For me one of the most exciting parts of my wine passion is finding new wineries and helping spread the word about cool new projects. Let me start by saying I have not yet tasted these wines. I will once the weather is cool enough to ship or I make it to Napa. I do have a knack for identifying promising new wineries as you can see from my track record here of being the first to mention MacDonald, Beta/Jasud, Sandlands and Maître de Chai. Not to mention Germany which I don’t mention outside of commerce corner because of my involvement with source | material.
This particular project was highlighted by one of the winemakers I respect most in Napa, I am not going to mention his name because I did not ask his permission. The winery is called Tidingss and is the personal project of Reid Griggs the current winemaker of the storied Stony Hill. For his personal project he is working with Cab from Moon Mountain (similar to Arnot Roberts and Beta) and Syrah from the cental coast (Bien Nacido X and Z blocks) and White Hawk. I can tell just by emailing with him that he is the type of passionate winemaker that I want to support. Then add in the recommendation I received, his vineyard choices, his prior experience at Bedrock, MacDonald and in the Northern Rhone for Gonon and I can’t wait to taste these wines.
Copied from an email Reid sent me a few months ago.
“Thank you very much for your interest in my work. I am hoping to put together the inaugural release soon, which will consist of a 2019 Moon Mountain Cabernet and 2020 Central Coast Syrahs from White Hawk and Bien Nacido vineyards. Please stay tuned and don’t hesitate to reach out with any questions. ”
I’m more curious about the wine itself. There are a ton of Syrahs from Bien Nacido and White Hawk, but what makes these stand out? I’m genuinely curious and look forward to the next email discussing the wines.
Yep, curious as well. 2020 marked a year that many North Coast wineries picked up fruit from SBC due to the fires and have produced a bunch of different wines - from Santa Rita Hills pinots to plenty of syrahs. One thing I have noticed is that their pricing tends to be higher in many cases than those in SBC who produce wines from those same vineyards. Are the wines ‘better’? That’s truly subjective . . .
This first release will feature the 2019 Moonridge Cabernet Sauvignon from the Moon Mountain District along with a trio of 2020 Syrahs from Santa Barbara County, including Bien Nacido and White Hawk Vineyards. It’s truly been an honor to get to work with this fruit, and my goal has been to simply get out of the way and let each site’s true nature shine through. I have small quantities to share, as only a barrel or two of each wine was produced.
Good morning. Like some of you I’m sure, I occasionally sign up for mailing lists of new wineries based on things I read, frequently right here. I received an email about the upcoming inaugural release for Tidings wines. The email was from Reid Griggs. The first release will be, “…. 2019 Moonridge Cabernet Sauvignon from the Moon Mountain District along with a trio of 2020 Syrahs from Santa Barbara County, including Bien Nacido and White Hawk Vineyards.”
I did a search here but wasn’t able to easily find anything. What do you all know about Tidings?
