My day at the exclusive Sloan Estate winery:
On a nice Friday morning, the sun was shining brightly, there were some cumulus clouds and a slight breeze. I started my usual day trip in the Napa Valley, but this one was like no other. This is the mysterious Sloan Estate, it has always been this way since its inception, private and exclusive, it is not open to the public for tours or tests. Only your members can access your website and your published address is a PO Box number. It defines Swanky and it certainly is.
After several emails and phone conversations with Marsha Chandler, Customer Relations Manager, Martha McClellan, Winemaker, and Stuart Sloan, Owner, an arrangement was made for us for a tasting / tour of the Sloan Estate. Martha emailed me with driving directions and we were on our way. She emphasized how difficult it is to get to the Sloan Estate, looking at the map and reading the directions it seemed manageable as I am very familiar with Napa Valley, I was wrong.
Sloan Estate is in a very secluded part of Napa, tucked off the beaten track. We went up a gentle hill, slowly and carefully, through some narrow roads that were difficult to navigate, especially when another car was approaching from the opposite direction. We sail to the farm. I first learned about Sloan Proprietary Red when Robert Parker, Jr. gave it a perfect score of 100 for the 2002 vintage. The Sloan Estate shares the same plateau as some of the world’s best wineries on the 100 Perfect Wines list. by Robert Parker Jr. This list includes, but is not limited to, the Bordeaux power stations of France; Chateau Lafite, Chateau Haut Brion, Chateau Latour, Chateau Mouton-Rothschild, and Chateau Margaux, which are the full representation of Premier Cru. An impressive company of who’s who in the world of wine.
The property was acquired in the mid-1990s by: Stuart Sloan, a Seattle businessman who had a gift and a reputation for taking small businesses and transforming them into giant entities. Its track record has been tested and documented by both Wall Street and Main Street. There was no question that Sloan would achieve her ultimate goal of making great Bordeaux-style wine sooner or later. After all, when you start a company surrounding yourself with the best talent and location, you are sure to be successful. Stuart Sloan had the vision and experience to lead a talented team in his new place of business. It was surprising how quickly he was able to achieve his desire to produce a world-class wine, a perfect 100 points per RP rating. The Sloan team consists of dedicated individuals, consultant winemaker Michel Rolland, David Abreu, vineyard manager / viticulturist, and Martha McClellan as a winemaker.
Martha McClellan was the Harlan Estate Winemaker prior to joining Sloan. He lived in Germany for 10 years, while he was there he studied and obtained a degree in oenology and viticulture. She is an avid marathon runner, although small in stature, she is an achiever, motivated and thrives on perfection. It took her a little while to sink in and get comfortable in our conversation, but when she did, Martha was charming, passionate, and eloquent.
We arrived at the Sloan Estate passing through a closed double-rod iron gate, with the touch of a button, the doors swung open. We drove the winding road through the well-kept property. Approaching a traditional French castle-style building, adorned with an elegant ivy-covered tower that dominated the vineyard. Martha greeted us cordially on the front gravel driveway, where she led us to the English mansion garden with abundant vibrantly colored roses, which was beautifully groomed and meticulously manicured with hedges.
We were in the garden for about 15 minutes. talking about Martha’s winemaking philosophy. She motivates herself by personal pride and strives for perfection. I could feel his passion for making wine and doing what he really loves! He led us into the cellar through beautiful thick and heavy wooden doors, to the fermentation room which was lined with stainless steel tanks. These tanks are being replaced by more sophisticated technology, a temperature / humidity control system was installed to assist during fermentation. We walked over to a small touch screen panel hanging on the wall, Martha demonstrated how she is able to control and maintain the various temperature and humidity zones of the cave by electronically ventilating the airflow from this panel. We continued down a corridor where all the walls and ceilings were lined with European used bricks imported from Austria during the cave construction phase, which was completed in 2002. We reached the chamber where French barrels lined the walls of the cave and housed the grape juice in the middle of It is a long journey (24 months of aging in new oak barrels before bottling) to reach the delicate and gradual maturation process. They are the molecular changes that are known to develop and that involve the gradual interaction of oxygen and wine. Simple chemical compounds break down and recombine into more complex forms called polymeric phenols. Acidity and alcohol soften.
The larger compounds, the hard astringent tannins, slide onto a mat of sediment, taking the ink-saturated pigments with them. They leave a smooth and unfathomably subtle flavor and a brick red hue. Everything is woven, resolving into an increasingly fine complexity expressed fragrantly in the bouquet of the wine. But it doesn’t start there, it starts early in the vineyard, with careful pruning, the calculated drop of the fruit by cluster position, then the harvest according to the Brix count and the tasting of the fruit and finally the hand-picking for select the best. There is no fruit crushing at Sloan, then the selected berries are placed in the fermentation tanks for approximately 60 days. During this period, the juice is extracted from the fruit mainly by gravity and the pure pressure of its own weight on top of each other in stainless steel tanks of approximately 2 tons capacity. This is a time-consuming and labor-intensive method of operation, during which the juice must be constantly monitored and tended to. At the end of fermentation, the premature wine is placed in new French oak barrels to start the evolutionary process of maturity, as if it were a fetus in a mother’s womb, it is an ever-changing living organism, growing, building structure and complexity. After bottling, the wine is aged for another 12 months before it is launched on the market. Sloan produces two labels; its flagship is the Sloan Proprietary Red and the other is the Asterisk label. They both have the classic Bordeaux style. It is a careful blend of some Bordeaux varieties and is produced in very limited quantities (less than 500 Cs. Per year).
We sampled the 2006 vintage of Sloan Proprietary Red: Massive like a soft giant, extraordinary nose like crystallized violets with a deep deep purple color, rich dark fruits, blueberries, blackberries, roasted coffee notes intertwined with a subtle smoky oak and lots of spices. Intense, complex, well balanced with a long and lingering finish, I predict this wine will peak after 15-20 years and stay on that plateau for another 10-15 years before fading. If you are not a member of Sloan’s mailing list, which is currently closed, but can join their waiting list by visiting their website, you will not find their wines easily accessible. The most likely place you will be able to experience the taste of Sloan’s proprietary red is in a fine restaurant or a library of luxury wines that is very rare in the country. I was very impressed with how meticulous and well cared for the Sloan Estate was from vineyard to winery. In my opinion, Sloan started her effort with a solid performance early on. After all, it’s easier to get to the top than it is to stay. As I visit and experience first-hand how Sloan operates their property under strict measures of high quality standards, I have no doubt in my mind that they are on the right path to continued greatness. Here at Sloan The Grape is the king and the rules of wine. You will be pleased to hear that we were able to negotiate an allocation for our Sloan Proprietary Red members, beginning with its next release. We will announce it as soon as it is available. I’m sure you will appreciate owning this trophy wine.
Until next time,
Health!
