Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine & Spirits
Bright, fresh boysenberry flavors fill this wine with a wild fruit presence. It darkens to black raspberry as it takes on air, with serious structure and length of flavor. But it still has the kind of friendly, summery zin character that will brighten anyone's mood in winter.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The least expensive wine is the 2007 Zinfandel Mayacamas Range, which showed terrific character the day I tasted it. Loads of berry fruit (especially raspberries and dark cherries) intermixed with some crushed rock and minerality jumps from the glass of this medium to full-bodied, elegant, pure wine. Drink it over the next 4-5 years.
Undoubtedly proving its merit over and over, Napa Valley is a now a leading force in the world of prestigious red wine regions. Though Cabernet Sauvignon dominates Napa Valley, other red varieties certainly thrive here. Important but often overlooked include Merlot and other Bordeaux varieties well-regarded on their own as well as for their blending capacities. Very old vine Zinfandel represents an important historical stronghold for the region and Pinot noir is produced in the cooler southern parts, close to the San Pablo Bay.
Perfectly situated running north to south, the valley acts as a corridor, pulling cool, moist air up from the San Pablo Bay in the evenings during the hot days of the growing season, which leads to even and slow grape ripening. Furthermore the valley claims over 100 soil variations including layers of volcanic, gravel, sand and silt—a combination excellent for world-class red wine production.