After a two year, five continent search for an ideal wine estate, a French winemaker focused in on the Stag’s Leap District. 35 years later he is producing wines that dazzle.
Stags Leap: Bernard Portet at Clos du Val
Clos du Val is a thought-provoking winery, both for the quality of its wine and for its history. That history begins in 1970 when a 26 year old Frenchman by the name of Bernard Portet was commissioned by a wealthy American to identify land with promise, land capable of growing the kind of grapes that might result in world class wines. Mr. Portet had a mission and a passport, and he went out and searched the world in what has to be one of the most pleasantly challenging jobs I know if.
Keep in mind that 25 years ago the names of important and prestigious wine producing areas outside of a few French regions did not spring to mind the way they do today. After a two year and five continent search, Mr. Portet and his patron, John Goelet, established Clos du Val in the Stags Leap District of the Napa Valley, a place of captivating beauty with a fertile valley surrounded by rugged hills, and blessed with sunny days and cool evenings. Over the years, the three mile long and one mile wide “valley within a valley” has come to be recognized as having one of the finest microclimates in the winemaking world and producing grapes of remarkable focus and flavor.
Mr. Portet’s initial assignment evolved into a long career, and today he is the president and director of winemaking at Clos du Val, producing a selection of sought after, handcrafted, limited release varietals that are consistently recognized by wine lovers for their balance, complexity and elegance.
I recently joined Mr. Portet for lunch at the Mark Hotel in New York. We sampled wines from Clos du Val as well as from estates he presides over in France and Australia. The food and the wine were splendid, as I expected, and so was the conversation. Mr. Portet is the embodiment of an international winemaker, and he tells the story of his life and his wines with grace and charm and an obvious dedication to his work.
Napa is known for the richness and intensity of its cabernet sauvignon, and that seemed a good place for me to begin judging Clos du Val. I tasted some recent vintages, including the 2002, which is on store shelves now, some slightly older vintages like the 1992 and 1999, and a library wine from 1980s. There was a distinct difference reflected in both price and taste between, say, the 2002 cab (about $25) and a 1999 reserve cab (about $86), but both were serious, full-bodied, vibrant and fleshy wines, just what a California cabernet should be. The older wine displayed greater depth and subtlety, but the younger one still managed to gratify on every level, and do so at an affordable price. I recommend all the cabernets I tasted for those bountiful fall dinners we’ll be having now that cool nights are here.
While the pinot noir selections from Clos du Val do not reach the level of importance of its cabernet, they have style and are definitely worth serving. It is hard to come by a reasonably priced pinot noir that is really good. That’s just a fact of life in the wine world. I would not revisit too many pinots at $22, but I would with the 2003 Classic from Clos du Val. Soft, silky and finely structured, it can match quite a few $35 wines from the West Coast or from Burgundy. A Single Vineyard 2001 pinot noir (about $37) was more ambitious, more Old World, and quite delicious.
Clos du Val, with 150 acres in Napa and another 180 acres in Carneros, remains true to the early vision of Mr. Portet. His youthful instincts about “terroir” were correct, and now, 35 years later, his wines prove that land with ideal growing conditions combined with sensitive winemaking do indeed result in wines that dazzle.
