Winemaker Notes
Notes of strawberry, plum, black cherry, and cool herbs combine with woody spices like nutmeg and allspice. Hints of citrus and cedar offer an airiness to the wonderful aromatics. There is good weight throughout the palate and the wine offers a strong impression of chalky minerals that are overlaid with berry fruits, citrus, and hints of elderberry.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Deliciously fresh aromas of black raspberry, cherry, purple flowers and star anise make for a stunning nose in this bottling. The palate is utterly smooth in texture, with a full body yet no hard edges, showing generous and spicy flavors of baked cherry, cardamom and iron.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2019 Pinot Noir Central Coast has a medium ruby-purple color and a nose of black and red berry fruit with touches of blood orange, earth and licorice. The medium-bodied palate is soft, silky and open, with juicy uplift and loads of spicy accents on the finish.
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
COMMENTARY: Reaching for a go-to area for Pinot Noir? The 2019 Williams Selyem Central Coast is ready to serve you. TASTING NOTES: This wine deftly combines ripe berries, mineral notes, and oak into a package of elegance. Pair it with grilled shoulder lamb chops. (Tasted: January 15, 2021, San Francisco, CA)
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.”
Taking advantage of the cool Pacific breezes that arrive via gaps between the Gabilan Range and the Santa Lucia Mountains, San Benito AVA is a great Central coast source for cool climate whites and Pinot noir.