Turley Wine Cellars, Old Vine Zinfandel 2021

Old Vines comes from around 18 vineyards in Napa, Sonoma, Mendocino, Lodi, Contra Costa, Amador and Paso Robles. They are either too small to be given individual designation or very new to the Turley stable. The vines average 80 years old and the resulting wine offers more brooding depth and intensity than Juvenile. On winemaking Turley comments - "We never crush, we press whole berries. We never use anything but wild yeast, we never filter or fine, we rack occasionally, and we have stuck with our long fermentations,taking 30, 40 days, sometimes four to five months, to finish in barrel."

Larry Turley and his director of winemaking, Tegan Passalacqua, continue to produce a fantastic range of wines from some of California's oldest, head-pruned, dry-farmed Zinfandel vineyards. They have managed to persuade the owners of some of California's finest old vineyards to let them take total control of viticulture; farming organically, reducing yields to extremely low levels and picking earlier to retain acidity. Winemaking is totally unmanipulated, with very gentle extraction. The wines are matured for 14-16 months in 75% French, 25% American oak barrels (25% new) and bottled unfined and unfiltered.  Juvenile  comes from young vines (6-25 years old), interplanted, from several of their old vine designated vineyards  including Hayne, Ueberroth, Pesenti, Salvador and Vineyard 101. Whilst it offers sumptious, joyous fruit, it also gives more than a glimpse of Turley's single vineyard wines. Old Vines comes from around 18 vineyards in Napa, Sonoma, Mendocino, Lodi, Contra Costa, Amador and Paso Robles. They are either too small to be given individual designation or very new to the Turley stable. The vines average 80 years old and the resulting wine offers more brooding depth and intensity than Juvenile.