Alma Rosa "North Slope" Pinot Noir

Tasting notes & discussion 18

Typically $55/bottle from Alma Rosa Winery
Vintage 2022 from Sta. Rita Hills
Available for AL; AZ; AR; CA; CO; CT; DC; FL; GA; ID; IL; IN; IA; KS; KY; LA; ME; MD; MA; MI; MN; MO; MT; NE; NV; NH; NJ; NM; NY; NC; ND; OH; OK; OR; PA; RI; SC; SD; TN; TX; VT; VA; WA; WV; WI; WY
Sold by participating winery or licensee, fulfilled by Wine Country Connect

About Alma Rosa Winery: “Our mission at Alma Rosa is to produce exceptional wines that exemplify the best of our unique cool climate terroir in the Sta. Rita Hills appellation of northern Santa Barbara County. We specialize in Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Rhone varieties including Grenache and Syrah.”

Going Through, Not Around

TASTING NOTES: “In the glass, Alma Rosa’s 2022 North Slope Pinot Noir, which was sourced almost entirely from its own estate El Jabali Vineyard, alongside a small amount of carefully selected partner fruit sourced from top growers along the southern corridor of the Sta. Rita Hills, is a strikingly deep, rich ruby hue. On the nose, the wine shows ripe red fruit, freshly picked flowers, citrus peel, lavender and mint. Reflective of the excellent and “classic” 2022 growing season, this wine, with its bright red fruit flavors, lively acidity, distinctive oceanic salinity and firm yet elegant tannins, exemplifies why the Sta. Rita Hills is such a special and distinctive place to cultivate Pinot Noir.” (AbV 14.6%)

VARIETALS: Pinot Noir

BARRELS: 30% new French oak

PAIRS WITH: N/A

THAT REMINDS ME OF: El Jabali Vineyard, the estate at the heart of this wine, takes its name from the Spanish word for wild boar.

El jabali.

There is arguably no animal in all of human mythology, folklore, and general cultural imagination that punches so wildly above its weight. The wild boar has been: the beast that killed Adonis (Greek mythology), the creature Hercules had to capture as his fourth labor (also Greek mythology — they were really into boars), a sacred animal to the Norse god Freyr, the heraldic symbol of dozens of noble families across medieval Europe, the animal that inspired an entire category of Italian pasta sauce (cinghiale ragù, which you have almost certainly seen on a menu and possibly mispronounced), and the main antagonist of Princess Mononoke. That is an absurd résumé for a pig that got out of hand.

The Japanese, it should be noted, have the boar in their zodiac — the twelfth sign, representing courage and sincerity, though also a tendency to charge headlong into things without thinking. Which tracks. You do not look at a wild boar and think: here is an animal that deliberates. You think: here is an animal that has decided. There’s something almost admirable about that level of commitment. The boar does not hedge. The boar does not reconsider its route. The boar is going through the thing, not around it, and it will be somewhere else entirely by the time you’ve finished forming an opinion about it.

Who's buying this?

How are you buying your bottles?

The wild boar charges straight through without hesitating. When it comes to big decisions, you are:

I commit fast and course-correct later — momentum matters more than certainty

I commit fast and course-correct later — momentum matters more than certainty
I charge when it counts, but I know when to read the terrain first

I charge when it counts, but I know when to read the terrain first
I deliberate carefully. The boar gets there faster but I get there smarter

I deliberate carefully. The boar gets there faster but I get there smarter
I've charged headlong into enough walls to finally respect the value of a pause

I've charged headlong into enough walls to finally respect the value of a pause
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