The wine
lifestyle publication VINO , hosted
its latest group of Rockstar Winemakers at an issue roll-out and tasting last
Friday. The winemakers pouring, and profiled in the harvest edition of the
magazine, included; Joey Arnold of Pozo Valley, Lood Kotze from Cass Vineyards,
Carmine Rubino and Mike Mooney of D'Anbino and Chateau Margene/Moody Family
wineries respectively. Halter Ranch's Kevin Sass and Guillaume Fabre from Clos
Solene L'Aventure were also included in the six "rockstars" in the
latest issue. The (dare I say) pressing demands of harvest kept them from
participating in the tasting but are wineries with which I am familiar. Check
out the group on line or in print and plan to add a visit to your next tasting
tour of the area.
Without going into a lot of tasting note details, it was a
great group of winemakers with vastly different methods of entering the
business. Pozo remains a working family cattle ranch and offered a selection of
2006 Zin, Cab and Black Rock blend. It is rare to see that vintage being poured
or even for sale in these days of three years and out the door being the
standard sales cycle. Yes, Joey told me, "I have the hat and we still have
the cattle.
Carmine uses his music production background and that of his
nephew/partner John D'Andrea to style his wines with musical references on the
labels at D' Anbino. These included Quadrophonic '07, a four wine Bordeaux
blend that adds Syrah to the mix and a Syrah, Cab &Petite Syrah
combination, Orchestration '07.
Lood (a South African moniker) opened the Cass '09 Flying Nymph, a blend combining Syrah, Mourvedre
and Grenache. Other recent Rhone bottlings were also sampled and he discussed
his formal education in wine and travels throughout the world in perfecting his
skills.
Mike Mooney came from a corporate tech sales background and
is determined to make a very few thousand cases of really nice Pinot (under the
Family label) and Cabernet with the occasional experiment with other varietals
just to keep things interesting at Chateau Margene. Meritage and a super Tuscan
style are offered as Chateau Margene while Rhone varietals fall under the Moody
Family label.