Cathy Corison

Thumbs up. I've dug her wines for a while, and she is getting a lot of interest from younger folks wondering about what California is really all about.
 
originally posted by Cory Cartwright:
Thumbs up. I've dug her wines for a while, and she is getting a lot of interest from younger folks wondering about what California is really all about.
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You should import her.
 
We have no problem selling Cathys wines at a much faster rate than a few years ago. We'll be seeing her at coming chamber music events and I'll inquire. There are more people in the store asking for unspoofulated wines than ever before.
 
originally posted by Cory Cartwright:
Thumbs up. I've dug her wines for a while, and she is getting a lot of interest from younger folks wondering about what California is really all about.
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I agree on the wines but seriouly at $70-100 per bottle are younger folks really interested? I stopped by the winery a year or so ago and tasted some very impressive wines from her 2nd label that were much more reasonably priced. I have also purchased a number of her older wines at half of what the current releases sell for. Nice to see her and others like Dunn getting some recent attention.
 
Very good point Robert. Seems every time I read an article about restrained California wine regaining popularity I can count to 5 and before I'm done the writer will have sung the praises of Corison, but these are still very expensive wines and it'll take more than restraint to justify those prices in my mind. Restraint isn't an end in itself, it's supposed to be a means to an end - showing the character of the site. I haven't had enough Corison wine to have gotten a sense of what that is or whether it's classy enough to justify the price tag, but I've read enough of these odes to Corison in the wine press to have gotten a bit annoyed that nobody seems to address it at all, as if being from Napa and not being overripe is enough. Well, there's plenty of Medoc wine that's not overripe and runs $20 or less. I also wish Renaissance would get more attention from these writers so eager to rally for restraint but I guess making stellar cabernet doesn't count for anything if you're not in Napa.
 
Keith, I think that the Corison wines are classy enough to justify their price tags, but it's difficult to separate a wine from its context (ie: Napa vs Bordeaux). You can get relatively inexpensive Napa Cabernets but they're not going to have the texture and depth that Cathy's wines do.

The Napa thing is definitely in play in terms of the domestic Cabernet hierarchy. There are plenty of producers in Sonoma whose Cabernets are more enjoyable and food-friendly than their Napa neighbors but they don't bring the prices and aren't nearly as collectible. I'm enjoying a .375 of 2008 A. Rafanelli Cabernet from Dry Creek Valley tonight and it's great - 14.5% alcohol but still supple, juicy, and showing great delineation of the classic Cabernet descriptors. The emphasis is on the red fruits rather than the purple/black/contusion fruit of Napa, and it's succulent and a little young and maybe the heat sticks out if it hits room temp, but it works beautifully with lamb chops because it's not cloying or syrupy. This wine doesn't cost anywhere near what a Napa Cabernet of similar quality would bring, but I can't imagine that the Rafanelli's wouldn't charge Napa prices if the grapes were grown in Yountville rather than Healdsburg.

By the same token, I don't think that Corison should charge less than other producers in the neighborhood are able to get for their bigger, spoofier wines. I'm no capitalistic Libertarian teabagger believing it's okay to screw the public for every penny they're willing to let go of, but I don't think that it's fair to ask Ms. Corison to not charge the going rate if people are willing to pay it and if she's offering a good quality product. I'd be less sanguine if she was making El-Spoofo, allocation-only, stoopidly expensive collectible cult Cabernet and selling them at whatever the going rate happens to be.

Maybe the ideal situation would just be to go to the Corison tasting room, work your way through the Cabernets but then only buy her Corazón Gewurztraminer. That way, you get to taste some excellent red wine and go home with an excellent white at a much more reasonable price (albeit made from non-Napa, Anderson Valley fruit, so of course it's cheaper).

-Eden (Shelley Rafanelli graduated from the same University I attended, so her wines must be good, right?))
 
originally posted by Keith Levenberg:
I haven't had enough Corison wine to have gotten a sense of what that is or whether it's classy enough to justify the price tag, but I've read enough of these odes to Corison in the wine press to have gotten a bit annoyed that nobody seems to address it at all, as if being from Napa and not being overripe is enough. Well, there's plenty of Medoc wine that's not overripe and runs $20 or less. I also wish Renaissance would get more attention from these writers so eager to rally for restraint but I guess making stellar cabernet doesn't count for anything if you're not in Napa.
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Both are among the handful (of a kid who played carelessly with fireworks) of American Wines I'll buy and cellar (Mr. Edmunds, as well). With age, their prices are fairly well justified in my mind.
 
originally posted by Eden Mylunsch:
...I'm no capitalistic Libertarian teabagger...but I don't think that it's fair to ask Ms. Corison to not charge the going rate if people are willing to pay it and if she's offering a good quality product.
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Indeed, if you wanted to encourage more such wines to be made, consistently high prices for them would certainly send the right signal.

At lower prices, the Gewurz is nice, and for a while Corison was making some rather good Napa Syrah under her 2nd label (Helios?).

I am a big fan of Corison, but pace Keith and John, there are quite a few wineries producing restrained or balanced wines.
 
originally posted by Christian Miller (CMM):
originally posted by Eden Mylunsch:
...I'm no capitalistic Libertarian teabagger...but I don't think that it's fair to ask Ms. Corison to not charge the going rate if people are willing to pay it and if she's offering a good quality product.
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I am a big fan of Corison, but pace Keith and John, there are quite a few wineries producing restrained or balanced wines.
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What can i say? Her wines are one of the few Cabs (not Franc) that speak to me. If i could swing a case of Monte Bello every vintage, I would. They have that Cantemerle-type qpr that rewards patience without that collectors' fetishism vibe. They're wines to drink, after all.
 
Yes, the wines are expensive. They are more worthy and cost less than so many other Napa Cabernets. The thing about Corison is that she is one of very few winegrowers in Napa (one could say California); and just about the only one I have met from that area who believes in terroir and gets it into the bottle, namely Rutherford Bench.

I've heard tell there are more coming along, but it's been a few years since I was there.
 
I agree, there is the taste of Rutherford Bench in the Corison Cabernets.

They have been a staple of restaurant wine lists that I have worked with for at least a decade, very much owing to the fact that Corison holds back wine and releases library vintages direct from the cellar. We had a long stretch of vintages back to 1987 on The Federalist list, eons ago. I currently work with a list that has Corison Cab back to 1992.

I visited Corison many, many years ago, and with my mother. She was about to depart her California residence in favor of Florida. She called me, as I was in Boston, and said, you know you are into wine, so we had better take a trip around the vineyards before I leave the state. She drove us around Napa, Sonoma, and the Shenandoah in a vintage surviver Subaru that sported a cracked windshield and one working wiper. We would pregame at the Denny's over Spanish omelettes and then make our way out, meeting with whoever we could. I remember standing on the Hendry Ranch, jutting out from Mt. Veeder, and feeling like I was looking across the very seam in the Earth's seal.

We were headed out from a previous appointment at a winery where a sales rep had served us chocolate covered wine bonbons in a tasting room lined with large portraits and larger taffeta. And then we rolled up across the dust to Corison and the day turned on its head. "Sure," was the reply to our inquiry, "I can take you around." No sales about it. Looking at often used pieces of equipment. Taking up bottles from a simple and quite charming rough hewn tasting table. Talking a bit, as folks do. "And how long have you been at school?" and "Oh sure, I remember."

Anyway, it was a highlight for me. My mom liked the Gewurztraminer a lot. It may have been the last wine I really shared with her.
 
FWIW, 44% of the wine purchased in this country is bought by folks 18-31 years of age (and of course, those 18-21 can't even legally purchase so this figure is even larger than it appears). As to the question of whether or not younger folks would be interested in more expensive wines, that figure suggests they would.
Further, this age group seems to be relying less and less on professional reviewers. Research shows that their favorite source of recommendations for buying are each other followed closely by trusted local merchants.
Neither reviewers nor the internet are considered to be "favorite" sources.
Lastly, when asked if they prefer to buy something they have not tried before or something they have tried, the majority say something new.
It is a brave new world out there; Ms. Corison seems well positioned to do well.
And even us boomers like her wines.
Best, Jim
 
Whether they merit the price is a question of far too great philosophical significance for me to tackle (you might say that I Kant do it), but I will add my own 2¢, devalued as they are by Levi's lovely anecdote: after visiting Phelps and being overwhelmed by mintiness, I went to Corison and tasted what I recalled wine tasting like in Napa back in my salad days. The wines were each distinct and yet all hearkened back to my ur-recollection of Napa Cabernet, back when I was too intimidated by Charlie Wagner's crusty persona to utter a single comment in his presence. I was moved enough to buy two of her Cabs on the spot, the only purchase of Napa Cabernet that I've made in the past decade. It's true that I'd buy more of her wine if it were priced lower, but the same could be said of most of my favorite producers.

Mark Lipton
 
Nice to see everyone defending the pricing of the wines. However when I go to the search function I only find two actual posts on tastings of Corison and one was at Family Winemakers. My only point is the pricing of the wines due to the economics of Napa Valley sadly limit their overall exposure. I would say the same for the newer producers (e.g. Arnot Roberts) that are trying to make old school cabs.
 
originally posted by Robert Dentice:

Nice to see everyone defending the pricing of the wines. However when I go to the search function I only find two actual posts on tastings of Corison and one was at Family Winemakers.
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Mom never put her notes up here? Are you quite sure? Maybe something is wrong with the search function. What say you, Politburo?
 
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