Complex mixed berry aromas with spice: blackberry, damson plum, Bing cherry are intense and concentrated but quite fresh. There’s a touch of allspice and white pepper as well. The flavors continue the aromatic profile, both fruity and spicy.  This delicious wine is nicely ripe, yet restrained: it has fruit (blackberry, raspberry), spice and structuring elements; all well balanced. It is medium-plus in body with a very long finish.

WINE INFORMATION

Roy Raymond moved to Napa Valley in 1933 and became the winemaker at Beringer Vineyards. He married into the Beringer family in 1936 and continued making the wine until 1970. In that year, he and his two sons bought a 90-acre estate in Rutherford; they released their first commercial bottling in 1974. Jean-Claude and Claudine Boisset hail from Burgundy, originally working in the wine trade as brokers. They bought their first vineyard in Gevrey-Chambertin in 1964and acquired more properties over the years. Their son Jean-Charles and daughter Nathalie unified the Burgundy holdings and turned their attention to California, purchasing DeLoach in 2003, Raymond Vineyards in ‘09, and California’s oldest winery, Buena Vista, in ‘11. They converted all estate viticulture to organic and biodynamic and raised the quality and consistency of the wines.  This wine is part of the R Collection; Lot 5 refers to the fifth generation of the family. It is a field blend, reflecting early California viticulture in which several varieties were planted in the same vineyard, harvested and fermented together.

2019 is considered a near perfect vintage in California. Heavy spring rains enriched the soils and delayed bud break by a few weeks. A heat spike in June, followed by warm weather, brought even veraison throughout the vineyards. A cooling trend and touch of rain in mid-September created ideal conditions for the 2019 harvest.