Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
From a six-acre site further inland than many of the producer's other sources, this wine shines in classic coastal expression nonetheless. It presents a mix of earthy, stemmy forest and black tea, with a touch of reduction and lightness of oak and power. Delicately textured, it delivers a refined style.
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Wine & Spirits
From a small vineyard planted on sandy Goldridge soil near Sebastopol, this is an airy, high-toned wine, pale ruby in color, lasting on enticing hibiscus and rooibos aromas and fine, dusty tannins. The fruit is gentle and persuasive rather than rich. Drink it with something earthy in flavor, like pasta with morel mushrooms.
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
Displaying great subtlety, the red-fruited 2013 Cobb Rice-Spivak Vineyard Pinot Noir dances delicately on the palate. The wine's powerful and pure red fruit flavors invite a pairing with lightly smoked salmon. (Tasted: August 7, 2017, San Francisco, CA)
The Sonoma Coast AVA is large in area but, not counting overlapping regions like Russian River Valley, only has a few thousand acres of grapevines—and it’s no wonder. Much of the region is rugged and not easily accessible. Its proximity to the Pacific Ocean’s fog and cool breezes limits the varieties that can be cultivated, but it proves to be an ideal environment for high quality Pinot Noir.
Since fog is a frequent fact of life here, as are heavy marine layers that sometimes bring rain, the best vineyards are wisely planted above the fog line, on picturesque ridges that capture enough sun to provide even ripening. That, with the overnight drop in temperature that reliably preserves acidity, results in fine expressions of Pinot Noir that often receive tremendous critic and consumer praise alike, and are often in high demand.