Rotating Reds - Napa Valley's Six-Course Supper Club
By Steve Pitcher

Emerging from the cave into the warm, early-evening mountain air, I made my way across the winery's crush pad to the walkway and up a gentle slope to the house where the bustle of activity met me halfway. Having just tasted through an extensive flight of precocious, pre-release Cabs in the recently completed von Strasser cellar, my senses were on ready-alert. The gentle tinkling of crystal stemware being set out hinted at what was in store and the tantalizing aromas wafting from the kitchen set my mouth watering.

Although I hadn't visited this property before, I knew its owners and had enjoyed the hospitality of the exclusive supper club to which they belong. Having dined with the group at a succession of annual harvest affairs held at each member's Napa Valley home, I was primed for a memorable repast.

Climbing the stairs to the house, I surveyed the pleasant outdoor terrace filled with tables laden with a profusion of wine glasses. Here, I told myself, the feast would soon begin.

This was the sixth annual supper and wine tasting undertaken by the Rotating Reds, a group of six small (less than 6,000 cases), premium Cabernet producers who banded together in 1996 to acquaint a handful of wine writers with their wines and the personalities behind them. I felt fortunate, indeed, to be among those critics invited back each year.

Tonight's informal evening of fine wines, great food and lively conversation - a repast that would stretch well into the night - was being hosted by Rudy and Rita von Strasser at their spacious home and winery on Diamond Mountain, Napa County's newest officially designated appellation (AVA) at the northern end of the valley, to the west of Calistoga.

Each year, the hosting role rotates from one member of this red-wine fraternity to the next - hence the name "Rotating Reds" - so the dinner at the von Strasser home marked the first full rotation of responsibilities.

The circle complete, on September 5 the dinner will return to the home of John and Diane Livingston, proprietors of Livingston-Moffett Winery, who initially set the tone for these delightful and informative events and were instrumental in forming the group. "Robin Lail was doing some consulting for us in 1996 - before she had her own wine label - and it was she who came up with the concept and the name," Diane recalls. "We were developing public relations ideas and she suggested joining forces with a few other small Cabernet producers to hold a social event during harvest each year." They felt that a casual dinner would be an ideal environment for a select group of writers to better get to know the wines and their makers.

"Robin coined the name Rotating Reds, but it was up to me to invite the members."

She settled on five other family wineries whose main focus was ultrapremium Napa Valley reds. Invitations were extended to Barnett Vineyards, Harrison Vineyards, Judd's Hill, Pahlmeyer and the more recently completed von Strasser Winery.

"Because we were in the midst of building the caves and remodeling our home at the same time, we asked to be put at the end of the rotation," Rudy von Strasser explains. "Knowing we would be the host in 2001 compelled us to get the work completed on time. September 6 was our target date."

The Rotating Reds dinners are intimate affairs that depart from the typical wine country catered meal in that each Reds member prepares one of the six courses using a personal recipe that has been carefully matched to a wine from the vintner's cellar. Talk about incomparable pairings!

The von Strasser's first course of vichyssoise - served with their 1991 Diamond Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon - is a wonderful example of the group's creativity. Drawing on his Viennese heritage, Rudy cooked up an Austrian version of potato-leek soup, served chilled in the traditional manner, but enhanced with roasted garlic and finished with a drizzle of spicy pumpkin seed oil.

The 1991 Cab, a nicely evolved mountain wine, was Rudy's second release under the von Strasser label. After graduating from UC-Davis in 1985, he honed his winemaking skills that year at Château Lafite-Rothschild (thanks to a family connection with Eric de Rothschild), followed by a stint at Napa Valley's Trefethen Winery. In 1988, he became assistant winemaker at Newton Vineyards in St. Helena. The next year he and Rita Amidon were married and set out in search of a vineyard property to call home. Serendipitously, the old Roddis Cellars wine estate on Diamond Mountain came on the market and they jumped on it. In the spring of 1990, the von Strasser label was born and the couple embarked on the task of renovating the property. After the 1990 harvest, Rudy left Newton to concentrate on his fledgling brand.

Originally planted in 1970 with Martha's Vineyard budwood, the six-acre vineyard was modernized and expanded with inter-planting to create higher density and a conversion of the old trellising to the more efficient, vertical shoot-positioning system. Today eleven acres are planted to various clones of cabernet sauvignon, a 1-acre plot is devoted to Rudy's beloved petit verdot and 2.5 acres, located further up the mountain, are planted to chardonnay. The von Stassers also retrofitted a circa 1890 barn to serve as the winery. The caves, dug into the hillside behind the winery site, were the piéce de resistance.

So how do Austrian-style vichyssoise and mountain-grown Cabernet pair? Quite well, actually, with the pumpkin seed oil lending a piquancy that enhances the wine's inherent spiciness and enlivens the deep berry-cassis fruit. Rudy's bigger Diamond Mountain Reserve, which was discussed at the table, would have completely overshadowed the dish. To make a match with the petit verdot-rich Reserve, Rudy says, "The food would have to be particularly robust and hearty, maybe something like wild boar." Often with more than 40 percent petit verdot blended with cabernet and merlot, the Reserve is a wine of massive proportions. Yet as Rudy points out, this ultra-Diamond Mountain wine "still exhibits the finesse that marks our other Cabs."

A flawless shift from red to white was pulled off by Jayson and Paige Pahlmeyer, whose 1999 Napa Valley Chardonnay proved a seamless match for their coriander-perfumed dish of "Sunken Shrimp."

Jayson, who is rarely at a loss for words (perhaps a legacy from his years as a successful trial lawyer) is justifiably proud of the personality his wines possess. "Our strict viticultural regime, combined with a non-interventionist winemaking approach, creates wines that exhibit full-throttle fruit with concentration, polish and pizzazz," he asserts.

By the time the Rotating Reds gathered in 1998 at Pahlmeyer's ultracontemporary, showcase residence and winery high in the eastern Napa hills on Atlas Peak Road, the Pahlmeyers were truly living the wine-country dream. Twenty-odd years before that, Jayson had realized he was reading more wine journals than law reviews and decided to pursue his goal of producing a California "Bordeaux-style" blend. After several trips to France, where he sought the aid of viticultural experts at the University of Bordeaux, he isolated excellent clones of each of the five red Bordeaux varieties and had them imported - legally, he insists - into California. He used them to great effect in partnership with viticulturist John Caldwell in a vineyard they planted on terraced hillsides at a 500-foot elevation in the comparatively cool Coombsville area east of the city of Napa in 1980.

The then-freelancing Randy Dunn (who at the time was also consulting for the Livingstons, fellow Reds members) was enlisted to make the first wines, Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon, from purchased fruit under the Five Palms label. The undertaking went "upscale" in 1987 when Jayson changed the label to "Pahlmeyer" and released the 1986 Pahlmeyer Red Table Wine, a blend of all five classic Bordeaux varieties prominently enumerated on the label, on October 1, 1989.

The esteemed Helen Turley took over from Dunn as consulting winemaker in 1992. In the transition, these two veritable winemaking legends collaborated to create the 1991 Pahlmeyer, a cabernet-dominated blend reflective of Pauillac, and the 1992 Jayson Red Table Wine, in which merlot leads the blend à la Saint-Emilion.

In the mid-1990s, Jayson began sourcing fruit beyond the Caldwell Vineyard, turning to cool, hillside sites with low yields on Spring Mountain, Howell Mountain and Carneros. In 1997, he purchased the historic Waters Ranch, a 220-acre property about ten miles east of the city of Napa in the hills of the Atlas Peak appellation at an elevation between 1,700 and 2,100 feet. "This is a perfect spot for us," Jayson exclaims, noting that planting began in 1998. "The vineyard presents three plateaus, or benches, and supports about 100 acres of vines. Each possesses a different terroir - one is perfect for cabernet sauvignon, another for merlot and cabernet franc and a third for malbec and petit verdot." They've also planted a small amount of sauvignon blanc and sémillon, anticipating the day when full-time winemaker Erin Green will turn out a Bordeaux-style white along with the winery's signature red blend.

Now at the midway point of the evening, I could sense the pace slowing a bit as we vainly attempted to make ample room for the remaining three courses. And while the portions had been appropriately diminutive, the flavors were, indeed, generous, as demonstrated by "Pasta Daddy," a fusion of penne pasta, cannelloni beans and ground lamb dreamed up by Fiona and Hal Barnett and paired with their complex and silky 1999 Santa Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir.

After commuting from San Francisco to the Napa Valley for nearly a decade, in 1991 the Barnetts decided that raising their three girls in the country "would be better for them," Fiona notes. They'd originally bought the real estate - 40 acres near the top of Spring Mountain high above St. Helena - in 1983. Initially intended merely as a weekly retreat, the site boasts spectacular views of the valley 1,700 feet below. "All we wanted was to build a small house for the weekends and plant a few vines," Fiona recalls. But somehow, the small house morphed into a magnificent showplace, and the few vines grew to 14 acres of terraced vineyards planted to cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc and merlot.

Most of the planting was done between 1984 and 1988, but not before clearing the land of huge boulders and building terraces that would follow the contour of the hill. "The land is very steep with grades of 45 to 50 degrees in some places, averaging a bit more than 35 degrees," Hal notes. "Mountainside farming is quite challenging; the vines have to struggle to reach nutrients and water in the soil, and so yield is naturally low, between one and two tons per acre." The site is hand-harvested, row by row, "by a team of loyal workers" as the grapes reach optimum ripeness and maturity.

Although the Barnetts originally planned to sell their grapes, they too succumbed to the siren that is winemaking. They hired Kent Rasmussen to make their first vintage in 1989. Since 1992, the wines have been produced by Charles Hendricks, the winemaker at Steltzner Vineyards, and today all facets of the winemaking process take place in the estate winery, completed in 1990.

The Barnetts produce a trio of Spring Mountain District Cabernets, including two vineyard-designated wines and an appellation bottling, each of which is distinctive for floral notes. The Spring Mountain District Cab is a chewy wine on release, offering rich blackberry fruit aromas and flavors accented by an intriguing note of just-crushed rose petals. More massively proportioned, the Peacock Family Vineyards Cab and the highly sought-after Rattlesnake Hill Cab both entice with a dried floral note reminiscent of pressed violets.

For the meat course, Art and Bunnie Finkelstein of Judd's Hill had whipped together an earthy, soul-warming "Wine-Friendly Ragout of Curried Lamb," opting to pair it with their 1997 Estate Cabernet.

Judd's Hill (named for the Finkelstein's son, Judd) produces around 4,000 cases of Cabernet and Merlot per year from its 14 acres of terraced estate vineyards. Bunnie notes that "Judd's Hill is actually three hills, each with different soil profiles and orientations." The two main hills sit at right angles to each other, one with a southern exposure and the other facing west. "They join at the bottom at a lovely pond that we use for irrigation and a little bass fishing," she adds. The third hill faces southwest on what the Finkelsteins believe to be "antique" vineyard land from the early 1900s. "Most of the vines are cabernet sauvignon, with just enough merlot and cabernet franc to make it interesting," she says.

The Finkelsteins moved to St. Helena from Southern California in 1979 to establish Whitehall Lane Winery with Art's brother's family. Nine years later, the families sold the highly successful winery and the Finkelsteins relocated to the beautiful vineyard property they had purchased a few years earlier on the east side of Napa Valley, overlooking picturesque Lake Hennessey.

"When Alan, Art's brother, wanted to retire in 1988, we decided that a smaller venue would be more our personal style," Bunnie recalls. They downsized from a 30,000-case-per-year winery to Judd's Hill, which produced about 400 cases in 1989.

Rather than building both a home and a winery on the property, Art, who had an architecture firm in Southern California, determined that two structures would require the removal of too many precious cabernet vines, so he designed an all-in-one home winery. "We live on the top floor and the 3,000-square-foot winery occupies the ground floor," Art explains. "It's something of an homage to our ancestors living 'over the store,' so to speak." The building borrows its profile from the ubiquitous Napa Valley barn, fitting unobtrusively into its sloping site.

The winery's namesake, now 30, has a natural talent for sales and marketing. "Watching Judd sell wine when he was working at Whole Foods Market was poetry in motion," Bunnie recalls. Naturally his parents offered him the position of managing the winery's sales and marketing activities. His pitch is basic and convincing, says Bunnie, paraphrasing: "'Hi! I'm Judd from Judd's Hill.'"

The task of winemaking falls to dad, who strives for balance and complexity in his handcrafted wines. The estate Cab proved a sublime match for the lamb, and raised expectations even higher for the 30-odd diners ringing the tables.

The next course, a much-welcomed "Spinach Salad with Hot Bacon Dressing and Cheeses," was orchestrated by John and Diane Livingston, who chose it as accompaniment to their luscious, fruit-forward 1999 Mitchell Vineyard Syrah because of the bacon-like characteristics in the wine.

In search of the alluring wine-country lifestyle, the Livingstons moved to the Napa Valley from Los Angeles in 1976, purchasing a Rutherford Bench property at the end of Cabernet Lane that included a seven-year-old cabernet vineyard. Adding to the mystique and beauty of the estate were the remains of an abandoned "ghost winery," the once-great wine cellars of H.W. Helms, a German viticulturist, who had built it out of native stone in 1883.

"We moved to the Napa Valley with no intent to make wine and, in fact, we were drinking Lancers or Mateus at the time," Diane explains. "We had no background particularly suited to the discipline except, as a stretch, John's geology profession," which gave him a leg up on some of the area's week-end gentlemen farmers. For the first few years, they were content to sell their grapes to area wineries.

By 1984, however, they had become enamored of the prospect of making wine from their much-sought-after fruit and launched their Livingston-Moffett label (Moffett is the last name of Diane's three sons from a prior marriage). Randy Dunn was tapped to make the wine at a custom-crush facility. "We bought our own barrels for aging," John recalls, "and being Cabernet producers meant financing three years of inventory, barrels and bottling, plus graphic design and sales networks. In 1987, we sold our first bottle of wine and had 900 cases of 1984 Moffett Vineyard Cabernet under our belt."

The Livingstons began purchasing additional grapes in the late '80s to increase production, focusing on three disparate but impeccable Napa Valley cabernet sources: a rocky, mid-valley knoll affectionately known as the "rockpile piece;" five acres of older vineyard on Howell Mountain; and a parcel of west-side benchland. The combined fruit goes into the winery's highly regarded, non-estate "Stanley's Selection" Cabernet, which was launched in 1989.

"After custom-crushing, the next phase was to do all barrel aging, racking and blending on premise, which for us meant construction of caves in 1991," John explains. "Finally, in 1996 we built our own facility, bringing home all aspects of the winemaking, which is really a dream come true."

Since its inception, Livingston-Moffett has been a family-run business: middle son Mark directs cellar operations; son Trent specializes in sales, marketing and strategic planning; Diane manages the winery from her headquarters in the barn near the family home; and John, with a love of the land and geology degrees from Yale and Rice Universities, is out in the vineyards overseeing the seasonal activities of grape growing and winemaking.

Dunn made the wine through the 1990 vintage, and then handed off to John Kongsgaard, who spent five years shaping and developing the winery, moving on only last year to dedicate more time to his own projects, particularly Kongsgaard & Arieta. Today winemaking is in the capable hands of Mark Moffett and consulting winemaker Marco DiGiulio, previously the winemaker at Cardinale and Lokoya.

The candles were nearly spent by the time Lyndsey Harrison presented an exotic, sinfully rich chocolate dessert dubbed "Zuzu Gateau Georgette," which she boldly served with her plush Harrison Vineyards Zebra 2000 Zinfandel.

Before settling in Napa Valley in 1988, Lyndsey and her late husband, Michael, had been looking for a retreat in Tuscany until the former New Yorkers discovered the 48-acre jewel of a property high above the valley floor overlooking Lake Hennessey. "Michael wanted lots of trees and I wanted vines," Lyndsey remembers. "This place had them both and we fell in love with the property the moment we saw it."

Even though the site was planted to 17 acres of mature chardonnay and cabernet sauvignon, the Harrisons were not entertaining the idea of becoming vintners. Rather they were content to sell the fruit to nearby wineries, an arrangement established by the previous owners. Yet local friends who were acquainted with the high quality of the property's fruit encouraged them to make their own wine. "It really didn't take too much convincing," Lyndsey admits.

Their first commercial wines - a Chardonnay and Cabernet from the difficult 1989 vintage - were made with consultant Helen Turley at a neighboring winery and released in 1990 and 1991, respectively.

Although Michael died rather suddenly in the summer of 1999, Lyndsey soldiered on, hosting the Rotating Reds dinner at her home that September. Last year, she married Robert Leslie, who has since assumed the role of CFO, handling the business side of winemaking.

Lyndsey makes her own wines now in a small, rustic winery on the estate and also produces limited quantities of exquisite olive oil. She credits her Bordeaux-school winemaking techniques - extremely gentle crushing, extended maturation prior to pressing, cold soaking before spontaneous wild-yeast fermentation, barrel-to-barrel racking and no fining or filtering - to the mentoring she received from John Kongsgaard, who served as consulting enologist for Harrison in the early 1990s.

"After we bought the vineyard in 1988, I interned as a 'cellar rat' at the Pecota Winery, where I learned the basics, and took weekend classes and fully immersed myself in trade periodicals," Lyndsey explains. "However, I gained my most helpful information from new friends in the wine industry who were free with their knowledge." >

The Harrison estate is comprised of five separate small vineyards on rugged terrain, flanked by forests of oak and madrone, which compete with the grapes for the scarce water hidden beneath the shallow, rocky soil. "On hot days you can almost feel the roots reaching down, finding comfort only in the cool evening, when breezes drift over Lake Hennessey," Lyndsey remarks.

The wines she so lovingly crafts are notable for their rich aromatics and dense, rich, vibrant fruit, and the Zebra Zin, in particular, proved its breed on this particular night.

As both participant and observer over the last half-dozen years, I can testify that Robin Lail's idea has richly served the members of Rotating Reds. Not only have they sewn good will and good cheer from a string of stellar Napa Valley reds, they have woven a fabric of enduring friendships among themselves that will last a lifetime.

Based in San Francisco, Contributing Editor Steve Pitcher is vice president of the Vintners Club and president of the Bay Area chapter of the German Wine Society. He can be reached via e-mail at wine2words@aol.com.

Tasting Bar

The wines were not tasted blind, and most were still several months away from release. Because numerical scores are inappropriate for young wine, the notes on these "baby" Cabernets are accompanied only by a BuyLine-based "word score" that indicates a range of quality.

Barnett Vineyards, 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon, Spring Mountain District - $60: Evolving nose of ripe berries, black cherry, plum and vanilla bean accented by toasty oak. Smooth and seamless with medium tannins framing flavors of ripe cassis, blackberry, dark chocolate and dried herb. Very Good

Other 1999 Barnett Cabernets tasted: Peacock Family Vineyards and Rattlesnake Hill, (limited production), both $95, both Outstanding.

Harrison Vineyards, 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon, Estate Grown, Napa Valley - $60: Pleasant scents of mocha, warm earth and cherry-berry fruit. Bolstered by medium-full tannins, this full-bodied mountain Cabernet is loaded with ripe berry-cassis fruit accented by a hint of coffee bean. Smooth, round and rich with enormous depth. Outstanding

Judd's Hill, 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon, Estate, Napa Valley - $70: Forward nose of glove leather and black raspberry-cassis fruit. Full-bodied, rich and generous on the palate displaying super-concentrated black fruit imbued with subtle, leathery undertones and medium tannins. Long, pleasantly oaky finish. Superb

Livingston-Moffett, 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon, Moffett Vineyard, 15th Anniversary Vintage, Napa Valley - $55: Enticing scents of dried herbs, glove leather and black currant. Ultrasmooth and rich with great concentration and copious flavors of red cherry-cassis fruit. Finishes with a wonderful flourish of red currant. Outstanding

Pahlmeyer, 1999 Red Table Wine, Napa Valley - $90: Attractive, complex, aromatic nose of glove leather, vanilla, dried lavender and dark cherry-cassis fruit. Plush and velvety in the mouth; brimming with complex, deep, persistent flavors of ripe berry-cassis fruit, mocha and vanilla. Downright delicious. Superb

Von Strasser, 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon, Estate Vineyard, Diamond Mountain - $70: Appealing, complex scents of leather, blueberry, cassis, boysenberry, subtle cigar-box and a wisp of faded roses. The nose is replicated on the palate with wonderfully deep and concentrated flavors braced by medium-full tannins. Outstanding

Other notable 1999 Von Strasser reds: Sori Bricco Vineyard Red Table Wine, Diamond Mountain - $60 (Outstanding); Diamond Mountain Reserve (Meritage blend) - $100 (Superb). - SP

Warm Spinach Salad
with Bacon-Thyme Dressing

Pair with Livingston-Moffett 1999 Mitchell Vineyard Syrah

5 cups loose, fresh spinach
10 slices bacon


For the Dressing:

3 tablespoons bacon drippings
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon brown sugar
3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon fresh thyme


Wash and dry spinach, set aside. Chop bacon into 1/4" pieces and fry until crisp, set aside and drain on paper towel. Measure bacon drippings and discard the balance. Return bacon fat to frying pan and warm over medium heat. Add balsamic vinegar, olive oil and brown sugar. Cook until brown sugar melts. At this point dressing may be held until ready to use. Reheat and add thyme prior to serving. Pour over spinach and serve. Garnish with chopped bacon.

Serve with a good, crusty bread and selection of cheeses such as French bâtard, Vermont Farmhouse Cheddar, Single Gloucester Neals Yard and aged Asiago.

Serves 10

Pasta Daddy!
Pair with Barnett 1999 Santa Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir

1 pound penne pasta
1 pound ground lamb
2 fennel bulbs, sliced
1 white onion, chopped
2 tablespoons minced garlic
2 16 ounce bottles tomato sauce of choice
1 10-ounce can cannelloni beans, drained
1/4 cup olive oil
Salt and pepper
3 stems rosemary, chopped fine, stems discarded
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese
Warm olive oil in sauté pan over medium-high heat. Add onion, garlic and fennel and cook until soft. Add lamb and brown. Add tomato sauce, beans and rosemary. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Turn down heat and let simmer, covered, for 15 minutes.

Bring 4 quarts salted water to boil. Cook pasta until al dente. Drain but do not rinse. Gently fold sauce into pasta, add freshly grated Parmesan cheese.

Serves 6-8

Changing of the guard

The Rotating Reds supper club is bidding farewell to Pahlmeyer this year, an original member winery. Owners Jayson and Paige Pahlmeyer plan to devote more energy to their growing family and newly completed winery in Sonoma County. Lail Vineyards will fill the spot vacated by Pahlmeyer, a solution the members view as fitting. "It's perfectly natural to invite Robin Lail to join our group," says Rotating Reds co-founder Diane Livingston. "After all, she came up with the Rotating Reds idea, her winery is small and her specialty is red wine." - SP


Article first published in The Wine News