Cedar Mountain Winery

Cedar Mountain is a Livermore icon: not only do Earl and Linda Ault make their own wine, at about 4K cases, they also handle winemaking duties and bottling for several well known and up and coming wineries in the area. Consequently, they can get some great fruit from pretty much anywhere they want.

This 50/50 Bordeaux duo is a great example of how well these two varieties can play together. It kind of reminds me of Earl and Linda: both intense individuals with the ability to play a joint lead role in whatever they do. They manage to gracefully share the stage very nicely despite their strong, singular personalities. If you ever have the chance to visit their winery, you will be amazed at their artwork collection: the thing is, Earl created all of it. And Linda did the décor to match. It is so them. More on that later. Meanwhile, there are the fine wines Earl makes when he’s not painting watercolors, or the winery barn.

This two-fisted Bordeaux style wine is at the same time deep and dark and mysterious, and yet beautifully opaque, ruby red and totally approachable. It packs a potent set of punches. First, it hits you in the nose with its undeniably Bordeauxness: big wood, pepper and cigar box. Then it wafts over your palate with dark cherries, ripe, ripe raspberries, heavy cigar box, sandalwood and spicy pepper. I detected something like chile-laced cinnamon chocolate on the back end, which was delightful. This is an oak-lover’s wine, to be sure, and it wants New York steak or rib eye with double-baked potato. This wine could use a year or so of aging, which would make it even more enjoyable. However, it’s very enjoyable right now, so why wait?

(Alc: 14.8%, Retail: $22)

Reviewed October 24, 2006 by Laura Ness.