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I
suppose a number of people perceive Your West Coast Oenophile as a bit of a contrarian. Certainly, that has always deliberately been the case with the wine program I am building for Sostevinobile. Our broad-ranging focus on the sustainably grown wines of the West Coast flies in the face of dominant paradigm throughout the San Francisco region, and, to be honest, I am hoping it will carve out quite a special niche for us. Other times, however, my iconoclasm stems from something more unintentional. I really do not have a refined beer palate and usually end up ordering wine at brewpubs like Gordon Biersch. Not that I dislike the beers—they just don’t go down as easily, especially when I’m not accompanying them with food.
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The day after my marathon excursion to Napa, I attended the Pinot Noir Summit’s Grand Awards Tasting at the Hilton Hotel-Financial District in San F
rancisco. I had never participated in one of Barbara Drady’s wine events before, but I had agreed to help publicize it (for which I was extended my trade ticket) beforehand; even so, it was a bit of terra incognita when I arrived. Perhaps because I’ve become so intimately involved with wine, I could not get myself in the spirit of the event or to participate in the Shootout that saw competing bottles of Pinot color-tagged and ludicrously wrapped in aluminum foil.Frankly, I was still
decompressing from the sensory overload of eight tastings in two days
and was tempted to leave almost immediately after I arrived. However, I quickly became aware that nearly all of the participating wineries were pouring a range of wines in addition to their Pinot submissions. Wonderful! A Pinot tasting with varietal variety!
decompressing from the sensory overload of eight tastings in two days
and was tempted to leave almost immediately after I arrived. However, I quickly became aware that nearly all of the participating wineries were pouring a range of wines in addition to their Pinot submissions. Wonderful! A Pinot tasting with varietal variety!
And so I set out in iconoclastic fashion to taste my way through such wines as the appealing 2008 Lascivious, an anomalous blend, in its own right, of Cabernet Sauvignon, Mourvèdre and Syrah from Paso Robles’ Asuncion Ridge and the exceptional 2007 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon from Frank Family. The very vivacious Teri Michele Love impressed me with the quirkily-labeled 2008 Tiggy Paso Robles, an asymmetric mélange crafted from Grenache and Tannat by her Gioia Wine.
From Sonoma, UPTick Vineyards vinted an amiable 2008 Russian River Valley Estate Syrah. A well-familiar operation, also from Sonoma, Simple Math showed itself as delightful as when I first sampled their wines last year; this time they featured the 2007 Convex, a Syrah blended with 20% Grenache.
I managed to find a couple of contrasting whites in this crowded room, starting with the 2009 Chardonnay from Leveroni, the same family that produces Clover Stornetta milk, one of the Bay Area’s most iconic (Tip Clo through Your Two Lips) brands. While Chardonnay is a natural complement to Pinot Noir, the excellent 2008 Riesling from Oregon’s Firesteed Cellars proved a surprising yet welcome contrast to the expected.
Temecula
may be California’s most unpresupposing AVA, but I am always glad to
make new discoveries from this Riverside County enclave. Here, Woodworth Vineyards proved their mettle with the pleasant 2007 Black Dog, a modest blend of 65% Cabernet, 25% Syrah, and 10% Merlot. I also sampled their 2008 Estate Pinot Noir, a wine that underscored the vast geographic range where this varietal can flourish. From that point, it simply became a matter of tasting as many Pinots as I could squeeze into the time remaining.
may be California’s most unpresupposing AVA, but I am always glad to
make new discoveries from this Riverside County enclave. Here, Woodworth Vineyards proved their mettle with the pleasant 2007 Black Dog, a modest blend of 65% Cabernet, 25% Syrah, and 10% Merlot. I also sampled their 2008 Estate Pinot Noir, a wine that underscored the vast geographic range where this varietal can flourish. From that point, it simply became a matter of tasting as many Pinots as I could squeeze into the time remaining.
I was surprised I had not previously tried the wines of Santa Rosa’s Adler Fels, but found their 2008 Pinot Noir Santa Barbara more than approachable. Roudon-Smith’s winemaker Brandon Armitage inaugurated his eponymous, 70-case production of the 2008 Pinot Noir Santa Cruz Mountains. Coming in slightly larger, with 425 cases of Pinot Noir and a mere 75 of Cabernet Sauvignon, Fotinos Brothers of Carneros impressed with their sophomore vintage offering, the 2007 OSR II Block Los Carneros Pinot Noir. Similarly, Coghlan Vineyards of Los Olivos produced only 300 cases of their 2009 Sta. Rita Hills Pinot Noir, with a bottling of Grenache Blanc to be released this fall.
I moved about the other tables with relative precision, seeking out new labels, eschewing the imports, and exchanging pleasantries with established friends. From Healdsburg, Portalupi showcased an austere 2008 Pinot Noir Russell Family Vineyards they describe as “Côte du Nuit not Côte du Rhône.” Over the years, I have sampled numerous Pinots from the Sonoma Coast, but only once before encountered Sonoma Coast Vineyards, which poured their delightful 2007 Pinot Noir Balistreri Vineyard. North by a few miles, Standish Wine Company featured their whimsical Wild King label and its 2007 Pinot Noir Bosc Block.
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I find the labels from PARO Wines incredibly evocative (hopefully, most attendees got to see this bottle with the aluminum cloak removed); sourcing their grapes from various AVAs in both Sonoma and Mendocino, their 2009 Pinot Noir Indindoli Vineyards artfully depicted the splendors of Russian River Valley fruit. Another Mendocino finalist, Masút, is a relatively new offshoot from the prodigious Fetzer clan, here making an impressive debut with their 2009 Estate Pinot Noir. I can’t unravel the etymology of either Indindoli or Masút, but I do know that Joseph Jewell derives from the middle names (to be sure, far more assimilable than Micah Adrian or Wirth Manspeaker) of its two proprietors, who collaborated on their 2008 Pinot Noir Appian Way Vineyards from the Russian River Valley.
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The curiously named Zoller Wine Styling constitutes a Paso Robles enterprise producing an assortment of ten far-ranging labels, represented here by their 2008 Pinot Noir Keller Vineyards from the Sonoma Coast. Embracing a wide swath of Central California, virtual winery Pacific Coast Vineyards introduced themselves in stunning fashion with their superb 2007 Pinot Noir Babcock Vineyards from the Santa Rita Hills. Similarly spreading out from their Templeton base, Icon Estates’ Wild Horse offer an amiable 2008 Pinot Noir Central Coast.
Not to be confused with Wild Horse, WildAire from the Willamette Valley impressed with their 2008 Pinot Noir Timothy. Returning to California, Cotati’s James Family Cellars offered an unpretentious 2008 Pinot Noir Stony Point Vineyard, while nearby, overlooking the Sonoma Plaza, Sharp Cellars poured the highly impressive 2007 Keenan’s Cove Pinot Noir.
I sampled both of Windward Vineyards’ bottlings, the 2008 Monopole Pinot Noir and the 2008 Gold Barrel Select Pinot Noir, with equal delight. And I also sipped two contrasting wines from McIntyre Vineyards, preferring the 2008 Estate Pinot Noir Santa Lucia Highlands to the nonetheless excellent 2007 Pinot Noir Arroyo Seco.
I had tried McIntyre’s Vin Gris of Pinot Noir at last year’s Wine Artisans of the Santa Lucia Highlands in Los Gatos. Given their ubiquity at more tastings I can count, I would have thought my friend Joe Lazzara’s Jazz Cellars would also have poured there, so it was a fitting conclusion that I finished off the event here with their delightful 2008 Doctor’s Vineyard Pinot Noir Santa Lucia Highlands.
Perhaps my relentless pursuit to taste and catalog the finest wines from the West Coast for Sostevinobile has left me a bit jaded. I can’t countenance such secular activities as Wine Tweets or the circus-like atmosphere at the San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition. Maybe this popularity pageant at the Pinot Noir Summit presented a valid exercise in broadening these wines’ appeal to the general public—as one might say in Québec or France, however, ce n’était pas à mon goût. But still, I recognize that this event did introduce me to quite a number of wineries I had not previously encountered or, in several instances, even heard of, and I did get to sample some very fine Pinot Noirs this evening, along with a far more diverse selection of wines than I ordinarily encounter at single-varietal tastings. So, contrary to my initial inclination, je suppose que cette fête ne fût pas si mauvais, après tout.