2020 Turley Wine Cellars, Zinfandel “Buck” Cobb Vineyard, Shenandoah Valley, Amador County, Sierra Foothills.
The deeply colored, purple/garnet 2020 “Buck” Cobb Zinfandel from Turley is wonderfully vinous and generous on the full bodied palate with loads of blackberry, raspberry, plum and Italian cherry fruit, along with dark floral notes, sandalwood, briar spice, mocha and a touch of anise that all meld together in a smooth and seamless way. This is a terrific effort from the old Karly property in the Amador County that the Turley family acquired, and this wine has been bottled since the 2012 vintage, it is obviously mostly all Zinfandel, but there’s small amounts of Petite Syrah, Mataro (Mourvédre) and Alicante Bouschet, a rare teinturier grape with red flesh and juice, in the mix and give added complexity. In fact I love the savory, almost meaty undertones and hints of sanguine irony/mineral accents that come through in the background and there’s an underlying structure, velvety tannin and brightness that balances out the ripe fruit, making for an interesting and thoughtful wine. I enjoyed this Shenandoah Valley Zin with a rustic pizza and found something new and exciting with each sip, making for a food friendly version of this grape and I can see it going fabulous with BBQ as well. Hats off to winemaker Tegan Passalacqua and his Amador team for another exceptional wine from the Sierra Foothills, joining some of my other favorites in the Turley collection, like the Judge Bell and Sadie Upton Zins.
Part of Turley’s Amador Estate, the “Buck” Cobb vineyard, which is planted at 1500 feet on the volcanic, granitic hillside of their property in Plymouth, formerly part of Karly, is one of the most distinctive and terroir driven sites in their Sierra Foothills collection of offerings. The Cobb Vineyard Zinfandel, as Turley notes, is an homage to “Buck” Cobb from whom they purchased this vineyard and the Karly estate property in Amador. To pay a full tribute, Turley even added a little bi-plane symbol to the label to commemorate Buck’s time as an aerobatic pilot! The rocky conditions here and more extreme weather (including snow) in this dry-farmed vineyard, Turley adds, makes for a very hearty, robust and complex Zinfandel, but still opulent and hedonistic, as this 2020 shows. Not old by Turley standards, the “Buck” Cobb Vineyard has plantings that began in the 1980s, with more added here in 2001 and, just after Turley took over, in 2013. Coming from all head-trained, dry-farmed and hand harvested vines, as per normal for Turley, this “Buck” Cobb Zin saw a native yeast fermentation and small lot maceration with gentle daily punchdowns before being racked to barrel, with 80% used oak, 20% new, 80% French oak and 20% American, for 15 months. This wine was bottled unfined and unfiltered and saw limited distribution, with some restaurants getting some, though mainly released to mailing list members, which is how I got mine, and those that visited the Amador tasting room, which is highly recommend if you are up that way!
($40 Est.) 93 Points, grapelive