This wine is good. Got all the BLIC (balance, length, intensity, complexity) and it has really good mouthfeel with velvety tannins a weight that doesn’t feel like gylcerol.
The wine was brought to dinner by a friend of my mother’s who is a member of Navarro’s wine club. After an incidental visit years back, he signed up and now receives packages in the mail.
But notice the red logo on the right side of the label of this 2006 Navarro Vineyards Anderson Valley Pinot Noir. It says Méthode a l’Ancienne.
What does this mean? It’s not explained on the website, so I called the winery. The nice man who answered the phone told me their grapes are fermented in separate lots and that the Méthode a l’Ancienne lots are punched down by hand. I asked if it meant unfined or unfiltered and he said they can no longer do that as it is unreliable.
So there you have it. Wineries can call their wines whatever they want and it’s up to you to find out what it means.
