2011 Ridge Vineyards Zinfandel Carmichael Ranch Sonoma County

A sweetly fresh-berried Zinfandel

2011 Ridge Vineyards Zinfandel Carmichael Ranch Sonoma County

A field blend from the forty-acre Carmichael Ranch, which Ridge began renovating in 2000. They left the oldest vines and replanted less productive areas, accommodating the noticeable differences in soils across the site, from clay loam to gravel. The result is a patchwork of old vine and new, Zinfandel and Petite Sirah and Carignan and Alicante Bouschet. We purchased this bottle in 2014.

It’s a shiny raspberry color, limpid, and the perfume is of raspberries, too, red brambles in the sun, plus field strawberry (ripe not tart), and dark but fresh red plums. The texture is light, the tannins extremely modest, but this wine does not have that stewed blueberry Zin character so prevalent in old-vine wines. It’s light-handed and nimble instead, more red than black and blue. Drink it now.

14.8% abv | $27 (in 2014) 1,000 cases made

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