The New York Wine Experience took the high road on its second day of seminars—right into the mountains that run along the west side of Napa Valley—with a tasting of four Lokoya Cabernet Sauvignons from California’s Spring Mountain District and Mount Veeder AVAs.
“I hosted a mountain Cabernet panel here [in 2019] to illustrate what vineyard sources at elevation can do,” senior editor and Napa Cabernet taster James Molesworth said to preface the tasting. “These sites are not conducive to mechanized labor. [They’re] also naturally low-yielding, sometimes giving just half of what a valley floor site does … [in terms of] slope and smaller productions, these are the grand cru sites in Napa.”
Lokoya winemaker Chris Carpenter has been making mountain-grown Napa Cabernets for more than two decades. While he’d taken a red-eye flight to New York to present these two mini-verticals, the former University of Illinois defensive lineman had more than wine on his mind: Filming with his phone, he asked the 1,000-strong crowd to give him a cheer—so his former teammates attending the Illinois-Michigan game would understand why he couldn’t be there that afternoon.
“The 1983 team I played on beat the Wolverines and went on to play in the Rose Bowl; and it’s the hundredth anniversary of Memorial Stadium in Champagne, [Ill.], and all my teammates are there,” Carpenter explained. “I’m happy to be here though too, to talk about what makes these Cabernets special.”
Approaching Lokoya’s Spring Mountain District Cabernet from the 2019 (96 points, $500) and 2006 vintages, Carpenter said the “floral notes are like rose petal and orange blossom; the minerality is different—kind of like a pine forest—and there’s a red fruit character that defines it.”
“Mountain Cabernets age very slowly,” Molesworth added. “I think you see that when you go back: There’s not a commensurate gap in terms of evolution [from the 2019 to the 2006].”
In contrast, the Cabernets from Mount Veeder have “this blue fruit and wet shale–after-a-rainstorm minerality, and a violet note on the aromatics,” explained Carpenter as he and Molesworth compared Lokoya’s 2019 (96, $500) and 2013 Mount Veeder bottlings. “[The 2013] has budged even less than the [2006 Spring Mountain],” Molesworth said admiringly. “There’s a touch of evolution in the aromas, but again, that structure is still evident. The fruit has a generosity, but it’s still really gripping.”
“2013 is one of the great vintages in Napa, and it’s still so vivacious,” said Carpenter. “It was just a perfect vintage.”
Completing Carpenter’s triumphant day at the Wine Experience, his Fighting Illini toppled the reigning champion Michigan Wolverines just a few hours later, 21–7.
