Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Splashes of high acidity and contoured minerality mark this estate-grown wine with a sinewy, fresh palate that's inviting and exotic. The defining characteristics are a pleasant mix of roses, soy and forest floor. Dark cherry and pomegranate lie beneath the more savory aspects, ultimately leaving one with an appreciation for how velvety a wine can be.
Editors' Choice. -
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2014 Pinot Noir Pastorale Vineyard used a slightly higher percentage of whole clusters and offers dark raspberries, sweet and sour cherries, and beautiful, fragrant aromatics with a hint of wild blueberries as well. This looks to be a successful 2014 that should drink nicely for 7-8 years.
Joseph Phelps Vineyards is a family-owned winery committed to crafting world class, estate-grown wines. Founded in 1973 when Joe Phelps purchased a former cattle ranch near St. Helena in the Napa Valley, the winery now controls and farms nearly 375 acres of vines on eight estate vineyards in St. Helena, the Stags Leap District, Oakville, Rutherford, Oak Knoll District, Carneros and South Napa Valley. In 1999, the Phelps family added 100 acres of vineyard property near the town of Freestone on the Sonoma Coast, where Phelps now grows Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.
Phelps is best known for its flagship Napa Valley blend of red Bordeaux varietals, Insignia, first produced in 1974. Awarded Wine Spectator's "Wine of the Year" in 2005, Insignia is widely regarded as a qualitative benchmark for California winemaking.
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.