Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
For decades, artisan wineries throughout the world—especially the United States—have experimented with Mourvèdre in hopes that they could take this pedestrian grape variety to a higher level. Except for only one area—Bandol—where it truly called home and had performed admirably, the story was the same—this was just a good little red table wine, and that is all. The 2014 Seam has succeeded to change that notion and produced one of the best Mourvèdres in the marketplace. The wine, showing ripe fruit and dried cocoa powder, is exhibiting the perfect combination of the grape's best traits. Drinking well now. (Tasted: August 24, 2016, San Francisco, CA)
Full of ripe fruit, and robust, earthy goodness, Mourvèdre is actually of Spanish provenance, where it still goes by the name Monastrell or Mataro. It is better associated however, with the Red Blends of the Rhône, namely Chateauneuf-du-Pape. Mourvèdre shines on its own in Bandol and is popular both as a single varietal wine in blends in the New World regions of Australia, California and Washington. Somm Secret—While Mourvèdre has been in California for many years, it didn’t gain momentum until the 1980s when a group of California winemakers inspired by the wines of the Rhône Valley finally began to renew a focus on it.
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.