Open: 10am-4pm
Appt required? No (only for 8 or more)
Last barlinwine.com visit: 2012 (May 15, 2012 Itinerary)
Directions:
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Tasting:
I returned to PlumpJack this May after a five year absence from the tasting room. I’d always appreciated their wines, and was reminded how delicious their Cabernet could be during 2011’s visit to CADE (their sister winery).
Just as CADE poured the PlumpJack Cabernet out of their tasting room, PlumpJack also offered the option to taste CADE wines from their location. Having recently tried CADE, I elected to just do the PlumpJack tasting. This flight featured the 2010 Chardonnay, 2009 Syrah, and 2009 Estate Cabernet. Before we started the tasting, my host asked what I typically drank at home. When I revealed I was strongly partial to reds and big Cabs and that I’d skip the Chardonnay, he had no problem with me mixing and matching from the two tasting lists.
I started with the Syrah, which is only sold out of the tasting room. This was a solid wine (as all of PlumpJack’s wines are). He then moved unbidden to the CADE side of the list and poured me the 2008 CADE Cuvee and 2008 CADE Napa Cabernet, both good but unexceptional wines (the CADE Howell Mountain Cabernet is much better). We then came back to polish off the tasting with the excellent 2009 PlumpJack Cabernet.
Assuming we were done, I started to contemplate whether I wanted to carry anything with me. While I was debating, I found one more wine in my glass: the 2009 CADE Estate Cabernet, their version of a “reserve”. This was quite good, as was the PlumpJack Cabernet. But given the ready availability of the PlumpJack Cab at Binny’s and the pricepoint of the CADE Estate ($150.bottle), I decided to just go with what I couldn’t get at home: a bottle of the PlumpJack Syrah.
I closed out and was a tad disappointed to see I was charged the $15 tasting fee. Not a big deal, and I basically got the wines of two tastings for the price of one, but no tasting fee would have definitely garnered extra atmosphere points for PlumpJack.
All things considered, this is a decent stop to try some very good wine. I would recommend a trip up to CADE over a trip to PlumpJack just because of the spectacular view and facility they have at CADE, but PlumpJack is a little less off the beaten path and certainly a nice alternative to get to try basically the same set of wines.
Just as CADE poured the PlumpJack Cabernet out of their tasting room, PlumpJack also offered the option to taste CADE wines from their location. Having recently tried CADE, I elected to just do the PlumpJack tasting. This flight featured the 2010 Chardonnay, 2009 Syrah, and 2009 Estate Cabernet. Before we started the tasting, my host asked what I typically drank at home. When I revealed I was strongly partial to reds and big Cabs and that I’d skip the Chardonnay, he had no problem with me mixing and matching from the two tasting lists.
Assuming we were done, I started to contemplate whether I wanted to carry anything with me. While I was debating, I found one more wine in my glass: the 2009 CADE Estate Cabernet, their version of a “reserve”. This was quite good, as was the PlumpJack Cabernet. But given the ready availability of the PlumpJack Cab at Binny’s and the pricepoint of the CADE Estate ($150.bottle), I decided to just go with what I couldn’t get at home: a bottle of the PlumpJack Syrah.
All things considered, this is a decent stop to try some very good wine. I would recommend a trip up to CADE over a trip to PlumpJack just because of the spectacular view and facility they have at CADE, but PlumpJack is a little less off the beaten path and certainly a nice alternative to get to try basically the same set of wines.
Recommended wine:The 2009 Plumpjack Estate Cabernet was still as good as I'd remembered from my trip to CADE. The rest of the wines were also good but this was once again the star.
Ratings (out of 5):
 WINE | 4.50 |  TASTING ROOM | 4.25 |
 ATMOSPHERE | 4.25 |  VALUE | 4.00 |
 OVERALL | 4.25 | ||
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