2019 Kirkland Signature Carneros Pinot Noir

2019 Kirkland Signature Carneros Pinot Noir


Vintage: 2019
Region: Carneros, Napa Valley, California
Winery: Kirkland Signature (made by Alison Crowe)
Varieties: Pinot Noir
Price: $9.99
My Rating: 88 Points

The Review: Howdy folks. Hope everyone had a great Memorial Day! Today's blog covers what I think is one of the all-around best value wines out there. The 2019 Kirkland Carneros Pinot Noir is consistently a really good Pinot for $10! As I think I've mentioned in the past, Pinot Noir is really hard to make well for cheap. It's finicky, very sensitive to the weather, and can easily be screwed up by the winemaker. This one, however, from the very famous Pinot region of Carneros, is typically very good!

From the Napa side of Carneros (this subregion is really interesting because part of it is in Sonoma and the other part is in Napa), Alison Crowe puts out a wine that checks all of the boxes for what we want in a wine from this region. One of the really cool things about Carneros is that the soils are super sandy, so the wines often exhibit a really unique freshness and spiced berry note.

In this wine, we get nice aromas of ripe cherry and currant as well as a hint of some tart raspberry and strawberry. There were also some darker berries like blueberry that added depth. Rounding out the nose was some vanilla and a little bit of dried herb and mushroom. The taste was very fresh, with tart cherry intermingled with some riper strawberry and currant. A hint of pithy citrus and some dark berries throw a curveball and keeps things interesting. The secondary notes are very delicate, with a touch of baking spice, vanilla, and damp earth all filled out by grainy tannins.

As a lover of Pinot, especially of the cheap variety, I'd encourage anyone to give this one a shot. Many people would argue that this is Kirkland's best bottling! It's perfect for a summer grill out or for no reason at all. I'm pretty sure they still have a couple of cases floating around in stores, so be sure to jump on it fast.

drink what you like,

db

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