Pinot Noir is like a paramecium: it evolves constantly. In a matter of moments, it can change personality like single-celled creatures under a microscope, becoming a bipolar calamity, even turning into Cerberus, dog of the underworld. Hey, wait!! I liked you better before you grew two heads! That’s Pinot for you. Don’t turn your back on the possibility that the golden retriever you loved at first sniff can turn into the Rottweiler that will bite the back of your tongue off upon ingestion. Few wines can masquerade as something so jailbaity on the nose and turn into such long prison sentences when they cross your lips. Ouch. And that’s on a normal day, when conditions are ideal. Pinot, you are a harlot.logo1At the Pinot Shootout finals (organized by Barbara Drady of Affairs of the Vine), held January 15, 2011, on a beautiful day at Fort Mason in San Francisco, I had the misfortune of sitting across from the fire escape door. In a rare happenstance, it was open to add some air to a stuffy top floor room on a windless, cloudless, all sunny, all too much like Spring afternoon. The abundantly bossomy Sophia Loren-like sun spilled over onto my tablespace, adding a bit too much warmth to several specimens in the first flight. I sipped the one in most jeopardy first: already this one was heading to the Riviera with a suitcase filled with Ban del Soleil. Seconds later, it had shed its baggage, passport and flip-flops, and had crashed, naked on a beach, with a beer in hand, virtually as unrecognizable as a Wall Street tycoon on an offshore vacation. It happened rather suddenly. In haste, I tried to retaste each one before they followed suit, I mean suitlessness, and I found myself saying to several flight contenders, “Wait, I really did like you better before you….uh, changed. Can we go back to ‘hello’?” Sometimes the naked truth ain’t so pretty.Ack. That’s Pinot for you. Even when you’ve tasted a certain wine before, you can’t rely on your cranial database to recall its unique genetic imprint. And more often than not, the circumstances will guide the performance. Wine tasting is a live stage performance, not videotape.The smaller the production lots and the more expensive the wines, the more those variations occur. Larger production wines are by default, made in larger vessels with fewer variables. There is more control, and fewer opportunities to introduce variance. On the other hand, in smaller wineries that do not use tanks, each individual barrel can introduce an entire ecosystem, especially when they are specialty items. The mutation effect is thus magnified. Which is why consistency is the watchword of wineries seeking to appeal to a larger marketplace, where uniqueness of character drives small-lot winery appeal.My top scoring wines out of 4 flights of 8 wines, all blind-tasted:2008 Sequana Dutton Ranch, Green Valley, Russian River ($40) : This one lives in a secluded seacoast cottage on the Pacific bluffs. It’s a complete story, with smoothly flowing segues from brambly fruit to pumpkin-apricot bread pudding. Deeply satisfying, almost meaty. Superb. (95)2007 David Noyes Wines Crane Vyd, Sonoma Coast: Clay notes, with strawberry jam cooking on a Summers day. Rhubarb, orange and apricot, with great acidity, cinnamon-tarts and almond paste. Marzipan, yeah, baby! Toasty hazelnut finish with a hint of fine cigar. (92)2009 Hahn Estate Santa Lucia Highlands ($29): Sweet raspberry jam, with lovely hints of strawberry and lemon. The most romantically balanced, lovely wine of the flight: it has it all, but not too much. It’s like the proverbial perfect feast, where one course flows into the next. Pretty baking spice, harmonic fruits and nuts: excellent stuff. (94)2008 Mueller Emily’s Cuvee, Russian River Valley ($44): Raspberry, lime, kiwi and melon: a summer’s evening smorgasbord of fruit on the palate. Deliciously bright, great texture, superb acid, violets, loganberries, orange peel and Earl Grey tea with sage honey. (92)2008 nth degree Arroyo Seco, Monterey ($55): Charming sun-drenched adobe walls, covered with bougainvillea. Nice and zippy in the mouth with runaway filly acid. A core of ripe raspberry and pink lady apple, with hints of sweet lemon buttercream. (91)2008 Claiborne and Churchill, Twin Creeks, Edna Valley ($36): Earthy, mushrooms, herbs de Provence aromas. Tomato, basil, oregano and lamb fennel sausage. A most savory wine with very little sweetness. No flaws, except a wee bit heavy on wood, but it has the balance and texture to mature nicely. A savory sizzler! (90)2007 Kenneth Volk Nielson Vineyard, Santa Maria Valley ($48): Peachy, strawberry, raspberry pudding. Flirtatiously flips between fruit and earth. A precocious pre-teen. Surprisingly peppery, piquant and zesty. Flavors of peanut sauce with extra ginger. A very nicely complex wine with lots of great closets to explore. (90)2008 Summerland Fiddlestix Vineyard, St. Rita Hills ($50): The charmer of the flight in the aromatics category. Strawberries and lemon peel on the opening. Spice, ruby red grapefruit and white pepper. Very acid- and spice-driven wine with a pink lemonade and gin-fizz component. Intriguing and polarizing. Wood slightly off-kilter. (90)2008 Fulcrum Gap’s Crown, Sonoma Coast ($54): Charming mix of wild flowers, plum blossoms, cedar, molasses and clove. Now we’re talking! Currant, dried apple, pistachios, tamari almonds and a hint of fennel and dill. Lamb sausage would pair nicely. Good food wine, good balance, huge acid. (92)EXP 39 Anderson2009 Expression 39 Annahala Vyd, Anderson Valley ($48): Smells just like baked fig bars. Flavors of sweet mission fig, cherry jam, nutmeg. Very middle-of-the-road appealing. Good acid, interesting dried citron and spiced pecan notes. Love the package! Young. Wood needs time to settle. (92)Two wines I did not score highly, but that nonetheless made an impression:2008 Beauregard Santa Cruz Mountains, Estate ($35): A huge beast. I suspect extraction and hedonism in the soul of the winemaker. Wet clay, dark brambles, chorizo and peppers. A most impressively large expression of a wine made to arrest your attention. The antithesis of subtle.2007 TR Elliott Burgenot, Russian River Valley ($40): Intriguing aromas of baking gingerbread, caramelized pears, burnt sugar, walnuts and ginger. Meaty hints of jerky and well-done pork spareribs in hoisin sauce. A Heart of Darkness wine.Pinot never ceases to amaze. It’s the most abundant mutator in the grape world, constantly evolving, in the field, in the bottle and in the glass.Darwin was definitely onto something. If I ever break down and make my own wine label, I will call it Darwin’s Indecently Decadent Revenge.
