MORE PINOT NOIRS


SIDURI

Adam & Dianna Lee are a couple of wine fanatics who were bitten so hard by the wine bug, they began making wine at home.
Now things are totally out of hand, as they launched their own label called "Siduri."  

This is named after some mythical goddess who held the wine of "eternal life."  I've read some news articles about wine having positive health benefits, but nothing quite so dramatic as immortality.  Wait until CSPI, a self-proclaimed group of health Nazis, figures out this!

Today this label is one of the benchmarks for California Pinot Noir.  Tasting through their line-up, I'm usually impressed by the over all high quality of the wines.  Most are vineyard designated and while I find some better than others, the qualitative differences are small.

The Lees have the right idea about making Pinot Noir.  They seem to understand the idea of "terroir" and allowing the grapes to express the character of where they originate, rather than seeking to craft or mold the wine to their particular idea of what the ideal Pinot might be.

They don't filter or use fining agents to clarify the wines.  It's not that they're opposed to those techniques, but they feel if the wine doesn't require fussing with, then don't fuss with it!

As a result, we've seen uniformly good wines from this producer.  That's fortunate, because the wines are priced at numbers which scare off most wine drinkers.  Siduri's vineyard sources are asking high prices and those new oak barrels don't exactly grow on trees.  Well, maybe they do, but they still cost a fortune and the Lee's replace a significant percentage of them each vintage.

Most of the wines are produced in small batches amounting to less than 400 cases.  

The 2009 Rosella's shows a bit of ripe plum, notes of spice and black cherry...Mildly tannic, but drinkable now with food and it ought to cellar nicely for a few more years.
  

Currently in stock: 
2009 Santa Lucia Highlands "Rosella's" Pinot Noir SALE $49.99
2010 Santa Lucia Highlands "Pisoni Vineyard"  Pinot Noir SALE $55.99




MIURA

This label is the work of a former professional "cork puller."  Emmanuel Kemiji was the sommelier at San Francisco's Ritz-Carlton dining room.  

He must have had too much to drink one night, because he embarked on a project of actually making wine.  Now he's got some help from an old college buddy who, coincidentally, was the winemaker for a Carneros winery called Saintsbury.

The "Miura" name, aside from being that of a famous "boiler" maker (famous for 'low mass boilers') and of a Japanese porno queen, refers to a rather strong Spanish bull.  Bull fighters in Spain (where Emmanuel spent a number of years in his youth) regard the "Miura" as the most formidable of opponents.  

The famous (legendary) bull-fighter Manolete met with death in a battle against a Miura bull in 1947.  

So, Kemiji, taking the bull by the horns, has a number of wines under his "Miura" banner.    

Though they make wine from some of the more famous Santa Lucia Highlands sites, there's a cooler-climate vineyard in the Santa Lucia Highlands...Silacci.  The 2006 from that site is terrific and a bit more elegant.



The same crew makes a dynamite Syrah...Antiqv2s...one of the few in California that, at times, has actually resembled a good Rhône wine!

 

Currently in stock:  

2006 Santa Lucia Highlands "Silacci" Pinot Noir SALE $56.99
 

 

 

PAUL MATHEW

This little winery is the work of wine geek/winemaker Mat Gustafson and his wife Barb.

Mat has worn many hats in the wine business...he's played sommelier at a restaurant with a phone book for a wine list.  He's been a tour guide at a Napa winery before being their ambassador in the Southern California market.  And, bitten by the wine bug, he's become a winemaker, having learned a bit at Oakville Ranch in Napa and from working with Merry Edwards in Sonoma.  

His philosophy in winemaking features indigenous yeasts, low levels of SO2 and minimal cellar treatment (like filtering).  They so concerned about leaving a "carbon footprint," their bottles come without foil capsules!

We are big fans of Mat's killer Valdiguie (it comes from a really old vineyard in Knights Valley and it gives cru Beaujolais wines a run for the money.  $17.99.  Delicious!) and we found a really nice Pinot in the portfolio.  The Valdiguie used to be labeled as Gamay, but they recently discovered these 60+ year old vines are not Gamay.  Valdiguie is a grape finding its roots in the Languedoc region of France, not Beaujolais.

We have a terrific Pinot Noir from this winery...it's from a tiny vineyard situated between the towns of Occidental and Sebastopol and it's called the TnT Vineyard (Tanya and her husband Tom).  It's a dynamite Pinot Noir, true to the varietal and it is not a Cabernet-Wannabe.  Nor does it taste like Syrah...we like the bright cherry/pomegranate-like fruit tones to this wine.  It's medium-bodied and elegant.

Currently in stock:  2007 PAUL MATHEW Russian River Valley "TnT" PINOT NOIR $35.99

PISONI VINEYARD

Gary Pisoni is a nut!  I remember meeting this fellow a number of years ago.  He was driving by and due to celestial alignments, stopped into our humble wine emporium.  
He poked around the shop, looking at the various wines and was unusually delighted that we had some bottles of various wines from the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti.  Pisoni told me he was growing some Pinot Noir and that I ought to stop by his little vineyard down in Monterey.  I have never taken him up on his offer.  
One day, I may have to make the trek!

Pisoni's family has owned acreage in Monterey County for many years.  The Santa Lucia Highlands features some east and south-east facing slopes which are considered ideal for early-ripening varieties; Pinot Noir, especially.

Mr. Pisoni, according to the legend, was roaming around Europe and had occasion to taste one of the Romanée-Conti wines.  The poor fellow could not believe the extraordinary quality of what he was drinking.  The story is that he made his way to one of the "DRC's" vineyards and appropriated some cuttings.  These were brought back surreptitiously and I imagine the statute of limitations has run out on him being nailed for some kind of smuggling.  The vines have been propagated and now Mr. Pisoni is the proud owner of a modest "domain" of Pinot Noir vines.  I believe he also has planted some Syrah, as well.  

He sells the fruit from these vines for a hefty sum and winemakers line up to purchase the grapes and make "Pisoni Vineyard" Pinots.  The Pisoni name has become synonymous with Pinot Noir.  

Now Gary Pisoni even has his own label of Pinot, competing with the other famous folks such as Patz & Hall and Siduri (and Miura, listed above).  The first wines were made at Peter Michael's Winery, but now Jeff Pisoni makes them at the Copain facility in Sonoma.  Interesting that they ship the fruit so far away to make wine from their own vines!

The 2009 is a big wine with Cabernet-like tannins. It's fairly full-bodied, too...should be interesting to see how this wine develops.   The 2008 has the same sort of character...fairly big, which makes it the sort of wine appreciated by those keeping score.  It's less tannic and showing notes of ripe berry, a shade of jamminess.


We have been impressed, too, with the Pisoni's "other" label.  It's called "LUCIA."  You shouldn't make the mistake of calling this a "second" label.  The Lucia brand is found on non-Pisoni grown wines.  

The 2007 Pinot Noir is in stock.  Nice and deep, a shade less ripe than the Pisoni-labeled wine.   The half bottles of the 2006 are also quite nice.

 

Currently in stock:  2009 Pisoni "Santa Lucia Highlands" Pinot Noir $64.99
2008 Pisoni "Santa Lucia Highlands" Pinot Noir $64.99 (last bottles)

2006 LUCIA  Santa Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir 375ml  $20.99

ROAR

Gary and Rosella Franscioni are the owners of a wonderful vineyard in the Santa Lucia Highlands of Monterey County.  You may have seen the "Gary's" designation on some Pinot Noirs, he being the less :notorious" Gary, with his neighbor Gary Pisoni being the most "notorious".  

Some people are willing to substitute the word "crazy" for "notorious."

Both Gary's grow great Pinot Noir.

The ROAR label is the Franscioni's foray into the world of wine sales, the wines were being made in concert with Adam and Dianna Lee, the equally "notorious" dynamic duo from the Siduri winery in Sonoma.  Adam, apparently, still does some consulting, but wine wizard Ed Kurtzman handles the enology and such.

Production of ROAR wines has gown a bit over the past few vintages.  We've been fans since the first vintage and the wines continue to be of good quality and honest prices.

We typically receive a few bottles of these Pinot Noirs and are delighted to be able to share them with our friends.  

There's a 2009 bottling of Garys' vineyard Pinot Noir...nice bright cherry notes to this.  The 2007 Pisoni is a bigger, slightly jammy red.  The 2009 Rosella's has nice raspberry notes and a touch of sweet oak, while the Santa Lucia Highlands bottling from 2009 is bright and shows red cherry notes and it's a bit lighter than the single-vineyard wines.

We do not ship these, as they are a 'reward' for customers who shop in the store.

 

Currently in stock:  2009 ROAR Santa Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir $39.99
2009 GARYS' Vineyard Pinot Noir $49.99
2009 ROSELLA'S Vineyard Pinot Noir $49.99

 

STEELE WINES

Winemaker Jed Steele is now an "old-timer" in California winemaking.  We first met him in the 1970s when he was working out in the Anderson Valley for a guy named Deron Edmeades.  They made some curious wines (to be polite) and some were actually pretty good.  

Jed left there to work for some little winery called Kendall-Jackson and he spent nearly a decade handling that task.  He left KJ to become an independent consultant, helping wineries around the state make wine.  It seems Mr. Jackson was not entirely happy with this arrangement, feeling Mr. Steele was taking with him "winemaking secrets" and so he stopped paying the final two installments of a severance package.  Steele sued Jackson for the remaining $275,000 and Jackson, a lawyer in real life, sued Steele for something like $22 million.  Neither party won, exactly, Steele ending up losing the final two installments of his pay.  Jackson's victory was only in not having to pay Steele but a few pennies.

In the meantime, encouraged by his wife Marie (behind every great man...) he started Steele Wines.  They purchased to old Konocti Winery in Lake County and Steele makes a huge array of wines there.  Numerous Zinfandels, Chardonnays, Syrahs and Pinot Noirs are produced.  

We usually have some bottles of Jed's "Carneros" Pinot in the shop.  The 2004 is currently available.  This is a nice, medium-bodied, cherryish Pinot with just a touch of vanillin on the back.  Smooth and soft, it is ideally served at cool cellar temp.  Not a wine for cellaring, this is best consumed in its youth.

Currently in stock:  2006 Carneros Pinot Noir Sold Out Presently

 

SEA SMOKE

This new property is the work of a creative fellow named Bob Davids.  This guy has an amazing story, starting off in various phases of the automotive industry, working for General Motors.  From there he grew wings and worked for aviation mogul Bill Lear.  

Later he got into electronic games and founded a company called Radica.  If you've ever seen a fishing rod "game" with an electronic bass fishing game attached to it: That is Bob Davids' own design!



While working in Hong Kong cranking out electronic games, he attended a wine event and a bottle of 1947 Château Climens from France's Barsac region put Davids under its spell.  So enchanted by wine was he that Davids came to California and bought a hundred acre property near the Santa Ynez River.  

The winery gets its name from the smoke-like fog that wafts over this property from the Pacific Ocean.  

Sea Smoke currently has a lot of buzz amongst the wine geek community.  The winemaker was a young lady named Kris Curran.  We understand the current winemaker is a fellow named Don Schroeder.

 

The wines we've tasted have been very showy.  They are big, ripe, deep reds with a note of Burgundian-styling, but we find them more reminiscent of some California Syrah wines.  These are dark in color and lavishly-oaked.  Notes of mocha and toasty oak are common in each wine.  Since they're new, availability is rather limited.

 

Currently available:  Please inquire...

WH. SMITH

The Smiths are former Peninsula residents who bought a piece of dirt on Howell Mountain back in the 1970s and planted Cabernet there.  The old winery on the property was owned by a guy named Hess, well before the Swiss fellow, Donald Hess, opened his little cellar across the Valley.

The Smiths made big, sturdy, husky, rough-and-tumble Howell Mountain Cabernet under a label called La Jota.    We were on board in the early days, but I found the wines too tannic and hard.  I'm certain we fell off the Smith's radar screen and they fell off ours.

They sold La Jota to the Markham winery in 2001 and Markham sold it recently to Wine Baron Jess Jackson (who doesn't have enough wine brands to sell, apparently).

The Smiths, however, still cultivate some vines on Howell Mountain and they embarked on a Pinot Noir project in Sonoma.  

I recall tasting some wines of this label and wondered what all the fuss was about.  They'd gotten wonderfully encouraging numerical scores for wines which, to me, did not taste like benchmark Pinot Noir.  

On a whim, I purchased a bottle of their 2006 Maritime Pinot Noir for a blind-tasting.  We were going to have a look at some Sonoma County Pinots and so we splurged for a bottle of the Smith's wine.

This was an impressive wine and I was a bit surprised, frankly, that the fellows on the tasting panel that evening were so fond of the wine.  One taster hated it and this reaction wasn't a surprise, as I noted on my score-sheet that this wine is "a bit particular."  In fact, if I had been told we had a French ringer in the line-up, it's the WH. Smith I'd have pegged as some sort of Gevrey-Chambertin or Nuits-St.-Georges.  

They make several different bottlings, but the one designated "Maritime" they consider to be their best.  The 2006 comes from two vineyards in Freestone, a top site in the Sonoma Coast appellation.  Three other vineyards contribute to the blend.  

The fragrances are herbal and reminiscent of forest floor scents.  It's not a fruit bomb, nor is this especially oaky (only 10 months in French oak).  It's the sort of wine which starts out with an element of mystery and intrigue and continues to perplex all throughout the time it's in your glass.  I wouldn't recommend this to every Pinot drinker...it's the sort of wine which will totally enthrall those who are "on the same wave-length" and disappoint those whose "receivers" attract too much static.

Currently in stock:  2006 WH. Smith Sonoma Coast "Maritime" PINOT NOIR SALE $49.99
  2007 WH. Smith Sonoma Coast "Marimar" PINOT SALE  $42.99

"THE SHOP" (Byron Kosuge Wines)

Though this label is rather obscure, the fellow who owns it has been making good Pinot Noirs on a modest scale for many years.

You may have tasted some of Byron Kosuge's work from his days as the winemaker at Carneros' famed temple of Pinot Noir, Saintsbury.   He actually grew up in the town of Davis where his father taught at the university.  Though Dad was a biochemist, Byron studied American and English literature before embarking on his own "best cellars" career path.

Kosuge doesn't seem to be one of those vintners who's terribly interested in the "show business"-like aspects of wine marketing.  In fact, he says "I could never be a 'rock star' winemaker.  I'm much too ordinary for all that.  In fact, I don't even speak French..."  So, in an era of "celebrity winemakers" who demand their client wineries charge big bucks for wines with which they're associated, here's a down-to-earth guy who makes good wines.

"The Shop" is the name of the brand as "Byron" was already taken and "Kosuge" doesn't roll off the tongue like "Lafite" or "D-R-C."  The name comes from the tool and equipment shed used by a vineyard management crew in the Carneros region.  Byron bought fruit from the vineyard near "the shop" and it's the source of his Carneros Pinot Noir.

Kosuge made a delightful wine, showcasing the bright berry and mild cherry notes of Carneros Pinot.  Though matured in French oak, wood is well in the background here.  It's smooth enough to drink now and probably can be cellared for 3 to 5 more years.  Slightly more than 300 cases were bottled.

Currently in stock:  2006 THE SHOP Carneros Pinot Noir $31.99 (last bottles)

STORRS

Storrs is one of those delightful California wineries which seems to fly a bit under the radar most of the time.  They routinely make good wines, though, in my experience.

The winery was founded in 1988.  We've often found good Chardonnays from Storrs, nice Riesling and Gewurztraminer and one really spectacular Bordeaux-styled blend.

Now we can add Pinot Noir to the list.  

 

In January of 2008 we had a blind-tasting of Santa Cruz Mountains Pinot Noirs and this 2005 from Storrs won the tasting.  Handily.

And it's a very fine example of Pinot Noir.  First, it's not a Syrah or Cabernet-Wannabe.  The wine is beautifully balanced and has aromas displaying black cherry fruit.  There's a whiff of wood, but not so much that all you sense is oak.  The wood is in the background, where it should be.  The tannins are mild and not overbearing.  In short: one pretty Pinot Noir.  


The 2007 is their current offering and the 2005 is long sold out.  This is a wonderful example of Santa Cruz Mountains Pinot.  

Reasonably-priced, too, as the Storrs price their wines sensibly.  It's drinkable now and will remain in good shape for a few years.

 

Currently in stock:  2007 STORRS Santa Cruz Mountains PINOT NOIR (Winery Price $36)  SALE $23.99  (last cases)

 

WAXWING WINE CELLARS

Here's a label you probably have not heard of.  

Winemaker Scott Sisemore has a number of interesting enological notches on his belt...he started his winemaking journey at McDowell Valley Vineyards in Mendocino and later spent time at Rosenblum Cellars and Ravenswood.  He was affiliated with our friends at the Pellegrini Family winery where they specialize in Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.

Some Pinot producers are challenged to make numerous small lots, buying fruit from vineyards scattered around the state (or beyond).  Scott has chosen to produce Pinot Noir from Sonoma's Russian River valley for the time being.  His wine comes from the Toboni vineyard, a site we're familiar with under the Arista label.  

Waxwing's wine offers a nice cherry-like fruit note and there's a bit of earthiness here along the lines of "forest floor" tones.  The wine is medium-bodied,  not tannic, but balanced.  It's very fine immediately and we think a year or two or three in bottle will enhance it even more.  

Scott made all of two barrels, so there are less than 60 cases of this artisan wine.  The vineyard, by the way, if you're interested in esoteric details, is planted entirely to the Pommard clone of Pinot Noir.  

This will be a nice enhancement to the Thanksgiving meal this year...best at cool cellar temp, too.

 

Currently in stock:  2008 WAXWING Russian River "Toboni" PINOT NOIR  $29.99

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    Last modified: February 20,  2012