Morgan- any chance we can get the release notes early? I personally enjoy planning my purchases. 
Seconded!!
If you liked the Judge SB there is a good chance you’ll like the Staves SB more. It’s excellent and probably my favorite Bedrock white.
The Alta Vista Gewurztraminer is made in a dry style. It’s a good change of pace from other typical whites when looking for something different. I’ll be in for a bottle.
Thank you. Looks like I’ll be buying every type I’m allocated. 
Is the special “Evangelho Vineyard” Carignan/Mourvédre blend anticipated to be included in the upcoming Bedrock release?
Link
Sure! Here are the wine write-ups for Tuesday. As usual, please excuse any typos, misspellings, etc. as I have not done the final edit. We are getting excited!
2018 Compagni Portis, Sonoma Valley
It is pretty hard to believe, but this is the 10th release of this wine! When we first released this wine, we had no idea what to expect. The previous folks who took the fruit picked out only the Gewurztraminer, leaving behind the other “mixed whites,” feeling that Gewurztraminer was a tough enough sell as it was. In our opinion, it turns out the key to the wine IS the other mixed whites—for it is the later-ripening Trousseau Gris, Riesling, Roter Veltliner, Chenin Blanc and others provide acid and lift to brighten the spicy, yet oft, er… well-padded Gewurztraminer component of the wine. In 2018 the wine was fermented in a combination of stainless steel and older oak casks where malolactic was inhibited to further preserve leavening brightness in the wine. This is a classic Compagni Portis—lemon curd, rose water, and a suggestion of lychee with pretty density and structure. Unfortunately, only 120 cases were produced, so please hit the wishlist button if you would like some and do not have an allocation.
2018 Alta Vista Gewurztraminer, Moon Mountain District
After six years of farming, this 1940s-planted vineyard back from multiple years of no pruning and neglect it is now firing on all cylinders (to see a short video about the site and what it took to rehabilitate it click here). This small, 2.5-acre parcel, is planted high above the town of Sonoma in the southeast flank of the Moon Mountain AVA on the Sonoma side of Mt. Veeder. Dry-farmed in Tuscan red clay loams around basalt outcroppings, the vineyard puts out small amounts of intensely perfumed and dense fruit. The real key to what makes the wines from this site so amazing is that high levels of malic acid that remain in the grapes due to the way vines respire acidity under the unique diurnal conditions found at the site. The result is a Gewurztraminer that is remarkably light on its feet and dense but refreshing.
2018 Staves of Waidhofen, Sonoma Valley
In the years where the Sauvignon Blanc is particularly stellar, and we have enough of it, we make our homage to the five-century-old “Fassbinderei Stockinger” located in the Austrian Alps (Fassbinderei is just German for Tonnellerie; Tonnellerie is French for Cooper, Cooper is fancy English for barrel maker). In our experience, the remarkably subtle and elegant barrels from Stockinger are among the best for framing white wines—imparting elegant and integrated perfume while adding just a touch of spice and weight to the finished wine. This year’s “Waidhofen” is a blend of 74% Uboldi Vineyard and 26% Judge Vineyard, combining the sappy green melon and kiwi fruit character of the former with the red fruit and florals of the latter. Though possessing some weight, as you would expect with a barrel-fermented wine, this maintains refreshing acidity thanks to its 3.27 finished pH. Like many wines from 2018, this is one of my favorite iterations of this wine.
2018 Old Vine Zinfandel, California
2018 was a brilliant year for Zinfandel across California, and this wine reflects it. I have said it before, but it bears repeating—though this is one of the least expensive wines we make, in many ways it is the most important. First, it is the one Bedrock wine that trickles out to most markets, so if someone gets introduced to our wines, there is a good chance it is through this one. As such, it has to be reflective of the vibrant, fruit-filled yet fresh style we look for while crafting California’s great variety. Second, this is the wine that allows us to rehab old vineyards by giving us a place to put the fruit while we upgrade farming, pruning and soil health; at an average of 80 years of age, these lovely old vines appreciate the attention. The 2018 is a blend of 85% Zinfandel filled out with Mataro, Grenache, Alicante Bouschet, Carignan, Petite Sirah and scant amounts of the many other varieties that can be found in California’s older, multifarious vineyards. Many of our most venerable vineyards contribute to this wine, including Bedrock, Teldeschi, Esola, Pagani, Papera, Evangelho and Pato filled in with lots from other old vineyards throughout the state. This will provide great drinking pleasure with a decant early on, but as with most iterations of this bottling, will develop nicely for a number of years.
2018 Evangelho Vineyard Heritage Wine, Contra Costa County
2018 was our second vintage with full control of farming at our nearly 130-year-old estate site (still gives me chills to say that), and we enjoyed a mild and even vintage leading to a relatively late harvest at this amazing Delta site. The main thing we have noticed since taking over the farming is that our earlier opening of canopies and added fruit drops in certain sections to balance fruit load have led to wines with a bit more density. It was a vintage where all varieties performed well, and that plays out in the final blend where Mataro and Carignan make up over 20% each of the cuvee. We continue to learn how to best express this singular site and have found that each year we gravitate to more and more large format cooperage for elevage—in this vintage, much of the Carignan, Zin and Mataro were all raised in 600-gallon ovals. Unlike some of our Sonoma sites where new oak is easily absorbed and befits the wine, we find that the sandy soils and the pure, fine tannins it imparts show most clearly with very little new oak interplay. This is a classic Evangelho, showing the bright and composed fruit we expect along with the savory bite inflected by the Mataro and Carignan, and one that should provide plenty of pleasure throughout the years.
2018 Bedrock Heritage Wine, Sonoma Valley
The O.G. of Bedrock Wine Co.! These vines turned 131 years in 2018 and decided it would be a great year to turn out a relatively small crop of delicious and dense fruit. As always, the wine, though based around Zinfandel, is a field-blend of the 27 varieties found in the old vines at my family’s site in the heart of Sonoma Valley, including about 20% Carignan and 5% Mataro. That said, like the other great old vineyards we have the good fortune to work with, the wine is far more defined by site than by variety. I have always loved that Bedrock produces a wine less about opulent dark fruits and more about spice, orange-peel tinged red fruits, noble structure and balanced weighting. Like the other Sonoma Valley “Grand Cru” sites, this will definitely reward time in the decanter or a few years on its side to start showing all of its secrets. The most consistently decorated of our wines (the 2016 was the Spectator #10 wine of the year and the 2017 just got another 95), the 2018 should be another classic.
2018 Old Hill Ranch Heritage Wine, Sonoma Valley
Yikes, I cannot believe we are actually releasing this wine! Few vineyards are so closely associated with my childhood as Old Hill Ranch—I remember picking blackberries while my father sampled the vineyard in the 80s. I remember hanging around in the cellar, hearing the reverence with which my dad talked about this place and its 1880s-planted vines. To this day, opening bottles of the remarkably long-lived wines made by Ravenswood in the late 80s and early 90s turns up memories of a life unencumbered by the complexities of adulthood. What is amazing is that under the careful oversight of our friend Will Bucklin, the vineyard has only gotten healthier as it has aged. It is rare that I get woo-woo about walking vineyards, but there is a different energy here, and each time I step among the vines I feel among sacred company. The vineyard lies just .85 miles north of the ancient vines at Bedrock Vineyard, planted on soils derived from the next alluvial fan north. Though the soils are a similar iron-tinged red, there is less cobble at Old Hill. Here, over 30 different varieties are field-blended, though Old Hill is unique in that the second most planted grape here is Grenache—a variety of which we have two vines at Bedrock and none at Pagani or Monte Rosso. In addition, there is small cabal of extremely rare Savoie varieties—Mollard, Etraire de la Dui and Persan—along with a spotted grape that has no matching genetic fingerprint. I am pretty certain that the Grenache, along with the healthy dose of Petite Sirah, Syrah, Alicante and others, account for the incredible ability of this wine to age (a bottle I opened shortly after bottling somehow remained fresh for 2 weeks once opened). What surprises me most about the 2018 though is that over all of the power lies an alluring murmur of ethereal violet and pepper-tinged perfume—something that I would associate more with the Alps than a vineyard planted in the heart of Sonoma Valley. This is one of my favorite wines we have ever made, and thanks to the relatively generous 2018 vintage, there will hopefully be enough to go around.
2018 Esola Zinfandel, Amador County
If you were to tell me 13 years ago that a lightly colored, well-structured, expressively perfumed wine from Amador County that is more about finesse than power would be one of our most popular wines, I would have been quite surprised (thankful, but surprised). Esola is as singular as the former dancer, Denise Esola, who oversees this remarkable site today and my favorite wine to break out for people who purport to have an “old world” palate. Though there is plenty of California fruit here, it lies upon a firm foundation (the subsoil is granite) that reminds me more of Nerello Mascalese or Trousseau Noir than what people typically think of for California Zin. What makes this even more surprising is that Esola is a relative outlier for us in that it is younger (planted 1968) and pure Zinfandel. The 2018 is a beaut (am I getting redundant regarding 2018s yet?).
2018 Carlisle Zinfandel, Russian River Valley
One of the aspects of the 2018 vintage I love most is how much the wines scream where they come from, and Russian River Valley is no exception. The 2018 Carlisle Vineyard, from vines planted in 1927 and tended by our friends Mike and Kendall Officer, has all the fireworks one might hope for from old vine in the Piner-Olivet area of Russian River Valley. Flamboyant blue fruit (boysenberry) and spice explode aromatically from this wine and is followed by dense, penetrating, beautifully balanced fruit. I know this wine is going to age wonderfully, but it is so damn delicious—I anticipate much will be consumed in this writer’s household in the following years.
2018 Limerick Lane Zinfandel, Russian River Valley
From a vineyard that needs little introduction, the 2018 Limerick Lane comes from this stellar site located in the northeasternmost corner of the Russian River Valley AVA. Our little block of dry-farmed vines planted in 1910 are among the oldest at the vineyard and provide, for me, the essence of this place. Limerick combines the blue fruit unctuousness and leavening acidity of Russian River with the structure and density of its warmer neighbors, Dry Creek and Chalk Hill, resulting in a singular expression that really only comes from this great vineyard. Interestingly, 2018 was an incredibly light vintage at Limerick, with lots of shatter and tiny berries— something out of the norm for what was volumetrically a more generous vintage—and the resulting wine is about as deeply colored and dense a version as we have made. As always, I wish we could make about 5x as much of this wine as we can, so allocations are unfortunately rather tight.
2017 Evangelho, ‘Areio e Vento e Amor’, Contra Costa County
From the first time Frank showed me Evangelho Vineyard in 2011, I was always smitten by the possibilities of a small, western facing block of vines located in the heart of the vineyard. Located at the intersection of the Zinfandel, Mataro and Carignan blocks, this small block seemed to potentially encapsulate the site more than any other on that ranch. Unfortunately, it was so small that it had always been picked into larger lots and blended away by whatever winery had been contracted for the fruit. In 2017, we decided to pick the one ton out separately and give it the stage we thought it deserved. We were rewarded mightily by a wine that I consider to be the essence of Evangelho—a Mataro-dominated field-blend that also features Zinfandel, Carignan, Palomino and Alicante Bouschet. After Frank passed away last year, we thought it only fitting that his beautiful image should adorn the label with the words “Wind and Sand and Love” written in his beloved Azorean (Portuguese) spelled across the back. Unfortunately, as with most precious things, we have tiny quantities of this (less than 40 cases) to go around.
2016 ‘Gambrels of the Sky’ Grenache, California
We have been sitting on this wine for a couple of years now trying to figure out what we wanted to call it—for those who came to Spring pick-up, this is the wine we poured from shiner. “Gambrels of the Sky” comes from an Emily Dickinson poem entitled “I dwell in Possibility,” and though this feels a little lofty, it seemed appropriate for a wine that is a dedication to my remarkable grandmother, Frances Howard Peterson. Not only did she love poetry, she also loved cooking, science, and wine. She was the first woman to graduate Phi Beta Kappa in Chemistry from UC Berkeley, then later worked on isolating plutonium, came home and became a crack chef (check the Chez Panisse cookbook and you will see her as a recipe tester), and was a member of many of the first Bay Area tasting groups. To this day I cannot have an interaction with the famed Sacramento grocer Daryl Corti without him reminding me that my grandmother had the best palate in the family. Well-read and always up on contemporary culture, I still remember prattling on to her about how great Pulp Fiction was while in high school, assuming with teenage hubris that she would never have seen it. Rather, her response to me was that as much as she liked Pulp Fiction, she still preferred the rawness and dark comedy imbedded in Tarantino’s earlier Reservoir Dogs, though she could do without the ear-cutting scene. Score one for Grandma.
As the story on the back label lays out, a single Grenache-based wine was one of the first my grandmother tried and launched her into the world of vinous possibilities. The 2016 Gambrels is built around the 1880s planting of Grenache at the venerable Gibson Ranch in McDowell Valley, whose precise and elegant fruit composes a little over 80% of the blend. The balance is made up by aromatic and friendly Cinsault, also planted in the 1880s, from Bechthold Ranch in Lodi and a bit of savory Oakley Road Mataro. The wine saw about 20% whole cluster during fermentation and after blending was raised in a single, neutral, 600-gallon foudre. This wine certainly lies on the more elegant side of the Grenache spectrum with lifted aromatics and bright fruit.
2017 Sky Vineyard Syrah, Mt. Veeder
Oh Sky Vineyard, how little we got to know you. Unfortunately, the 2017 will be the last vintage of Sky Syrah for the foreseeable future, as the little vineyard was in the crosshairs of the inferno of October 2017. This vintage though is one to savor, a wine that screams Syrah from the mountaintops—potently aromatic, peppery and full of the mountain drive and ageworthiness one would expect from this remarkable site—it will provide drinking pleasure for a couple of decades. I will put as much as this in my cellar as is reasonable, though with only 120 cases made, that still won’t be that much!
Thanks Morgan!
My wallet says “ouch” and my cellar says “there’s plenty of room for more Bedrock”.
OMG - Old Hill???
I just died.
Ugh, it is bittersweet not to be on this mailer. Looks like delicious wines and as always prices make them no brainers.
Finished my last cabs from the early days this year and they were uniformly outstanding. Only a smattering of ‘15s left now.
The “Areio e Vento e Amor” bottling and the “Old Hill” sound like a dream come true for this wine lover!!
I just hope there’s enough to go around!!!
In.
After many years on the Turley and Carlisle lists, I dropped Turley and kept Carlisle. Just retired so I should be dropping off lists, but after
a few bottles and a lot of thought, I signed up for Bedrock. I should have done it a long time ago. Now I wonder how long I’ll have to wait for an offer.
I signed up in the spring. Not long after I got an introductory offer of a six pack (2x each of Evanghelo, OVZ and Rose) that, if purchased, let me jump the wait list. I bit and the save the date for this one.
They made it sound like this is pretty standard for them so I suspect you’ll get a similar offer sooner than later.
I have done a great job this year of reducing my purchases across the board, but I will be in for this release. anything that has Syrah in it, I will buy.
We are drinking a 2014 Weill a Way now, spectacular.
everyone have their wallets ready? time to make sure sufficient funds are in place for tomorrow!
On the waitlist, what’s the odds of getting bottles on the 30th?
typically there are only 1-2 bottlings that don’t make it through the week… but its also some of the most interesting normally. really depends a lot on total production of each. but there is a really good chance for a couple heritages, a zin or two, and some whites id guess… but there will be several here doing their best to prove me wrong. haha!
I was on wait list last year and had no issue grabbing some rose, zin, heritage. I did miss on the budget Sonoma cab but was able to grab the other Cab.
I joined the wait list earlier this year and while I don’t believe everything was available I was able to get a variety of things that were left over. Since I bought then I made the list and got the application notice.
Order in!