernets

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The best 2022 Rutherford wines showcase the AVA’s signature balance of power, elegance and dusty minerality, despite the vintage’s heat challenges.

Rutherford, known for its alluvial benchlands and deep gravelly soils, produced wines with ripe fruit concentration, refined tannins and impressive structural integrity in this vintage.

To read all coverage of the Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage use the code NAPA22 for a 20% discount off an annual Premium subscription

Even with the heat dome that struck in early September, many producers successfully preserved acidity and freshness by precise harvesting, careful canopy management and restrained oak use.

The result? A collection of wines that maintain both plush generosity and a mineral-driven backbone, reinforcing Rutherford’s reputation for seamless, polished Cabernet Sauvignon.

Rutherford 2022: The top-performing producers

Scarecrow

Bella Oaks

Greer

Inglenook

J H Wheeler

Sullivan Rutherford Estate

The fruit profile in 2022 leans toward dark-toned berries, with blackcurrant, black cherry, cassis, and plums dominating. However, several wines also showcase red-fruited lift, including raspberry, kirsch and cranberry, bringing brightness and energy.

A defining characteristic of Rutherford wines – their dusty mineral quality – is evident across a handful of bottlings, expressed as loamy earth, graphite and crushed stone minerality.

However, not as many as is typical, and in quite a number of instances, that mineral character takes a backseat to fruit.

Rutherford’s tannins are famously fine-grained and long-lasting, and in 2022, they are silky and plush. While some wines display firmer, graphite-laced tannins, others lean more plush and opulent, making them accessible earlier than usual.

Rutherford at a glance

Climate Rutherford is still marginally influenced by early morning fog, its western bench area is cooler, with less late afternoon sun, tempered by afternoon marine winds. Many vineyard sites are above the fog line, providing warmer nights and cooler days than the valley floor.

Soils Its famous western benchland is comprised of sedimentary, gravelly-sandy and alluvial soils. The eastern side has more volcanic soils, moderately deep and more fertile.

Elevation 47m-152m

Top Rutherford Cabernets sourced from Beckstoffer Georges III Vineyard, as well as those from producers Scarecrow, Bella Oaks and J.O. Sullivan (the Founder’s Reserve) exhibit firm, structured tannins and deep complexity, ideal for long-term cellaring (10–20+ years).

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

Many wines, including Inglenook’s Rubicon, JH Wheeler, and Implicit Cellar’s Acuity from Star Vineyard, show wonderful plushness and balance, making them immediately enjoyable while retaining ageing potential (up to10 years).

Skip out on buying from this appellation if you prefer ultra-lean, high-acid reds.

But for collectors, a host of high-scoring wines in 2022 come from Rutherford and those offer excellent investment opportunities at prices far below neighbouring ‘high-rent’ appellations.

Cristaldi’s 2022 value picks from Rutherford

Force & Grace, Cabernet Sauvignon

Foley Johnson, Cabernet Sauvignon

Sequoia Grove, Rutherford Bench Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon

Napa Valley Cabernet 2022: Full vintage report and top-scoring wines

Rutherford 2022: the top-scoring Cabernets

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The 2022 Oakville vintage is a study in balance, depth and precision, despite the challenges of a heatwave year.

Oakville’s diverse terroir – ranging from the gravelly alluvial fans on the western bench to the iron-laced, volcanic soils of the eastern slopes – allowed for remarkable retention of freshness and structure even in a warm vintage.

To read all coverage of the Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage use the code NAPA22 for a 20% discount off an annual Premium subscription

Wines from top estates – including those sourced from Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard, Vine Hill Ranch, Oakville Ranch, and iconic producers like Harlan Estate, Dalla Valle and Screaming Eagle – exemplify polished, structured and finely detailed expressions of Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon.

Oakville 2022: The top-performing producers

Annulus Cellars

Arrow&Branch

Screaming Eagle

Dalla Valle Vineyards

Rudd Estate

Harlan

Nickel & Nickel

The Debate

Kinsman Eades

Morlet Family Vineyards

Purlieu

Schrader Cellars

Winemakers leverage meticulous farming, precise harvesting and careful oak integration to craft wines of both power and refinement.

In the glass, these wines exhibit classic Oakville black fruits of black cherry, blackcurrant and cassis, though several wines feature brighter, red-toned cherry and pomegranate lift.

Expect layers of sagebrush, bay laurel and dried wild herbs, along with incense, sandalwood and cedarwood spice from oak ageing. Many wines showcase a striking ironstone, graphite or crushed rock minerality, elevating the depth and structure.

The gravelly and volcanic soils lend themselves to firm, mineral-laced tannins, giving wines length, tension, and longevity. While some wines display more plush, velvety tannins, others maintain grippy, structured and framing tannins for long-term cellaring.

Buyers will want to look for wines that have ‘Vine Hill Ranch’ or ‘Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard’ on the label, and collectors should be eyeing the wines from FUTO, Harbison, Screaming Eagle, and Harlan Estate. Due to their firm structure, deep concentration and impeccable balance, these wines are built for long-term ageing (15–30 years).

Oakville at a glance

Climate Moderately warm and heavily affected by the cooling influence of the morning fog and evening fog. The eastern side of Oakville is exposed to the warm afternoon sun.

Soils The Oakville soils are fairly deep and retain moisture but vary along an east/west delineation. The eastern soils tend to be iron-rich and volcanic, while those on the western side of the AVA tend towards sedimentary soils in the form of gravelly loam.

Elevation Oakville runs the spectrum from the valley floor at 30m and extends 150m up the Mayacamas and 300m up the the side of the Vaca Mountains.

Three of my top-scoring wines from the entire vintage are from this AVA – Annulus Cellar’s Vine Hill Ranch Cabernet, Arrow&Branch’s Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet, and Harbison Estate’s ‘Horsehoe’ Cabernet (a site that borders Screaming Eagle’s vines).

They all delivered wines that exhibit a combination of power and finesse, ideal for long-haul collectors, and best of all, upfront drinking appeal.

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

Dalla Valle, Oakville Ranch, and PlumpJack Reserve offer lush, approachable fruit with fine-grained tannins, perfect for early drinking (up to 10 years). Amici Cellar’s Beckstoffer To Kalon is one of the most immediately enjoyable To Kalon expressions from this vintage, perfect for earlier drinking.

If you enjoy layered, mineral-driven Cabernet Sauvignon, look for Fait-Main Tierra Roja and Käännös Vine Hill Ranch.

Cristaldi’s 2022 value picks from Oakville

B Cellars, Beckstoffer Missouri Hopper Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

Nickel & Nickel John C. Sullenger Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

Bacio Divino, Janzen, Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

Oakville Ranch, Cabernet Sauvignon,

AXR, Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

Gallica, Oakville Ranch Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

Favia, Cabernet Sauvignon

Oakville 2022: the top-scoring Cabernets

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The high-profile Auction Napa Valley began last Tuesday, when online bidding opened via Sotheby’s.

Every single lot received a bid within the opening hour, setting the stage for competitive action throughout the week.

Almost 2,000 people then descended upon Louis M. Martini Winery for a barrel auction on Friday, and the main event took place at Chandon the following evening.

Auctioneer Jacqueline Towers-Perkins presided over Saturday’s event, which featured 14 exclusive lots. Here are the highlights:

• Antinori Napa Valley & Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars: A week-long experience at Marchesi Antinori’s Tuscany estates, plus a luxury visit to Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars and various wines, fetched $550,000.
• Alpha Omega & Bouchaine Vineyards: A blending session and farm-to-table lunch in Napa, followed by a stay on the private Caribbean island of Mustique, brought in $425,000.
• St. Supéry: Lunch at the Dollarhide Ranch vineyards, plus a trip to Paris to see winery owner’s Chanel’s ready-to-wear collection and jewellery, fetched $240,000.
• Kenzo Estate: A five-night tour of Japan with a follow-up wine event in Napa, received a winning bid of $180,000.
• Darioush: A two-week trip aboard a mega-yacht called The World, culminating in a Napa dinner hosted by the Khaledis – owners of Darioush winery – and featuring rare Darioush wines, also brought in $180,000.

Saturday’s auction featuring 14 lots raised $2.64m, taking the total for Auction Napa Valley 2025 to $6.5m. That was a significant increase on last year’s $4.8m, although it was some way off the record $18.7m achieved back in 2014, which featured 49 lots.

‘The results this year were just amazing,’ said Alpha Omega owner Robin Baggett, who co-chaired Auction Napa Valley 2025 alongside his wife, Michelle. ‘There was a lot of love for our Napa Valley youth, for our wines and for the auction lot experiences we will be sharing.

‘From those who come back year after year to our new friends who jumped right in, all showed up in a meaningful way. And we are very grateful.’

Napa Valley Vintners, the event’s organiser, has now invested more than $230m (£169.5m) in the local community.

The proceeds from this year’s auction will support youth wellness programmes across Napa County, including mental health services and summer learning programmes.

‘Thanks to the long-standing investment by Napa Valley Vintners, we’ve been able to deepen our impact in the community, giving thousands of young people a safe place to learn, grow and thrive,’ said Jaime Gallegos, interim executive director of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Napa Valley. ‘It’s a partnership that has truly changed young people’s lives for the better.’

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The 2022 vintage in Stags Leap District reflects both the elegance and intensity that define this legendary AVA.

The steep, rocky hillsides and alluvial valley floor sites yielded wines that are finely structured yet plush, maintaining the appellation’s signature graceful power, mineral depth and perfume despite the year’s heat challenges.

Notably, winemakers leaned into precision farming and harvest timing, ensuring wines retained freshness, balance and a refined tannic structure, even in the warmest sites.

To read all coverage of the Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage use the code NAPA22 for a 20% discount off an annual Premium subscription

Stylistically, black cherry, cassis and blackberry fruits dominate, often laced with blue fruit lift and red-toned brightness. Many wines showcase graphite, ironstone and crushed volcanic rock notes, giving them drive, tension and a distinctive Stags Leap edge.

Expect incredibly fragrant wines offering up baking spices, spearmint, bay laurel and espresso bean, alongside rose petal, lilac and violet aromatics.

Stags Leap District 2022: The top performing producers

Stags Leap Wine Cellars

Cliff Lede Vineyards

Futo Estate

Realm

Odette

B Cellars

Even the most structured wines show suave, fine-grained tannins that unfold gracefully over time.

However, what is lacking in 2022 is the more firm, robust and compact tannins you’d expect from just about every producer, not to mention a rather muted minerality in favour of more fruit.

Collectors should seek out the wines of Cliff Lede’s Poetry Vineyard, Odette Reserve, Vice Versa Steltzner Old Vines, Amici Hirondelle and FUTO’s ‘5500’ Cabernet Sauvignon – these wines balance power with impeccable structure, ensuring long-haul cellaring potential.

Stags Leap District at a glance

Climate Moderately warm with afternoon marine winds coming north from San Pablo Bay to cool the warmer air radiating off the bare rocks of Stags Leap itself and the surrounding hillsides.

Soils The soils in the Stags Leap District range from volcanic gravel loams on the valley floor to its rocky hillsides, with hard clay subsoils.

Elevation From sea level to about 120m in elevation.

Click here for scores and reviews of all 650+ 2022 Napa Cabernets tasted

Baldacci Brenda’s Vineyard, Clos du Val Yettalil, Chimney Rock’s Clone 7, and Realm Cellars’ Moonracer showcase focused, mineral-laced wines with depth and longevity.

While Chimney Rock’s Arrowhead Vineyard, Ganymede Vineyard, and Tomahawk Vineyard Cabs, along with Cliff Lede’s Rhythm Vineyard Cab and Wild Fantasy, all offer balanced, structured wines with enough density for mid-term aging but plenty of immediate appeal.

Buyers who think of the refined, mineral-driven Cabernet Sauvignons from Stags Leap – especially those from Stags Leap Wine Cellars (Cask 23, S.L.V. and Artemis) will find more fruit-forward wines in 2022.

It’s not a question of whether to buy or not to buy; it’s a question of what to enjoy now and for the next decade, while your more powerful 2021s, 2019s, 2018s, and even 2016s in some cases, continue to slumber.

Cristaldi’s best value picks

Cliff Lede, Wild Fantasy Red Wine

B Cellars, Stagecoach Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

Chimney Rock, Clone 4, Cabernet Sauvignon

Napa Valley Cabernet 2022: Full vintage report and top-scoring wines

Stags Leap District 2022: the top-scoring Cabernets

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A cool growing season followed by an unprecedented harvest-time heatwave and unexpected rain have resulted in an early-drinking vintage of rich, fruit-driven wines, many with immediate appeal.

The variation in quality and ageability across all price points will make careful selection essential for both collectors and enthusiasts.

Our Napa correspondent presents a selection of 28 excellent wines from the more than 600 he tasted, many with very high scores.

To read all coverage of the Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage use the code NAPA22 for a 20% discount off an annual Premium subscription

Napa Cabernet 2022 vintage rating: 3/5

The 2022 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignons offer a varied representation of quality across all price points, making careful selection essential for both collectors and enthusiasts.

The wines are ripe, red-fruited and fruit-forward, with supple tannins that make them smooth, approachable and best enjoyed within a decade while the 2021, 2019 and 2018 Cabs continue to cellar.

A vintage tailor-made for the impatient

Readers looking for easygoing, approachable reds will find plenty to love in the 2022 Cabernet Sauvignon releases from Napa Valley. Early reports from tasting rooms confirm their broad consumer appeal.

Compared to more structured, long-ageing vintages such as 2021 or 2019, the 2022s are approachable, plush and opulent.

Tannin structure varies, with some wines showcasing excellent granular grip and ageing potential while others exhibit a smoother, more fruit-driven profile that leans toward early drinking.

The 2022 Napa Cabs are predominantly fruit-forward, with red-toned fruit, sweet spices, sandalwood, supple tannins and slightly elevated alcohol.

However, a small subset – mainly from cooler valley-floor sites and mountain appellations – lean toward black-toned fruit, savoury spices, balanced alcohol and more robust tannins.

Blended wines incorporating Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Petit Verdot often offer freshness and refinement to counterbalance the heat of the vintage.

The wines have evolved markedly since their awkward, unformed stage when first presented in February 2024 at the Premiere Napa Valley trade event (see May 2024 issue report).

‘The colours stabilised and barrel age added more structure,’ says consulting winemaker Thomas Rivers Brown (pictured, below). ‘They shifted from medium to medium-plus weight. They are definitely drinkers.’

Napa Valley’s 2022 vintage at a glance

Their immediate and suave style makes many of these wines a pleasure to drink upon release.

Those seeking ageworthy bottles should focus on the upper tier of my score range and consult the detail of the tasting notes closely.

While time will ultimately reveal the full ageing potential, at present these wines appear to be structured for a drinking window of around 10 years, though a few standouts will undoubtedly surprise.

Under the heat dome

Most of the wines are unfussy, juicy and built for short- to mid-term enjoyment.

Yet the vintage was initially shaped by three preceding years of spring drought conditions, low fruit set and a cool growing season – until, according to a California Department of Public Health report, an intense 10-day heatwave from 31 August to 9 September brought record-breaking temperatures (up to almost 49°C, in places).

This was ended in unexpected fashion, however, as tropical storm Kay brought late-season rains from the 9th, shifting the course of the vintage entirely – fears of raisining at that point suddenly turned to fears of mould pressures.

‘If you look before the heatwave,’ says Lithology winemaker Matt Sands, ‘it was a great growing season – healthy canopies, excellent fruit set and well-sized berries.’

But the heat came and panic set in.

Every site in the valley required a unique approach predicated on winter pruning, soil drainage, water availability, irrigation methods and individual site nuances.

‘It’s going to be difficult to paint the vintage with a broad brush,’ observes consulting winemaker Celia Welch, who adds that winemakers and growers faced ‘excruciating pressure’ from owners seeing others pick – often prematurely.

‘You had to make quick decisions,’ says consultant Philippe Melka. Stephanie Putnam, vice president of winemaking at Raymond Vineyards in St Helena, where Melka consults, notes: ‘Picking was all over the place.’

Michael Costley, winemaker for Signorello Estate, observes: ‘The top vineyards – the A+ sites – bounced back and kept ripening, while lower-quality ones mostly shut down.’

In such a year, he advises, ‘it’s better to avoid green flavours, allow some grape desiccation and be highly selective – maybe even pick in stages before the main harvest’.

Important choices

Some vintners compare 2022 to 2015, including Julian Fayard, who noted the wines have ‘more density and freshness’ than 2015, a vintage marked by prolonged heat.

Despite the intensity of the heat in 2022, the acids held, ‘but the profile is sweeter, with greater tannin concentration than in 2015’.

Meanwhile, Luc Morlet, whose Coeur de Vallée wine has been released on La Place de Bordeaux, compares 2022 to 2012, citing its supple tannins and concentrated fruit.

Jeff Cole, winemaker for Sullivan Rutherford Estate, noted that optical sorting was essential for any fruit he harvested during the heatwave. With most fruit in before the heat, Cole’s wines have density and a standout structure.

Consultant winemaker Jean Hoefliger calls 2022 ‘perhaps the greatest surprise of my career’. His wines showed a deft hand, offering intensity of flavours and balanced elegance.

‘I overwatered to the point of insanity before the heat dome settled,’ he explains, ‘and we had no dehydration.’

Pahlmeyer winemaker Katie Vogt (pictured, below) reflects on grower relations. ‘We had to make tough picking decisions to ensure the character and intensity we were looking for.’

On the reds, she adds: ‘As the fresh red fruit settles, there’s a surprising savoury earthiness emerging, giving me optimism for ageing potential.’

During the extreme Labor Day heatwave, desiccation and shrivel were minimal on Pritchard Hill, where vineyards above 245m are typically 4°-5°C cooler than the valley floor.

‘Budbreak and bloom are later, but warm nights help the vines catch up,’ says Allison Tauziet of Colgin Cellars, who harvested most fruit on 6-8 September. ‘I’d never seen flavours move so fast,’ she said of their valley floor vineyards.

Further north, at Arkenstone on Howell Mountain, above 420m, grapes are fully exposed to the sun and the harvest is typically weeks ahead of the valley floor.

‘I asked if the wine would be better after the heat dome and chose to pick most before it hit,’ says winemaker Sam Kaplan, who usually harvests early, ‘finishing the rest during and after.’

Multiple narratives

The 2022 Napa Valley Cabernet vintage underscores a fundamental truth: in this climate changed world, there is no new normal. The year demanded adaptability, as location, access to water and precise timing dictated success.

While some winemakers likened the vintage to past years, comparing it to 2012 or 2015, the diversity of results suggests no single narrative applies.

Ultimately, the vintage reinforced the importance of pre-planning, precision farming and the ability to pivot under pressure.

The best wines of 2022 will come from those who anticipated the worst, hoped for the best, and made crucial decisions in real time.

Wines of the vintage

Harbison Estate Horseshoe Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville)

Arrow&Branch Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon (Oakville)

FUTO Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Oakville)

Stony Hill Côte Rouge Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Spring Mountain)

Pott Wine Her Majesty’s Secret Service Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley

Matthiasson Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley

Louis M. Martini Mount Veeder Napa Valley

Colgin Cellars IX Estate Cabernet Sauvignon

Cliff Lede Songbook Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley

Acumen PEAK Edcora Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley, Atlas Peak

Grace Family Vineyards Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (St Helena)

Cristaldi’s Cabernet highlights from the Napa 2022 vintage

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What does it take to turn a mere patch of vines into something truly extraordinary? In places such as France, the answer is as much political as it is cultural – think grands crus, the product of centuries of tradition and strict regulation.

In the US, however, no such hierarchy exists.

Yet, if greatness in wine truly begins with a profound sense of place, a vineyard so distinct and expressive that it imprints itself on every bottle, vintage after vintage, then America’s most compelling sites are slowly but surely asserting their case.

Not through formal classification, but through daring minds, patient hands, vibrant topography that communicates the character and dynamism of a region or place – or perhaps all of these combined.

Scroll down for notes and scores of 10 wonderful wines from America’s finest vineyards

‘Part of our strength is that there’s a lot of fluidity and still plenty of opportunity to observe the sites we already know more closely, refine our practices and discover smaller, lesser-known sites that are absolutely worthy but perhaps not yet recognised,’ says Ted Lemon winemaker and co-founder of West Sonoma Coast’s famed Littorai.

Among the vineyards that have risen to prominence across the US, the following 10 stand out for their distinctiveness and their growing reputations – consistently offering something unique, they have already earned themselves a place of significance in US viticulture…

Heintz

Sonoma Coast, California

Planted area 22ha

‘That vineyard holds acidity very well. It has this lovely, gradual, steady ripening quality,’ says Ted Lemon, highlighting why Heintz has become synonymous with the piercing acidity that has helped revive Californian Chardonnay in recent years – bright, lean and unapologetically fresh.

Located east of Occidental and about 10km from the Pacific, the vineyard sits in a sweet spot at the intersection of three different AVAs: Sonoma Coast, Russian River Valley and Green Valley. It seems to capture the best of all worlds – coastal fog, higher elevation (about 250m) and just the right amount of warmth to promote ideal ripening.

The site has been in the Heintz family for more than 100 years, dating back to 1912, but it was only planted with vines in the early 1980s, primarily using Wente clones. For years, the family mostly sold their fruit to large wineries.

Currently managed by Charles Heintz, a third-generation grower, the Heintz vineyard has quietly shifted focus, establishing contracts with smaller producers such as Littorai and Williams Selyem, and sparkling wine makers such as Ultramarine.

This transition has introduced a more hands-on approach to farming, block by block, moving away from high yields in favour of a craft that prioritises quality over quantity.

Hirsch

West Sonoma Coast, California

Planted area 29ha

The drive up Bohan Dillon Road in northern California hints at what awaits at the summit.

Right above the Pacific, rising from the marine fog at an elevation above 370m, the Hirsch vineyards rest where the Sonoma Coast meets wilderness. It’s a place of extremes, perched atop the San Andreas Fault – steep slopes, fractured and diverse soils, intense sunshine, high if erratic rainfall and winds that never quite settle.

Yet, against all odds, the wines from this site carry an enduring grace and a powerful elegance. ‘It’s a uniquely shaped piece of land,’ says Jasmine Hirsch, second-generation winemaker and daughter of David Hirsch, the land’s pioneer.

When David planted the first vines in 1980, he didn’t have a master plan – just a feeling that this remote, unruly land could produce something special.

After experimenting with Riesling, he received advice from his viticulturist friend Jim Beauregard, who was visiting from the Santa Cruz mountains, regarding the site’s potential for Pinot Noir.

Beauregard even gifted him cuttings – a mix of Pommard and Wädenswil clones, which have their origins respectively in France and Switzerland. And the rest, as they say, is history, with the vineyards now covering an area of 29ha (72 acres) across more than 60 blocks, all farmed individually.

‘There’s no great terroir without great ownership,’ says Ted Lemon, who has been the longest continuous purchaser of Hirsch fruit, starting back in 1994.

‘At Hirsch, you have all these different spurs and hilltops with varied orientations – something that wouldn’t necessarily make sense in a European, pre-climate change context. It’s David’s resolute stubbornness and his willingness to understand what suits the vineyard best that sets it apart.’

Las Piedras

St Helena, Napa Valley, California

Planted area 8.9ha

Las Piedras may not be the first vineyard that comes to mind among Beckstoffer Vineyards’ remarkable stable of renowned Napa properties, but if you ask around, many winemakers will say that it shows the most distinctive terroir of them all.

Acquired in 1983, Las Piedras (‘The Stones’) is part of Beckstoffer’s heritage vineyards collection. ‘It’s definitely the most individual in Beckstoffer’s lineup,’ says Matt Sands, winemaker at Lithology, who has been making wine from Las Piedras grapes since 2015. Andy Beckstoffer himself agrees, noting that many of his buyers consider it a ‘true grand cru’.

‘The idea of investing in terroir was risky, and I don’t want to take too much credit for it because it takes a village, but it worked out,’ reflects Beckstoffer.

Originally part of the Mexican land grants, it was the first vineyard in what is now the St Helena AVA and was initially planted to Mission grapes (País/Criolla, the earliest Vitis vinifera variety to be grown in the Americas).

Las Piedras is celebrated for its striking minerality, benefiting from the gravelly, loamy, alluvial soils, which provide good drainage and natural vine stress. The result is wines that consistently earn top scores, with 100-point ratings from leading producers appearing time and time again.

‘You get a mix of vibrant red and black fruits, deep concentration, an underlying earthiness and a distinct freshness with a mineral edge. It’s a captivating vineyard,’ Sands concludes.

Sanford & Benedict

Sta Rita Hills, Santa Barbara County, California

Planted area 60.7ha (20.6ha early 1970s original plantings)

Sanford & Benedict isn’t just part of the Sta Rita Hills story – it helped write some of its first chapters.

As the first site planted to Pinot Noir in Santa Barbara County, it set the stage for the region’s rise, with its influence stretching far beyond its vineyard rows and leaving an indelible mark on the wine world.

Planted own-rooted by Michael Benedict and Richard Sanford (first to Riesling and Cabernet Sauvignon in 1971, then to Pinot Noir and Chardonnay in 1973), the vineyard has provided cuttings that have spread widely across the region.

‘As Michael shared with me over the years, any time a neighbouring vineyard owner asked for cuttings, he was happy to share,’ says John Terlato, vice chairman of the Terlato Group, which purchased the vineyard in 2007.

Sanford & Benedict lies just 16km from the Pacific, where it’s enveloped in a cool, marine layer of air that tempers the relentless Central Coast sun, a delicate balance of brisk ocean breezes meeting sun-drenched afternoons. Its deep marine soils boast a remarkable water-holding capacity.

The legacy of Sanford & Benedict is not only rooted in its history but also in its boundless potential.

Terlato notes that even wines from the mid- to late 1970s still exhibit a ‘rare depth, precision and youthful vibrancy. The potential couldn’t have been more evident, and they still have a great deal of runway ahead,’ underscoring the vineyard’s remarkable ability to produce wines with exceptional longevity and character.

Savoy

Anderson Valley, Mendocino, California

Planted area 21ha

‘It’s the one right across from the hardware store,’ locals will say, reminding us that great terroir doesn’t always come with a view. ‘It’s nothing flashy, but the fruit is spellbinding,’ says Kenneth Juhasz, founder and winemaker at Auteur Wines.

If Savoy’s outward appearance doesn’t turn heads, its inner beauty – soil, climate, farming – has attracted people for decades and has helped elevate Anderson Valley to one of California’s top Pinot Noir regions.

The 21ha vineyard sits on a mix of valley floor and gentle southwest-facing slopes. It was first planted in 1991 by Richard Savoy, a true Burgundy devotee – often described as eccentric by those who know him.

Ted Lemon, who has been producing a Savoy Pinot Noir for Littorai (based further south at Sebastopol) since 1995 – dramatically influencing the site’s development – credits this to years of farming with organic methods, and the vineyard’s soil diversity and moderate climate.

‘To me, the wine reflects that same unassuming quality of the site,’ Lemon observes. ‘It’s never the flashiest wine we make, but it’s always among the wines that age the best.’

Vine Hill Ranch

Oakville, Napa Valley, California

Planted area 29ha

Vine Hill Ranch is Napa Valley’s backstage pass to some of the world’s most prized Cabernet Sauvignon – a source for some of Napa’s most prestigious winemakers, supplying grapes to labels such as Harlan’s Bond label, Colgin Cellars and other ‘cult’ Napa Cabs.

The blend of volcanic rock and loamy clay soils across seven distinct blocks, different clonal and rootstock combinations, and an east-facing exposure on the benchlands are just a few reasons this site has earned its well-deserved reputation in Napa Valley.

Though the estate has been farmed since the late 1800s, it was the Phillips family who truly cemented its reputation as a premier source of top-quality Cabernet Sauvignon, starting in the 1950s when Bruce Kelham, maternal grandfather of current owner Bruce Phillips, bought the property.

Replanting in the late 1980s – prompted by the damage wrought by phylloxera and guided by Bruce’s father Bob Phillips – reshaped the vineyard’s structure and solidified its commitment to Cabernet excellence.

‘This is a special place,’ says Bruce. ‘In a single vineyard, we capture the true Oakville character, from plush red fruit, vibrant acidity and silky tannins on the benchlands to deeper blue-fruited notes and more pronounced tannic structure as you move upslope. Along the forest perimeter, the wines develop a savoury complexity. It’s a remarkable expression of site, and we continue to evolve the farming with each vintage to honour it.’

Eyrie

Dundee Hills, Willamette Valley, Oregon

Planted area 4.5ha

In the history of American wine, few stories are as bold as that of Eyrie’s original vineyard in Oregon’s Dundee Hills.

Armed with hundreds of grape cuttings and a dream, then 25-year-old David Lett rolled into the Willamette Valley in 1965 and planted the first Vitis vinifera vineyard in the region – unknowingly setting the stage for what may just become the most revered place for American Pinot Noir.

‘When I look at the decisions my dad made at that time, being new to the region, about the best place to plant Pinot Noir here, it’s almost spooky how correct he was,’ says Jason Lett,

David’s son, second-generation grower and winemaker at Eyrie since 2005. The proof is in the vineyard, which has turned out to be a masterclass in precision – currently at 4.5ha, it rises from 80m to 125m and is framed by trees including oak, pine and a Douglas fir where red-tailed hawks nest every year, inspiring the vineyard’s name.

Intentionality has been Eyrie’s guiding principle all along. From the start, the vineyard was organically farmed (certified in 2013) – no irrigation, no herbicides, no shortcuts – long before sustainability was a buzzword in the wine world.

David’s commitment to showcasing the true potential of Oregon Pinot Noir through Eyrie has inspired a generation of growers and winemakers to pursue authenticity in viticulture. ‘Eyrie has this really magical interplay of earthy components, lyrical fruit and a lightness in colour – something that stays true from one vintage to the next,’ Jason says.

Cailloux

Walla Walla Valley, Oregon

Planted area 3.4ha

Cailloux makes a bold first impression, much like vigneron Christophe Baron. When he planted the 4ha plot near Milton-Freewater city in 1997, local scepticism ran high, but Baron’s defiance drove him forward. ‘They called me crazy. Well, they still do,’ he jokes.

Cailloux’s ground is covered with stones (hence the name, from the French); the vines seem to wrestle their way through these cobbles, embodying a struggle that has become the vineyard’s signature.

While there is a little Cabernet Sauvignon (two acres, or 0.8ha) and half as much Viognier, it’s primarily planted with Syrah, which produces wines that are intensely earthy, savoury and unmistakably unique – ‘funky’, many would say. ‘If you want to create a great wine, you must start with a great foundation, a great terroir.

After that, it’s all about how you treat the site,’ explains Baron, who has been farming Cailloux organically since the beginning and pioneered biodynamic practices in Walla Walla in 2002 (certified since 2004).

‘I never used forces of death in my vineyard,’ he adds, referring to herbicides, fungicides and pesticides. ‘He’s created something truly unique. The wines from Cailloux are built to last. It’s undoubtedly a piece of American wine history,’ reflects Linda Milagros, wine director at fine-dining destination Canlis in Seattle.

Boushey

Yakima Valley, Columbia Valley, Washington

Planted area 65ha

Boushey makes a compelling case for the idea that terroir is as much about the hands that shape it as the land itself.

Dick and Luanne Boushey planted their first vines in 1980 on a site that’s layered with silt loam, windblown loess and ancient flood deposits over fractured basalt, all in one of the cooler corners of the Yakima Valley AVA.

Sure, the geology, coupled with the moderate temperatures of the south-facing slopes of the Rattlesnake hills, add to the site’s complexity, but it’s undoubtedly Dick’s unwavering dedication, over a period of more than four decades, that makes Boushey, well, Boushey.

Over the years, the site has earned a reputation for producing some of Washington’s finest Syrahs. The farming appears to be marked by a profound ‘sensitivity to the vines’. ‘He connects with the vines almost on an emotional level,’ observes James Mantone, winemaker at Syncline Winery.

Boushey produces distinctly different fruit from that of the surrounding vineyards – with an elegant umami and cream profile.

‘It’s not as if he’s farming in just one type of soil,’ Mantone continues. ‘As you go up behind his house, you encounter gravelly soils; as you come down, you find more loamy soils. Yet, despite that variation, there’s a consistency – a sort of “Bousheyness”.

Magdalena

Seneca Lake, Finger Lakes, New York

Planted area 5.9ha

The consistent quality of Magdalena vineyard – driven by organic farming and currently transitioning to biodynamics – only strengthens its growing reputation. Magdalena reliably produces wines of distinction and character, regardless of the year’s conditions.

Magdalena’s location on Seneca lake, on a 60ha property about 800m from its western shore, is pivotal to its success.

‘When we started to explore sites in the Finger Lakes, it was based on how warm the site was – not only ripening, but also how warm it is in the winter,’ explains Oskar Bynke, co-owner of Hermann J Wiemer Vineyard. ‘The lake’s airflow protects the vines from frost, making it both a warm site for winter and a ripe one for growing – an ideal combination.’

Planting began in 1999 with Riesling, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, followed by Gewürztraminer, Lemberger and Cabernet Franc. The site is now emerging as a standout vineyard for the last of these.

‘The intense afternoon sun, along with the 327 clone of Cabernet Franc – originally from Bordeaux – leads to a more refined profile, highlighting red fruit and floral notes rather than just ripeness,’ says Allison Slute, founder of the Cab Franc Chronicles substack. ‘This unique combination really sets the site apart.

10 wonderful wines from America’s finest vineyards

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The 18.9ha hillside property is located in the Calistoga AVA, with sweeping views of Mount St. Helena and the Palisades.

This historic property includes 2.5ha of prime Cabernet Sauvignon vines, which yield more than 20 tons per year.

Decorated winemaker Thomas Rivers Brown makes the estate’s wines. The grapes yield around 1,200 cases annually for the estate’s loyal wine club.

The property also features a natural spring-fed lake, heritage oak trees, fruit orchards and extensive recreational facilities.

There are six buildings, spanning 8,950 sq. ft. of living space, with a total of six bedrooms, six bathrooms and two powder rooms.

Renowned architect Howard Backen, who is famed for his sophisticated rustic style, designed the main two-storey residence at the heart of the estate.

It features an open-concept living room, a commercial-grade kitchen, a wet bar, a butler’s pantry and a 5,000-bottle temperature-controlled wine cellar with a tasting nook.

The second building at the estate, whose address is 225 Franz Valley School Road, is known as The Headmaster’s House. It’s a colonial-style two-bedroom, two-bathroom cottage with a wraparound porch, two fireplaces and an attic.

There is also a poolside cottage and a lakeside Victorian studio residence. Both buildings feature one bedroom and one bathroom.

Meanwhile, the Bell Tower Administration Building is a custom-designed event space, which could be turned into a gym, studio or wine tasting room.

The grounds include a 40,000-gallon pool, a basketball court, a tennis court and a bocce ball court, along with several areas designated for outdoor entertaining. There are two private wells, with ample reserve tank storage.

The listing agent, Sotheby’s International Realty’s St Helena Brokerage, described 225 Franz Valley School Road as ‘more than a property; it is a legacy awaiting its next chapter. A rare confluence of luxury, lifestyle, and viticultural excellence in the heart of Napa Valley.’

Current Napa County regulations mean that a property with this many living structures and features could not be reproduced today, making it a ‘truly unique and valuable holding’.

The estate, which is just minutes from downtown Calistoga, features four separate vineyards, which were planted between 1998 and 2002. Hardin-Clark manages the vineyards.

Each plot is bottled as a vineyard-specific, designated wine. There is a premium ‘Estate’ designation and an entry-level ‘Indulgence’ brand.

The inventory extends to the first vintage in 2002. The wines are primarily sold via the Heritage School Wine Club, which has seen its membership increase by 24% since 2021.

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Wine is a rarity – a splendid, value-added substance built upon an agricultural commodity. There is also, for the time being, far too much of it.

The 2024 growing season in California, my 17th vintage making wine, was gorgeous. Plentiful winter rain set the vines up for success. The summer then brought warm, dry days with cool nights – perfect for even ripening.

Relatively few heat spells and low disease pressure meant that there was no rush to pick. As the associate winemaker at Sonoma’s Brick and Mortar, I was working with pristine fruit brought in at its peak.

However, while cycling around Sonoma County months later, I saw row upon row of unharvested grapes. Fruit was left to rot on the vine in some of the state’s most prestigious appellations. For the 2024 harvest, there was no hiding in plain sight.

Desperate times

The custom crush facility that I worked for received calls from growers on an almost daily basis, asking us to vinify their fruit for them and offering all manner of deals. ‘Take half the fruit for yourselves,’ was often the plea.

Promises to pay may have been well intentioned, but there are no guarantees. Major wineries have gone bankrupt.

That unspoken-for wine in the tank loses value as the days go by. It will eventually be picked up for a song and blended into one generic bulk wine or another, its identity and integrity lost, any invocations to terroir a hollow joke.

‘Does this not mean amazing prices and plentiful wine for all?’ one could be forgiven for wondering. Sort of, in the short-term, is the answer.

However, over time, it also means a hit to quality, vineyards and the environment.

The California wine industry must figure out what it wants to be, and we, fellow wine lovers, should understand the role that we play in crafting the future of wine.

As I write this, there are 360 California bulk wine sale listings on one online marketplace alone, many dating back over multiple vintages. In one, 18,000 US gallons (about 68,000L) of 2024 Mendocino Chardonnay is optimistically priced at $12 per gallon ($3.17/L – about £2.50).

Competition is stiff. Tens of thousands of gallons are on offer for less. Consider the 2020 Alexander Valley Zinfandel, listed at $3 per gallon.

This is a stark indication of how punishing the passing of time is to the perceived value of unsold wine. So how did we get here?

The notion of infinite growth

The last two-plus decades saw enormous over-planting of new vineyards, spurred on by excessively exuberant projections based on past growth.

In the 1990s and 2000s, Americans were rapidly becoming wine drinkers; the mistake lay in thinking that this trend would continue until wine sat on every table.

Add to this the swirl of complex factors surrounding drinks culture – the sober-curious movement, adaptogenic beverages (involving active ingredients), cocktails, Millennials not wanting to be like their parents, and consumer confidence – and plop! We’ve landed in this wine-dark sea.

For five years or more, Californian marketing cooperatives such as Allied Grape Growers have issued warnings about the over-planting of new vineyards and have been urging farmers to rip vines out. It takes years before new acres make themselves felt.

Fruit comes online (ready for commercial wine production) in year three, or really year four. If one isn’t paying attention to who is planting what, one can quickly become part of the excess.

The low-yielding drought years of 2014-2016 gave producers a false sense of scarcity, which fuelled the growers’ refusal to heed the warnings of oversupply. Then Mother Nature layered on extra complexity.

Masking the problem

Wildfires in 2017, 2019 and even more so in 2020 slashed production across the state, most notably in Napa, Sonoma and Mendocino counties. Smoke rendered thousands of tonnes of fruit unsalvageable.

Unscrupulous producers already sitting on more wine than they could sell used the fires as an excuse not to accept perfectly good contracted fruit. Here was their out. The ensuing scarcity masked the problem yet again.

Then came Covid, bringing with it a temporary uptick in wine drinking that gave wineries a misguided sense of exuberance – wine is back! Wine club memberships are up! We’re saved! Not so. What happens to all of the extra fruit?

Cue the rise of ‘private label’ wine companies that contract to make a ‘Cuvée CostCut’ or a ‘Bob’s 80th’ birthday wine. Cue the mass-marketed boxed wines.

Understand that these are, by and large, put out by opportunistic entrepreneurs/marketers – not actual winemakers – picking up wine that someone else is frequently selling at a loss.

Think market forces, think global markets.

Buying in bulk

Picture enormous plastic tanks full of wine, sloshing as they ride on merchant marine ships across the globe, from Australia to the UK, Chile to Canada, San Francisco through the Panama Canal and on to…?

This isn’t a dystopia to be guarded against – it already accounts for a vast percentage by volume of wine consumed around the world. Sure, the carbon footprint is lower when wine is shipped in bulk and bottled where it’s to be sold, and that’s something.

But is the primary goal to have plentiful cheap plonk from all over the world? Or should we hold wine to a higher standard and place quality over quantity?

Now imagine that top wineries that long held to principles of terroir are facing pressures that may fundamentally change the way they’re making wine.

I knew we had reached a crisis when a colleague of mine who owns a boutique winery said that her 2025 crush plan was to drop all fruit contracts and buy finished wine on the bulk market.

Why deal with grower contracts, vineyard tracking, worrying about the weather and when to pick, hiring and training a harvest cellar crew, and fermenting grapes into wine when one has an ample and diverse supply of bulk wine easily at hand?

Any ‘winemaker’ buying wine in bulk comes to it after many critical decisions and actual winemaking have come and gone.

To be clear, wine has been traded in bulk for as long as wine has been made. Transactions mainly involved wineries looking to make relatively minor tweaks to their production.

For example, maybe I could use an extra 750L of Merlot to round out a particular lot and you made a bit too much to sell for yourself this year.

Shadow markets

As someone who has participated in small-scale, less cynical bulk wine buying, I can say looking for that diamond in the rough can be creative and fun; however, the ‘shadow market’ in bulk wine has expanded dramatically in recent years as wineries renew fewer grape contracts.

Today, entire companies are built around the assumption that growers will continue to overproduce and that bulk wine will continue to be sold at or near a loss.

Brands made with bulk wine pop up overnight, wooing the consumer with flashy packaging rather than the wine itself. The business model isn’t to enter into meaningful long-term contracts with growers, but to buy cheap and invent new labels as needed.

There is a sameness to these wines. They are invariably tweaked to conform to a particular formula. But these wines don’t offer a repeatable experience because where in the morass of bulk wine did that bottle come from?

Cheap wine also has an environmental cost. When grape prices are down, farmers often cut back on human labour. This can necessitate increasing the use of fungicides or herbicides, which takes a toll on the workforce, the environment and wine quality.

Far from being just a romantic notion, organic, biodynamic and regeneratively farmed vineyards are proven carbon sinks and havens for wildlife.

The extremes are stark, each producing radically different outcomes for the environment.

The way forward?

In a global context, California is still in its infancy as a wine region, still sorting out which varieties do best where.

Once vines have been planted, regardless of quality and need, farmers are loath to pull them out. They are business people, but it’s emotional. The vines are their babies. Many refuse to believe that their fruit is worth less or, indeed, worthless.

The sustainable option is to pull out enough vines to bring production in line with consumption, understanding that Mother Nature will always have the last word.

Between 2023 and 2024, California saw an estimated 15,000ha ripped out, mainly from the Central Valley. However, about 7,000 additional hectares came online, representing a net reduction of only 8,000ha. Allied Grape Growers calls for pulling out at least 20,000ha more.

This is a tricky proposition. Everyone agrees that vines should go, but nobody wants it to be theirs. How best should growers proceed? I sought the advice of a highly regarded Californian viticulturist who has more than 25 years of experience in this cyclical business.

They were happy to speak, but requested anonymity. ‘First, I look at, okay, is the vineyard economical in a good market?’ they told me. ‘And if it’s not, it’s time to remove it. If it’s virus-affected or compromised, it’s a challenge to sell that fruit.

‘I’ve had multiple calls over the last six months,’ my interviewee continued, ‘from people saying, “Will you lease my vineyard for no payment?” They want to maintain the property. They think it has tremendous value, and I look at the age and yields. “Do you have a contract? No?” Those folks are in denial. They don’t understand the business.’

What if you have a new, healthy, well laid-out vineyard in a prime appellation but sales are soft and you’re having trouble covering costs?

‘Of course, you’re not going to pull that vineyard. You haven’t even begun to pay for your investment,’ they explained. ‘My advice to those is: let’s do the minimal work to keep the vineyard healthy this year, to be in line for healthy production next year.’

Looking for balance

My source is confident that Napa and Sonoma are close to finding a balance between supply and demand. There isn’t much room in either county for new plantings, and growers and wineries are, they said, increasingly ‘diligent and efficient about what we are doing’.

The market will no longer tolerate poorly farmed fruit, and nor should it.

Citing the Sonoma County Winegrowers’ sustainability programme, they continued: ‘Sonoma County as a whole has made this claim that we are going to be sustainable. Well, we have to act on that, and we have to improve what we are doing every year.’

Their message: ‘Plant to your site, and farm to your site.’ In other words, don’t try to force quality where the terroir won’t support it and don’t plant in high-yielding terrain unless you have a solid sales plan for all those grapes.

Wineries must also do better. Those that don’t seek rapid expansion, focusing instead on only making what they can sell, are more reliable buyers of fruit and tend to treat that fruit with greater care.

Where even these wineries can fall short is in their marketing. Food and wine, enjoyed together at the table with loved ones, is an ancient story in need of a rebrand. This is wine as culture, and this is at risk.

Most importantly, wine buyers shouldn’t discount the role they can play in rectifying the situation.

‘The number one driver for wineries is the consumer,’ noted the viticulturist. ‘Consumer pressure for sure has gotten wineries that 10 years ago were not on board (with sustainability) on board.’ Mindful consumption, I would add, is the real answer.

We babble on, misty-eyed, about terroir and then get excited by a screaming deal. Here’s where the rubber meets the road. Get to know your winemaker. Trace the wine back to the vineyard it came from and learn how it was farmed.

Understand the power of your wallet. This will create better wine, serve our planet and enhance our wine adventures.

Striking a balance: six recommended California wineries

Ignoring the ‘bigger is better’ ethos, these six California producers are all focused on only making as much wine as they can sell, while also treating their suppliers and the fruit that they supply with respect.

Dunn Vineyards

Howell Mountain is one of the greatest AVAs for Cabernet Sauvignon, and Dunn Vineyards has been creating dense, delicious Cabs here for 46 years.

Focusing on one variety may seem limited, but multiple sites yield complexity, which is complemented by 32 months in carefully chosen French oak barrels. Don’t be afraid of that oak – this fruit integrates it beautifully.

The 2019 Howell Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon (US$175-$250 Widely available, Alcohol 13.9%, 98pts) is stunning, still fresh, with plenty of life ahead. There’s a relatively more affordable Napa bottling, which is also excellent, and a reserve wine in the top years.

The family’s large donations to the Napa Land Trust demonstrate its commitment to ecology. dunnvineyards.com.

Flanagan

‘To make great wine, you must start with great fruit from great sites.’ So says Isabelle Mort, director of winemaking at Flanagan. Clichéd, perhaps, but few live up to this like Flanagan.

In addition to its own vineyards, Flanagan has long-standing contracts for renowned sites such as Bacigalupi and Ritchie. Where other wineries stomp on this famous fruit, Flanagan is all about expressing the vintage and the terroir.

Expect balance across the board.

The 2023 Viognier (US$65-$70 Flanagan, Vintner’s Collective, Alc 14%, 95pts) – with great acidity, complexity and a smooth mouthfeel – manages to be sumptuous without being cloying, which isn’t easy for this variety in California. flanaganwines.com.

Lichen Estate

There’s a touch of the mad inventor about Doug Stewart, founder and winemaker of Lichen Estate in the Anderson Valley, Mendocino.

From yoghurt to high-temperature superconductors, the companies he has founded have a through-line: sustainability and caring for the environment.

Doug farms Lichen organically, also focusing on regenerative practices such as not tilling and encouraging native grasses. Aiming to set the bar for California sparkling, his vines are planted at high density, which also conserves scarce water reserves.

The Lichen 2018 Sparkling Pinot Gris is pure and delightful.

The 2019 Grand Cuvée Rosé (US$95 Lichen Estate, Alc 12.5%, 93pts) is peachy, flinty and lively – and made from 100% estate fruit. lichenestate.com.

Porter Creek Vineyards

Alex Davis, owner and winemaker at Porter Creek Vineyards, is uncompromising in terms of his thoughtful, organic viticulture and hands-off approach to winemaking.

He doesn’t chase trends or markets. While about 80% of his production comes from his estate fruit, with a focus on Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, Davis also purchases small quantities of other grapes from organic growers – in order to offer something at a lower price point.

The 2019 Hillside Pinot Noir (Alc 12.8%, 95pts) perfectly represents what to expect from here: chiselled, elegant, restrained and delicious. portercreekvineyards.com.

Silver Oak

Silver Oak’s size (currently more than 160ha of vines in Napa Valley and Alexander Valley) makes it the outlier here. But when you’re big, your actions make a difference.

It’s an exemplar when it comes to taking a holistic approach to maximising wine quality.

This means drastically reducing herbicide use, conducting farming trials focused on soil health, building the first ever LEED Platinum-certified commercial wineries – in Oakville and Alexander Valley (the latter is also Living Building-certified for its net zero energy and water usage, among other things) – and fostering mutual respect with their contracted growers.

All this care is evident in the glass.

The 2017 Alexander Valley Cabernet Sauvignon (£108 Millésima, US$70-$120 Widely available, Alc 14.2%, 93pts) has a superb structure, lovely floral notes and a lingering finish. silveroak.com.

St Supéry

Few Napa wineries work exclusively with their own fruit – it leaves one vulnerable to the slings and arrows of nature.

At St Supéry, whose mandate is to make the best possible wine, estate fruit is considered non-negotiable.

Choosing one’s best vines to propagate new vineyards, nurturing low-yielding old vines that produce delicious fruit, and being a Silver member of International Wineries for Climate Action – these are among the quality moves Michael Scholz and his team at St Supéry have been empowered to make; it shows in their wines.

The 2023 Dollarhide Estate Vineyard Sauvignon Blanc (Alc 13.5%, 94pts) is delightful, creamy, complex and lively. stsupery.com.

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Crossing continents

Leader: Amy Wislocki, Magazine Editor

I’m in western Colombia at the moment visiting family. The scenery is breathtaking and the people incredibly welcoming, but in the local supermarket all I can find is basic Rioja or Chilean/Argentinian wine, priced at eyewatering levels.

Certainly nothing resembling the top-class wines recommended in our batch of features on the US this month, or the exciting picks featured in the comprehensive guide to Rioja bundled with this month’s issue. The guide really is a must-read, featuring our first ever Rioja Report (for which we tasted more than 700 recent releases), plus editorial on the names to know, the wines to seek out across all styles, and what to do if you visit.

Last but not least, please take time to answer a few quick questions on our redesign – we’d love to get your views. Just visit decanter.com/mag-redesign

See what’s inside Decanter magazine May 2025

In focus

• Cru Americana Ana Carolina Quintela digs into the dazzling dirt of 10 of the US’s most revered vineyards
• Vintage report: Napa Cabernet 2022 A year for choosing carefully: Jonathan Cristaldi picks out the star performers from a tumultuous vintage
• California shakedown Kate Nowell-Smith explains the origins of and solutions to California’s grape glut
• Singular US Pinot Noir Single-vineyard expressions represent peak Pinot Noir, argues Clive Pursehouse
• One to watch: Raúl Moreno Ines Salpico meets a wandering winemaker who’s shaking up Spanish wine
• Azerbaijan 101 Introducing a new player in wine, by Anthony Rose

Spirits

• Distilled Spirits news
• Cocktail files: Paloma Laura Foster offers tips on mixing and ingredients for this refreshing tequila tipple

Food & travel

• What to pair with Southern cuisine Henna Bakshi’s tips on matching wine to southern US food’s lively flavours
• Travel: A taste of the Tamar Take a tour to some of Tasmania’s world-class wineries, guided by Nola James

Learning

• Books etc Sophie Thorpe cracks open the latest Classic Wine Library release
• Wine wisdom Expert tips, and ‘The ethical drinker’ on how biochar is boosting vineyards’ climate resilience

Buying guide

• Editors’ picks Decanter staff share highlights from their recent tastings
• Panel tasting: South African Chardonnay A tasting of 128 wines highlights the stellar quality on offer, with 11 scoring 95 points or above
• Panel tasting: Provence whites With a dozen Outstanding wines, this tasting showed that this sunny corner of France has more to offer than rosé
• Expert’s choice: Santa Barbara Chardonnay Vanessa Rason picks 18 vibrant wines from the southern end of California’s Central Coast
• Weekday wines Decanter’s in-house tasting team brings you 25 top picks, ready to drink and priced at £30 or less
• Weekend wines Priced £30-£60, seven standout buys to impress
• DWWA 2024 highlights Cool-climate precision. Medal-winning rising stars from the heart of Europe

Collecting & investing

• Marketwatch Auction news and new releases, plus Bordeaux’s pricing woes

Regulars

• Writing this month Meet four of the authors from this month’s Decanter
• Uncorked News, inspiration & more
• Andrew Jefford’s column
• Hugh Johnson’s column
• Guest column Eliza Dumais ponders the ‘imperfect science’ of wine scoring
• The Last Drop Celebrity bottles, crisps and wine, and more…

Rioja at 100

Ines Salpico, regional editor for Spain

It is both serendipitous and meaningful that a landmark edition of Decanter’s annual Rioja guide – inclusive, for the first time, of a comprehensive report on new releases – coincides with a landmark anniversary of the DOCa Rioja. As the denomination celebrates its centenary, we commit to an ever more complete coverage of the region at a time of exciting evolution and transformation.

While analysing the past 12 months and century, this guide looks decisively to the future. Rioja’s new generation of winemakers and entrepreneurs are a promise of great things to come. Could we be entering a post-post-modern period in Rioja’s history? I think so. Many of the top-scoring wines in our report might already be pages of that new chapter.

Here’s to another 100 years of a fascinating narrative!

Inside Decanter’s Rioja supplement 2025:

• Writing on Rioja Meet the four authors behind this year’s Rioja guide
• Rioja report: new-release tasting Assessing 12 months’ worth of new Rioja releases is no mean feat, but Ines Salpico and Beth Willard took on the challenge
• 100 years of DOCa Rioja A timeline synopsis of the first century of this top wine region’s esteemed history
• What the locals are drinking How better to discover the latest trends? Beth Willard gets the Rioja trade view
• New styles Fintan Kerr introduces the people and the thinking behind Rioja’s second new wave
• Joven at heart: next generation Young winemaking talents are putting terroir first, says Noah Chichester
• The last botero Noah Chichester meets the one man left in Rioja making the real goatskin wine flasks
• Expert’s choice: 2021 Beth Willard’s pick of 18 wines, confirms the ‘pure excellence’ of the historic vintage
• Travel: Wild Rioja Off the beaten track for stunning landscapes, one-off adventures and more, with Fintan Kerr

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There have been reports of growing interest in harnessing artificial intelligence (AI) to manage vineyards, and a recent seminar in London heard how the technology could help wineries in an increasingly unpredictable climate. 

‘Climate is by far the biggest threat to us, because we have no control over it; I call it climate chaos,’ said Kia Behnia, co-owner of Napa Valley’s Neotempo Wines, at a Berry Bros & Rudd event entitled ‘Napa 2050: the last vintage?’. 

He argued greater precision will be needed in vineyards to cope with climate change impacts efficiently, alongside other approaches, such as a commitment to sustainable farming methods.

As a computer scientist-turned-winemaker, Behnia has co-developed Scout alongside Mason Earles, assistant professor at UC Davis. It’s one of a new generation of vineyard management and wine industry tools powered by some form of AI. 

Behnia described how Scout can process large amounts of data, including photographs, to provide insights on the health of individual vines.

Uses range from yield prediction to spotting early signs of disease or heat stress, he said.

An ‘X-ray for vineyards’

Behnia acknowledged concerns around the adoption of AI. He said he opposes ‘recipe-driven’ wines and considers it fundamental to respect winemakers’ choices.

‘Part of our goal with Scout is to help growers everywhere be able to see their own vineyards and be able to make the right decisions,’ he told the seminar, held prior to BBR’s West Coast wine tasting. 

‘Think of it as an x-ray for vineyards.’ 

Farming for balance

Matt Taylor, winemaker at Ink Grade, told the BBR seminar that he saw opportunities to marry technology with other sustainability approaches.

Taylor spoke of his experience with organic, biodynamic and regenerative farming throughout his career, including since joining Ink Grade, a biodynamic estate on Howell Mountain that is part of the Lawrence Wine Estates portfolio alongside properties including Heitz Cellar and Haynes Vineyard.

Rehabilitating the soil can help to build vines’ resilience to extreme weather events, such as heat spikes, he said, echoing observations by winemakers in other regions.

At Ink Grade, he said the team takes a flexible approach based on reading vintage conditions. He spoke of striving for elegance and balance, reminiscent of Napa’s treasured wines of the past.

BBR’s West Coast tasting also included the inaugural, 2022-vintage Trailside Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon produced by Lawrence Wine Estates’ CEO, Carlton McCoy Jr MS, and Burgundy winemaker Jeremy Seysses.

The pair have described the wine as a ‘terroir-driven, age-worthy style that is an homage to Napa Valley’s glory days of the 1960s and 1970s’. 

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• Interview: New Château Lascombes owners plot big changes

In Bordeaux, the ‘second wine’ concept is both well-established and well-defined.

These wines, often called ‘second labels,’ are traditionally crafted from lots that don’t make the cut for the château’s grand vin.

Whether the fruit comes from younger vines, less favoured plots, or barrels that don’t align with the stylistic ideal of the flagship bottling, the idea is to preserve the prestige of the top wine while offering consumers a more accessible (and more affordable) entry into the estate’s style.

Scroll down for scores and reviews from Jonathan’s search for ‘second labels’ in Napa Valley

But in Napa Valley, as with much in the New World, the rules are looser, the philosophies more varied, and the marketing less beholden to tradition.

Many Napa wineries produce what could be called second labels – but scratch the surface, and you’ll often find a more complex origin story than simple declassification.

Not just the ‘second’ best

Some producers, such as Harlan Estate, follow a model close to the Bordeaux analogue. Its second label, The Maiden, is crafted as a barrel selection from the same estate vineyards that produce the Harlan Cabernet Sauvignon.

‘The Maiden represents a more approachable yet still site-reflective expression of the estate,’ says Director of Winemaking Cory Empting. It is, in essence, a second wine in the classic sense, a carefully curated counterpart to the grand vin.

Others fall into a different camp entirely. Take Dominus Estate’s Napanook, for instance. Though often lumped in with second labels, Napanook has never been a wine made from declassified Dominus fruit.

Instead, it is a purposeful expression of specific vineyard blocks — parcels that consistently yield vibrant, fresh, and more approachable fruit. ‘To us, it’s not a second label,’ notes Tod Mostero, ‘It’s a companion wine that expresses a different facet of the vineyard’s identity.’

Kassidy Harris, PR and Marketing Director for Dominus Estate says: ‘We don’t consider it an “entry-level” wine, especially at its $80 retail price point.

‘For those looking to experience the estate’s style at a more accessible price point, we also produce Othello, a separate wine retailing around $55 per bottle,’ which comes from vines rooted in soils along Hopper Creek, creating a wine with all its own style and personality.

Happy little accident

Scarecrow’s M. Étain, made by the indomitable Celia Welch, also charts its own path. Coco Lopez, the Executive Vice President of Scarecrow, described the creation of M. Étain as ‘a fortuitous event’ that transpired during the blending of the 2008 vintage.

‘The portion of juice that wasn’t included in the final Scarecrow blend was so undeniably superb that we were inspired to bottle it,’ recalls Lopez. ‘In 2014, we replanted approximately 1.25 acres (.5ha) to Merlot and Malbec, specifically for M. Étain.

‘Welch’s idea was to differentiate the flavour profile by creating more of a Bordeaux-style wine by also incorporating the Petit Verdot that grew on the JJ Cohn Ranch.’

Lopez concludes: ‘We refer to M. Étain as Scarecrow’s companion label because, despite coming from the same vineyard and having the same wine maker, it is very much its own wine.’

Wines of intentionality

This theme – intentionality rather than inferiority – runs through many of the wines often grouped under the second-label banner in Napa. While some are made from barrels or lots not included in the flagship bottling, others are produced from estate blocks explicitly earmarked for these wines.

Still others blend purchased fruit with estate-grown grapes, or are crafted to appeal to a different audience entirely.

Rudd’s Crossroads, Dalla Valle’s Collina, Bryant’s DB4, Accendo’s Laurea, Kinsman Eades’ Hierothesion, and Bella Oaks Le Genie all walk this line. They are wines born not from leftovers, but from decisions about style, accessibility, and audience.

Some lean into approachability and fruit-forward charm, while others still require time in the bottle to reveal their full potential.

‘My father founded Rudd Estate in 1996, with a vision to craft the ultimate expression of terroir,’ says his daughter, vintner Samantha Rudd.

‘We launched the Crossroads wines as a limited-edition second label from 2004 to 2008. But when my father passed away in 2018, I felt it was time to return the Crossroads label and fully use the land and the grapes we source for it.’

Rudd sources from organically and biodynamically farmed sites in the Oakville and Mt. Veeder appellations, crafted by winemaker Natalie Bath. The Crossroads wines serve as an introduction to Rudd’s higher-end estate offerings.

The deep dive

Dalla Valle’s Collina is historically from the younger vines on the property, many of which are over 10 years old. It’s the freshest and most approachable wine, made for early drinking, but it still possesses the thread of Dalla Valle’s structure, integrity, and ageability.

‘The real difference begins when we get onto the blending bench,’ says Nigel Kinsman, who makes Laurea, Hierothesion and Le Genie.

‘We do a deep dive into each flagship lot to assess quality and fit for the “first” wine, and once that blend has been decided, we then turn our attention to the “second” wine.’

Kinsman says there are many reasons for why a wine is not included in the blend for the first wine, but epmahsises that, ‘it’s not an inferior wine, it’s just that particular piece of the jigsaw puzzle doesn’t fit, or in some cases, we just didn’t need all of that particular component in the first wine – too much of a good thing!

‘We take the blending of the second wine seriously, and devote as much energy into this blend as we do for the first wine.’

Every icon needs a sidekick

There’s also the commercial reality. In an increasingly competitive landscape, having a wine that sits below the flagship in both price and positioning isn’t just savvy, it’s essential.

These wines help Napa producers reach new consumers, fill out high-end by-the-glass lists, and meet demand for more accessibly priced bottlings on a restaurant wine list that still bears the imprimatur of a top estate.

For collectors and enthusiasts, the appeal is obvious. Whether you’re seeking a preview of a winery’s house style, a more budget-friendly way to drink iconic fruit, or simply a delicious bottle with pedigree, Napa’s so-called second labels deliver.

And in many cases, these wines offer surprising ageability and exceptional value – especially when tasted alongside the flashier flagship wines.

Which brings us to the list. Below, a look at some of the most compelling wines from Napa producers whose second labels (or companion wines, or entry-level expressions) are every bit as considered, characterful, and cellar-worthy as their more famous siblings.

A selection of second wines from Napa’s top estates

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Cannabis & Cabernet: Shared challenges for California growers

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Humboldt County may be best known more by reputation spread by word of mouth. Cannabis, its key crop, and legal in California, is listed as a Schedule I drug by the US Federal Government.

A coastal region, Humboldt County is located about a four-hour drive north of San Francisco, and is renowned worldwide for historically growing high quantities of cannabis. Images abound of the Netflix series Murder Mountain and the infamous DEA raids of growers in the 1980s and ’90s. When it comes to quality of product, the region’s marijuana growers see a shadow of Humboldt’s days gone by.

Recently, the bulk cannabis industry has moved to the southern part of the state, where larger commercial brands produce distillate products, like vape pods, with very little thought given to growing the cannabis plant itself.

This mirrors the farming of bulk wine grapes in places like California’s Central Valley, in contrast to the small hands-on approach to viticulture in the state’s premier regions like Napa and Sonoma.

Cannabis & Cabernet: Myriad similarities

When California legalised recreational marijuana in 2016, it also enforced new rules that made it impossible for any small farmer to sell their crop directly to a consumer, further removing consumers from the source of their weed.

Much like viticulture, small family farms have an uphill battle, with legacy growers still producing incredible examples of the crop. Chief among them may be Johnny Casali, whose second-generation Huckleberry Hills Farm not only grows excellent examples of cannabis flower but also develops genetics used by many of Humboldt’s top farmers. Consider UC Davis or Tablas Creek’s role in the American wine industry.

Manipulating genetics with cannabis is very similar to the practice of crossing wine varietals. In the same way that Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc crossed to create Cabernet Sauvignon, the cannabis strain Moroccan Peaches is a genetic cross between Spanish Barbara and Lemon Tree Skorange, themselves descendants of historic cannabis strains from Afghanistan and Morocco.

One could imagine a volume entitled Weed Strains as an excellent companion to Jancis Robinson et al.’s Wine Grapes.

Tales of terroir

Similar to wine, cannabis production can take on multiple stylistic forms, and terroir makes a considerable difference in the end product.

‘In my early days of cannabis growing, it didn’t take long to realise that unique elements of place played an extremely important part,’ explains longtime Humboldt grower Griffin Bramble. ‘The microclimate, the soil, the cool nights versus warm nights. It plays a major role in how much resin is packed on the plants and the flavour created from the unique soils and microbes living within them, and it is definitely what guided me to the location of my current farm after working in many different locations throughout Northern California.’

‘Looking at the Anderson Valley in Southern Mendocino County, I learned how the fog interacts with the heat. In eastern regions like Trinity County, I saw the magic of inland heat, playing with the coastal air coming from the ocean. It taught me what elements of microclimate and location were most ideal. This led me to my current location, at 5,000 feet (1,500m) elevation in SE Humboldt County, I found the terroir I had been searching for, and every season I’ve grown, I have seen it expressed in my flowers in a unique way.’

But why are farms with such high-quality and site-specific products struggling?

Tough on small producers

As Casali puts it, ‘Consumers want to develop a direct relationship with farmers and know more about the product that they’re about to consume.’ The answer, unfortunately, lies in the inability of the cannabis marketplace to accommodate high-end small producers.

Dylan Mattole, another legacy Humboldt grower, says that ‘most farmers are really in survival mode. Demand for high-quality cannabis is still out there, but with fewer local distributors and a lack of retail outlets, it’s not easy for anyone.’

Small wine producers in the Napa Valley are unfortunately facing similar issues. In September, three small wine producers sued Napa County for prohibiting them from legally hosting tastings and events on their properties. This came after Napa County filed a public nuisance complaint against Hoopes Vineyard over wine tastings and other prohibited activities on its property. A federal judge has decided to await the state court proceedings between Napa County and Hoopes. There is another lawsuit targeted at Dalla Valley Vineyards, brought by neighbouring property owners over the legality of hosting trade tastings.

Hoopes Winery is alleged to owe Napa County over $8m for illegally hosting tasting experiences and events. Napa also recently banned Hoopes from hosting tastings or selling bottles onsite at the winery going forward. The county’s counter-argument is that small wineries, by definition, do not include hosting guests. Yet Napa County’s own municipal code states that agriculture by definition includes ‘sale of agricultural products grown, raised or produced on the premises’.

Policy problems

When asked about the potential DTC market for cannabis, Mattole says: ‘Gaining direct access to our consumers is our primary goal. Like wineries, we are selling the experience of our products and our region. Currently, we are very limited in how we can make that personal connection with our customers. Like with wine, this will require a policy change. The system now makes this type of direct engagement and sales nearly impossible.’

Similar to Napa, the future of Humboldt’s cannabis-centric economy may lie in fundamental policy changes from California’s government. Back in September, cannabis farmers from across California headed to the state Capitol in Sacramento to lobby for a bill that would have allowed small farms to sell directly to consumers.

But that bill was vetoed by California’s governor Gavin Newsom, who had promised to protect small Humboldt growers before legalisation during a visit to the county in 2015.

Small wineries across California also face similar political issues.

Owner of Hoopes Winery, Lindsay Hoopes, states of the current business climate: ‘If you want to fix this, you must look past the trade organisations and look at small business directly. Trade organisations tend to represent the big wineries but not protect smaller businesses. Different interest groups are at play, agriculture is a land game, and the more land you have, the more powerful you are.’

There is seemingly little relief on the horizon for boutique farms in Napa or Humboldt.

Declining Napa Valley tourism numbers have already led to multiple tasting room closings this calendar year. In Humboldt, there were once thousands of cannabis farms and now just a few hundred, with many more still at risk due to weak cannabis pricing across California’s marketplace.

But no matter the market, both Napa and Humboldt have their calling card, and for that, they will always be worthwhile for consumers of craft wine and cannabis. In the words of Johnny Casali, it’s the respective terroirs that ‘allow the plants to express themselves here, like no other place in the world’.

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I did a lot of tasting in March that doesn’t really count towards my own tally.

In one instance, I was backing up our Napa Correspondent, Jonathan Cristaldi, at Heitz Cellars, with an epic vertical of about 45 wines, which you’ll hear more about later this year.

I also helped out our Sonoma Correspondent Ana Carolina Quintela on the Sonoma Coast. We tasted about 85 wines in one day with some of the region’s top producers.

For my own reviewing, I just about hit 150 wines in March. There were some real gems in there, mostly from Oregon and Washington, with a few delightful wines from California showing up as well and a single wildcard from Bolgheri from a virtual tasting I took part in.

March is also Washington wine month, and so I attended Taste Washington in Seattle, where I found a few new names that I’ll be seeking out to share with our readers soon.

Scroll down for scores and reviews of Clive’s selection of wines from his March tastings

An epic day in Napa Valley

My afternoon with Carlton McCoy and Jonathan Cristaldi got off to an early and somewhat auspicious start. My 8:25 am flight from Seattle to Sacramento boarded early, despite the sideways rain in Seattle. I was feeling pretty good about my ability to get into the Valley early and maybe even have a few minutes to gather myself. My airline would have other plans.

We waited 40 minutes for the pilot, who was doing who knows what, and then sat on the runway for another 25 minutes even though we were number one for take off. Despite that we landed only 15 minutes late, and it’s a quick jaunt to the rental car counter.

Surprise! They rented me a car with an expired registration, so that tacked on another 20 minutes to my waiting around, but before too long I was on my way.

If you’re lucky enough to ever visit the Heitz estate, it’s like going back in time to a Napa Valley that’s unrecognisable today. The old stone winery, built in 1898 has withstood many an earthquake, but the modern winery has crafted some of Napa’s most historic and undoubtedly elegant wines.

It was an epic tasting, and I don’t want to give anything away because you’ll be able to read all about it later this year in the Decanter print magazine. But, I’ll say it was a once-in-a-lifetime tasting experience.

Pigs and Pinot Noir

The next day, it was straight to work as I met up with my two fellow judges to taste blind through the 61 entries in Charlie Palmer’s Pigs & Pinot event. The wine side of things for this event, is taken care of by the legendary Bob Cabral.

I got to rub elbows with some of my favourite California Pinot people, including Ashley Holland and the inimitable Greg Brewer from Santa Barbara County.

There was fantastic food and wine, and great storytelling, from Tom Rochioli, Michael Browne and Bob Cabral himself, who apparently knows everyone.

Legendary Sonoma Coast

I was fortunate enough to join our Sonoma correspondent on a big tasting of over 80 wines on the Sonoma Coast. We had a great sit down with Ted Lemon at Littorai and Catherine Kistler at Occidental, who continue to craft delicious wines.

The Freeman wines and their beautiful estate continue to impress, as do some rising stars in the region, like Ernest Vineyards and their talented winemaker Joseph Ryan.

A cheeseburger from Graton’s classic stop, the Underwood Bar and Bistro, made the stop complete.

The cool side of Washington

Perhaps my biggest surprise when it comes to wine in over a year came from a fantastic day tasting with some producers from the Puget Sound AVA hosted at Bayernmoor Cellars in Woodinville, Washington.

This appellation is often forgotten as it is a complete departure from the rest of Washington state, with a focus on outside-the-box aromatic whites like Siegerebbe and Iskorka and, more and more, Pinot Noir.

I tasted delightful wines made in the very wet, and most of the year, equally cool region where I live. It was an exercise in open-mindedness for me that paid real dividends, and you’ll read more about it later this month. There were impressive wines made by people with a pioneering spirit right on the climatic edge.

The wine that was a complete shock to the system, which wholly reframed the region for me, came from a tiny producer in Snoqualmie, Washington, a place I associate with hiking and mountain biking called Chateau NoElle.

Its 2018 Revelation Pinot Noir from Devorah Creek Vineyard in the Seattle suburb of Auburn nearly knocked me out of my chair. In an age where terms like ‘awesome’ or ‘iconic’ are often overused, the word ‘revelation’ here is apt.

I took the wine home with me that evening to share with a few friends, and it got better over the course of the evening. It shows, for me, the future of Pinot Noir and perhaps Washington viticulture in this region next to the mighty Puget Sound. Winemaker Tom Wilson and his wife Lorrie are doing amazing things in very unexpected places.

In addition, there was a fantastic Washington state Sauvignon Blanc from Trothe, a great San Luis Obispo Chardonnay and the Gamine wines. They come from one half of Portland’s Division Winemaking Co duo, Kate Norris.

These beautiful Syrahs speak to the old world elegance that many love from the northern reaches of the Rhône Valley; these are worth seeking out for lovers of Syrah that goes beyond fruit and bombast.

You can see all the wines we taste in our Decanter database.

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Clive’s selection of top wines from March

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Chateau Montelena put Californian Chardonnay on the map when it secured a shock victory at the 1976 Judgement of Paris.

The winery’s 1973 Chardonnay earned the highest overall grade in that blind tasting, finishing ahead of the finest Meursault and Puligny Montrachet.

Chateau Montelena has gone from strength to strength in the ensuing years, but it now has one eye on the future.

‘We’re not just making wine for today, we’re building a future where Chateau Montelena remains a beacon of quality and longevity for American wine,’ said CEO Bo Barrett

‘This new vineyard is a testament to our belief that the best is yet to come. We’ve always aimed to push boundaries, to show the world what American wine can be, and this step ensures that legacy thrives for generations.’

Chateau Montelena is based in the Calistoga AVA. Entrepreneur Alfred L. Tubbs established the estate on a 103ha plot at the foot of Mount Saint Helena back in 1882, and the Barrett family has owned the company since the 1970s.

The new vineyard is located approximately three miles from Montelena’s current chardonnay vineyard in Oak Knoll.”

It is ideally suited to growing Chardonnay, according to Chateau Montelena, as it features well-drained loam, red volcanic soils and optimal growing conditions.

The Carneros AVA is split between Napa County and Sonoma County. It is located at the southern edge of both counties, and it is renowned for having a cooler climate than most other parts of those counties.

That makes Carneros ideal for growing Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, and many of the region’s grapes are used to make sparkling wine.

Chateau Montelena plans to begin planting the new vineyard next year. The company said the acquisition ‘secures the foundation for the next era of its legendary Chardonnay’.

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Cliff Lede Vineyards said it has bought three hectares (7.5 acres) of vineyard from the Andelin family in Napa Valley’s famous Stags Leap District American Viticultural Area (AVA).

It represents a rare opportunity for the winery, given that the site lies adjacent to the eastern border of Cliff Lede’s Rhythm vineyard. The deal also includes a private home, bringing the total purchased area to 3.5 hectares (8.6 acres), added a spokesperson.

While Cliff Lede has farmed and leased the Andelin vineyard site since the winery was founded in 2002, the prospect of ownership was too good to miss.