2023 Littorai Pinot Noir Savoy Vineyard

The 2023 Pinot Noir Savoy Vineyard offers bright red spices and rooibus (red tea) notes, as well as salty, brambly, grippy Nebbiolo-like tannins. A refreshing red, there’s nothing austere about this vintage, but even though the wine is refreshing, it’s grippy and packed with expressive feel. The year 2025 marks the 30th anniversary for Littorai. Heidi and Ted Lemon operate Littorai from their Gold Ridge Estate in Sebastapol, where they produce Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from exceptional cool-climate vineyard sites on the Sonoma Coast and in Anderson Valley. Ted is, hands down, one of Sonoma's most important farmers and winemakers today. Though they farm biodynamically, they prefer to describe their practices in the vineyards as “generative farming,” a term intended to include the human relationship to the stewardship and shaping of the land as part of modern nature and integrated farming. In the winery, all the wines undergo spontaneous fermentations, with the reds going through two to three weeks of fermentation, and although Ted is not dogmatic in his approach, each of the wines is raised similarly. All of the wines for this report were tasted at the estate.

The 2023 Pinot Noir Savoy Vineyard has slowly unfurling scents of raspberry, pomegranate, oolong tea leaves and bitters and offers additional nuances with each return to the glass. Medium-bodied, it floods the mouth with powerful, crunchy red fruit flavors. It’s structured by silky tannins and vibrant acidity and has a long, latent finish. It will be long lived in the cellar. 783 cases were made.

Sits north of the town of Philo, at the base of the hills on the north-eastern side of the valley. With soils of Pinole and Boont loams over Franciscan shale, the site is protected on two sides, one by the hills and on the south-east by the little rise which leads into Philo, making the site warmer than most of its neighbours. Planted in 1991, 1992, and 1993, this site is farmed using organically certified materials but itself is not certified. Free-run juice from a combination of destemmed fruit and 34% whole clusters ferments with ambient yeasts in a combination of steel and wood, utilising both punchdowns and pumpovers, with the wines pressed at dryness. Aged for 14–17 months in 20–25% new French oak on the lees with no racking. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. 780 cases produced. Smells of crushed herbs, raspberries and raspberry leaf with a touch of potting soil. Intensely bright flavours of raspberry and cranberry have an expansive force to them, that seems to push out against the sides of the mouth as powdery tannins give a fine-grained texture to the wine. Excellent acidity seems to drive raspberry, sour cherry and citrus peel through a lengthy finish. (AY)