2010 Pinot Noir Solomon Hills

This is a fabulous set of wines from Ojai. Winemaker/Proprietor Adam Tolmach and Assistant Winemaker Fabien Castel hit the ball out of the park with a number of these new releases. Frankly, I am not sure where to start, as there are so many wines here that are worthy of serious consideration. Looking at the 2011 whites, they are the product of a very difficult season marked by a spring frost and windy/rainy conditions during the flowering that lowered yields dramatically. Production may be down, but the two 2011 whites I tasted were dazzling. Ojai's 2010 Pinots are simply breathtaking. Here, too, the wines are a little bit richer and more powerful than is often the case. Suffice it to say I can't wait to taste the rest of 2010 Syrahs. As always, the Pinots are made in a stripped down manner that includes slow malos, low amounts of new oak and minimal racking, which is typically performed only to prepare the wines for bottling. A heat spike just as the Chardonnay was being picked caused challenges. The fruit that was picked before the heat went into the single-vineyard wines, but the lots that were not brought in on time ended up in the straight Santa Barbara Chardonnay. As a consumer, sometimes it feels there are no great values left in California. Ojai is a rare exception. These wines deliver the goods (and then some) yet remain exceptionally fairly priced. Readers who want to learn more about Ojai might enjoy this recent video covering the 2010 Bien Nacido and Solomon Hills Pinots.

Adam Tolmach told me that he thinks that vintage 2010 is about freshness. "The pHs were low across the board and so we got great energy in the wines, which will allow them to age. The pinot in 2010 gave very small berries, so we have lots of good fruit tannins to go with the bright fruit, so there's another boost to their ability to age." An ongoing issue with too many New World growers is their addiction to water, he said. "You have to be willing to turn off the irrigation because otherwise your vines are too happy, and happy vines give vegetal character." As we usually do, we discussed Tolmach's aim to produce "balanced and fresh wines that are a pleasure instead of a chore to drink." He told me that he said he is aiming for lower yields and lower sugars but not by picking too early. Doing that gives too much greenness and tartness." On the flip side, Tolmach thinks that "if you have to adjust acidity it simply means that you didn't harvest right."