Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2012 Pinot Noir Symposium was aged in 20% new French oak and is actually the only wine that is not 100% Pinot Noir. It is blended with – of all things – 4% Pinotage. There are plenty of sweet cherries, raspberries and floral notes, followed by an earthy, spicy, medium-bodied wine with good structure and finely tuned tannins. The acidity is good and the wine fresh, pure and delicious.
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.”
On the far western edge of the larger Sonoma Coast appellation, the Fort Ross-Seaview AVA hugs right up against the Pacific coast. Vineyards, planted at rugged elevations between 920 to 1,800 feet, occupy only two percent of the total land in the AVA. Fort Ross-Seaview growers believe that the region boasts an ideal mix of sunshine, cool air and beneficial stress for producing high quality Chardonnay and Pinot noir.