2012 Pinot Noir Comptche Ridge

As was the case with all the producers I visited this March, the Anthill team was thrilled with the 2012 vintage's combination of high yields and high quality, a situation that repeated itself in 2013."We were especially happy considering what happened in 2011, when it was so cold and grey that everybody was freaking out about getting not just good fruit, but much fruit at all," Anthony Filiberti said.In fact, production here was up 80% from '11 to '12, from the same acreage, "and that was after dropping fruit," Filiberti added.Filiberti, Web Marquez and David Low now vinify their wines with an average of around 50% whole clusters and will go as high as 100% for syrah.Punchdowns are holding steady at one or two per day (they were doing three a day prior to 2007) and new oak is routinely 25% to 30%, according to Anthony, "because beyond that the wines need a lot of time to fully absorb it.The vast majority of our wines are drunk in the year after release, so the oak needs to be in the background."

I was quite taken with the wines I tasted from Anthill Farms this year. Winemaker Anthony Filiberti works with a handful of sites in Sonoma and Mendocino counties to produce highly transparent, nuanced wines loaded with personality. The Anthill wines are typically made with a generous amount of stems and see very little new oak. All of the 2012s were in bottle at the time of my visit in January 2014. Some of the wines had just been bottled, but they all showed well. Anthill Farms remains one of California's most intriguing boutique wineries. Readers who can find the wines should not hesitate in giving them a try.