Wine Review: Syrah, Babcock, 2003 Nook and Cranny

Syrah, Babcock [link], 2003 Nook and Cranny, Estate Grown, Santa Rita Hills.[My Rating [Link], 8.5] Good. An excellent syrah but not as rich and elegant as the frying pan. Bold with a tart taste of black cherries and smoke. It starts out big and ripe. It is high in alcohol and it tasted it right away. Still, nice with a lingering oakey and smoky finish. Retail $50, Terrior Exclusive, Received Nov 05 Wine Club. Drank 1/7/06. Perhaps more time in the bottle would have taken off some of it's edge? Winemaker’s Notes:

Syrah grown west of Highway 101 in the Santa Ynez Valley can be extraordinary. The trick is in getting it thoroughly ripe. Our vineyard is under a heavy influence from the ocean, and like the rest of the Santa Rita Hills, it’s very cool and breezy through out the growing season. In fact, most of our ranch is too cool to consistently ripen Syrah. But, as luck would have it, we have a couple of small sites that do accommodate this noble Rhone varietal.

With the exception of Burgundy, the prevailing wisdom says that great vineyards in the northern hemisphere ideally face west or south, so as to insure that their vines get plenty of sun. But with Syrah we have found it necessary to plant on east facing hillsides, out of the wind, where it is actually a couple of degrees warmer through out the day. With 95% of our vineyards facing the wrong way, we are only talking about a couple of tiny adjacent hillsides. Making it even more extraordinary is the fact that their soils are a matrix of gravelly loam and shattered sandstone, the kind of stuff that intimately governs the vigorous nature of Syrah, while still allowing it to ripen. What we have are two little viticultural sweet spots, indeed on our ranch, the NOOK & CRANNY for the growing of world class Syrah.

The downside is that we can’t make very much of this stuff. The upside is that 95% of our ranch is Mecca for growing Pinot.

Technical Notes: VARIETAL COMPOSITION: 100% Sryah VINEYARDS: Babcock Estate FINISHED WINE: Residual Sugar:Dry, pH: 3.57, TA: 7.3 gm/L, Alcohol: 15.0% TIME IN BARRELS: 18 months, 33% new French oak BOTTLING DATE: December 2004 TOTAL PRODUCTION: 169 cases 12/750 ML RELEASE DATE: November, 2005 SUGGESTED CA RETAIL PRICE: $50.00 per 750 ML

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