Tres Perlas

Tres Perlas Wines, formerly known as Renteria Wines is owned by the Renteria family including Salvador and his wife Maria Luisa and Oscar and his wife Denise. Their first vintage of wine was in 1997. Salvador (Sal) immigrated to the USA from Jalisco, Mexico. His first work in Chicago was as a barber, starting at age 15. As a tribute to his early trade, the Renteria’s keep a beautiful barber chair on site at their Carneros property. In 1962 Salvador left Chicago and moved to Napa Valley; his older brother Carlos was already living and working in Napa Valley for Usibelli Ranch & Vineyards. In 1964 he took a job at Sterling Vineyards, helping plant some 500 acres of vineyards; while there he helped clear the land at the top of the knoll where Sterling Vineyards was eventually built. As a result of his time at Sterling he met and worked with a number of individuals who would go on to have influential careers in the valley, including Nils Venge and Michael Walsh, the founder of Walsh Vineyard Management. By 1975 Oscar was helping oversee some 600 acres of vineyards for Yountville based Calplans Farms Vintage 1870.

Early in his career he also helped oversee initial vineyards for well-known area wineries such as Beaulieu Vineyard, Clos Pegase, Cuvaison and Silverado. He developed the well-known Three Palms Vineyard (which he affectionately calls the “1 million stone vineyard”) due to its significant rock content. Later in his career he managed premium vineyards for cult wineries such as Screaming Eagle and Dalla Valle.

It is a story told several times over in Napa, where someone arrives to the valley without any experience and many years later is considered a leader in his or her respective part of the wine industry. Such is the case with Salvador. After 12 years working at Walsh Vineyard Management, he started Renteria Vineyard management Company in 1987 with a single vineyard under his management; his son Oscar took over the day-to-day management in 1993 and became CEO and owner in 1995. Today they are among the largest vineyard management companies in Napa Valley managing some 2,200+ vineyard acres with nearly 80 full time employees and 400 seasonal workers.

They work with both growers and wineries managing vineyards in 12 of Napa Valley’s 16 sub appellations and overseeing 18 different grape varieties. As a result, they have a diversity of vineyard real estate to source grapes from. Some of the vineyards they buy grapes from were originally planted by Salvador; today these low yielding older vines produce intensely flavored grapes.

Their primary property, the nearly 30-acre Brown Ranch is located towards the end of Buchli Station Road past Bouchaine Vineyards, a gorgeous part of Carneros that we have walked a number of times. The Renteria’s purchased this property in 2012; it was formerly associated with Saintsbury Winery taking its name from a former owner, Nadine Brown (died 1989). Brown was a descendent of early Napa Valley pioneers (reference the last name Grigsby and Tasche); during her family ownership of the ranch she raised cattle, sheep and horses and grew hay and grain.

Twenty-nine acres of vines (Pinot Noir and Chardonnay) were already planted but most of these vines were afflicted with a fungi disease, Eutypa (otherwise known as the Dead-arm Dieback) causing trunks or arms of the vines to essentially rot and die. Rather than pulling all of these vines out, their vineyard management team decided to keep the rootstock, cut off the trunk just above the soil and allow a bud from each vine to grow, training it into a new trunk and then trellising it when it became of size.

This saved time and month compared to doing a full replant and they had grapes within about a year of doing so. For wine grapes, Brown Ranch was already well established by the time they acquired it; the vines were planted in 1992 and grapes were being purchased by a number of premium producers. Today they still sell grapes to well-regarded Napa Valley wineries such as Hall and Pahlmeyer, among others, some of which produce a Brown Ranch vineyard designate. The vineyard is truly micromanaged and is separated into 20+ individual blocks growing Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Merlot.

This is prime Napa Valley Carneros vineyard terroir. Nearby neighbors include a vineyard owned by Far Niente, Truchard, Beaulieu’s Vineyard No. 9 and HDV’s Hyde Vineyard.

The purchase of this ranch was on the forefront for a number of changes for the Renteria’s. Karen Culler was their winemaker for many years; her style was creating food friendly balanced wines. In 2014, well-respected long-time Napan, Kirk Venge was hired as their winemaker bringing his own style of wine making to the team (different from Karen’s).

They also decided to further separate their vineyard management company from their winery and changed the name of their wine brand from Renteria to Las Perlas and re-branded their packaging. For many years Las Perlas was a Cabernet Sauvignon only produced in Magnums. Now they produce a Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and a Cabernet Sauvignon under the Las Perlas label. Las Perlas (translated to three pearls in Spanish) is a tribute to Oscar and Denise’s three daughters: Bella, Mia and Gabriela. Three elegant circles represent the name on their label.

The Renteria’s also have a 30-year lease on a 60 acre property in the northern part of Oakville (on the edge of Rutherford off of Skellinger Lane) called the Renteria 360 Vineyard. We always enjoy nomenclatural creativity; this vineyard name results from combining its total acreage with ‘tres’. The owner of record for this property is Lodi based UBS Farmland Investors. Incidentally, Salvador’s wife Maria Luisa used to walk by this land in the 1960s on her way to what was called La Luna The Handy Store, at the time located in Rutherford in what is now the Rutherford Grill location. Nearby vineyard neighbors including Bonny’s Vineyard, Beckstoffer Georges III and Groth. Tres Perlas produces a Cabernet Sauvignon from this vineyard and also sell grapes to other producers including Davies Vineyards (the still wine brand for Schramsberg Vineyards).

In 2022 Napa Valley experienced an unprecedented sustained heat spike centered around Labor Day resulting in day time temperatures above 115 degrees and unusually high low temperatures at night. Grapes were still hanging in many vineyards. Renteria 360 Vineyard has sprinklers in this vineyard meant for frost protection; however during this heat spike these sprinklers were turned on to lower the temperature in the vineyard.

A later addition to their portfolio was a Cabernet Sauvignon from the famed To Kalon Vineyard (first vintage 2014).

Tres Perlas is a member of the Mexican-American Vintners Association (MAVA). The first ever tasting hosted by this association was held Saturday July 30, 2011 at Maldonado Vineyards in the far northern reaches of Napa Valley and is where we first met Salvador and Oscar. It was formed in 2010 after a number of vintners poured their wines in Mexico at the Michoacán State Fair and collaboratively recognized the need to have an organization that would promote their own wines, support Mexican Americans in the wine industry and provide a forum for wine education.

Select Wines
Whites
The 2022 Tres Perlas Daughters Rosé Pinot Noir, Renteria Brown Ranch (100% varietal) is salmon skin/light copper in color; the attractive bouquet offers aromas of citrus blossom, lemon/lime, ruby grapefruit, mint and a minerally character like the resulting scent of water hitting hot slate rock. A sweeter aromatic thread with both fruit and hints of vanilla show deeper in the bouquet as the wine opens further. Crisp, bright and alive, the citrus driven palate offers flavors of grapefruit, lemon, raspberry and sour cherry, The finish is mouth watering, showcasing a long-lasting bright acidity along with a light but noticeable velvet-like textural suppleness. This wine was pressed immediately after harvest with a cold fermentation lasting just over a month. It was then aged in neutral French oak barrels for 6 months before being bottled. 13.2% alcohol.

The first wines bottled under Las Perlas, sourced from the Brown Ranch were from 2014. It is nice to see a more recent evolution in style of Chardonnay being produced from Napa Valley favoring restraint, mineralities and brightness. California Chardonnays are often associated with being overtly oak driven and displaying a buttery flavor which often dominates the palate. This style of wine has been popularized by Rombauer in particular. The Tres Perlas Chardonnay are not produced in an oaky or buttery style.

The 2020 Tres Perlas Chardonnay, Renteria Brown Ranch Carneros Napa Valley is medium to deep gold in color; the bouquet is intensely layered with scents of honeycomb, Golden Delicious apple, caramel, warm butter, vanilla, ripe pineapple, mango, crème Brule, vanilla pudding, tapioca and toasted oak. If aromatics could be described as a particular business, this would be like walking into a dessert/bakery shop in the early morning. Balanced across the palate with with flavors as intense as the aromatics, this wine offers notes of baked apple, pineapple, butter, vanilla, pear and a nutty character most noticeable on the finish. Its texture is supple, rounded and almost creamy like. Both primary and secondary fermentation were conducted using native yeast.

The 2014 Tres Perlas Chardonnay, Renteria Brown Ranch Carneros Napa Valley offers clean aromatics with both topical and citrus notes and hazelnut. Some of nut driven aromas continue onto the palate – layers of flavor, rich yet balanced with a noticeable crispness. This wine offers a pleasing texture which is somewhat creamy. Sommelier, Harry Oranges calls this his “lemon meringue pie” wine. The several Tres Perlas Brown Ranch Chardonnays we have tried over the years always delivers a rich and rewarding expression of this variety.

Reds
The 2020 Tres Perlas Pinot Noir, Renteria Brown Ranch Carneros Napa Valley is pale to medium ruby in color; the bouquet is both focused on its fruit character as well as influences from its barrel aging. The scents are dark and spice driven including of leather, crushed peppercorn, black olive, chocolate, mocha, cloves, cardamom, dark raspberry and cherries. If we were to use one word to describe its aromatic character, perhaps it would be brooding. The palate offers flavors of raspberry, cherry, red plum, white pepper and a woodsy spice. The fruit continues to persist for quite some time on the extended finish accompanied by lightly grainy tannins. This Pinot Noir shows plenty of character, both on the bouquet and the palate. This wine would pair nicely with our grandfather’s homemade ravioli (made in the basement of course).

The 2014 Tres Perlas Pinot Noir, Renteria Brown Ranch Carneros Napa Valley was fermented 20% whole cluster with 80% of the fruit de-stemmed and chosen by an optical sorter. The nose shows beautiful fruit interwoven with spicy components including a spicy raspberry character. The palate is not as spicy driven as the bouquet would lead one to believe; this is an extremely flavorful and balanced wine from this variety. It is somewhat briary on the palate completed by dusty tannins anchoring the finish.

The 2019 Tres Perlas Cabernet Sauvignon Renteria 360 Vineyard Oakville is medium to dark ruby in color; the bouquet features ripe fruit aromatics including blackberry, dark cherry and boysenberry along with dried sage. There are also several secondary aromatics at play here including burnt toast, toasted oak, dark chocolate, mocha and coffee grinds. The palate showcases plenty of ripe with almost a perception of sweet fruit which somewhat echoes the bouquet with flavors of blackberry, dark cherry, Santa Rosa Plum and Pakistani mulberry accompanied by finishing notes of dark pepper. This is a simultaneously ripe, dark, bright, spicy and rich expression of this variety. It clearly shows as warmer Oakville grown rather than cooler Carneros. The granular and lightly gripping tannins ultimately outpace the fruit on the finish with a persistent drying character. 15.1% alcohol.

The 2014 Tres Perlas Cabernet Sauvignon shows a departure in wine style from their older vintages. It is very dark in the glass. This is a robust Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon showing dark and layered aromatics including of blackberry with scents of dry earth and toasted cedar. It sports big and bold fruit flavors across the palate with both a simultaneous ripeness and a richness. The mouth watering finish is complemented with chewy long-lasting tannins.

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NOTE: this review has been identified as needing a major update including additional current vintage tasting notes.

Total production is currently around 1,200 cases with plans to grow this to about 2,500 cases in the next few years. The wines are sold direct to consumer via several membership levels including the Collectors and the Familia. For more information, to schedule an appointment or to join their membership list, visit: www.tresperlas.com

Brown Ranch, Carneros

Renteria 360 Vineyard, Oakville