One of the most pleasant surprises of my recent visit to the Napa Valley was an early look at the soon-to-be-released 2007 vintage of Pinot Noir from Twomey Cellars.
Twomey is an offshoot of Silver Oak Cellars, created in 1999 after the purchase of the Soda Canyon Ranch at the southeastern tip of the Napa Valley. This had been a source of Cabernet grapes for the Silver Oak wines, but the vineyard also possessed exceptional Merlot vines that stirred the juices of winemaker Daniel Baron, who fondly remembers learning at the feet of the Merlot masters in Pomerol and Saint-Emilion in the 1980s.
So Twomey was created to produce Merlot, for Silver Oak’s founding winemaker, Justin Meyer, insisted Silver Oak remain true to its mission — a winery dedicated solely to world class Cabernet Sauvignon.
Twomey has been a roaring success, and in 2006 the winery made its first Pinot Noir from Russian River Valley grapes. The Pinot program really got rolling in 2007 with wines from four appellations: Sonoma Coast, Russian River Valley, Anderson Valley and Santa Barbara County.
I tasted these wines with Baron last week and came away impressed. Much like the Silver Oak Cabs, the Twomey Pinots are uniformly well balanced. They have found that sweet spot between wines that are light and thin and wines that are overripe, jammy and high in alcohol.
The finesse of the Twomey Pinots is most evident in the quality of the tannins. There’s none of the bitter, green stemmy quality found far too often in Pinot from the cooler coastal regions. The silky tannins, fragrant aromatics, generous flesh and palate weight combine to produce elegant Pinot Noir that offers excellent cellar potential as well as immediate appeal.
I sat down with Baron, flipped the video switch and had him walk me through these lovely wines, rendering his unique insight into each. Enjoy!
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