The 2021 Pinot Noir Bodega Ridge Vineyard is tightly coiled to begin, slowly unfurling pure aromas of raspberry and pomegranate, shiitake mushrooms, iodine, pipe tobacco, licorice and tremendous floral perfume. The light-bodied palate is more open at this youthful stage, bursting with expressive red fruit. It’s structurally seamless, its powerful, velvety tannins balanced by focused acidity that drives the wine forward, and it has a very long finish with a kaleidoscopic array of spicy accents. It gained weight and nuance for several days after the bottle was opened and will be long lived in the cellar.
Steve Kistler and his daughter Catherine are hard at work developing their new property on the Sonoma Coast, located just 10 minutes from their Occidental winery but more heavily impacted by the marginal effects of the Pacific Ocean. Blocks have been plotted out and staked, and the first vines will be planted in the spring of 2024. The Kistlers are proponents of massal selection, propagating from their own vines rather than using purchased clones. You are trying to find the selection that will produce the best wine, but in most years, you give something up to get there, Steve explains. The massal selections are not virus free. But it’s like everything else, it’s a matter of degree. It’s not debilitating the vine, but it helps keep the vine from overproducing. You get less but better crop. Catherine proudly notes that her father has been developing vineyards and producing wine on the western Sonoma Coast for over two decades?about as long as anyone who has farmed serious acreage out here, she says. I’m 32 now, and my dad was 32 when he founded Kistler. Working on this new ranch gives me an appreciation of the risk.

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