26. Thurston Wolfe Winery 2010 Reserve Petite Sirah, Horse Heaven Hills, $30
Black cherry, blackberry, black tea, black pepper and more dark, earthy elements in the nose. On the palate, repeat all those black fruits and black elements, with even just a touch of black teach. An incredibly rich, complex, layered drink that surprises at the end with sweet, almost subdued tannins that reveal a touch of chocolate. Beef or lamb kabobs or some other grilled meat for this one.
Production: 48 cases
Alcohol: 14.5%
Lists such as this are nice. But I content that wines with a production of less then 250 cases should not be included. There are wines here with microscopic production levels. That just amounts to teasing the vast majority of the readers.
Jim,
A valid point. I would contend that highlighting even small-production wines gives wine lovers an idea about what wineries to visit or wines to try.
Additionally, this is a bit of a slippery slope. Do we also exclude wines based on price point because they are accessible primarily to those only able to afford them?
We went into this with the thought of picking out the very best wines we tasted in 2013. During the process, we didn’t look at price point or production level. As a result, we also ended up with a lot of wines in which tens of thousands of cases were produced (in addition to small-production wines).