Wine Wizard

Aaron Pott gained a reputation for working magic on other vintners’ cabernets. The Napa Valley star is now producing his own line of Bordeaux-style reds.

By Elin McCoy Bloomberg Markets, April 2010

It’s harvest time in the Napa Valley, and winemaker Aaron Pott has been on the road since 7:30 a.m. He’s spending what will become a 12-hour workday nibbling grapes in vineyards and deciding when to pick, sampling fermenting wine and fielding anxious calls on his mobile phone from exhausted cellar workers.

In the midst of the usual harvest craziness, Pott, 43, looks remarkably calm. During the past 20 years, he’s become famous for making stellar cabernet sauvignons and cab blends at every winery where he’s worked, from Bordeaux to Napa. Now, he’s finally released the first vintage of his eponymous label. At $75 to $90 a bottle, his six distinctive Bordeaux-style wines -- produced with grapes from top vineyards -- are welcome contrasts to the valley’s overpriced fruit bombs with three-digit price tags.

As we speed south on Silverado Trail in his Honda hybrid to the winery where he’s bartered cellar space to make his wines, Pott says he’s convinced that the key to making great wines is finding the right terroirs, those special locations that produce wines with unique characters. He’s a new-style wine wizard with a romantic streak who’s focused on vineyards more than winemaking and who prizes finesse over power.

Pott was immersed in this philosophy during six years in Bordeaux, where he explored vineyards on an ancient Peugeot bicycle and made wines at two estates in the St.-Emilion appellation: Chateau La Tour Figeac and Chateau Troplong Mondot. All included cabernet franc, which he considers more interesting than cabernet sauvignon.

“I only like a handful of Napa Valley cabernets,” Pott admits. “I don’t like same-tasting and over-the-top oaky cabs that my wife calls oak-a-cola. Only certain sites make good cabernet.”

Pott discovered some of Napa’s best vine spots while working on single-vineyard wines at St. Clement a decade ago. That’s also how he found his own, 75-acre (30-hectare) property on Mt. Veeder in the southwestern part of the valley near legendary cab producer Mayacamas Vineyards. Its hillside terroir and long growing season enable Pott to produce low-alcohol wines with ripe fruit.

Pott’s interest in wine started at age 9, when his family was eating in a Parisian bistro. “I ordered milk; ‘Milk ees for babies,’ the sneering waiter told me and brought a glass of red cut with water,” Pott says, laughing. Soon he was stirring up fermentation experiments in his family’s garage.

Pott joined the list of star winemakers who have turned consultant after leaving a full-time gig at a winery whose owners ruled against his making wine on the side. These hired guns are behind some of Napa’s most in-demand wines. The valley’s tiny boutique producers, whose owners have millions to invest but no expertise, depend on them.

Pott’s portfolio includes some of the best new names in Napa, such as Blackbird Vineyards and Seven Stones Winery. Being a part-time winemaker and adviser on highly praised, expensive cult cabs provides Pott with more than cash flow. “It has a halo effect on my own wines,” he says.

At the end of the day, we head up steep, winding Mt. Veeder Road to the fledgling estate Pott jokingly calls Chateauneuf-du-Pott. His front yard consists of a half acre of vines; behind the house is a 6-acre parcel he started clearing for vineyards last year, after a five-year wait for a permit to plant vines.

While his wife, Claire, and I chat while watching the sun set, Pott grills steaks and pulls together a salad. We dine at a yellow formica kitchen table where Pott makes up his final blends before bottling. “For the 2007s, I opened up a Chateau Cheval Blanc and Chateau Trotanoy for taste inspiration,” he says.

Then Pott uncorks the 2007 The Arsenal, a cabernet sauvignon named for the North London soccer team. The inspiration clearly worked. It’s wonderfully deep, rich and elegant, with a long, long finish. It seems destined to have staying power. Just like its maker.

Columnist Elin McCoy is based in New York. elinmccoy@gmail.com

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