2010 Chardonnay Horseshoe Vineyard

This is a fabulous set of new releases from Rhys, proprietor Kevin Harvey and winemaker Jeff Brinkman. I am not sure where to start, as all of these wines are highly recommended. Yields were brutally low in 2011, to the point Harvey told me he had never seen the cellar so empty during the fall. The Pinots were made with lower amounts of whole clusters, none in the Horseshoe and very little in the Alpine. Although Pinot Noir gets most of the limelight at Rhys, in top vintages the Syrahs are every bit as exciting. I hope readers can check them out as quality is world-class, while pricing remains incredibly reasonable. Rhys's two Chardonnay sites are 400 yards apart, but totally different in style. Ideally, the Chardonnays need several years of bottle age. If that is not an option, readers should give the Chardonnays a generous decant. Unfortunately, neither the San Mateo nor the Swan Terrace Pinot was made in 2011. However, Rhys fans will want to take a look at the Alesia wines (Rhys's second label), which are reviewed separately in this article. I also tasted all of the 2012 Pinots from barrel in composite blends. Harvey describes 2012 as the ‘vintage we have been waiting for.' It was a bumper crop for Rhys, which in these marginal sites means 30 hectoliters per hectare, yields that would be considered minimal in any other region in the world. Harvey's latest project is a Nebbiolo vineyard in Sonoma. The first vines went in just a few weeks ago. I can't wait to see how things develop at this site given Harvey's relentless passion and dedication. It is not an overstatement to say that what Kevin Harvey and his team have achieved at Rhys in just a few short years is nothing less than remarkable. These are benchmark California wines, it's as simple as that.

Proprietor Kevin Harvey and his team, led by winemaker Jeff Brinkman, have received quite a bit of attention of late. They deserve every bit of it, if not more. Harvey has spared no expense in building a state of the art facility, which includes 100 one-ton fermenters that allow for multiple small lot fermentations. In the vineyard, Harvey has taken the type of risks only someone with a background in early stage technology investing could stomach. The result is a series of breathtaking wines, Pinots especially, that are among the finest being made in the United States. I am quite sure Harvey's goals are much more ambitious than that, though. It will be interesting to see how things play out at Rhys over the coming years, but there is no question these are exciting, compelling wines of the highest level. My experience with the Rhys Pinots is that they develop very slowly in bottle, so readers need to exercise a bit more patience than is typically required with California Pinot Noir. Like most estates in 2010, Rhys grappled with the September heat spikes, which took place during the harvest. The Home and Family Farm were brought in before the spikes, as was 80% of Alpine, Horseshoe and Bearwallow. Rhys had a harder time with Skyline, which came in after the spikes. Ultimately, only 25% of that fruit made it into the fermentation tanks.

"We're just starting to get the hang of matching clone to individual site, which is the next challenge here," said Kevin Harvey in March. "We'd like to further fine-tune our vine work so that growth is balanced in such a way that there's no need for any green-harvesting, which means throwing away expended vine vigor. Better that it goes into grapes that you actually use than wasting energy, especially on poor soils where vines struggle anyway." Winemaker Jeff Brinkman called 2010 "a terroir vintage, whereas 2009 was a weather vintage. The '10s have a site transparency to and a mineral pungency while the '09s are more about fruit." The slow pace of the 2010 growing season was definitely a cause for concern, said vineyard manager Javier Meza. "It was like slow cooking: you had to be patient."