2019 Pinot Noir Garys' Vineyard

Adam Lee retains his grassroots, bootstrapper, friendly-next-door-neighbor vibe despite the resounding commercial and financial success of Siduri, Lee’s brainchild and former venture with Dianna Novy. He loves what he does, and he’s not afraid to keep pushing himself—not to mention, he’s good at it. Lee loves the Santa Lucia Highlands, which is why it’s the sole focus of the Clarice label. Additionally, he consults on a number of other projects, including Rombauer (he’s responsible for the recent advent of their Pinot production), Morét-Brealynn, Dial Tone and Phone Booth. Where Lee truly shines is in the high-quality, transparent, stylistically outlying wines he makes at Clarice. He’s not afraid of stems, and he’s not afraid to completely turn his own approach on its head from year to year, depending on what the vintage requires. We tasted through four vintages of his three Clarice cuvées—2018, 2019, 2022 and 2023, all of which showed exceptionally well. If one thing is clear, these wines are built to last. The 2018s and 2019s are just beginning to open their eyes. These wines age like molasses, but that’s encouraging to see from such a relatively fledgling region. The 2022s saw Lee adjusting his winemaking significantly to combat the heat, greatly increasing whole clusters in all three Pinots in order to compensate for the structure he predicted the heat would impede. The stems are particularly noticeable in the 2022s, but tasting the 2018s and 2019s confirmed that those characteristics meld into the wines with time in bottle. Most notably, the 2023s are unbelievably great. Mark my words. The 2023 Clarice Pinot Noirs may very well turn out to be among the best wines the region has ever spawned.

Adam Lee, who first gained acclaim for his wines at Siduri, set up Clarice Wine Company as a wine club/mailing list-only, starting with the 2016 vintage. This side project has swiftly emerged as a leading source for Pinot Noir not just in the Central Coast but in the New World. Lee sources fruit from two of California’s greatest Pinot Noir vineyards for Clarice, Rosella’s and Garys’, sites that he has been working with for decades. Production is tiny and will remain that way because Lee wants to maintain strict control over quality and is comfortable with a certain level of quantity – roughly 300 cases split between three bottlings. Lee maintains close contact with his customers via steady e-mails, tastings and even trips to France so this is an especially hands-on endeavor. As for the wines, they are made with a high percentage of whole clusters, which is the opposite of the approach at Siduri, where the wines are made almost entirely from de-stemmed fruit.