2016 Keplinger Fuego y Mar, USA, California, Sonoma Coast, Wine Review

This is a Syrah from the Sonoma Coast made in Helen Keplinger's home winery. It drinks with a cooler climate profile and comes across beautifully. Purple in color, opaque and bright. The nose is nice with boysenberries, dark chocolate, slight bacon fat and violets. Medium to full bodied. Medium tannins. On the palate, this is the elegant side of California Syrah. Boysenberries, white pepper and roasted herbs. Deep. Still young but starting to show some maturity. Drink over the next ten to fifteen years. This is great on its own but better with food. Grilled Lamb Chops would work well.

Grade:

Score:

Vintage:

2016

Current Price:

$80.00USD

Top Ten California Syrahs - 2016

I tend to taste and drink a lot of wine over the course of a year. I am in a few tasting groups, sometimes the wines are consumed at various local wine store tastings and a number drunk with friends and family.

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America’s Best Rhone Style Red Wines: 11th Annual Rhone Rangers Tasting Reviewed

The Rhone Report: About Rhone and Rhone-Style Wines and Winemakers is part of an ongoing series. Last month we discussed the white Rhone style wines offered at the 2008 Rhone Rangers tasting event at Fort Mason in San Francisco on March 18. This month we turn to the reds, of which we tasted 50. Among those we tasted were some old favorites and some wineries or bottlings with which we were not yet familiar. We don’t pretend that we tasted a representative group of wines, because our sample was skewed to wines we have loved in the past and others about which we have heard positive comments.

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2008 Hospice du Rhone Events: Highs & Lows of American Rhone-style Wines Tasted

The Rhone Report: About Rhone and Rhone-Style Wines and Winemakers is part of an ongoing series. The 16th annual Hospice du Rhone events in Paso Robles, California from May 1 to 3, 2008 was an opportunity to consider Rhone-style wines from a fresh perspective. Unlike most tasting opportunities, these events included Rhone-style wines from the Rhone Valley itself (51 wineries), elsewhere in France (4 wineries) as well as from Spain (4 wineries), Australia (17 wineries), South Africa (6 wineries), Chile (2 wineries), Argentina (1 winery) and the United States. The American wines were mostly from California (144 wineries), but a few examples from Arizona (2 wineries) and Washington State (5 wineries) were also included. While this is a California-dominated event, and while many of the Rhone Valley’s best producers aren’t represented, there is still sufficient European and other entries to make for interesting comparisons and contrasts. The events included two general tastings and a series of focused seminars.

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2017 Keplinger Fuego y Mar, USA, California, Sonoma Coast, Wine review

Vintage:

2017

Score:

Grade:

Current Price:

$75.00USD

this is 100% Syrah. Purple in color, some ruby, opaque and bright. The nose is earthy with plums and roasted meats and herbs. Black olives as well. On the palate, this is full bodied with medium tannins. Black raspberry and black cherry fruit. With air plums come out. Great acidity. A touch of salinity on the finish. This comes across as a cooler climate Syrah more in the Northern Rhone style. It will need some time flesh out, perhaps another seven to ten years. After that it will drink well for ten to fifteen more years. A nice match with brisket or roasted veggies.

Cool-Climate Syrah in Sonoma

Sonoma County winemakers are searching out the perfect marriage of locale and climate to produce noble cool-climate syrah. “This is, honestly, one of the best places in the world to grow syrah,” said winemaker John Holdredge, who makes a cool-climate syrah from a Russian River Valley vineyard called Lovers Lane. “You can have a nice syrah from a warm climate but it’s just a different animal. I don’t think I’ve had one where I thought, wow, that’s pretty.”

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2016 Keplinger Fuego y Mar, USA, California, Sonoma Coast, Wine Review

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2017 Keplinger Fuego y Mar, USA, California, Sonoma Coast, Wine review

Cool-Climate Syrah in Sonoma