By Laura Ness
Mudita Wines almost didn’t enter the 2018 Press Democrat North Coast Wine Challenge. “This win almost didn’t happen,” says Mudita owner, Carol Baker. “I was so wrapped up with my youngest daughter graduating from high school and going to college – and Zack was getting married. Life sometimes gets in the way. But then I got a call from the Press Democrat reminding me of the deadline!”
When she sent in their 2014 Cabernet and Syrah last April to the NCWC, she hadn’t even tasted them since they had been in barrel. It was a leap of faith that paid off. The 2014 Mudita Cabernet Sauvignon from Circle S Ranch on Atlas Peak had one of the highest score of any Cabernet submitted from Napa, with 95 points.
Whew. Moral of the story: don’t wait to enter your wine in this year’s Press Democrat North Coast Wine Competition, as the deadline is fast approaching. You may miss out on a big win. You never know until you try.
Mudita Wines, like many wineries, is a family affair. Owner Carol Baker says her nephew, Zack Robinson, after getting his Masters degree in in Viticulture and Enology from UC Davis and then working at various wineries around the world, asked her to dinner in 2010 and said, “Auntie, I want to make wine!” She thought, ‘I can get involved in wine.’ So I asked him to send over a business plan.”
Robinson, who counts experiences at Etude, Mumm, Martinelli, Palisades Wine Company and Quivira, as informing his winemaking style, was eager to source great fruit. They started small in 2011, with about 50 cases of Syrah, and did the same for 2012, all Syrah initially, from good vineyards that would accommodate small buyers.
Why all reds, you might ask? Carol is a breast cancer survivor. “My doctor told me, if you drink wine, it needs to be red.” And that was that.
In 2013, they found a great opportunity for Cabernet at Circle S Ranch on Atlas Peak. Says Zack. “This was a terrific vineyard. You can see the different soil profiles on the bench. It’s a dry-farmed vineyard, and 2013 was so difficult. Even before veraison, you could see the vines were doing well through the drought. They seemed established, which was very encouraging.”
They were the only winery to make a vineyard designate from Circle S in 2013. “There is such a cachet of putting the Atlas Peak name in the label,” says Baker. “It was great stuff! It was a home run!”
In 2014, says Zack, the vineyard looked even more encouraging. They’d had a little bit of rain and the vines recovered really well. They were able to access just the portion of the vineyard they wanted, from the younger block that was planted in the mid-2000s, to clone 337 on different rootstocks. They were the first to pick. In 2015, they switched to an older block, where Zack describes the profile as richer in acid, with a finer structure, and what he believed would be better quality wine. We’ll see what happens, as that’s the vintage they entered in this year’s NCWC.
They sourced from Circle S until the fires in 2017 interrupted the supply, but they hope to acquire fruit from there in 2019.
You may wonder about the name. Mudita is a Buddhist word from Sanskrit for “vicarious joy,” which is the pleasure that comes from delighting in other people’s joy. It also means “speechless” in Spanish, which they learned from the ladies on the bottling line, who smiled at the label as they were bottling the first Mudita wines.
You could say that Zack and Carol were speechless with joy for the win for their 2014 Mudita Cabernet, but that wouldn’t be quite true. In fact, they can’t stop talking about it. Can you blame them?
