From Napa to the Côtes de Nuits and back

Terroir-driven winemaking

Here is a vineyard with a history. It was first planted to vines in 1878 by the wonderfully named Levi Philander Davis and has been under vine cultivation continuously ever since. Despite the depredations of Phylloxera, Prohibition and depression, when the Snowdens bought the 160 acre ranch in 1955 there were still seven acres of mostly unsuitable varieties planted. Cabernet Sauvignon has been the focus here since the 1950s and the first six acres of new plantings were all that variety. Since then all the original vineyards have been replanted. There are still challenges on this largely forested property, with rabbits and deer among the bigger threats to the vines, but valuable for biodiversity. Stag's Leap Wine Cellars bought most of the grapes in the 1980s and Warren Winiarski helped out enormously with the new plantings and vineyard husbandry.

Now, with Diana Snowden Seysses at the winemaking helm, Snowden Vineyards are an established producer of excellent Cabs. Diana's Burgundy expertise - she's the winemaker at Domaine Dujac - shows in their elegance and purity, while their Napa heritage and terroir is allowed to shine through. These are wines with nothing added and nothing taken out. Great farming, rigorous grape selection, only natural yeasts and gentle extraction combine to make a series of individual, fresh and hedonistic wines. The 2010 Cabernet has 20% Merlot with a little Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot.

Come taste the 2010 Snowden Ranch with three other 2010 US wines this afternoon in the entertaining and erudite company of Gearoid Devaney MS. /CW

Offered subject to remaining unsold; available imminently