Winemaker Notes
Blend: 100% Pinot Noir
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Light and smoothly textured, this beautifully crafted wine is earthy in wild strawberry preserves, mushroom and forest floor. With a tannic grip that subsides in the glass, it's built to age but entirely enjoyable now, showing power and concentration on the finish.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
From a vineyard used successfully by Luc Morlet for his wines, comes the 2013 Pinot Noir Nobles Vineyard out of Fort Ross-Seaview. The wine is made from the Martini clone of Pinot Noir, with more recent Dijon clone selections such as 777 and 828. This wine comes across like a Musigny from Burgundy. Notes of crushed rock, red currants, black cherries, plum and forest floor are all present in this dense, dark ruby-colored wine that is rich, concentrated, round and capable of evolving for a decade or more.
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Tasting Panel
Dense and meaty with spice, cherry and rich texture; smooth, lush and juicy with balance and style.
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.