Caduceus Cellars Tasting Room - Awesome Music, OK Wine

I found myself escaping the summer heat in Phoenix by taking a trek up north for the weekend. One of my stops was in Jerome, AZ. I figured I'd hit the Caduceus Cellars tasting room on Main St and then grab some lunch.

I'll admit that I'm a huge fan of Maynard Keenan's music and I feel most of his work is brilliant. I was really hoping that same brilliance translated to an amazing wine tasting experience. And well, let's say it there were some glimmers of greatness, but not enough to have me sold on the whole package quite yet.

The tasting room itself is very nice. It's a got a classic look, with a modern feel. There were a few servers working the Saturday I was there. Wines came in three different tasting flights:

$5.50 bought you 4 tastes of Merkin Vineyards offerings. $10 bought you 4 different Caduceus wines and then there was another flight of 4 Caduceus wines for $13.

I opted for the $10 tasting. Let me stress that they take the word 'taste' very literally there. The pours are almost laughable; maybe 1 oz at most. You'd think they were serving holy water blessed by Jesus himself.

My tasting consisted of the following wines (sorry I forget some of the actual label names):

• 2008 Chardonnay blend: It's a 70%/ 30% blend of Chardonnay and Malvasia Bianca. The wine had a bitter finish. I thought maybe I had some residual food or something on my palette, so I drank some of the reds and came back to it. Still bitter. I couldn't even drink 1 oz of it, so I'd take a pass on this one. Some people said "The Diddler" by Merkin Vineyards was a better white wine to have. 
  

• 2007 Sangiovese: This was a nice wine. Great bouquet and had good structured tannins. It would rock with some lamb chops.

• 2006 Primer Paso: This was a wine that I expected to better than it was. The bouquet was way funky, and not in a good way. Kind of like dark chocolate mixed with a hint of ashtray. There was almost too much going on with the wine and I think it just ended up tasting a bit dull. Honestly, it reminded me of a bottle that had been left open too long.

• 2007 Anubis: Here is the star of the show for me. It's mainly a Cab Franc/Cab Sav blend. It's a big wine with firm tannins that still need a bit of age to round them out. The quality of the wine is very apparent. It has a great mouthfeel with nice fruit, but also some hints of smoke and maybe licorice. Hard to judge completely when you don't get much to taste. But it was good enough for me to want a bottle.

• Bonus taste - Merkin Vineyards Chupacabra: I asked for a taste of this and was granted a 1 oz allotment. It's a very dark wine, mainly Cab Sav and Syrah I was told. It was pretty tannic and had sort of a dank, musty essence to it. Maybe it needed some decanting or food to pair with it, or both. Either way, I felt it was decent, but not worth $25. 

Which brings me to the prices. Caduceus is pretty proud of their wines as $30 is pretty much the entry point. Most reds were $40 and up. The Merkin wines were a little less expensive, in the $20 - $25 range. My bottle of Anubis was $40.

*** FYI, if you buy a bottle, they still charge you for your tasting. I've had wine in dozens of tasting rooms and NEVER paid for a tasting when making a purchase. When I asked about this, my server said "well, I didn't charge you for the Chupacabra taste." Wow, how could I have overlooked that gracious act of wine philanthropy???

Final Take 

$50 got me a good bottle of red and a taste of some wines Caduceus makes. I'd really like to see them pour a decent sized taste (go crazy and make it 1.5 oz) and if people buy wine, comp them the tasting fee. I'd say they show promise and I love that AZ is starting to make some good vino, but I think Arizona Stronghold does a better job across the board with their wines as they seem a bit more consistent. Half the wine I tried at Caduceus was very forgettable, but then I realized that every Tool album always has a couple "throwaway" songs. Like 2 minutes of static, or some dude mumbling in German. I know it's artistic, but after one listen you tend to skip them. Maybe Caduceus wines are like that, too. There are a few that should be tried, then skipped, so you can really savor the ones that rock your inner wino.

I do look forward to seeing how this winery develops and matures over the next few years as I really want them to do well. Plus, I'd like to revise their grade to something better at some point...

Overall Grade = C (Average)

The EV Foodie