Thanks for visiting PRIME Napa Valley wines!

Why PRIME?

prime   [prahym]
adj.
           1. first in excellence, quality, or value: a prime example
           2. of the greatest relevance or significance: a prime artifact
           3. of the greatest commercial value: prime real estate

  After working with grapes from all over California, PRIME's winemaker, Ted Henry, launched PRIME Cellars with the 2005 vintage to focus on a prime piece of Napa Valley called Coombsville.  With its cooler temperatures and unique flavor and acid profile, Coombsville was approved as Napa Valley's newest AVA in 2012.  In 2013 we opened our Downtown Napa tasting room at 974 Franklin Street.

Ted remains the winemaker at Napa Valley's Jarvis Estate and has been making wine in Napa Valley since his graduation from UC Davis' winemaking program in 1999.  PRIME wines are extremely limited with production levels of less than 1000 cases annually.  SIGN UP for our new wine club here.

Visit our tasting room in Downtown Napa

974 Franklin St. Napa CA 94559

Reflections from the front window

OPEN!
Please visit us at our new tasting room at 974 Franklin St. in Downtown napa.  We are right across from Oenotri and Norman Rose restaurants as well as the new Andaz hotel.  We're here daily from noon to 6pm, we would love to see you.

PRIME Napa Valley- the Coombsville connection

 © 2003, AirphotoUSA LLC, The Winemaker's Dance by Jonathan Swinchatt and David G. Howell

I love this satellite picture, it really tells the Coombsville story in one image.

Coombsville is the newest area to be considered for American Viticultural Area (AVA) within Napa Valley.  When I started PRIME the concept was to find "prime" vineyard locations within Napa.  I worked with fruit from all over but because of the high quality I kept returning to this Southeastern part of Napa known as Coombsville.  The black line shows the boundary of this new AVA.  It is a dramatic and unique piece of geology.  You can see in the center a hill and then a circular valley around it.  This is what is called the "cup and saucer" and is an indication of the special volcanic soils that lie beneath.

The grapes from Coombsville give PRIME its unique profile of crisp, fresh fruit with higher than usual acid levels and long finishes.  I hope you enjoy drinking the wines as much as I have making them!

Dining in ATL just got better

I've spent a fair amount of time in Atlanta's ATL airport.  Partly because I'm partial to Delta and end up there on connecting flights and partly because I really like Atlanta and its food/wine scene.  I often wander around the airport looking at the food options, riding the train to other terminals hoping for better fare than a TGI Fridays.  Other than the fairly cool piano lounge in terminal E the One Flew South  Sushi meets Southern cooking restaurant is the best I have seen in an airport.  Perhaps it is also the most expensive but sometimes it is worth the cost if you are captive for hours with a delayed flight.

Brian Hannigan was kind enough to send a photo to PRIME of his family enjoying a bottle of PRIME at One Flew South the other day and I wanted to post it here.  That's Susan on the left and Melissa on the right.  I can't tell you how excited I was to receive this picture of a group in an airport across the country enjoying my wine.  Its amazing to see where the few hundred cases of PRIME I make end up!

Mystery: District 4 Cab, Oxbow and the man with the accent

I was passing by the Oxbow wine merchant a few days ago and noticed our District 4 Cabernet was unfortunately missing from the shelves.   I'm thinking, Great, how long have they been out? On a seemingly unrelated note I got a call from an East Coast Prime fan (with a terrific accent) that was on vacation in Napa and was looking for the wine.  Turns out after I missed his call he stopped by the Oxbow in Napa for lunch and by chance saw the District 4 and bought all they had in stock.

All the pieces came together the next day when a 2 case order came in from the wine merchant and the customer let me know he found what he was looking for.  Mystery solved, time for a glass of wine.

Prime time at the Oxbow Market

Not that you need another reason to visit the Oxbow Public Market in Napa but I'm going to give you one anyway.  Aside from my longtime favorite Taylor's Refresher (aka Gott's) there is a new excellent reason to show up at the Oxbow at least once a week.


The Oxbow Wine Merchant has picked up PRIME's 2007 District 4 Cabernet and is going to be pouring it by the glass.  Located directly across from Hog Island's oyster bar, you can't miss the shop so stop in and have a glass!  Don't forget to look for PRIME by the glass in San Francisco at Foreign Cinema, First Crush and Inner Fog too.

News from the recent tasting in SF

There should be much more hoopla for the recent release of our 2007 Prime Cabernet Sauvignon "Midoriya Hills Vineyard". Everyone else is giving it much more attention than we are. It is at least available on our website, with more info to come soon.

Ted poured at the public tasting for the San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition. Just discovered this nice write up regarding the tasting. Thanks to Frank Thorsburg of Wine Country Insider.

http://fthorsberg.wordpress.com/2011/02/24/tasting-winners/