Welcome Wine Bloggers to Calistoga

July 22, 2009

We want to welcome the second Wine Bloggers' Conference to Sonoma and Napa this weekend. We know you will have a full three days running back and forth, but if you still want to explore some of the tucked away niche wineries of northern Napa Valley on Monday, July 27th, come over and meet us at Lava Vine Winery in Calistoga.

We opened last October in a refurbished barn at 965 Silverado Trail, just outside of downtown Calistoga and produce Viognier, Chardonnay, Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon. Our winemaker is Nile Zacherle, who also makes the wines for David Arthur and Montagna. We call it Lava Vine because we source our fruit from sites planted in volcanic soils. Our wines are only available via mailing list, or direct from the winery. One of your fellow wine bloggers, Doug Wilder, just reviewed all of our wines last month.

Our owner, Joe Cabral invites you to join him at Lava Vine at 11AM on July 27th for a tweetable tasting of the Lava Vine lineup. We are wireless too, so you can also blog from the picnic benches by the olive orchard.

Please tweet us @lavavine if you plan to make it.

Check out our Facebook page

Enjoy your visit and come share your love of wine with us and each other!

Lava Vine Winery

Reviews from Doug Wilder's wine blog

Hi everyone,

Summer is finally here at Lava Vine and we are all in a very sunny disposition following the publication of tasting notes by the dougwilder purely domestic wine blog. Doug visited us in the tasting room a few weeks ago and spent a couple hours with his nose in the glass and writing down copious notes on our wines. We were getting ready for a Chamber of Commerce mixer that day and as the crowd got bigger, we got stretched a bit thin. We were thrilled that when he was done tasting Doug turned his cap around and helped us pour wines for the event. Thanks, Doug! and thanks for the notes. We are glad you liked the wines. Here are his thoughts:

2008 Lava Vine Viognier Napa Valley; DW 89+

14.1% alcohol

Aromas: jasmine, nectarine and white peach with some crisp notes

Palate: rich, creamy white peach showing mineral and tropical fruit backbone with hints of macadamia

Impression: delightfully fresh and styled slightly round. An excellent choice for warm weather refreshing. I tried the wine initially at room temperature and a second sample from a chilled bottle had a tighter focus.

2007 Lava Vine Chardonnay Napa Valley; DW 89

14.7% alcohol, 207 cases produced

Aromas: creamy lemon, salt and mineral with some flinty edge

Palate: very accessible, soft entry yet displays some mineral and lush citrus through the core

Impression: nice choice for a weekend dinner at home, shows nice structure throughout

2006 Lava Vine Syrah Knights Valley; DW 92+

14.9% alcohol, 266 cases produced

Aromas: warm, smooth and approachable black cherry, black plum and warm blue fruits, chocolate

Palate: solidly focused vanilla, spice, black cherry and dark chocolate

Impression: Syrah needs love in this market, and here is the fluffy poodle puppy. I can’t resist!

2006 Lava Vine Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley; DW 91

14.7% alcohol, 192 cases produced

Aromas: rich cherry, black fig, licorice and slightly dried black fruit

Palate: solidly smooth structure showing chocolate, saturated black currant and red cherry

Impression: very harmonious throughout, this is one of those sneaky wines where you can get into your second glass really fast!

2006 Lava Vine Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve Napa Valley; DW 91+

14.7% alcohol, <100>

Aromas: herbs, black plum and fresh, ripe fig with hints of sweet blackberry

Palate: Firm entry with well defined blackberry, cherry, garden herbs and blueberry

Impression: still showing some tightness across the finish, it needs a bit more bottle time to show its potential

We are especially excited about the direction the Cabernet Reserve is going. We don't open it for tasting very often and it is selling pretty briskly in the tasting room. Doug mentioned he would like to revisit the wine in the fall. We told him "sure, though it may all gone by then!"

Additionally, Doug reviewed the one Zacherle wine that Mike opened for him.

2006 Zacherle Syrah Crowley Vineyard, Spring Mountain District; DW 92

14.5% alcohol, 100 cases produced

Aromas: rich chocolate, black currant and dark cherries

Palate: tobacco, nutmeg with blackberry, currants and graphite

Impression: a beautifully focused Syrah, with intense vibrancy that is hard to match

All of these wines are available in the tasting room. Let us know if you want to stock up following these nice reviews.

- Bella

Doug Wilder's wine review blog can be found here

Spring in Calistoga - Lava Vine Spring Celebration this Saturday, May 2

Welcome to our first blog posting of 2009. We have been busy growing the winery from when we first opened in October, and now that we are catching our breath, expect to see more information coming your way on the blog. 

By the way, that's a picture of us, with our daughter, Paige. What you can't see is the jar containing Paige's tadpoles behind her on the table. Bella is not in the picture because she was chasing one of her favorite sticks.

Springtime has arrived in the Napa Valley and things are getting busier by the day at Lava Vine, and we're growing! The newest addition to our Lava Vine family is Christy Argast, in charge of our recently added private tasting room. To reach Christy directly to set up a private visit, email her at christy@lavavine.com. Her wine education background is a great complement to Mike Gordon, our Sales Director. Now that Joe has some time on his hands there will likely be more hammering and sawing going on around the property. He promises not to start that until next week at the earliest so a

s not to interfere with this Saturday's  Calistoga Wineries Spring Celebration. Remember it is Cinco de Mayo weekend and Calistoga should be hopping beginning tomorrow.  The Spring Celebration is an annual fundraiser for St. Luke's Preschool and last year raised $3500.00 Come on out, taste eight local, family-owned wineries, and help a good cause. Tickets are by donation, but a $35.00 minimum each is requested. This is our first year participating, but don't worry - Joe has the BBQ down to a science. Right now the tasting room is featuring our non vintage Portuguese style Port tasted with Michael Mischer chocolate.

Bring the kids and we can introduce them to Phoebe and Francis, our sheep who live on the property and are the weed control in our organic vineyard.  They will be joined in a few months by the baby lambs. We will let you know when they arrive!

As a reminder, we are located at 965 Silverado Trail in Calistoga. If you are in the area this weekend, or anytime. Stop in and see us. 

Thanks,

Joe and Jill Cabral

We're open, Lava Vine Winery in Calistoga

We want to welcome you to our newly minted blog site. A friend of ours recommended we create a blog to tell the story of our brand and lead you to our just opened tasting room in Calistoga. We're not hard to find. Just drive up the beautiful Silverado Trail till you can't go any further and look for the Lava Vine sign.

Come see us this weekend during Calistoga's Downtown Jazz & Blues Festival on November 1 - 2, 2008

We will be adding lots more information in the next few days.

We look forward to seeing you this weekend. Our address is 965 Silverado Trail, Calistoga. Visit our website at www.lavavine.com, or call us at 707.942.9500 in the winery tasting room. We're here from 10-5 everyday. 

Joe and Jill Cabral