Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
This annually anticipated bottling offers a blend of Doug Margerum’s top barrels from a variety of vineyards. In this vintage, aromas of baking spice and red fruit come with minty sagebrush lift. Herbs, from oregano to dried thyme, play a central role on the palate, with red cherry fruit and a tighter, tart plum skin finish, proving slightly lighter in style.
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Vinous
A dark, expressive wine, the 2012 Syrah UBER presents a resonant, textured personality, with plenty of depth and terrific overall balance. Plum, dark cherry, menthol and spice flesh out on the open-knit, inviting finish. The UBER is Rick Margerum's biggest Syrah and is a blend of all five sites Margerum works with; Black Oak, Colson Canyon, Purisima Mountain, Great Oak Ranch and John Sebastiano, all co-fermented as the various lots come in. Although there is plenty of intensity, all the elements are in the right place. The UBER spent 20 months in French oak, most of it new.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
One of the flagship releases from Margerum is the 2012 Syrah Uber, which sees a long, wild fermentation with grapes added over time as the different vineyards are harvested. In this case, it resulted in a 45-day maceration. Aged 20 months in mostly new French oak and never racked, it has more obvious oak than the Colson Canyon release and gives up blacker fruits, pepper, dried flowers and toasted spice. Slightly angular and edgy at the moment, I like its concentration and structure. Give it a year or two, and plan on drinking bottles through 2024.
Rating: 90+ -
Wine Spectator
Broodingly intense, with floral aromas of violet and blueberry and complex but still tightly wound flavors of blackberry, mineral and smoked pepper beef. Drink now through 2025.
Marked by an unmistakable deep purple hue and savory aromatics, Syrah makes an intense, powerful and often age-worthy red. Native to the Northern Rhône, Syrah achieves its maximum potential in the steep village of Hermitage and plays an important component in the Red Rhône Blends of the south, adding color and structure to Grenache and Mourvèdre. Syrah is the most widely planted grape of Australia and is important in California and Washington. Sommelier Secret—Such a synergy these three create together, the Grenache, Syrah, Mourvedre trio often takes on the shorthand term, “GSM.”
The largest and perhaps most varied of California’s wine-growing regions, the Central Coast produces a good majority of the state's wine. This vast California wine district stretches from San Francisco all the way to Santa Barbara along the coast, and reaches inland nearly all the way to the Central Valley.
Encompassing an extremely diverse array of climates, soil types and wine styles, it contains many smaller sub-AVAs, including San Francisco Bay, Monterey, the Santa Cruz Mountains, Paso Robles, Edna Valley, Santa Ynez Valley and Santa Maria Valley.
While the Central Coast California wine region could probably support almost any major grape varietiy, it is famous for a few Central Coast reds and whites. Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon and Zinfandel are among the major ones. The Central Coast is home to many of the state's small, artisanal wineries crafting unique, high-quality wines, as well as larger producers also making exceptional wines.