Today’s 97 point wine is the very best Syrah we’ve tasted in recent memory.

Landmark Vineyards’ 2012 Kivelstadt Vineyard Sonoma Valley Syrah is a dense, delicious, velvet-wrapped beautiful beast of a wine. This extraordinary wine is all depth and dark fruit, supported by minerals, spice and earthy elements.

The nose is bold and spicy - loaded with black fruit, earth and spice. Blackberry, plum, and black cherry lead the charge. These are closely followed by braised mission fig, grilled nectarine, hickory smoke, bramble bush, cigar box, subtle dried herbs and black pepper.

Bold and beautiful on the palate, loaded with dense black fruit, spice and woodsy character. Black plum, braised Mission fig, blueberry, blackberry and black cherry dominate on entry. Then, as these initial flavors settle onto the palate, secondary flavors emerge, including dried meats, cassis, toasty oak, dark chocolate, cedar box and black pepper.

Today marks the first time that we’ve featured a wine from Landmark. You can bet that it will not be our last from this Sonoma County icon.

“Landmark Vineyards’ 2012 Kivelstadt Vineyard Sonoma Valley Syrah is a truly stunning and complex wine. The dark fruit completely fills the mouth. Nuances of spicy, meaty, earthy complexity permeate nose and palate, building to an extended, intense and very flavorful finish.

All of this, wrapped up in a warm blanket of crushed velvet and plush tannin. A hint of flinty minerality and good acidity make this wine a great food companion. Wondrous fruit is really the key to this dense and sculpted Syrah.

Intense blackberry, raspberry, blueberry and cassis are supported by smoke, mocha, flint and black pepper. It is hard to ask much more of a California Syrah.” - 97 points, Highly Recommended - Anthony Cimorelli, Sommelier