2008 Syrah Rodgers Creek Vineyard

David Ramey is one of the few California winemakers who thinks in terms of structure, not just flavor, something that sets him apart from many of his peers. All of the wines I tasted at Ramey's cellar just outside Healdsburg were terrific. I also sampled a number of older wines, all of which have held up very well. Best of all, most of the wines remain very fairly priced considering the quality of what is in the bottle. My visit ended with the 2001 Cabernet Jericho Canyon Road, which was stunning. At age 10 it remains an infant. I only wish I owned it. The next best thing is Ramey's new Annum bottling from 2009 forward, the vintage in which the main vineyard source switched to Shartsis, a parcel in Rutherford close to Dana Estates's Helms vineyard. The Pedregal, from a vineyard in Oakville is perhaps even better, but it also costs twice as much.

"Five to seven years old is the sweet spot for my chardonnays but they plateau for a while after that," David Ramey told me in March. To make the point we tasted bottles of his 2001 Russian River Valley and Hudson bottlings, both of which were still eneregtic and mineral-driven, with serious heft. "Chardonnay is the red wine of whites if it's made right," he said. "There's a texture that it can achieve that's sometimes more serious than pinot noir, and it can handle the richest foods." We talked about the ongoing debate over alcohol levels and what he called "the narrow obsession with that particular number. Why not talk about pH instead?" he asked. "That's even more important for the impression the wine gives when you drink it. Alcohol has always been the bogeyman in the U.S. and this is just another manifestation of that obsession."

"Syrah's image to American consumers, I hate to say, was seriously damaged by the Australians," David Ramey told me. "First, they didn't call it syrah. Then, they made it sweet, and after that they made it cheap. Now, it's an incredible struggle to get people to buy these wines for what they're worth so more and more people, growers and producers, are just giving up on the grape." Ramey himself has made his last Shanel Vineyard syrah (the 2006) and is now producing a SonomaCoast syrah that's intended for earlier drinking and priced at about one-third less than his Rodgers Creek bottling. He drew a comparison between 2007 in Napa and 1982 in Bordeaux, saying that although the wines have big immediate appeal he thinks they'll have a smooth aging trajectory and never really close up. As for 2008, he says that "it isn't an easygoing vintage. The wines are looking very direct and will need some time to gain breadth."