*2018 The Insider, Pinot Noir, Sonoma Coast

90 PTS, Wine Enthusiast
"This is a value-driven wine that overdelivers on its price point, offering black cherry, vanilla and dried herb around an oaky center. Made in a full-bodied, fleshy and lush style, it finishes in earthy varietal character and drops of cinnamon." - V. B. 

This Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir has a deep garnet, crushed cranberry color which illustrates the depth of this cool climate Pinot Noir. Right out of the glass this wine is perfumed with elegant dark fruit from ripe bing cherry to black raspberry notes. The wine is subtly spiced with integrated cinnamon and clove spices and backed with mocha notes. On the palate the wine carries through consistently with the aromatics and displays the ripe and juicy cherry and raspberry fruit notes with balanced acidity and generous vanilla and toasted oak notes revealing silky tannins that linger. The wine finishes with in a Burgundian style referencing the earth tones of the Pommard clone 4 that makes this wine memorable. 

The Insider Pinot Noir was carefully crafted from grapes grown by a notorious producer with vineyards in the Petaluma Gap area of the Sonoma Coast. The grapes were harvested at night under the lights and hand picked. At the winery the grapes were destemmed and transferred to open top fermenters where the grapes were cold soaked for 48 hours prior to commencing fermentation. The fermenters were pumped over 3 times per day and once per day with a tub and screen and remained on the skins for 14 days afterwhich it drained and gently pressed to 1.6 bars. After combining all lots together we racked the wine into second year burgundy, Francois Frerres, medium toasted French oak barrels as fermentation was complete and then our secondary malo-lactic conversion took place. Once malo-lactic was complete we made our first racking into tanks to combine all lots and then back into the same barrels for aging a total of 18 months. The wine was racked once more before its final rack for bottling (these racking we’re in 6 month intervals).

The name "The Insider" comes from the confidentiality agreement we had to sign in order to purchase the grapes from the vines of a well known winery producing world class wines. With our insider connections and knowledge we are able to offer you a wine of exceptional quality and pedigree at a price that will amaze.