1999 Insignia

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"Nineteen ninety-nine was a late, small harvest, even later than 1998," said Director of Winemaking Craig Williams. "It was a cold year and we needed to wait for riper skins. With the small size of the berries and the intensity of the seed tannins, the '99s tasted like mountain wines in the early going. Even now, the '99s are tannic and gripping." The next growing season, according to Williams, was even trickier following another cool summer. We ended up declassifying some vineyards in 2000 because we picked too late and lost some flavor intensity without getting higher sugars." Williams, filling in for new winemaker Sarah Gott, who was conducting a wine dinner in San Francisco, always gives me the bad news up front before pouring this winery's consistently excellent wines.

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I tasted this year with Craig Williams on his last day as director of winemaking for Phelps. Williams is now directing the launch of Phelps' new Sonoma Coast operation and other vineyard development projects, and former assistant Sarah Gott will take over as winemaker. Williams and Gott agreed that 1999 was an unusually good year for white wine; this winery '99 reds were also extremely promising when I tasted barrel samples in late winter. There was no Backus cabernet produced in 1998, yet Phelps' Insignia bottling is a noteworthy success for this difficult year.

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