2013 Chester's Anvil Zinfandel Mead Ranch - USA, California, Napa Valley, Atlas Peak (11/15/2025)
Was organizing and consolidating boxes to clean up my cellar a bit a few weeks back and came across 2 bottles of this wine. I figured I’d bring them in the house and put them in the drinking queue in the wine fridge. Tonight my Wife walked into the kitchen with one and asked “Can we open this?” Been open 3hrs now, dinner is over, dishes are put away and I’m sitting down with the last couple glasses. Great ruby red with no bricking. Nose is bramble fruit, tobacco, leather and spice. Ripe black cherry, vanilla/sarsaparilla, red volcanic soil/iron up front, zippy acidity turns the fruit red and spreads it across the palate where it picks up some spice and firm chewy tannins. The finish sports red currant, black cherry and chewy chewy goodness. What a delicious Zin. I was worried this might be on the decline but was dead wrong. It still hasn’t reached its’ peak and seems to have at least another decade ahead of it. I’m taking the other bottle, stashing it back in the cellar and upping the drinking window to 2035.
Ron, the drinking window is open but isn’t closing any time soon. If I had 5 I would follow them over the years to get a better impression of their evolution.
Wow! I bought some 2010 Chester’s Anvil Zin, Hattori Hanzo and some 2009 Pott Arsenal (Greer) at Maisonry in Yountville in 2012 (?). It was my intro to Pott wine.
When I finally met Aaron a few yrs later I asked him about the Chester’s Anvil wines. He told us a funny story about the brand’s inspiration- a Napa old-timer, farmer named Chester, I think on Mt Veeder who drove around on an old tractor. I’m a bit fuzzy on the details, but I think Chester asked Aaron (and maybe Steve Lagier) to help move an old anvil which turned out to be huge and impossibly heavy.
Chester’s Anvil wines were supposed to be wines they & their winemaking friends wanted to make & drink. Aaron said the name set up running jokes with their crew- What should we do tonight? Let’s get hammered on Chester’s Anvil!! What did you do last night? We got hammered on Chester’s Anvil!! Etc, etc.
The inspiration for the name was our neighbor Chester Brandlin, who owned property to the south of us. (Chester’s father owned what is now Mayacamas Vineyard in the 1920’s and 30’s and also bought the property south of us that is now owned by Cuvaison and called “Brandlin Estate”. Chester Brandlin retained a few acres of that vineyard for himself.)
One day in April 2007 Chester told Steve Lagier that he needed to disc his vineyard but his tractor wasn’t running. Steve offered to do it for him with our tractor. Chester wanted to pay Steve for doing that but Steve declined. Chester insisted so Steve said “If you really want to pay me, why don’t you just give me that old anvil that’s been sitting in the dirt in your garage for as long as I’ve known you.” So Chester gave him the anvil. It’s a Peter Wright anvil made in England in the 1800’s. It weighs 106 pounds and we still have it.
Later in 2007, Chester asked Steve if he wanted to buy the Zinfandel grapes from his vineyard. Steve initially said no, because our Lagier Meredith wine has always been entirely estate-grown. But a day or two later, during one of our frequent wine-laden dinners with Aaron and Claire Pott, Steve told them of Chester’s offer and we decided that we should buy the grapes and make the wine as a joint project. Thus Chester’s Anvil wine was born.
