2016 Clos du Val Proprietary White Wine Napa Valley

Heady white blend in its last vintage

2016 Clos du Val Proprietary White Wine Napa Valley

Napa’s Clos du Val winery went all estate in 2017, leaving this white blend that included purchased fruit on the cutting room (tasting room?) floor. The base of the wine is about two-thirds Muscat, whose tonic perfume gets amplified by a hefty dose of Sauvignon Blanc. The balance is Chardonnay, for gravitas.

Predictably, this is an aromatic wine, its perfume a drift of sweet flowers and shimmery tropical fruits, while a sense of oiled stone keeps it grounded. The body is shot with juicy acidity and finishes in a blaze of citrus peels and pineapple, but there’s enough complexity for interestingness: sense of petrichor, some tannins, good weight.

This is a solid wine for seafood raw or cooked, and is also good with milky young cheeses, especially of goat’s milk. Try it with cuisine inflected with ginger, citrus, lemongrass, coconut milk, chilis.

Eight hundred cases were made. The end.

 

2016 Clos du Val Proprietary White Wine Napa Valley

13.9% abv | $45 (I paid about $20 on a close-out sale)

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