2005 Calera Ryan Pinot Noir

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Oswaldo Costa

Oswaldo Costa
2005 Calera Ryan Vineyard Pinot Noir Mt. Harlan 14.0%
While rummaging through old papers a few months ago I found a 2001 NYT article by Frank Prial singing the praises of Calera as being ne plus ultra. Saw a half bottle of this recently and went for it.

All labels should be as detailed: average ripeness 26.0% sugar, fermented with native yeasts, spent 16 months in 60 gallon French oak barrels, 18% of them new...

Nose a bit closed - no fruit, just some dishrag, mint and marigolds. Tastes thick and chewy, highly extracted. Good acid/sweet balance, bitter finish. Cherry flavors emerge, with some leafy green and judicious oak (which I'd rather not have, but it's not excessive, just a condiment).

Blind, I would never have guessed pinot. No pinosity whatsoever. While I'm not one of those who want new world pinots to taste like Burgundy, except cheaper, I do want them to somewhow relate to my internalized notion of pinot, to be an interesting twist on it. But no relation whatsoever is a bit much.

Marcia thinks it may be designed for people who know that pinot is the hippest of the big name grapes (or have seen Sideways) but don't want to let go of the modern palate. But Calera seems like a conscientious company (from the label, at least), and this was no means excessive or unenjoyable. So I find it hard to believe that their business plan is based on fooling brown belts. Maybe I opened this too young, even for a half bottle, but I don't think it will ever taste like an interesting twist on Burgundy, or even something entirely sufficient on its own.
 
Calera has always been an interesting winery. And Josh Jensen's quest to find limestone in California led him to Hollister, but in no way is that area 'cool climate' to me, and that is reflected in the wines. It's too bad his focus has always been pinot noir, when perhaps Italian varieties might be better suited there?
 
Well, I am a huge fan of Calera and have to strongly disagree with some of the comments here.

It's true that when the wines first come out they have a lot of primary sweetness and fruit intensity. Most of them cannot be mistaken for Burgundy on release. But they behave very differently from most wines with that level of primary fruit. If you put them in a decanter for a few hours or even overnight you will be shocked how much of it recedes and how Burgundian it tastes.

Occasionally they will make a clumsy wine that tastes a little cabernet-ish. But most of them can't be confused for anything other than pinot in my opinion.

They are built to age and have a track record for doing so unlike any other pinot noir in California. At 15 years or so, some of them will taste indistinguishable from Burgundy of a similar age. But in general they are *not* the most Burgundian of California pinot noirs even among the old-school producers (Mt. Eden has that honor) because most of them have a profile completely unique to Calera's vineyards: tangy cranberryish red fruit, cinnamon and spice, steeped orange peel, an almost citric acidity, and, in the best examples, a palate-enveloping breadth and silky tannin -- at least in that last respect they can resemble a Grand Cru Burgundy.

You simply do not get this kind of distinction in a site where you have planted the wrong grape variety. I don't know anything about the climate, but none of them taste like hot climate wines and the vastly superior performance of pinot and chardonnay over their viognier provides at least some evidence that the cooler climate grapes do better there. My only reservation about the terroir is that with the exception of Selleck which is almost always a cut above the others in finesse, I don't see much differentiation from one of their vineyards to another.

As for the charge of catering to hipness... well, I cannot think of any winery *less* in tune to what's hip than Calera. Grab an old bottle and you will see a clear continuity of style with the wine they're making today. Maybe fashion has come around to where Calera is, but Calera certainly has never budged an inch to be more fashionable.
 
I agree, mostly, with Keith, who is dead on about how these wines show with age.

My only (minor) disagreement is that I like think both the Selleck and Jensen wines show differentiation, and are a cut above the others.

Find one of those with some age (I had a 99 Selleck in the last year that was rocking).
 
As for the charge of catering to hipness... well, I cannot think of any winery *less* in tune to what's hip than Calera. Grab an old bottle and you will see a clear continuity of style with the wine they're making today. Maybe fashion has come around to where Calera is, but Calera certainly has never budged an inch to be more fashionable.
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True about that: I don't really think they have changed one iota since I've known about them. And you are quite correct about them aging, 10-15 years is not uncommon.
 
They've changed in one way: they raised their prices (transparently: they announced they were doing it and why) to get more attention/higher ratings, and it worked.

I concur that they age as well or better than any California pinot noir, but I also agree that more often than I'd prefer there isn't a point along that lengthy aging curve that I find inordinately appealing. It is -- and here it's a little like Arcadian -- a winery I want to like more than I actually like. That said, their successes are worthy, and require (rather than just benefit from) age.
 
originally posted by Thor:
That said, their successes are worthy, and require (rather than just benefit from) age.
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Another reason they are un-hip.

And that being the case, doesn't it seem that many who write and review wines (whether pro or not) do not give domestic wines the same "benefit of the cellar" when rating or assessing them as they do for Old World wines?
It often appears to me that, since many domestic wines are made for immediate consumption, the ones that are not do not merit judgments that include the possibility that they have to age to be at their best.
Or maybe I am overly sensitive to that issue.

Best, Jim
 
originally posted by Thor:
They've changed in one way: they raised their prices (transparently: they announced they were doing it and why) to get more attention/higher ratings, and it worked.
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Yep. I still have that mailing when they announced such, I think it was from the early-mid-90's. I thought it took chutzpa to do so, but at least they were being honest and transparent about the 'why' part.
 
I agree with many of the pro-Calera comments and would add that the Ryan Pinot is not the place to start with this winery. It's the youngest block of vines, planted in 1998 and 2001. Folks can, and do, debate the importance of vine age, but I think it does matter with California Pinot. That is, if the wine isn't ruined already by over-ripeness, oak, or poor terroir. Anyway, drinking one bottle of Ryan and then forming overarching opinions about Calera is not a very rigorous approach.

For tasting young, I've had the best luck with Calera'a Reed Vineyard Pinot. It was planted in the mid-70s with the Selleck and Jensen, but is usually lighter styled.
 
originally posted by Jeff Twersky:
I agree, mostly, with Keith...
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I do too, especially about the laughable notion of Calera being trendy, either in catering to the pointy hyper-ripe style or to Pinotmania. Josh's notions and intentions at Calera predate both, and he definitely marches to his own drummer. Calera's raison d'etre was soil and terroir driven, but the result has been something quite different from classical Burgundian notions of Pinot Noir. Less fragrant in the spice and rose dimensions and with some of the "bass notes" in flavor and structure that remind me of Northern Rhone.
 
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