Today’s epic Pinot Noir hails from the Carmel Road Winery, whose mission is to craft Pinot Noir that expresses the unique terroir of its Monterey County vineyard sources.

We are proud to be the only online wine merchant to be showcasing this exemplary wine. Heck, you might not even be able to find this wine at a bottle shop - or the winery itself. They love us enough to have given us exclusive access.

This Carmel Road 2011 Panorama Vineyard Monterey Pinot Noir is the inaugural release from the Panorama Vineyard, whose close row spacing makes for smaller berries of greater intensity. The grapes here benefit from super-cooled winds from the Monterey Bay, placing additional beneficial stress on the grapes.

Today’s wine is dark and very concentrated with none of the residual sugar found in something like a Bel Glos Pinot Noir. Rather, this wine presents bold flavors that are bolstered by great structure and integrated tannins, with enough bright fruit to make it a compelling pairing for something rich.

We offer you this fantastic wine with our very hearty Wine Spies recommendation and we invite you to taste this inaugural release - and several releases to come. We can’t wait to see how the fruit from this great vineyard progresses.