Description
The story behind Honig starts in 1964 when Louis, an advertising executive in San Francisco bought a beautiful tract of land in Rutherford, and founded a small vineyard, hiring a winemaker and pretty much leaving it alone. By 1980, when he passed away, the plan had been cemented in his architect son's mind to build a family house there.... but by 1984, he had decided it wasn't a dream he was going to be able to complete due to financial constraints.
Phoning his son up to give him the bad news, he was slightly shocked when the 22-year-old Michael Honig dropped everything to move upto Napa and take over the winery himself! Discovering that the cellar was chock-full of back vintages which hadn't been sold...he rented a van, drove the wine down to San Francisco and forced every restauranteur to taste till he had sold the lot. And thus, a winery was born.
Honig is deeply, deeply concerned with the sustainability of their winery. Ensuring that the vineyard works in harmony with it’s surroundings is top of their priority list. They have beehives in all of their vineyards to avoid using imported swarms (and therefore produce honey as well) use flocks of sheep to keep ground cover down and power their vineyard through solar power. This attention to detail shows in the quality of every wine they produce. In making this archetypal Napa Valley Cabernet Honig use fruit from both their sustainably farmed vineyard in Rutherford and from local growers across the valley. Each vineyard block was harvested and vinified individually and then blended to create a harmonious whole that is unmistakeably 'Honig.' Aging for 18 months in French and American oak barrels adds soft ripeness and toasty, sweet spice notes. Unmistakeably Napa, this wine is rich, inviting and complex.
2015 in Napa Valley started out with unseasonably warm temperatures in the late winter and early spring, however colder temperatures in May ultimately resulted in much smaller than usual crop in 2015. The harvest was one of the earliest on record in Napa Valley, but the fruit produced was of excellent quality. The 2015 Honig Cabernet Sauvignon is classic Napa, full of bright blackberry, red plum, cranberry, black tea, spice and coriander seed. Luscious and balanced, this is a rich, complex wine with toasty oak and a long finish.