Winemaker Notes
From its pleasing tension to its generous flavors of blueberry, baking spices and crème fraîche, this is a classic Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir with playful acidity and fresh, balanced richness.
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Sourced from an esteemed site in the Petaluma Gap, the 2019 Pinot Noir Gap's Crown Vineyard is layered with a sweet perfume of kirsch, a hint of blue fruit, and violets. The richly textured palate is ripe with cherry and baking spice.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2019 Pinot Noir Gap's Crown Vineyard is drinking beautifully, with expressive aromas of red cherries, amaro and tobacco leaves. The medium-bodied palate offers a fantastic intensity-to-weight ratio; its abundant fruits are supported by fine, chocolaty tannins and seamless freshness, and it finishes long and layered.
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.”
A vast appellation covering Sonoma County’s Pacific coastline, the Sonoma Coast AVA runs all the way from the Mendocino County border, south to the San Pablo Bay. The region can actually be divided into two sections—the actual coastal vineyards, marked by marine soils, cool temperatures and saline ocean breezes—and the warmer, drier vineyards further inland, which are still heavily influenced by the Pacific but not quite with same intensity.
Contained within the appellation are the much smaller Fort Ross-Seaview and Petaluma Gap AVAs.
The Sonoma Coast is highly regarded for elegant Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and, increasingly, cool-climate Syrah. The wines have high acidity, moderate alcohol, firm tannin, and balanced ripeness.