A conversation I had at the tail end of the 2014 Premiere Napa Valley Auction: Alder Yarrow: “So, where are you visiting when you’re in town?” Me: “I’ve got appointments at Stony Hill, Kapcsandy, Casa Nuestra…” Alder: “Casa Nuestra! Oh, yeeeah!” Me: “Did you just squeal?” And so there you have it, one of the…
Category: overachiever wines
Yesterday’s Wines, Tomorrow (Stony Hill Recent Releases)
Peabody’s Wayback Machine has got nothing on the steep, two mile drive from Napa Valley’s Bale Grist Mill State Park up to Stony Hill Vineyard. Brave that vertical, moss-covered tree-lined climb between St. Helena and Calistoga, and in many ways you’re transported at least forty years back in Napa time, and to what seems an…
Welcome To The Icebox (Warre’s Otima 10 Year Tawny, Chilled Old School)
The icebox in the title has several meanings (in undergrad literature class fashion). First, it’s a reference to my neck of the woods, currently blanketed in ice, and with > 500,000 homes sans power. Including 1WD HQ. Then, there’s a coy reference to the internal temperature of my house, which, after two days of no…
Hey, Nice Spicerack! (Punchdown’s Cool-Climate Syrah Goodness)
“Joe, Enjoy! – Cool-climate Syrah – touch of Viognier – neutral oak – low alc Best – Jonathan Pey” It’s always nice to get something – anything – that isn’t formulaic when you open something up from the wine sample pool. So much juice comes into 1WD central sometimes, accompanied with letters that begin impersonally…