Pisoni Estate Pinot Noir, Santa Lucia Highlands (2019) 2019

This is the wine the entire Lucia range orbits. Gary Pisoni planted these blocks in 1982, among the very first in the appellation, on granite-laced slopes at 1,300 feet - one of the highest, coolest, and most coveted sites in California. Critics from Parker to Galloni have called it the Grand Cru of the Santa Lucia Highlands. The family makes essentially one wine a year here, a barrel selection across the estate, vinified by Jeff Pisoni. Hand-farmed and made with a high proportion of whole clusters, then aged in a good measure of new French oak - the backbone that lets this wine run two decades. The site is high enough to sit above the fog that fills the valley below each morning, so up here it is the altitude, the relentless afternoon wind off Monterey Bay and the granite that do the work: cold nights and a long, slow ripening that give the wine its depth and its clean, savoury edge. Expect crushed black cherry, violet and orange peel deepening into baking spice, black tea, clove and damp earth, with a long, savoury, mouth-watering finish. Powerful but never heavy - intensely focused and built to last. Serve at 15-16°C, decanted in youth.