Unusually cool weather here in Sonoma County today so my better half fired up the oven and made a huge Alton Brown recipe meatloaf. Decanted the 2013 Calluna CVC for two hours prior to consuming.
Purple color, the blend here is 40% merlot, 28% cabernet Sauvignon, 15% cab franc, 10% malbec and 7% petit verdot. I first had this wine about 6 months ago and tonight reaffirmed my initial impressions. This wine is balanced, concentrated and has many years of development ahead.
Really fragrant nose of cassis, herbs and a distinct floral note. Flavors follow nicely with red cherry, raspberry essence along with that floral note (maybe acacia?). Acidity and tannins are evident but in perfect balance. This has the guts to age but drinks well now with a nice long decant.
This CVC bottling is a screaming buy if you like complex Bordeaux blends that drink well now but will no doubt age into something special.****
Haven’t had any other Calluna offerings but look forward to trying others in the line up.
You let it go 2 hours? I’ve found that the CVC falls off fast recently and has been more of a pnp these days. Maybe it’s just me and haven’t let it go that long.
I bought several bottles of the 2010. I’ve had two, one maybe a year ago and one last month. They’ve been pretty dreadful - they taste like black olive juice, seasoned with some bell pepper and green tobacco.
The wine was passable at first in a kind of extreme AFWE have-to-drink-with-food way, but it gets steadily worse with more air. Both bottles were like that.
I opened a bottle of the 2014 recently and it was great. None of the greenness to which Chris alludes in the 2010. These are structured wines, and lean by California standards, but I’ve found them to be very well built.
CVC is probably my least favorite cuvée - has been fairly tight and benefits from substantial air. I really love the Merlot Aux Reynauds, which i feel is something very special. And the Colonel’s holds its own with top end Bordeaux.
I’ve had Calluna CVC, Estate and Aux Reynauds Merlot starting with the 2008 vintage and most of the vintages since, am a big fan ala Noah. Tom, if you like the style of the CVC then the Estate is definitely worth checking out. My favorite bottling is the Aux Reynauds Merlot.
I wasn’t so sure about the 2013 after the first bottled opened about a year ago but all bottles since (all in the past nine months) have been very good. All bottle have been PnP but I haven’t noticed any decline over the hours that its open. I believe that it has many years left and unlike prior vintages intend to keep a couple back to see how it ages.
The 2013 estate is at a whole different level from the CVC and a wine that I think won’t show its best for at least a decade.
I’ve never had the 2010 CVC but I recently opened my first 2010 Colonel’s and it was showing really well after a two hour decant. I opened it side by side with an EMH regular for a buddy of mine who hadn’t tried either and on initial pour into the decanter the Calluna did not show well at all and I worried about if it would even be drinkable. The EMH showed much better at this point. Two hours later, the Calluna had opened up and shed all its nastiness and on this night was much the better wine than the EMH.
Obviously, the CVC is not the Colonel and my tastes do lean AFWE.
Interesting take. The last one I had one of these, (forget the year, but think I posted on it) and thought it full of typical California gloss, while the first one (different year) was more restrained and a whole lot better, but never in the AFWE camp.
Yeah, I would agree - not AWFE but not a fruit bomb either. I opened a 2013 CVC right after delivery in the Spring 2016 - it was a disjointed hot mess. Six months later it had come together nicely and was very enjoyable. I think the entire line up just needs more time than a lot of other wines. The Estate wine is my favorite. Cheers!
Agreed with Markus. I’ve never thought of Calluna as anything near AFWE, though I’ve never had the 2010. Maybe it was vintage specific? Def one Cali red I am not afraid to buy as I do find it much more restrained and balanced than almost all offerings at the $25 price point. Maybe I’ll let my next bottle air out for longer.
I get the sense this is a good producer, but I doubt many of you would have liked those two bottles I opened. Maybe that just wasn’t a good bottling, or maybe I got poor bottles. I’m glad most of you are having good experiences.
Your bottle sounds like it might have had reductive problems Chris. Might contact the producer to see what they say, if you haven’t already. If someone had an off bottle of my wine, I’d want to hear about it.
We had the 2012 CVC in November and it needed a 3 hour decant to start showing. This wines needs major time in the bottle/cellar. I buried my other bottles. I can only imagine the 2013.
I thought I would make a couple points as winemaker. When talking about the various vintages of the Calluna Vineyards Cuvee (CVC), it is important to note that the 2010 is somewhat of an outlier. It has a significant herbal element that the others do not have. This was due to the severe heat spike in August of 2010 when temperatures went to 106 for three days after an otherwise cool year. Many, including us, lost a lot of fruit. In addition, I believe it impacted the phenolic development of some of the blocks. Many will not like that herbal tone, and Chris, I am sorry you are among those. It is not my favorite CVC either, not so much that I do not like the wine, but rather I view it as a bit atypical. Nevertheless, I sold out of that wine easily as many in the NYC and SF markets loved what they see as a classic Cabernet nose. My other 2010s have a touch of that herbal tone, but far less. I recently poured the 2010 Calluna Estate at an event and it is showing beautifully. Regarding the issue of decanting: honestly I feel decanting is only needed to separate a wine from sediment. All other times, I let the wine take air in the glass and over the course of consuming the bottle – I want to see what the wine is like immediately after opening. While young wines can benefit from an open decanter, many also blow off beautiful fruit components too. Nearly all my vintages of CVC will age well, but I feel they are very drinkable now and without a lot of aeration. If you want to decant, I would advise this: splash pour the wine into an open decanter, then pour back in bottle and reinsert cork. Give it a couple hours like that – it will get a full oxygenation but will not be blowing off aromas sitting in an open decanter. Chris, I would love to have you visit sometime to taste other vintages of CVC and a range of our more limited production wines. Thanks, David
I checked in on a 2013 Colonel’s this last weekend along with a grilled ribeye. I anticipated the wine would need some air, so I decanted about four hours prior to dinner. I did notice that the nose was fairly well developed right after opening the bottle, but the flavors were a bit muted. Flavors developed nicely over dinner and in my opinion, the nose improved as well. It was a very nice cabernet and was enjoyed by all - glad I have a couple of more stashed away. Cheers!
I just saw this lovely post from David, and I’m glad I did.
Your explanation makes perfect sense, and I’ll look forward to trying some different bottlings and vintages of your wines. Like I said, I could tell from the comments I’ve read about Calluna and the people who made them that this was probably a producer I would like, but as I expressed, the one bottling I’ve tried didn’t show well for me.
The 2012 and 2013 Chalk Hill and the 2012 and 2013 CVC are pretty easily available at around $30. Anyone want to recommend one particularly over the others? I’m a huge fan of the 2013 California vintage in general, though it’s possible 2012s would be more open today if I didn’t want to wait.