Pinot Noir Vineyards

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Freestone Station | Goodin on Blank | Umino Vineyards | Holder
Pratt / Cornerstone on Sexton | Rayhill Vineyards

At harvest our processing is unintrusive. The fruit is fermented in small lot one-ton fermenters. To achieve carbonic complexity some whole clusters are added to the bottom of the fermenter. To maximize extraction and minimize astringency the ripe fruit is destemmed, not crushed to maintain integrity of the berry, after which the must is chilled down to ‘cold soak’ for several days using chiller plates (below, left). When fermentation begins, via indigenous yeast, a ‘submerged cap’ regime is employed to maximize extraction using screens (below, left) to hold the fermentation cap down. The screens are lifted for a gentle daily punch down. As the wine is pressed off and barreled down, Chardonnay lees from the previous vintage is added for color stability, to fine out unwanted tannins and as an extra layer of complexity.

Pinot Noir set up: Chiller plates (right) for the cold soak and screens (left) for the submerged cap

Pinot Noir must ready for the cold soak

Pinot Noir punchdown

Freestone Station

The property for this vineyard is owned by the Cleary family and is another farmed by the Dutton family. It is located in the city of Freestone on the western border of the Russian River Valley. We are working with an acre each of Dijon115 and 777 clone, clone 23 and a Pomard clone. This is a typical ‘west county’ vineyard with harvest coming in late October and a yield of about 1.5 tons to the acre. This wine consistantly has notes of red cherry, wild strawberry, yellow rose, roasted grain, pink peppercorn, smoke and sweet vanilla with sumac and other hints of Asian spice.

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Goodin on Blank

The Blank Road vineyard is on, as its name implies, Blank Road in the southern most part of the Russian River Valley. In fact the vineyard is just on the border with the new extension of the Russian River Valley appellation. The property’s proprietor is San Francisco attorney Kenneth Goodin and was planted and is managed by local farmer Jim Pratt in 2001. This is one of those special west county vineyards located in a very cool mezzo-climate allowing for long hang time and therefore enabling us to make wines of extraordinary depth and complexity. Planted to two Dijon clones 115 and 777 and spaced 5 X 8, this vineyard is harvested typically well into October and has made a vineyard designate from the first vintage.  Wine from this vineyard offeres red cherries, dried orange peel and ideally ripened Santa Rosa plums red licorice, pink peppercorn and mineral elements.

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Umino Vineyards

Dave Umino owns and farms this 11 acre vineyard, one third of which is purchased by Chasseur, located on rolling hills southwest of the township of Sebastopol on Blucher Valley road. At this writing the Russian River Valley has extended its boundary to include this vineyard. Dave is a third generation farmer from the Central Valley of California leaving to pursue a career in forensic metallurgy. With a desire to return to the land Dave retired and purchased this current property. Against the advice of local farmers and consultants he planted the property to 4 Dijon clones (115,667,777 and 459) of Pinot Noir in 1997. It was the belief at the time that this site was too cold for grapes. It is to our benefit that Dave paid no attention to this advice. 2006, our first vintage from this vineyard, was some of the finest quality fruit brought to the winery. In fact we have dedicated a vineyard designate to this vineyard starting with the 2006.

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 Pratt/Cornerstone on Sexton

Jim Pratt ambitiously planted the Cornerstone Vineyard in 2000 to multiple Dijon clones, 113,114,115,777 and the new 828. The vineyard is located 500 feet above the town of Feestone on Sexton Road. The cool breezes coming in from the coast allows this vineyard to ripen late, and therefore, allows for important hang time and flavor development. The different clones make for a complex blend. The Russian River Valley has been expanded so this vineyard now fits into this appellation.  Sweet cherry, red raspberry, pomegranate, rose petal jelly and pink peppercorn are the common characteristics of the wine coming from this vineyard.

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Rayhill Vineyards

Rayhill Vineyards is perched on the top of a mountain at a 500 foot elevation in the premier Pinot Noir location of Sebastopol Hills, a sub classification of the Russian River Appellation. The 9 acre Vineyard was planted in 2001 on the well drained Goldridge Sandy Loam soil. The weather during the growing season is warm days, afternoon winds and cool nights. These are ideal conditions ( terroir ) for world class Pinot Noir.

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Holder Vineyard

This is a 1.5 acre vineyard property owned and farmed by Bruce Holder and Mary Ann Wheeler. Situated one mile east of the town of Occidental at 832 feet above sea level, the Holder Vineyard benefits from the cool coastal influence in the morning followed by warm pleasant afternoons allowing for a slow ripening of the Pinot Noir grapes. The property was planted in four blocks with Pinot Noir Dijon clones 667 & 115 in 2000. The small acreage allows for individual attention to each plant presenting an excellent representation of Pinot Noir from the Russian River / Green Valley Appellations.

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