Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
COMMENTARY: The Mendocino Ridge AVA has come a long way in making its presence known. The 2015 Baxter Valenti Vineyard Pinot Noir is a fascinating and delicious wine. TASTING NOTES: This wine is delicately balanced and bright from start to finish. Its aromas and flavors of persistent red fruit should pair it superbly with a roast leg of lamb. (Tasted: April 23, 2019, San Francisco, CA)
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Essentially a northern extension of the Sonoma Coast AVA but part of Mendocino County, Mendocino Ridge is one of the rare appellations defined by elevation only. The Mendocino Ridge AVA is reserved only for vineyards at or above 1,200 feet between the Anderson Valley and Pacific Ocean.