Big Basin Dune and Mountain Pinot Noir 2019
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Enthusiast
Wine - Vinous
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Dunnuck
Jeb
Product Details
Your Rating
Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
The vibrant, spicy red fruit, beautiful silky texture and mouthfeel and a finish that is long and sustained. The aromatics jump out of the glass and the wine that follows is equally expressive and compelling. This is every bit the equal of some of their single vineyard cuvées at an 'appellation wine' price. It is drinking beautifully now, but will certainly come together more with time in bottle.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
This 100% whole-cluster blend of the sandy Lester and mountaintop Coastview vineyards is very fresh and vibrant on the nose, with aromas of raspberry juicesoaked herbs, menthol, sansho pepper and wet asphalt. The texture is stunning on the sip, where the minty pine needle flavor weaves between sour cherry and light raspberry elements.
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Vinous
The 2019 Pinot Noir Dune and Mountain is bright, floral and effusive. Crushed red berry fruit, rose petal, cinnamon, blood orange and mint are all laced together in this understated, classy Pinot Noir.
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Jeb Dunnuck
Ripe cherries, redcurrants, toasted spice, savory herbs, and rose hip notes all emerge from the 2019 Pinot Noir Dune And Mountain, a slightly more rounded, broad, supple 2019 from Big Basin that has terrific complexity as well as balance. It's one of the more up-front Pinot Noirs, yet I still think it should have 7-8 years, if not a decade of longevity.
Other Vintages
2018-
Spectator
Wine
Located in the heart of the Santa Cruz Mountains, Big Basin Vineyards is terraced into a steep hillside first planted to grape vines by French immigrants over 100 years ago. Their winery and the vineyards they work with are located at sites in the Santa Cruz and Gabilan Mountains that are as beautiful as they are exceptional for grape growing. They farm organically and practice minimal-intervention winemaking with the goal of producing wines that transparently and authentically express site and variety.
Big Basin believes that their choice of vineyards, picking at the right time to retain intensity and elegance, and minimalistic winemaking practices are the keys to producing more aromatic and ethereal wines - new world wines with old world soul. Owner and winemaker Bradley Brown has been on a 20 year quest to produce beautiful and soulful wines. Winemaker Blake Yarger joined the team in 2017 and together they are always fine tuning practices to more transparently express the vineyards.
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.”
A geographic and climatic paradise for grape vines, Monterey is a part of the greater Central Coast AVA and contains within it five smaller sub-appellations, including Arroyo Seco, San Lucas, San Bernabe, Hames Valley and the famous Santa Lucia Highlands. The climate is relatively warm but tempered by cool, coastal winds, allowing the regions in Monterey County an exceptionally long growing season. Bud break often happens two weeks sooner and harvest tends to be two weeks later compared to other surrounding regions.
Monterey’s coastal side, where the cooling ocean fog allows grapes to develop a perfect sugar-acid balance, excels in the production of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Riesling. Warmer, inland subzones are home to fleshy, concentrated and full-bodied reds like Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Zinfandel.
Chardonnay, covering about 40% of vineyard acreage, is the most widely planted grape in all of Monterey County.