Nicolas-Jay Carlton Estate Bishop Creek Vineyard Pinot Noir 2019
-
James
Suckling -
Wine
Spectator -
Wine
Enthusiast
Product Details
Your Rating
Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
The 2019 Bishop Creek opens up with wet stone, crushed granite and generous brambly blackberry. Underlying the fruit and minerality are subtle roasted meat and game aroma, toasted nut and a general savory essence as the wine begins to crack open in the glass. There is an exotic middle eastern spice, a sweet bark and resin nuance with a by-line of black cap blackberry that pulls the flavors upward with strong tannins and a long, dramatic, tight-knit finish that carries for several minutes. This wine will age for years to come as the tannins integrate and the fruit fleshes out in the bottle.
Professional Ratings
-
James Suckling
Alluring and complex aromas of fresh herbs, baked lemons, peaches, hazelnuts and a hint of olive oil. Medium-bodied with wet-stone mineral character. Linear, balanced and long. Supple texture. Notes of chamomile tea and straw just start to peek out towards the finish. This will age beautifully, but its hard to resist now. Drink or hold.
-
Wine Spectator
Handsomely structured, with detailed blueberry and raspberry flavors that bring in cardamom, clove and underbrush accents. Builds tension toward medium-grained tannins. Drink now through 2030.
-
Wine Enthusiast
Fruit for this wine comes from vines planted in 1988. Brooding aromas of cherry, black tea and dried herb lead to full-feeling flavors that show intensity, sophistication and balance. It's outrageously delicious.
Other Vintages
2021-
Jeb
Dunnuck -
James
Suckling - Decanter
-
Wine
Enthusiast
-
James
Suckling - Decanter
-
Wilfred
Wong -
James
Suckling -
Wine
Spectator -
Wine
Enthusiast
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.”
Yamhill-Carlton, characterized by pastoral, rolling hills composed of shallow, quick-draining, ancient marine soil, is ideal for Pinot noir and other cool-climate-loving varieties. It is in the rain shadow of the Coast Range to its west, whose highest point climbs to an altitude of 3,500 feet. Yamhill-Carlton is actually surrounded by mountains on three sides: Chehalem Mountains to the north, the Dundee Hills to the east and the western Coast Range to its west, which, when it lets Pacific air through, serves to cool the region.
Vineyards grow on the ridges surrounding the two small communities of Yamhill and Carlton and cover about 1,200 acres of this 60,000 acre region, which roughly makes a horse-shoe shape on a map.