2017 Vermillion Red Wine Blend California 750 ml

It shouldn’t be this easy to score an under-$40 bottle from a cult winemaker like Helen Keplinger. One of Napa’s most sought-after superstars, she’s graced the cover of Wine Spectator and was named Food & Wine magazine’s “Winemaker of the Year.” Her time as winemaker at Bryant Family Vineyard yielded a 2012 Cabernet Sauvignon that won 98 points from Robert Parker and now retails for upwards of $500.

Under her stewardship, Bryant came “to represent some of the most singular and prodigious” wines of Napa Valley, said Parker, while her consulting skills have been in high demand with places like Grace Family Vineyards and Kenzo Estate. Her focus today is on her own wines, and when it comes to value, nothing beats her spectacular Rhône-style second label, Vermillion. The 2017 effort “leaps joyously from the glass” raves Robert Parker's Wine Advocate, while Jeb Dunnuck calls it simply "A joy to drink." 

In Wine Spectator’s 2014 cover story on Helen Keplinger, James Laube wrote that Keplinger’s eponymous label is “one of the most exciting and innovative wineries to emerge in California in years.” In a region that largely hangs it hat on high-end Cabernet—a grape that Keplinger has had soaring success with—she’s gone out of her way to seek out the most unique sites planted with Rhône varieties.

Keplinger’s thirst for crafting single-vineyard, distinctive Rhône-style wines from top-notch sites in northern California borders on the obsessive. Laube praised her ability to create “captivating and uniquely styled wines that are stretching the boundaries,” of distinctive California reds. Stretching from Sonoma County to the Sierra Foothills, the range of her source of vineyards is like a wide-angle snapshot of Northern California viticulture. She has an unerring instinct for terroir, able to locate a vineyard’s “voice,” as she calls it, and exercises patience and meticulous care in expressing that voice with near-perfect clarity.

The 2017 wows for its superb structure and phenolic ripeness, spilling over with rich red and black fruits. That year, growing conditions were even and moderate, allowing for long, slow ripening, aided further by cool weather at summer’s end. Grapes were brought to the peak of maturity and richness, while still packed with scintillating acidity. Working with the top fruit of the region, Keplinger fashioned a gorgeously layered red that is one of the steals of the year and drinking at its peak.