2018 La Sirena Pirate TreasuRed Red Wine Napa Valley 750 ml

Drop the name Heidi Barrett to a collector, then brace for the plaudits. She’s the “Queen of Cult Cabernet.” The “Wine Diva of Napa Valley.” The genius behind legendary wines from Dalla Valle and Grace Family—not to mention the record-breaking 1992 Screaming Eagle that sold at auction for half a mil.

No doubt about it, Heidi Barrett makes serious wines.

But cruise up Highway 29 to Calistoga and clink Zaltos with Heidi and her inner circle, your glass will be filled with the lush, seductive, and dense 2018 La Sirena Pirate TreasuRed, which manages to captures Heidi’s cult quality and swashbuckling spirit in one life-is-short, drink-anytime blockbuster of a bottle. 

La Sirena is the Calistoga-based label that Heidi founded in 1994, and this edition of TreasuRed shows its pedigree in every opulent sip. It's bursting with dark plums, sun-warmed blackberries, lilacs, and violets, and layered with chocolate shavings and spice. Grand and seductive on the palate, the wine’s big fruit builds to a mountain of plush tannins that resolve in a long and memorable finish.

Barrett has long been known as a master blender, which has served her well in her high-profile winemaking gigs. She compares the art of blending to adding layers of color to a painting, which makes perfect sense given the influence of her artist mother and winemaker father. And the layers of flavor that reveal themselves in her 2018 Pirate TreasuRed show that she’s on top of her game.