This was my fourth year going and I have to say, I think it was the best. Not only were the wines great, but the food was incredible, and I got to spend time with some of my good friends in Napa, and make some new ones. This event is sort of Napa's unofficial release of the next vintage. This year we were celebrating the year 2014. While most of them still need at least another year to age and mature to perfection, Premiere Week in Napa is a chance to preview the wines before they're released. And I have to say, they're gonna be great. The Napa Valley rarely has a bad vintage, but this is the third in a string of really exceptional vintages. The 2012 and 2013 wines are turning out beautifully and already the 2014's are showing nicely.
Often the first question people ask is, "How can you tell whether a wine is going to be good or not when it's still so young?" And it's true, these wines have a lot of growing up to do but they already have a lot going on. But it can still be difficult to judge a wine at this stage. If you ever get a chance to taste wine from a barrel, here are some things to keep in mind:
- Barrel samples are their own thing. Other than core similarities (like red wine is still red and that kind of thing), wines tasted from barrel are a unique style of wine, kind of like dessert wine or sparkling wine. You have to learn about that particular style in order to be able to evaluate these wines. And just like any other style of wine, the more you taste them, the better you get. Each time I go to Premiere Napa Valley I taste somewhere around 200 barrel samples. That means I've tasted at least 800 wines out of barrel. It takes some getting used to but eventually you can begin to learn differences among barrel sample wines.
- Take a break. Have some cheese. Barrel samples, especially for red wine, are usually more tannic than they will be when released. This is because tannins mellow out with time, and exposure to oxygen. Aging in a barrel allows a wine very slight exposure to oxygen and since the wines still have 12 to 18 months until they're bottled, this time will allow the tannins to soften and become more integrated. In the meantime, though, they can wreak havoc on your taste buds. Your tongue needs a break every so often, with plenty of cheese, bread and water. This gives your tastes buds a chance to re-calibrate and get ready for another round.
- Think about the future. Barrel samples aren't supposed to be good, at least not yet. I've never tasted a barrel sample and said, "This is exactly what I want to drink tonight with dinner." When tasting a barrel sample I'm saying to myself, "What do I think this will taste like in a year, or five years?" That can be kind of hard to imagine sometimes, until you've tasted wines from barrel and then tasted those same wines down the road after they're finished. Then you can begin to learn, through repetition, how those barrel samples are likely to turn out. Since I'm still relatively new at this, I haven't gotten that chance often, but it has happened and it's a pretty cool experience to see how something evolves from barrel to bottle. You begin to learn how the tannins you taste will change, and how the fruit may begin to shine, and how the texture will become silky. Or not. And that's the real benefit to all this, getting a chance to predict how a vintage will turn out once all is said and done.
Apart from all the barrel tasting, some of my favorite things of the week: dinner at The French Laundry the famed restaurant of Chef Thomas Keller and truly a magnificent experience, lunch at Monticello Vineyards where we took apart a barrel and cooked our own steak, dinner at Barnett Vineyards with great friends and the lively winemaker David Tate, having lunch with winemaker Philippe Melka and dinner with Kathy Simpson. Below, some pictures from the week, though I don't have many. I was too busy working.