The axiom “It’s not what you know, but who you know” applies to today’s wine: Our friend Steve Ventrello, proprietor/winemaker at Parador Cellars, blessed us with an aged Napa beauty that comes in at the country’s best price. And the fact that he has thrown us this juicy bone not once, but twice, has made us deliriously grateful. His “new” back-vintage 2007 Cabernet, from a mature, single-vineyard high up in Napa Valley’s Vaca range, is a terrific expression of the lauded 2007 vintage—a year almost every major publication extolled from the get-go.
Given current market prices, the fact that we can sell this perfectly stored, mature Cabernet for under $50 is downright incredible, especially when the wine performs like this. So here we are again: Another library release from Parador has rocked our very cores and spurred us to reserve the rest of Steve’s limited stock for you. Take as much as your cellar will allow because it is a multi-faceted wine, whether it’s for personal consumption, gifting, a dinner party, or simply for further aging in your cellar. I could rack my brain and scour the internet, but my attempts to outshine this $49 decade-old Napa Cab would be fruitless. Parador’s nine-barrel production from 2007 is the best way to enjoy (and share) something special without breaking the bank. And, based on responses to last year’s 2006 offer, this rare deal will disappear quickly.
Having sold the great wines of the world over a long career as a wine merchant, Steve Ventrello crafts his Parador wines with what might be called a European sensibility. This Cabernet, while in no way lacking in body and structure, is constructed more along old-school Bordeaux lines—he isn’t gunning for ‘cult wine’ status, but rather a powerful, subtly complex red that he’d want to drink both on release and 10-20 years down the line. And one of the linchpins of this philosophy is the great partner/fruit source he found in the Hossfeld family.
Whether it’s the Mayacamas Range to the west or the Vaca Range to the east, the mountains that flank the Napa Valley are a treasure trove of world-class Cabernet Sauvignon vineyards. One example (of many) is the Hossfeld Vineyard, once an overgrown wilderness perched more than 1,500 feet above the valley floor in Soda Canyon, tamed and planted back in the early 1980s by Susan and Henry Hossfeld. The vineyard is extremely steep (required that it be terraced), with a very thin topsoil over volcanic bedrock.
Soda Canyon, where Hossfeld is perched, sits between the Stag’s Leap and Atlas Peak AVAs, up above Yountville. Furthermore, the Hossfelds farm the eight different blocks that comprise this vineyard sustainably, and are moving toward organic certification.
Parador’s Cabernet comes from 30+-year-old vines producing small-berried, thick-skinned grapes, and the wine was subjected to an extra-long (30 months) period of aging in Bordeaux-based oak before bottling. In the glass, it shows a 100% opaque garnet core (really, ink black) moving to hazy brick red reflections at the sediment-heavy rim. It’s intensely concentrated with brawny, slow-dripping tears that show off the brooding, thick-skinned grape that is Cabernet Sauvignon. Mature Napa Cabernet is a dead giveaway on the nose, too: black plums, crème de cassis, damp violet, and black raspberry aromatics are complemented by more-savory scents of cigar box, dried herbs, pencil shavings, tobacco leaf, and damp soil. Structurally, it is wonderfully firm and focused, with polished tannins that frame the ripe, dark-hued fruit. By current-day Napa Cabernet standards, this is a modestly proportioned style—still big and brooding, but far from massive and overly extracted (and all the better for it). While it is starting to enter its peak window of drinking now, I still see 5-10 more years of flattering evolution ahead of it. If you’re enjoying a bottle soon, decant (to rid sediment) quickly and serve in large Bordeaux stems just above cellar temperature, about 60-65 degrees. If you don’t have a cellar, simply place this wine in the refrigerator for a half-hour before serving—temperature is a key component to enjoying this wine to the fullest. As I’ve said before, we all deserve to drink a perfectly mature, perfectly balanced Napa Cabernet as often as possible; to do so with a medium-rare filet soaked in a
béarnaise sauce, is transcendent.
