2012 Taken Wine Co. Red Blend

Taken Wine Co. had its first release in 2010, but the genesis of the company goes back a couple of decades, when the two founders were schoolmates together in St. Helena. Josh Phelps and Carlo Trinchero both come from well-known winemaking families. But their “road taken” into the wine business is distinctly 21st century. They market their wines through social media and tasting parties aimed at millennial wine drinkers and give their wines out-of-the-ordinary names that resonate with their peers. The 2010 Taken was a Cabernet Sauvignon and more recent releases have included Pinot Noir, Pinot Grigio, Chardonnay and a red blend. The founders have an international outlook, and make wines in Italy as well as in California.

Napa Valley AVA is the most famous winemaking region in the United States and one of the most prestigious in the world. With nearly 43,000 acres of vineyards and more than 300 wineries, it is the heart of fine wine production in the United States. Winemaking started in Napa in 1838 when George C. Yount planted grapes and began producing wine commercially. Other winemaking pioneers followed in the late 19th century, including the founders of Charles Krug, Schramsberg, Inglenook and Beaulieu Vineyards. An infestation of phylloxera, an insect that attacks vine roots, and the onset of Prohibition nearly wiped out the nascent Napa wine industry in the early 20th century. But by the late 1950s and early 1960s Robert Mondavi and other visionaries were producing quality wines easily distinguishable from the mass-produced jug wines made in California’s Central Valley. Napa Valley’s AVA was established in 1983, and today there are 16 sub-appellations within the Napa Valley AVA. Many grapes grow well in Napa’s Mediterranean climate, but the region is best known for Cabernet Sauvignon. Chardonnay is also very successfully cultivated, and about 30% of the AVA’s acreage is planted to white grapes, with the majority of those grapes being Chardonnay,