Recommendations on wines to cellar

[Innkeeper]

In this week’s newsletter (11/30/06) that was transmitted yesterday, Dan Berger quotes Dr. Richard Peterson a long time wine maker and recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the California State Fair.

“I join you and others in predicting that most Napa Valley Cabernets produced today will fail their aging tests over the next decade,” wrote Peterson. “The reasons are their high alcohol/high pH and lack of ‘metabolically ripe’ varietal flavor – it having been trumped by over-ripe, prune-y and Port-like characters in grapes that are picked with excessive sugars. Even Cabernet Sauvignon grown in good terroirs cannot survive being harvested at 27.5 Brix year in and year out.”