The Best California Wine Region You’ve Never Heard of

The Best California Wine Region You’ve Never Heard of

by W. Blake Gray, Wine-Searcher.com, 9/16/14 [excerpt]

With nearly 1000 wineries in Napa and Sonoma County competing for grapes, you wouldn’t think there would be a lot of great unknown vineyard land left. And yet, you probably haven’t heard of Pine Mountain-Cloverdale Peak. There’s a good reason. Not until 2011 were the two mountains that rise from Alexander Valley at the Sonoma-Mendocino County border approved as an AVA. Most grapes on the mountains are red, so the first bottles with Pine Mountain-Cloverdale Peak on the label have just recently been released.

Some smart wineries are placing big bets there….

“This is extreme farming,” says Hien Nguyen, a mathematics professor-turned software developer from Montana who planted Ampère vineyard. “The growing season is very short. We start very late. After everything blooms in the valley, we are two-to-three weeks behind. In a year when the temperature isn’t high enough, half the vineyard might not ripen. The only way we can afford this is if they are very premium grapes.”

But there are advantages too. The appellation starts at 1600 feet (488 meters), rising as high as 3000 feet to what Benziger says are the highest-elevation vineyards in California. Most of the appellation is above the fog line, so in summer its high temperatures in mid-afternoon are lower than in the valley. But its low temperatures, at night and in the morning, are higher.

“A hundred and fifty days on Pine Mountain is like having 175 or 180 days on the valley floor because the vine doesn’t shut down,” said Lise Asimont, director of grower relations from Francis Ford Coppola Winery. “The fruit is like Alexander Valley on steroids. Even in a bad year in Alexander Valley, it’s great. It has so much power, so much strength.”