Jon Bonné’s "The New California Wine" Book Signing! 2012 Releases From Bedrock & Arnot-Roberts!
11/7/13 -
(Gnarled Old Vines in Bedrock Vineyard (July 2013))
We are thrilled to host a special tasting this Saturday to celebrate the release of "The New California Wine," the eagerly anticipated new book from San Francisco Chronicle Wine Editor, Jon Bonné. We have been stashing some of our favorite and most limited bottles to crack for the occasion; please stop by between 4 and 7pm to taste with Jon (as well as special guest Matthew Rorick of Forlorn Hope), and pick up a copy of this valuable new resource, which chronicles the people, places, vines, and wines shaping California today. Among the trailblazing producers featured by Bonné are Bedrock Wine Company and Arnot-Roberts. We are pleased to offer the first of their 2012 releases today.
Bedrock Wine Company in Sonoma is synonymous with the search for old vines and the effort to preserve them in California, which has been a defining influence behind the heightened quality and profile of many of California's wines. Morgan Twain Peterson founded the winery in 2007 and named it after his family’s Bedrock Vineyard, a historical and viticultural gem of over 22 varieties that were inter-planted in the 1880s (first by future Civil War Generals William Tecumseh Sherman and Joseph Hooker and again after the vineyard had passed to Senator George Hearst and phylloxera afflicted the vines).
Prior to Prohibition (well before the reign of single variety powerhouses) many California vineyards were like Bedrock — field blends of Zinfandel planted with myriad accessory grapes to encourage balance and ensure that no single variety dominate the character of the final blend. Bedrock's 2012 Heritage Blend seamlessly blurs the star power of Bedrock's old vines Zinfandel and ripe, forceful Carignane with the composite charisma of Trousseau, Tempranillo, Petite Sirah, Alicante Bouschet, Colombard, Mourvedre, Grand Noir, Merlot, Cabernet, Muscadelle, and Castets, among others. This is a true testament to the virtues of the field blend and the wisdom of our winemaking elders.
Peterson and his partner Chris Cottrell are devoted hunters of old vines, obtaining fruit for their innovative cuvèes from many different plots in Sonoma and beyond. Today's offer includes the luminous Kirschenmann Zinfandel from a head-trained, dry-farmed Lodi vineyard planted in 1915; an extroverted Zinfandel from Russian River's Sodini Vineyard – another trove of head-trained, century-old vines, which Bedrock is leasing and revitalizing; and Compagni Portis from Sonoma, the stunning white counterpart to the old vine field blends touted above.
Our allocation of Arnot-Roberts' spectacular 2012 wines just arrived and is already moving fast. What Bedrock has done to elevate appreciation of old vines, Nathan Roberts and Duncan Arnot Meyers have done for the cool and liminal pockets of Northern California. Their wines are complex, chiseled, and vivid expressions of terroirs that were long believed to be unfit for winegrowing. Roberts and Meyers have disproved this suggestion for over a decade and continue to do so. Saturday's tasting will feature their Legan Vineyard Pinot Noir from the Santa Cruz Mountains. We hope to see you there! -AR
