There’s something to be said for a winemaker’s long tenure at one estate. It would be a fine thing to, season after season, become one with a vineyard, with its vines and insects and rows and birds and microclimates. Don Schroeder, the winemaker at Sea Smoke, has been at the estate since 2003, and he knows every square inch of it.
I met Schroeder recently in Los Angeles at a Sea Smoke lunch tasting. The wines were very good, and I enjoyed speaking with him about his experiences in Alaska (we both once lived there), his education, his family, and his enthusiasm for Alsace, which I share. We also, of course, talked about the wines he makes.
Schroeder is the subject of the latest “Wine Talk,” which you can read here.
The Sea Smoke Estate shares an intimate relationship with the Pacific Ocean. (Courtesy Sea Smoke)
It was 1976, and a little thing we call The Judgement of Paris took place that year. In short, American wines largely bested their Gallic counterparts in the tasting, as determined by some fine French palates. The world noticed.
Chateau Montelena was one of the American producers involved in the tasting, and to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the auspicious event the estate is introducing a sparkling wine and a brandy in limited editions. These bottlings mark the first time that the estate has made a sparkling wine or a brandy.
The 2023 Blanc de Blanc and Brandy Release #01 go on sale today, July 3 (the brandy is available in California only). The wine is $125 for Chateau Montelena wine club members and $150 for everyone else, while the brandy sells for $75 (members) and $95 for non-members.
“The Blanc de Blancs and the brandy both trace back to the same ground that produced the 1973 Chardonnay,” said Matthew Crafton, president and winemaker at Chateau Montelena. “They aren’t recreations of that wine, nothing could be, but they are honest expressions of the same vineyards, approached with the curiosity and discipline that have always defined Montelena.”
Matthew Crafton, president and winemaker at Chateau Montelena, sits with some bottles at the estate. (Brockhaus Photography)
The sparkling wine’s fruit — 100 percent chardonnay — comes from Napa Valley’s John Muir Hanna Vineyard, which played a pivotal role in the 1973 Chateau Montelena selection that finished on top in the chardonnay category at The Judgement of Paris. The brandy was distilled from fruit (all chardonnay) harvested from the John Muir Hanna, Belle Terre, and Bacigalupi vineyards, the three sites that provided grapes for the famed 1973 vintage. Montelena plans to release nine additional bottlings of brandy over time.
Speaking of the Spirit of 1976, Montelena put together a great kit for the sparkling wine and brandy that includes a bottle of each, along with all of the ingredients needed for the Montelena 76, a cocktail I am looking forward to try.
In honor of a grand occasion and a storied cocktail. (Brockhaus Photography)
If you want to get a bottle of the sparkling wine, click here beginning on July 3. As noted, the brandy is for the moment available solely in California — contact the winery for information on that.
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