Winemaker Notes
The "Terra de Promissio Vineyard Pinot Noir delivers generous black cherry, blueberry, black raspberry and cranberry with notes of earth and black tea. Elegant, balanced, lush and focused. Mouthful is ample and plush gaining depth with a lingering velvety finish.
Professional Ratings
-
Jeb Dunnuck
The 2017 Pinot Noir Terra De Promissio saw slightly more new oak than the 2016 and offers more red fruits, as well as lots of toasted spice, crushed flowers, honeysuckle, and smoked earth. It's medium to full-bodied, has a light, graceful texture, beautiful balance, and a beautiful finish. It shows the more fresh, juicy, yet also sunny style of the vintage beautifully. It too will keep for at least 7-8 years.
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The pale ruby colored 2017 Pinot Noir Terra de Promissio offers prosciutto, cranberry sauce, crushed blackberries, red cherry sparks and touches of strawberry, dried flowers, fragrant earth and pipe tobacco. It’s medium-bodied, silky and firmly framed with well-woven freshness and nuanced flavor layers, finishing long. This deserves another year in bottle. Rating: 92+
-
Wine Enthusiast
Rich and earthy, this is a robust, full-bodied and memorable wine from the great site. Soft supple tannins support a core of baked plum, cardamom and dusty crushed rock, with stemmy black tea and clove playing supporting roles.
-
Wine Spectator
Big and plush, with voluptuously spiced dark cherry, plum and wild berry flavors that are finely textured. Creamy midpalate, showing mineral detail and a chocolaty richness on the finish. Drink now through 2023.
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.