Project Description
Cathy Corison of Corison Winery joined founder of A Life Well Drunk John Sporing for a virtual tasting on November 5th, 2020.
Did you miss the live tasting? No worries, watch it here:
In the November 5th tasting we sipped and discussed three of her wines.
Cathy put together three different kits (including two with 375ml bottles), you can find the wines on their site.
Meet the Maker
Cathy Corison, the first woman Winemaker-Proprietor in the Napa Valley, produces three Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignons, hand-crafted without compromise. Her wines are powerful and elegant at the same time, have a sense of place, and are structured to grace the table and enjoy a long, distinguished life. She sources some of the finest vineyards in the Napa Valley, all located on classic benchland between Rutherford and St. Helena, where deep, stony alluvial soils provide the ideal growing conditions for the Cabernet vine. These vines regularly produce some of the most concentrated and superbly ripened fruit anywhere. Kronos Vineyard, one of the estate vineyards, surrounds the winery on all four sides. Cathy harvested her 34th vintage of Corison in 2020!
For the Corison Cabernet Sauvignon, her concept is to make a complex wine by taking advantage of the natural range of flavors possible in Cabernet Sauvignon grown on different sites. Benchland at St. Helena’s western edge is renowned for wines of unrivaled complexity, concentration, floral aromatics, velvety tannins and notable natural acidity. The estates Sunbasket and Kronos Vineyards, on the other hand, speak of specific places; the French call this terroir.
Corison Cabernets are juicy with fruit and hints of violets, olives and spice and are moderate in alcohol. Fresh and lively on the palate, they are supple and decidedly drinkable as young wines but structured for decades of rewarding bottle development. Half of the small French oak barrels used to age each vintage are new each year. They are sourced from several coopers and various forests situated in the center of France for added complexity.
The images on the label of the bottles are very old life symbols, one based on rain and the other on a sprouting seed. They embellish vases excavated from the site of one of the earliest European cultures to cultivate grapes and make wine, over 7,000 years ago.
