Innholdsfortegnelse for Wine 2020 Guide i Sunset

Sonoma-Cutrer For 39 years, Sonoma-Cutrer has earned a reputation of craftsmanship by steadfastly choosing quality over quantity. The winery is known for creating world-class wines by marrying together Burgundian traditions with Californian ingenuity and a deep appreciation for Sonoma Coast’s remarkable terroir. This allows for wines that embody the beauty and authenticity of both places. Its uncompromising methods of vineyard management, grape oversight and cellar maturation allow Sonoma-Cutrer to create wines unlike any other. Sonoma-Cutrer balances hard work and artistry, science and intuition, knowing and feeling to create some of the highest awarded wines in the country. sonomacutrer.com Sonoma-Cutrer 2017 Les Pierres Category: Chardonnay $40.01 - $75.00 Award: Gold Score: 91 Appellation: Sonoma Coast (Sonoma) Price: $42 Judges Tasting Notes: Crisp and clean from beginning to end. NICE! Sonoma-Cutrer 2019…

You've played Tetris, right? Well how about wine Tetris? That's the uniquely maddening game of stacking, nesting, and shifting in your fridge that happens when your sparkling and white wines duke it out with tubs of hummus and the occasional condiment for space. I’ll spoil the ending for you: Eventually, woefully, you’ll be standing amidst shards, a full batch of something special at your feet, the dijon grinning at you from above—the victor. A cellar doesn't have to be anything fancy. It might be as simple as a handful of boxes in a cool location with a consistent temperature. Hell, call it a mental cellar: Knowing what you’ve consumed, and enjoyed, is half the battle. In the abstract, a cellar is a commitment you make to tracking and planning your…

Robert Mondavi, Fumé Blanc - The white wine created by Robert Mondavi in late 1960s Napa that was meant to stand head and shoulders above the sea of jug-handle sweet white wines coming out of California. This Sauvignon Blanc based wine can be considered one of the first great white wines of California, and still holds its own in any comparative tasting of Napa whites. Stony Hill, Chardonnay - Like Massican, originally committed to only making white wines until a decade ago, Stony Hill Chardonnays are legendary in the winemaker and sommelier circles and can rival some of the best Premier Cru Chablis coming from France. Tablas Creek, Esprit de Tablas Blanc - When one of the oldest and most iconic estates of the Rhone Valley, France (Chateau Beaucastel) sets…

WASHINGTON Cave B Inn A stone’s throw from the Columbia River, this Tom Kundig-designed property was founded by the couple behind the famous Gorge Amphitheater next door. Their acclaimed Cave B wines are available on site and tours can be set up with the concierge. Few vineyard views are this stunning. cavebinn.com WASHINGTON Willows Lodge This 84-room property is in the heart of Woodinville Wine Country. Every room offers a deep soaking tub designed for two. So…bring a friend? willowslodge.com WASHINGTON The Inn at Abeja Next door to a working winery, this 38-acre property features immaculately restored historic buildings along with easy access to the rest of Washington’s Walla Walla Valley. abeja.net WASHINGTON Eritage Resort Minutes from downtown Walla Walla, this 300-acre resort offers bountiful outdoor entertaining space, including patios…

Q: Tell us about your approach to winemaking. Petar Kirilov: Our main focus at Kukeri Wines is the quality of our wines, being small gives us the opportunity to take that extra time to monitor the whole winemaking process and to make each of these unique Napa Cabs amazing. Q: During vinification, what is the primary focus for your Sunset award-winning wine? A: Making wine is a complex process. We add an extra three days of extended maceration to build more texture and intensity on this exceptional Stags Leap Cabernet Sauvignon. The wine was then pressed and aged for 18 months on fine lees in 100% French oak barrels, of which 40% are new oak barrels. Q: What are your predictions for the wine industry? A: The last few years have been really…

Only a few years ago the liter sized bottle of wine was a rarity in the wine world: squat and broad shouldered, containing just a glass or two more than a standard 750 ml bottle with none of the awkward heft and self importance of a magnum and all that it connotes. You’d see them in the cold case of smart wine shops, often containing crisp grüner veltliner, sometimes sealed with a crown cap like a big bottle of beer but mostly topped with a stelvin style screw cap: all the better for quick access, quick resealing, and, blissfully, leak free storage on its side in the fridge. Those features make it stand head and shoulders above the 750 with its elaborate corking systems (fake or natural). As lovely and…

Napa can be a tough place to break into, even for billionaires. So consider the headwinds when you’re a twenty-something prodigy from Bombay like Priyanka French. “People like me trying to break in, we never saw anyone who looked like us,” French says. “It’s something I’ve gotten comfortable with, even though no one should ever have to do that.” Now in her second harvest as the winemaker at Signorello Wines in Napa, French brings a strong sense of purpose and a solid background in food science and chemistry to the third-generation house. Her task—to elevate Signorello to elite status—has been complicated doubly so, thanks to the fires in 2017, which all but razed the property, and this year’s blazes, which have had her in constant communication with a lab in…

The Wine: Domaine Carneros ‘Le Reve’, Blanc de Blancs, Carneros, 2012 Zion Says: One of California's best sparkling wines. It’s winemaker Eileen Crane at her best bringing out the best of two countries making a California wine with a French expression. A versatile wine for us at the Resort when it comes to pairing with food from fish, crab, lobster, and poultry to a ripe cheese. The Wine: Bouchaine ‘Swan Clone, Pinot Noir,' Caneros, 2018 Zion Says: Under winemaker Chris Kajani’s direction, Bouchaine’s wines have reached new heights. The small berries of the swan clone offer intense aromatics—from raspberries, strawberries and cranberries to violets. Graceful with structure I’ve found this wine pairs with a variety of flavors from leaner meats like roasted chicken and pork loin to fatty cuts like…

Standing on a ridge in the Mayacamas mountain range in Oakville, CA, the Promontory winery is part of Bill Harlan's portfolio of estates. First opened in 2017, the facility sits within 800 acres that Harlan pieced together over many years. It remains the only dedicated visitor experience offered by the winemaker and entrepreneur, whose other estates include Harlan, Bond, and The Mascot. We visited the Promontory winery to enjoy a tasting and learn how this bluechip facility was handling the experience during the COVID-19 era. Shown here are the french oak fermentation tanks in the Howard Backen-designed enclosure. Read on to learn more about this signature winery and more. REASON #1 Because private, safe tasting is possible Sip, Safely Jam-packed scenes full of influencers in knee-high boots flaunting mask rules…

PERFECT DAY 10 YEARS AGO Sonja Magdevski opened Casa Dumetz, a wine shop and tasting room in Los Alamos. Then, the sleepy little one-horse town had a brick oven flatbread joint, a saloon straight out of a Sergio Leone flick, and a general store festooned with a banner proclaiming this year’s rodeo-winning bull rider. It wasn’t long before Angelenos flocked to this picture perfect slice of the Santa Ynez Valley time forgot: the bakeries and bars and hipster hotels came, the adoring press coverage followed. It would’ve been so insufferable if it wasn’t so, well, perfect. A decade later this small constellation of towns has proven the enduring appeal of a formula that’s tough to argue with: restaurants and tasting rooms within stumbling distance of each other; down-to-earth proprietors; sophistication…

Scan the Sites French recommends three auction sites for older wines. Winebid.com “is very reliable,” she says. “If you get a bad bottle you just email them and they replace it.” Benchmarkwine.com has a great newsletter. And nolimitfinewines.com “is kind of my secret. I’m not sure I should even be telling you about it.” Know Your Houses Some wineries have made a practice of keeping old stock available, which means you’re more likely to be able to find it. French echoed what many in the Napa Valley will say about Stony Hill’s older white wines. And Mondavi’s bottlings from the 1980s “are all drinking spectacularly well right now,” she says. Join Forces While COVID has curtailed wine gatherings, you can still share the load of scanning for new auctions, and…

It’s a wonderful wide wide world of wine in the west, and each year we host the Sunset Wine Awards to steer you to bottles worth seeking out. We assembled a panel of judges (albeit virtually due to covid), and tasted our way through hundreds of bottles that collectively represent what’s being grown, vinted, and poured throughout the West. At the top you’ll find the winners of the top spots and in those few bottles you’ll see a through-line of the winners of the awards on the rest of the list. Whether it’s an elegant and jammy reserve Pinot Noir, a floral late harvest Gewurtztraminer, or a zippy and effervescent Reserve Estate Brut, they deliver what wine lovers want most: accessibility, satisfaction, and, above all, deliciousness. Cheers to the winners!…