2024 Climat Frais, Pinot Noir, San Luis Obispo Coast AVA, Cambria.
Like their 2020 version I reviewed, Eric Schafer’s Climat Frais along with famous sommelier and winemaking consultant Raj Parr, of Phelan Farms, Domaine de la Côte and Sandhi Wines fame, have dome a beautiful job with the 2024 vintage, making a light medium bodied and elegant Pinot with delicate florals, red fruits, spice and mineral notes. This translucent bright ruby hued and youthfully lively wine gives off its cool climate as a badge of honor in the glass, highlighting the Pacific Ocean’s influence here in the San Luis Obispo Coast AVA with an added bit of pedigree, as mentioned prior, to this seductive almost Burgundian style effort. This wine is fresh or tense, but wonderfully silky on the palate with Bing cherry, wild strawberry, guava and crushed raspberry fruits, and it also displays cinnamon, sassafras, heirloom tomato leaf and orange tea accents with subtle wood framing. Sourced from vines of Dijon 777 and 115 clone Pinot Noir set on well draining deep loam and alluvial soils, and (of which) helped convince Raj that this area would be a good spot to do his own estate, which he founded, just down the road in 2019, this 2024 Climat Frais Pinot is a gem of a bottle and opens up nicely adding a light earthy element, savory notes and depth when it gets time in the glass. This offering is an extremely limited effort and will require some search to get your hands on it, but certainly worth the chase.
The 2024 Pinot Noir comes from the Marfarm Vineyard, not far from Raj Parr’s own Phelan Farm in Cambria and vines situated just 3 miles from the cool Pacific Ocean in what is called the Creekside Estate Vineyard, a dry farmed 3.3 Acres parcel planted in 2008 to Rochioli clone. This wine was hand crafted for Eric Schafer of Climat Frais and again, as it was in the prior releases, fermented using native yeasts, fully de-stemmed berries that were crushed and macerated with gentle daily punch downs and pump overs in 1.5 ton fermenters for 16 days before press-off to barrels. The 2024 Climat Frais Pinot Noir was then aged for close to 11 months in special Taransaud Troncais (barrels) that were air dried and made exclusively for Pinot Noir. This year’s saw a third new French oak, and two thirds neutral wood, perfectly capturing the vintage and place with some luxurious toast and lots of transparency. Coming in again at just 12.5% natural alcohol, this wine shows a remarkable purity and finesse, spotlighting the sustainable certified organic practices and the proximity to the cold ocean waters. This vintage really grew on me after my first clean palate evaluation, getting much more distinctive and delicious with food later in the evening, hinting at the potential it has to age, while being approachable and engaging now, it may eclipse the debut release and I am looking forward to seeing how it develops in the bottle over the next couple of years.
($50 Est.) 94 Points, grapelive