2013 Silver Mountain Pinot Noir Estate - I bought more of this than of any other wine in the past ~5 years. This is a real beauty, a medium to light-weight Pinot featuring black and red cherries, floral notes, the wonderful Santa Cruz Mountain hint of conifer. My last bottle (sob!). Rated 92, but overshadowed by:
2013 Silver Mountain Pinot Noir ‘Miller Hill Vineyard’ - Same vintage and Appellation, I’m told the vineyard is only a mile away from the Estate.
This is better… by far. I love light, lacy Pinot. This is bigger, richer, but with impeccable balance. Besides cherries, there are blackberries. It performs the great wine magic of being both hefty and weightless. Rated 95. Again, my last bottle (sob!!!). Wonderful. All five of the red wine drinkers at dinner agreed that this was on another level, although we all also loved the Estate bottling.
2022 Arnaud Combier Beaujolais Blanc - Light to medium gold color. Aromas are pleasant but not intense, with notes of pineapple and leafy greens. The palate is broad, with enough acidity. The flavors are a little faint and generic. Identifiable as white Burgundy, it lacks the intensity and minerality of the Damien Martin Macon Verze that was recently discussed. Rated 86.5, drink up.
2009 Bedrock Pinot Noir Russian River Valley, Rebecca’s Vineyard - When I think of Bedrock I don’t think of Pinot Noir. Stoopid me!
This is spectacular. The aromas are very Burgundian, there is definite sous-bois, this is fully secondary. There are red and black cherries, and hints of plum, along with nice earthiness. I would think Burgundy if it wasn’t for the wonderful bright vivacity, very new world and very special in a 16 year old Pinot. Rated 94, probably fully mature.
I am from the SF Bay Area but long since removed. I love many of the wines from SCM. How is it I have never heard of these guys? Seems a month doesn’t go by and yet there is yet another great winery flying under my radar. Another to put on my list to try.
So many sneaky wineries from SCM. Tasting rooms in Santa Cruz makes sense. Anyone had anything from Assiduous? I’ve enjoyed a couple Pinots from Sandar and Hem. Would like to try some Neely too. Eric Baugher’s new label as well.
So many of the wineries are way too small for national distribution. For the SCM Silver Mountain is medium sized. I see their wines in stores on the Peninsula, so they have local distribution. Birichino is in the same size range and has similar distribution. A lot of the wineries seem to do just fine with tasting room, club and online sales and some local restaurant and retail. Some labels are tiny, and as someone who was actively following these wineries and co-running a database about them, there were producers I never saw. Or, they literally had one placement: VinoCruz. Some sell out to friends. Think a single 37 case estate wine.
I had an Assiduous Bates Ranch Cab. I guess it qualifies as a natural wine. It was on the light side, nicely expressive and very “drink now”. I wouldn’t buy it to age, but it’s a perfect restaurant wine. Or, you might say “bistro wine”. I see their wines at stores on the Peninsula.
Btw, we had a Neely '09 Chard Holly’s Cuvee tonight. Excellent, holding up well. We also had three SCM Pinots, which all showed well. Big Basin '07 Alfaro Vyd. That was their first year making Pinots, either 3 or 4. It’s gained weight, quite vibrant and still youthful, savory aromatics. There was a Fogarty SVD, I think '07. Wonderful nose. The palate was a bit over-extracted, which is the style then-winemaker Michael Martella liked for his wines. Nathan Kandler, who stepped up as winemaker over a decade ago makes wines in line with my preference. And the McHenry '11 PN Swan Clone. I love the terroir in that little area along Bonny Doon Rd. Old Redwood forest on limestone-y soil. The Coast Grade Vineyard down the road has similar expression.
McHenry is one you don’t see much of. They’ve been around since the '70s and are in their third generation. Founded by UC Santa Cruz Dean Dean McHenry. That’s not a typo. When I discovered them his son UC Davis Professor Henry McHenry, not a typo, was the winemaker. Fun story is a certain Randall Graham fell in love with their wine, bought a neighboring property and got into the wine business. Both vineyards later got wiped out by Pierce’s Disease, but Randall didn’t replant there. The McHenry winery was wiped out in the 2020 fire, along with two vintages and an unharvestable crop. Not sure if they still do, but they used to have a couple open houses a year, sell from their website plus just a few retailers. Sometimes K&L has them. The Los Gatos Safeway carries them. Otherwise rare to see, but worth seeking out.
Wes - always appreciate your insights into our local wines. But just to be clear, McHenry did not get “wiped out”. Damged but my understanding is that most of the vineyard survivied.
Assiduous has some good stuff, their Malbec was tasty. Sandar and Hem are make great wines and Rob is a really great guy too. Eric Baughers recent Paso cab (2021 I think?) was really awesome. One of those cabs thats 100% new oak but doesn’t taste like it, super well integrated. I think hes sourcing some fruit from Mt. Veeder now.
It was a wikispace a friend ran and I contributed to. He changed jobs and didn’t have time to keep up and let the subscription expire, so it went >poof!< I’d guess it ended around 2009. Sad, because it was a great compilation of current and former wineries and vineyards, cross referenced. Easy to navigate vineyard name changes. Info on what the wineries make/made, where the sourced their fruit, what’s planted at which vineyard, when they were planted. Whatever interesting stuff we could dig up.
I’m not buying much wine nowadays, but am far more likely to buy Santa Cruz Mountains wines than any others. I would subscribe to a devoted website and then probably spend some money on some more bottles.
