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: 2014 Bien Nacido Estate "The Captain" Santa Maria Valley Pinot Noir

2014 Bien Nacido Estate "The Captain" Santa Maria Valley Pinot Noir

SKU #1491934 97 points Vinous

Outer quote mark The 2014 Pinot Noir Bien Nacido Vineyard The Captain is one of the very finest wines I have tasted from Trey Fletcher and Bien Nacido Estate. Silky, floral and nuanced, the Captain is all finesse. The purity of the red-toned fruit is simply remarkable. As striking as the 2014 is today, it best drinking lies in the future. Inner quote mark (9/2017)

94 points Wine Advocate

Outer quote mark The 2014 Pinot Noir The Captain wafts from the glass with complex aromas of wood smoke, wild berries and savory forest floor. On the palate, it's medium-bodied, cool and racy, with a crunchy core of fruit, fine-grained structuring tannins and lots of sappy energy, concluding with a penetrating finish. Like the 2015 rendition, this will need some time to really open up, but it's a beautiful wine from Bien Nacido's highest-altitute, most windswept plantings. (WK) Inner quote mark (4/2018)

93 points Jeb Dunnuck

Outer quote mark A new cuvée (for me anyways), the 2014 Pinot Noir Bien Nacido The Captain saw the standard winemaking with 30% whole clusters, native ferments and 18 months in 40% new French oak. It sports a deeper ruby color as well as terrific red and black fruits, leafy herbs, underbrush, and leather. It's another concentrated, rich and nicely structured effort that has plenty of ripe tannin, solid mid-palate depth and a good finish. Like the other wines here, it's going to keep for a decade, and I suspect will be one of the longer-lived wines in the vintage. There’s just 98 cases. Inner quote mark (8/2017)

K&L Notes

William Kelly in Wine Advocate: "The Miller family's Bien Nacido Vineyard comprises over 800 acres of vines and is best known as the source of cool-climate grapes - above all, Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Syrah - for a multitude of California wineries. But winemaker Trey Fletcher also ably presides over an exciting program of estate wines that are worthy of attention. Fletcher has selected fine blocks, emphasizing old vines, and superintends their farming himself on organic principles (the rest of the vineyard is managed by Chris Hammell, with farming practices adapted according to client preferences)"

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2014 Bien Nacido Estate "The Captain" Santa Maria Valley Pinot Noir

Price: $59.99

Quantity:

VN: 97

RP: 94

JD: 93

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Varietal:

Pinot Noir

- One of France's most legendary grapes and the grape that earned Burgundy its reputation. The parent of varietals like Pinot Gris/Grigio and Pinot Blanc, Pinot Noir is blue to violet to indigo in color with relatively thin skins, and it is said to have been cultivated in France for more than 2,000 years. At its best, Pinot Noir creates elegant wines that are filled with primary red fruit aromas and flavors while young, revealing with an array of secondary characteristics like earth, smoke, violet, truffle and game with age. The varietal is also known, perhaps better than any, for its ability to translate terroir, or a sense of place. While the best Pinot Noir still comes from Burgundy, it is being produced with increasing success in cooler climates around the world. In France, it is part of the trifecta of grapes that can go into Champagne, and it is also grown in Alsace, Irancy, Jura, Savoie, Lorraine and Sancerre. Outside of France it is produced under the names Pinot Nero and Blauburgunder in Italy's mountainous regions, as Spätburgunder in Germany and as Blauburgunder in Austria. In the US, Pinot Noir has found suitable growing conditions in the cooler parts of California, including Carneros, the Russian River Valley, the Anderson Valley, the Sonoma Coast, Monterey County, the Santa Lucia Highlands and Santa Barbara County, as well as in Oregon's Willamette Valley. In recent years, New Zealand has demonstrated its ability to interpret this hard-to-grow varietal, with successful bottlings coming from careful and attentive growers in Central Otago, Martinborough and Canterbury. Chile is also an up-and-coming region for Pinot Noir, creating fresh, fruit-forward, early-drinking and affordable Pinots from the coastal Casablanca Valley and the Limari Valley.

Country:

United States

- When people consider domestic wine, they normally think about the state of California. The fine viticultural Region within California, including the Napa Valley, Sonoma, Santa Cruz Mountains, Mendocino and Santa Barbara, are capable of growing grapes of world-class quality. But there's plenty of fabulous wine coming from other states, too. Oregon, Washington and New York are also causing eyebrows (and glassware) to be raised around the world.

Sub-Region:

California

- With the explosive growth that California's wine industry has seen the past several years, it's easy to view winemaking and grape growing in the Golden State as a recent phenomenon. And while it's true that California's viticultural history is brief compared to several European countries, this state's roots date back well over 200 years. Due to the enormous response to California wine within the United States and worldwide, there are thousands of excellent and diverse wines being produced within the state each year.

Specific Appellation:

Santa Maria/Santa Barbara

- Santa Maria and Santa Ynez make up the two AVAs of Santa Barbara County, an area known for its natural beauty and temperate climate. The best grape-growing areas, however, are located on the very coastal reaches of these two appellations, and are cooled by ever-present fog and ocean breezes (it is even cooler and foggier here than Carneros!). As expected, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir thrive while the more inland zones lay claim to Bordeaux varietals and some Rhône blends.