WTN: Kickin' Pinot

I usually don't drink too much of any varietal in one week, but things happen and like the old Mounds/Almond Joy quandary, sometimes you feel like a pinot and sometimes you don't.

Mount Mary, Pinot Noir, Yarra Valley, 2011
I've always wanted to try this producer, but haven't really seen it around all that much. This has a pale rose wash of a color, beautiful to look at. Strawberry and watermelon on the nose and palate, which finishes with almost a slightly bitter nut skin finish (walnut perhaps?). Finishes light and is a little uni-dimensional, with a little tangerine-kumquat coming through. Well made, but you have to like subtlety. 12.9% A-

Rhys, Pinot Noir, San Mateo County, 'Family Farm Vineyard', 2013
Spicy floral, red fruited nose. Red fruit, Ludens® cherry cough drop with a musky finish. After a while, some rose and candied watermelon rind show up. This should age well as it has everything in balance: ripeness, acidity, and oak is only a background support unlike some other years where it comes through more forcefully. Thankfully, the stems don't stick out either, which has always been a complaint of mine with Rhys's pinots. Probably the best Family Farm I've had so far. Reminiscent of Anthill (without the roundness or weight). A-

Eminence Road Farm Winery, Pinot Noir, Finger Lakes, 'Auten Vineyard', 2012
From the warm Upstate summer that 2012 brought, comes this darkish pinot noir from a funky winery that is making really nice wines. This has a very nice mouthfeel and weight, which is pretty substantial for a Finger Lakes red. Red fruits with a bit of black fruit nuance, a little short and unidimensional, but lovely nonetheless. Short term aging, 4-6 years? Blackcurrant leaf, a little Morey Saint Denis or Nuits Village like. 12.1% A-/B+

Mark: where is Eminence Road located? ditto re Auten Vyd? names are new to me

thanks, Jon

Jon -

the winery itself is located on the edge of the western Catskills, east of Hancock, but the fruit is sourced from Finger Lakes, where Auten Vineyard is (on Seneca Lake I believe?), as is Elizabeth's Vineyard (another source). They are making some cool stuff.

[David M. Bueker]

Interesting that you say the Family Farm compares to Anthill but with less weight. I gave up on Anthill recently, as I found the wines too simple-fruity with no structure.

Interesting that you say the Family Farm compares to Anthill but with less weight. I gave up on Anthill recently, as I found the wines too simple-fruity with no structure.

This is my second bottle of the 2013 Rhys pinots, the first was Bearwallow, and there is a noticeable shift to my palate from earlier wines like 2006-7-8-9 where I am sensing less overt stems and wood and an airy-diaphanous quality to them which I like and which I found in certain Anthills, but Rhys has the better structure and more balance. But along with this, of the two vineyards I've tasted so far of the 2013's, there is more similarity between them than differences. If I tasted the Bearwallow and Family Farm together, I doubt I'd be able to tell them apart, which was Not the case when Bearwallow came out.

Mark: thx for the feedback..A winery in the catskills?? who wd have thunk it? Does Auten have a tasting room or are they just a source? easier/faster for me to get to Seneca than to Hancock

[David M. Bueker]

Interesting that you say the Family Farm compares to Anthill but with less weight. I gave up on Anthill recently, as I found the wines too simple-fruity with no structure.

This is my second bottle of the 2013 Rhys pinots, the first was Bearwallow, and there is a noticeable shift to my palate from earlier wines like 2006-7-8-9 where I am sensing less overt stems and wood and an airy-diaphanous quality to them which I like and which I found in certain Anthills, but Rhys has the better structure and more balance. But along with this, of the two vineyards I've tasted so far of the 2013's, there is more similarity between them than differences. If I tasted the Bearwallow and Family Farm together, I doubt I'd be able to tell them apart, which was Not the case when Bearwallow came out.

Thanks.

As for them tasting similarly, I bet that is just a youth issue. Lots of change over their first few years of life. I have been working through half bottles of the 2012 and 2013 San Mateo Pinot, and every one tastes completely different from the last. They have all been good, but they keep morphing/changing. I think they just need more time to settle down.

... Does Auten have a tasting room or are they just a source?

I think it's just a source; I haven't heard of any winery with that name yet, but then I don't always know who the vineyard owners/winery owners names are.

easier/faster for me to get to Seneca than to Hancock

Even quicker if you just stop by here.