2007 Turley Zinfandel Hayne Vineyard

Red-ruby. Crushed berries, pepper, gingerbread and sexy oak on the nose, with a captivating incense quality adding complexity. Large-scaled, dense and deep, with excellent clarity and lift to the pungent dark berry, spice and mineral flavors. This boasts terrific fruit intensity and chewy depths and finishes with superb persistence.

From Napa’s famed Hayne Vineyard, the 2007 Zinfandel Hayne Vineyard boasts a dark ruby/purple color as well as a sweet perfume of spring flowers, blackberries, and truffles. Deep, full-bodied, and rich, it is best consumed over the next 7-8 years. Interestingly, winemaker Ehren Jordan said that in 2007 the natural alcohol levels ranged from a low of 15% to the high sixteens, but the wines were easy to vinify, and the freshness, vibrancy, and excellent focus most possess are vintage characteristics. As always, a mind-boggling array of Zinfandels and Petite Syrahs has been produced by the world’s premier Zinfandel specialist, Larry Turley. He deserves remarkable credit for his “holy grail” quest to locate largely forgotten parcels of old Zinfandel vines, and preserve as many of these historic sites as possible. Like most Zinfandels, Turley’s are best drunk during their first 5-6 years of life, although in certain vintages, some wines can handle a decade worth of cellaring. However, the glory of Zinfandel is its youthful, exuberant, flamboyant, spicy, peppery, briery fruit. It will not achieve greater complexity or flavor dimension by extended cellaring. All of these Zinfandels come from dry-farmed vineyards, a majority of them being old head-pruned sites planted by Italian immigrants in the late 19th century. The wines are aged in 20% new French oak, and are bottled with little clarification. Total production for Turley Wine Cellars is slightly more than 15,000 cases. They also make a small quantity of white wine. No one makes more concentrated or ageworthy wines than Larry Turley’s Petite Syrahs. This is California’s most underrated, long-lived varietal, and having had experience with 20-30 year old Petite Sirahs, they actually do improve in the bottle, becoming remarkably civilized with outstanding aging potential. They can match Cabernet Sauvignon for the longest lived varietal in California, but they can be so impenetrable, thick, and broodingly backward in their youth that only a small number of consumers follow them. Tel. (707) 963-0940; Fax (707) 963-8683