California’s 2022 Keeps on Giving, Elevating Tradition in Arribas Do Douro and Campania Brings Out the Bold

As California wineries have been rolling out their 2022 vintage cabernet sauvignon wines, Executive Editor Jim Gordon and Staff Writer & Taster Courtney Humiston have discovered that despite a challenging heat dome that sent temperatures soaring for nearly a week in early September, the vintage yielded many perfectly drinkable wines and some great ones, too.

Take, for example, the Cornell Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma County Fountaingrove District Estate 2022, from the west side of Spring Mountain in Sonoma County. Elizabeth Tangney, Cornell Vineyards’ director of winemaking and viticulture, said her team picked their grapes mostly before the heat dome and its 115 degree Fahrenheit (46 Celsius) temperatures in parts of Napa and Sonoma.

"We have become an early site,” Tangney said. “We get a lot of sun without the heat days and we're not scared to have some edgier tannin. It's mountain hillside, so we have a lot and I push to extract. I want that big representative wine."

Courtney described it as astoundingly complex and powerful with layers of violets, cherries, blackberries and bay laurel. The palate is surprisingly mouthwatering and salivating with abundant, velvety tannins.

Lower down in Sonoma Valley, Gundlach Bundschu continues to make consistently bold and balanced wines from their storied estate. Courtney tasted their Cabernet Sauvignon Vintage Reserve 2022 from barrel, which is being bottled next month and is similar to their 2021. The 2022 is a rich and powerful wine with layers of black and blue fruit, earth, tobacco and graphite, and comes from certain blocks within the property harboring some of the oldest vines.

"While the 20-plus-year-old cab vines have always been resilient, we’ve noticed they’ve become even more able to withstand dramatic heat swings, much like we saw in 2022, since we started farming organically in 2019,” said Katie Bundschu, a sixth-generation winegrower.

Courtney also visited Hamel Family Vineyards, whose Cabernet Sauvignon Moon Mountain Nun's Canyon Vineyard 2021 scored highly. John Hamel has been dry farming since 2017 as part of his mission to encourage the vines to grow deep roots and pull minerality from the soil into the wines. And it's working. The wine is intense yet buoyant and very drinkable, with a vervy minerality and silky length.

Jim visited several Napa Valley cabernet sauvignon producers to taste their 2022s, and he came away with rave reviews for Bryant Family, Paul Hobbs and David Arthur in particular. He scored the Bryant Family Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2022 equally high with the Cornell 2022, calling it packed with fruit and tempting spice flavors and built for long-term aging.

Bryant Family winemaker Kathryn Carothers said their estate vineyard on Pritchard Hill was harvested before, during and after the punishing heat dome. “The rap on ‘22 is that it was supposedly riddled with V.A.[volatile acidity], too hot and some people didn’t bottle anything,” instead selling their young wine in bulk to other wineries.

“That wasn’t the case here,” Carothers said. “We didn’t bulk out a single barrel. Everything here went into our wines.”

Not that it wasn’t a lot of work. Her crew used an optical sorter plus 10 people on a manual sorting line so that only the best-looking grapes went into the fermenters. Before harvesting they used shade cloth and left extra lateral foliage on the vines to protect the grapes from sunburn. They even opted to leave a bigger crop so that some clusters would shade other clusters near them.

Carothers compared the 2022 to 2019 and 2016 from the perspective of texture and tannins. “2016s were approachable from the start, drinkable and pleasurable,” she said. “The ‘22s have now been in bottle for nine months and they have just been very consistent. Every time I open a cork they’re the same, and the ‘16s were like that, too.”

Also on Pritchard Hill, the David Arthur property produced several stellar reds, most notably the Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley Elevation 1147 2022 and Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley Old Vine 2022. Winemaker Nile Zacherle guides the success of this quietly confident estate winery, one of the first to be established on Pritchard Hill, which is a celebrated, high-elevation district without official appellation status.

Elsewhere, vintner Paul Hobbs made four of the highest-rated wines in this report – all 2022 reds. He said that the heat dome was not a problem for his many Sonoma County chardonnays and pinot noirs but was challenging for cabernet sauvignon. Still, his two best examples show how good the wines can be.

The Paul Hobbs Cabernet Sauvignon Oakville Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard 2022 is remarkably cool, composed, floral and broad in texture, while the Paul Hobbs Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley Coombsville Nathan Coombs Estate Cristina’s Signature 2022 feels sleek, poised and elegant, almost like a pinot noir, Jim said.

Old Vines, New Voices in Arribas do Douro

Arribas Wine Company co-owners and winemakers Ricardo Alves and Alfredo Machado were first drawn to Portugal’s Arribas do Douro region thanks to Machado’s father, who encouraged them to visit his old vineyards – head-trained plots either neglected or lost in local cooperative blends. Seeing them, their decision was immediate. “In fact, we knew we would work them,” Alves recalled.

Arribas do Douro lies in Portugal’s northeastern corner, in the district of Braganca, directly across the river from Spain’s Arribes del Duero, with which it shares a striking resemblance. Though part of the Tras-os-Montes wine region, it is markedly different from the more familiar Douro Valley. The name “arribas” refers to the dramatic cliffs lining the Douro River, which forms the natural border between the two countries. 

Many of the region’s vineyards are old field blends, often with a significant proportion of white grapes – perfect for palhete, a traditional Portuguese style made from red and white grapes cofermented straight from the vineyard. 

“For us, palhete is the traditional wine of Portugal. Each region has its own version – more red here, more white there – but always a mix,” Alves said. In Arribas, that often means 70 percent red and 30 percent white. The result: pale reds that combine the structure and depth of old vines with the lift and drinkability of white grapes. 

Vineyards stretch from exposed highland plateaus down to river-level terraces, shaping wines with freshness and texture. Leading producers like Arribas Wine Company and Antonio Picotes are helping to define this emerging zone. 

The Portugal Quilómetro 2021 from Arribas Wine Company is a textbook example of what this region does so well: a pale red of nuance and clarity that reflects its old-vine heritage, with quiet concentration and discreet weight. While palhete wines are a signature, the white wines from the region are equally compelling – typically multivarietal blends that are textured, saline and vibrant. A standout example is the Picotes Wines Portugal Branco 2023, a field blend of malvasia, verdelho, bastardo branco, posto branco and formosa.

In a region once on the verge of viticultural abandonment, these producers are working with clarity and conviction to, in Alves’ words, “elevate a traditional style into something more valuable.” 

A Bold Red Stands Out in Campania

We may be living through a moment in wine when the great, ageworthy reds – long celebrated for their depth, structure and gravitas – are increasingly eclipsed by a preference for lighter, more transparent styles: less extraction, lower alcohol, more immediate charm. But not every grape or region is meant to follow that path.

Take Irpinia, in the rugged interior of Italy’s Campania region. This is not a land that naturally leans toward gentleness. So why resist what the territory so clearly demands? Better, perhaps, to lean in – and go all the way. That’s precisely what Raffaele Pagano does in Taurasi with his Joaquin Taurasi Riserva della Società 2015 – a wine of unapologetic power.

The 2015 vintage is a study in darkness: dense, brooding, unabashedly alcoholic and yet shot through with a stern, muscular elegance and astonishing complexity. If vintage Port were reborn as a dry red, it might taste something like this. Don’t look for it in today’s trends – it stands defiantly apart. But make no mistake: the power here is not at odds with balance.

Irpinia should not be confused with the rest of Campania. Yes, this is southern Italy. Yes, there’s Mediterranean sun. But Taurasi lies inland, high in the hills, where the climate shifts dramatically. It is cold country. Aglianico, the region’s noble grape, is harvested as late as November. That lingering freshness – sharp and cleansing – is both the blessing and the burden of these wines, countering their natural intensity with edge and lift.

Though Campania is perhaps best known for its whites – think of the crystalline Fianos of Irpinia, the chiseled wines of Paestum on limestone soils, or the saline, vertical whites of the Amalfi Coast – it was Taurasi that claimed the spotlight in our recent tastings.

Among the standouts was Mastroberardino’s Taurasi Radici 2020, a wine that marries power and finesse with ease. It opens with notes of freshly ground black pepper, smoke, forest floor and an earthy minerality. Full-bodied and dense, its velvety tannins are beautifully tamed, the flavors just slightly leafy, lifted by bright acidity. There’s freshness here, and even a touch of grace.

Also compelling was the 2019 Taurasi Riserva Piano di Montevergine from Feudi di San Gregorio. It is complex and contemplative, with aromas of earth, wood, camphor, blackcurrants and dark spice, and it balances firm tannins with lively acidity and savory fruit.

A recurring highlight across recent vintages – still in the realm of bold reds from Campania – is the Galardi Campania Terra di Lavoro 2022. With its distinctive nose of Mediterranean herbs, forest floor, salted chocolate, cassis and prune, it offers fullness without excess. The wine shows cedar-like spice, vibrant acidity and a polished, tightly framed finish. This vintage is more austere than usual but remains one of Campania’s benchmark reds.

A Rosé Summer

The summer is reaching its peak, kicking off the core of the rosé wine season. This weekly tasting report contains a bunch of rosé wines, most of which were reviewed in our Hong Kong office, where Associate Editors Andrii Stetsiuk and Kevin Davy tasted a range of pinkies from the South of France and a 2024 vintage that offers a fresh wave of elegant, everyday drinking wines that deliver both charm and consistency. Nothing too fancy – just freshness and addictive drinkability, which is all you need for a hot summer afternoon.

Provence remains the core of dry, pale rosé, and the latest release show softness and clarity with good tension and minerality, providing vivid acidity while focusing on expressive aromatics.

The standouts were the Miraval Côtes de Provence 2024, with its finesse and mineral backbone; the Château D’Estoublon Coteaux Varois en Provence Roseblood 2024, which offers floral perfume and precision; the Château de Saint Martin Côtes de Provence Grande Réserve 2024, balancing fruit and structure with seductive ease; and the Danica Côtes de Provence Rosé Elégance 2024, tasted by Senior Editor Jim Gordon, which features a light, floral character that’s effortlessly drinkable.

The Domaine Lafage Côtes du Roussillon Gallica Rosé 2024, from nearby Roussillon, adds a fruitier, broader expression with fine texture and crunch, showing that precision and delicacy can be found outside the classic Provençal zones.

The 2024 rosés in this review are fresh, poised, and ready to go – and they prove that the South of France remains a global reference point for accessible rosé, not only seasonal but essential.

– Jim Gordon, Courtney Humiston, Jacobo García Andrade, Aldo Fiordelli and Andrii Stetsiuk contributed reporting.

The list of wines below is comprised of bottles tasted and rated during the past week by James Suckling and the other tasters at JamesSuckling.com. They include many latest releases not yet available on the market, but which will be available soon. Some will be included in upcoming tasting reports.

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