Napa Valley Classics- Part 1
Charles Krug Winery and Beaulieu Vineyards (BV)
Back in the late 70’s/early 80’s I began my wine tasting adventures
with my friend Walt. Walt’s folks must
have consumed better or more wine than mine because I think he was the
inspiration for us to start this activity.
One of Walt’s claims to fame was that he was interviewed, while still
under-aged, at a winery that was doing a story on the initiation of tasting
fees at wineries. Of course we were very
mature for our age and were very responsible with our initial tasting
trips. There were only a handful of
wineries with tasting rooms at this time and we probably hit them all. The wineries we visited in this era included
Beaulieu, Robert Mondavi, Christian Brothers, Beringer, Charles Krug, Louis
Martini, and Sterling. All of these
wineries, with the exception of Christian Brothers, exist today although many,
if not most have gone through ownership changes. These days we seek out smaller wineries with
unique attractions rather than these big old places, as they have become more
tourist oriented. Maybe we have gotten a little snooty. A couple of years ago we were invited to a
private tasting at Beringer in the old Rhine House and it was fantastic ; I
think we will try to visit all of these old wineries over the next year or so
for the nostalgic aspect of them. After
all, I think many of these wineries own some of the best dirt in Napa. I think we sometimes get jaded into thinking
that because we see wines like Beringer at every grocery store that that is the
only kind of wine they make. This
certainly is not the truth.
Beaulieu Vineyards
This week we’ll talk about our recent visits to Charles
Krug and Beaulieu.
I read somewhere recently that Charles Krug was staging a
comeback which prompted our visit. They
sit on a beautiful piece of property just north of Napa and just up the road
from Beringer. You know by now that we
are not wine critics, we talk about positive experiences and this was certainly
one of them. It is the Charles Krug
history that really is fascinating. The
tasting room is full of facts, timelines and family tree displays. The winery was in fact founded by Charles
Krug but has been under Mondavi ownership since 1943. Ceasare Mondavi, and Italian Immigrant and
father of Robert and Peter Mondavi bought the property for $75,000. Robert Mondavi left in 1968 to start a little
winery of his own and today Peter still runs the Krug operation along with his
sons Peter Jr. and Marc. Over the last 10
years the Mondavi’s have replanted much of their vineyards and they have
recently embarked on a large building refurbishment project.
The winery complex sits down a long entrance and on this
day, olive harvesting was going on in earnest.
The tasting room is not particularly impressive and the grounds seem a
little bit thrown together, but I think
this will change in a year or two when the hospitality center is moved to the
restored Redwood Cellar, a massive 1800’s building. I don’t think we actually saw a lot of the
property because while watching the Food Network last week there was a whole
hour on the wedding of Food Network star Robert Irwine (Restaurant- Impossible
and Dinner-Impossible) which took place on the grounds of Krug (and in the 1881
Restored Carriage House) and the venue and grounds were beautiful.
One of the things we found out here and especially at
Beaulieu is that they do not necessarily pour the wines in the tasting room as
you will see in the stores. I can see
this as being occasionally a disappointment to someone coming in the tasting
room and looking for that supermarket wine.
I think, for all but the bargain basement tasters, people are going to
be satisfied with the larger variety.
Krug offers two tasting experiences.
The Current Releases tasting is $15.00 and the Reserve and Limited
tasting are $25.00. We opted to share
the higher end tasting and we tasted some real premium wines. Krug has vineyards right at the tasting room
property as well as on Howell Mountain, Yountville and Carneros and source
other grapes including Pinot for their Limited Russian River Pinot Noir. The wines associated with the Current
Releases group were priced $18.00 (Sauv Blanc) to $29.00 (Yountville Cabernet)
and the Family Reserve and Limited wines run from $50.00 (Cabernet and Pinot)
all the way up to $125.00 (Howell Mountain Cabernet). The Limited wines really are limited, with bottling
in the 300-400 case range. The standouts
for me were the Voltz Vineyard Red (Merlot) at $80.00 and the St. Helena
Zinfandel at $60.00. At these prices,
they certainly are not the wines you see at Safeway but I have to think they
are fairly priced in comparison with similar quality wines.
Our most recent visit to a Napa Classic was to Beaulieu
Vineyards. BV also has an amazing
history, dating back to 1900 when the winery founder Georges de Latour
purchased the initial 4 acres and named the ranch Beau Lieu or Beautiful
Place. Georges, whose previous experience
was in the Cream of Tartar business, expanded the property in 1903 with Ranch
#1 (additional 125 acres) and again in 1910 with Ranch #2 (146 acres), the
vineyard that now makes up the base of one of Napa’s most famous vineyards the
Georges de Latour vineyard. The first
vintage of the renowned BV Georges de Latour Cabernet was 1936. In 1938 Andre Tchelistcheff, the famed
viticulturist and enologist, came to work for BV and propelled BV to the
highest levels of California winemaking.
Andre Tchelistcheff remained with BV through 1973. Over the last 30 years the winery has gone
through a series of owners and today is owned by Diageo, one of the largest
wine companies in the world, but you would not know it by visiting. BV today is all about BV and its rich past
and really pays homage to this.
In the main tasting room at BV there are three tasting
options running $15.00 and $20.00. There
is also a second tasting room, the Reserve Room which offers a $35.00 and
$40.00 tasting which can include the Georges de Latour Private Reserve
Cabernet. We opted for the Premium
Maestro Tasting at $20.00 but we came in armed with our 2 for 1 tasting coupon
which they would have gladly honored until I remembered that we are wine club members
of a related Diageo owned winery and our tasting was completely comp’d. We tasted a Reserve Pinot, a Cab/Syrah blend
and two other Cabernets. The Cabernets
were labeled No. 1 and No. 2 indicating the Rutherford property from the
original 1903 and 1910 purchases. We
liked the No. 1 a lot. We added a taste
from the regular Maestro Tasting, the Beauroge, a blend of 10 different
varietals and you could certainly taste the difference in quality from this at
$30.00 to the Cab No. 1 and 2 at $65.00.
As a side note here, this is where I became aware that nothing in the
tasting room is of the lower end wines that are in the wide distribution. The lowest priced wine was the Sauvignon
Blanc at $22.00. All the wines available
on the tasting lists were made in the Rutherford facility. The BV Coastal series wines are actually made
in a facility near the central coast in the Hollister area. And a last note on the wine pricing- I
noticed on the BV website the Cabernet No. 1 was on case special at nearly half
off. This is a pretty nice deal.
We really did not take the time to tour the grounds. I
don’t think BV has quite the same set up as Krug does when it comes to this
area. I think the tasting room is pretty
much unchanged in the last 25 years.
What BV does have that you are not going to find anywhere else is the
Rutherford Grill sitting at the corner of the property. The Rutherford Grill is one of the valleys
top lunch destinations and has great outdoor seating. We are not regulars because we (or I) are
always thinking that you come to Napa to drink (taste) wine. One day we will make it there though.
Both of these stops are good. We made these stops on days where really were
in the mindset for just a casual stop and not in that rush to go to ‘new’
places. Surprisingly, neither stop was
overly busy. You may not ever get to see the winemakers at these larger
establishments but certainly there is good wine being poured.
What we liked- The history is great, both our own with
these places and the history with the wineries themselves. The wines are a lot better than we would have
guessed.
What we bought- Nothing. But certainly there is good wine that is
probably fairly priced in comparison to some of those small and unique
wineries. I know that BV has some great
‘sale’ weekends and we might make it to one of those someday.
Vitals-
Charles Krug Winery
2800 Main Street
St. Helena, CA
94574
(707) 967-2000
1960 St. Helena Highway
Rutherford, CA
94573
(707) 967-5233
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