Wine of the Week: Smith-Madrone Riesling

A cult Californian riesling that’s worth splashing out on.

The best way to learn about wine isn’t by reading, talking to producers or even visiting vineyards, it’s by tasting as many bottles as you possibly can. And, this is the crucial bit, remembering them. So despite having visited vineyards in Paso Robles, Santa Barbara, Napa and Sonoma, my knowledge of Californian wine is patchy to say the least. In comparison, I have never visited South Australia but I’m much more confident on the wines of the Barossa Valley, McLaren Vale and Coonawarra. 

Most of the good stuff from California is simply out of my price range. But following an article featuring Peterson Family Vineyards, one of the few affordable Californian producers sold over here, in The Critic, someone from Smith-Madrone in Napa got in touch and asked me if I’d like to try some wines. Well, what was I going to say?

Three bottles arrived soon afterwards: a cabernet sauvignon, a chardonnay and a riesling. I think I was dimly aware that riesling was grown in Napa but had never tasted one before. The vintage I received was a 2018 and it was superb - bone dry but also honeyed and toasty with opulent apricots in syrup quality but as far as I could tell absolutely bone dry. It lacked the razor edge of dry rieslings from the Rhine or cooler parts of Australia, the nearest comparison would Alsace, I think.

They grow riesling in Napa??!!!

I put something stupid on Instagram like ‘California riesling, who knew?’ A few days later I discovered that Smith-Madrone Riesling was actually a piece of American wine history, almost as important in the development of California wine as Chateau Montelena Chardonnay or Stag’s Leap Cabernet Sauvignon. D’oh!