Dunning Vineyards is a small, family owned and operated winery making limited-production, artisan wines from their vineyards on the far West side of the Paso Robles appellation. Winemaker Bob Dunning and his family planted the secluded mountainous vineyards in 1991 with Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Chardonnay. The vineyards were expanded a few years later to include Zinfandel, Pinot Noir…
Category: Petite Sirah
Washington Petite Sirah – A Brief Primer
Petite Sirah was first bottled as its own varietal in 1961 by Concannon of California. Known as Durif in France and elsewhere, Petite Sirah was originally misidentified as Syrah when it was planted in California. The term ‘petite’ stems from the relatively small size of the grapes. As recent as 10 years ago very few Washington wineries bottled a Petite…
Petite Sirah: California’s Most Age Worthy Varietal?
Petite Sirah was first bottled as its own varietal by Concannon in 1961. The wines made in these early years were huge, tannic, extracted wines. Some of the better examples like Ridge York Creek, Freemark Abbey, Stags’ Leap and David Bruce were thought to be wines capable of aging for 30 or more years. Therein though was the problem as…
2004 Outpost Petite Sirah Howell Mountain – Bottle Notes
Outpost sits atop Howell Mountain and strives to make world class Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel and Grenache from an amazing estate vineyard. Thomas Rivers-Brown has been the winemaker from the very start. He has also gone on to start his own winery, Rivers-Marie, all the while making truly exceptional Cabernet Sauvignon for Schrader amongst others.