The Fine Wine Source in Livonia, Michigan has slowly been breaking in the new addition, as well as taking advantage of a big counter area for organized tastings.  We were now breaking in the Cabernet Sauvignon wines from Celani Family Vineyards and we had Tom Celani as well, a celebrity in his own right in the Detroit area.   We started with the Celani Family Vineyards “The Family” Napa Valley 2021, and over the years we have tasted several vintages of this wine.  It is crafted from 100% Cabernet Sauvignon grapes from the Coombsville and Oak Knoll regions of Napa Valley and aged 20 months in new French oak barrels.  Last year, we had the good fortune to try this wine fresh from bottling and my initial notes were that the terroir immediately announced this dark garnet wine which offered notes of black and red fruits, violets, and terroir.  On the palate the wine was big and powerful with tones of black cherries, cassis, and then secondary tones of tobacco, almonds, cardamom, and licorice and then finally ending with more terroir and fruit.   Now a year later this dark garnet colored wine offered intertwining notes of ripe blackberries, cassis, graphite, licorice and terroir, followed by layers of tobacco, spices and violets.  A year later, on the palate, the wine was blending the black and purple fruits with velvety tannins, perfectly balanced, touched by oak and a nice medium to long count finish of fruit and terroir.   

We then had for the first time the Celani Family Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Mount Veeder 2021, and this was only the second vintage for this wine; and The Fine Wine Source is the only location outside of the winery to have this wine on the shelves.  The fruit is from the Lynne’s Vineyard,  and the Napa side of Mount Veeder is known for its rugged East facing mountain terrain and the fruit gets concentrated.  This pure Cabernet Sauvignon wine was aged for twenty months in French Oak, of which seventy-five percent was new.  The dark garnet wine immediately offered notes red and purple fruits, with black cherry, blackberry, and plums and then secondary notes of currants, raspberry, tea, chocolate, violets and crushed rock terroir.  On the palate the tones of cherry, and raspberries led the way, and already lushly blending with velvety tannins, well-balanced with a nice long finish of fruit and terroir.

We then finished the tasting with the flagship wine, the Celani Family Winery “Ardore” Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2021.   The “Ardore” also evokes Tom Celani’s passion for a great cigar, as the label reminds one immediately of a cigar wrapper.  The wine is made from a careful selection of ten barrels of Cabernet Sauvignon from the most exceptional vineyard sites in the Coombsville AVA.  The wine is aged for twenty-two months in French Oak of which eighty-five percent is new, and the wine is never fined, nor filtered.  This deep garnet wine offered great notes of blackberries, black currants, Crème de cassis, tea, and followed by tobacco, chocolate, and minerals.  On the palate, powerful tones of rich concentrated fruit and velvety tannins with an ending that had a very long count of lush fruit and terroir.

Then just to further tempt us a we were doing the tasting, there were three bottles of Celani Family Winery in large sizes, of which only five bottles were produced, and now they were the last of the offerings, while two were colored and etched bottles representing another charity event that is underwritten by Tom Celani.  There was a Double-Magnum of the Celani Family Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2015 which is three liters.  Then an Imperial or a Methuselah of the Celani Family Winery Tenacious Napa Valley Red Wine 2019 which is six liters.   The last of the big bottles was a Salmanazar of the Celani Family Winery Tenacious Napa Valley Red Wine 2019, which is nine liters or the equivalent of one case of wine.