Our Finest Selection Pinot Noir Reviews

This rich, broad and mouthfilling wine soothes the palate with generous, ripe dark-plum and ripe blackberry flavors shaded by redwood forest and balsam accents. The moderate tannins are super smooth, adding to the indulgent character of this full-bodied wine.

Lightly aromatic and subtle on the palate, even as the tannins acquire strength and the wine gains prominence. Zesty wild raspberry flavors show a loamy licorice side. 

Pale to medium ruby-purple colored, the 2015 Pinot Noir O.F.S. delivers notes of warm raspberries and kirsch with underlying hints of garrigue, dried herbs and fertile soil plus a waft of fungi. Medium to full-bodied, it offers tons of juicy red fruit with a chewy backbone and loads of freshness, finishing on a savory note.

Brian Maloney selects this fruit from estate vineyards (40 percent), blended with grapes from BCD, close by, and the Starkey Vineyard in the Sebastopol Hills. This is Russian River pinot noir in all of its full-figured beauty, a rich, cherry-scented wine with enough intensity to take on a grilled burger with mushrooms. The alcohol isn’t shy, pointing up the grip of the tannins and the flower power of the fruit, but it’s all of a piece.

Garden herb and forest floor aromas make a case for this wine to be considered the producer's “Finest Selection” (the “FS” in “OFS”). On the palate, wild strawberry, black cherry and berry are the story, while powerful spice adds intrigue to the velvety texture, roundness and full-bodied concentration.

Slowly builds intensity and complexity, offering a taut range of spicy wild berry, raspberry, cherry, spice and crushed rock notes. Most impressive on the finish, where the flavors take on a delicate, supple charm.

Brian Maloney makes this mostly from an estate vineyard on Olivet Road, that fruit augmented by four other vineyards, including two cool sites in the Sebastopol Hills. This has an appetizing warmth to its wild strawberry flavor a ripeness that feels earned rather than pushed. It's sleek and lively, content to be delicious rather than complex. 

De Loach’s OFS bottling is a barrel selection of the winery’s extensive vineyard holdings. This 2011 is dry, balanced in acidity and tannins and quite impressive for the way the ripe red fruits and berries hold back, tantalizing with hints of ripeness yet receding into dryness.

This is an absolutely lovely Pinot Noir that's softly refined and balanced, yet so complex. It's silky and dry, with waves of raspberries and cherries, red currants, mocha, red licorice and sauteed wild mushrooms.

A subtle, delicate style showing ripe black cherry, plum and boysenberry notes on a medium body, with baking spices, mineral and dried berry flavors rolling off the finish.

Cellar Selection. A very fine Pinot Noir, dry and elegantly constructed, but it needs a little time in the cellar. That’s due to the tannins, which are thick and noticeable in the way they create an astringency through the finish. The flavors are exceptionally rich, suggesting cherries, raspberries and tobacco, with a welcome sweetness from toasty oak. — S.H. (4/1/2012)

A very fresh and attractive nose of red cherry, cranberry and blue pinot aromas nuanced with a hint of the vegetal introduces vibrant, detailed and pure medium-bodied flavors that possess good focus and detail on the clean, balanced and lingering finish. I very much like the style and the mouth feel and all this needs to be at the next level is more overall depth. In a word, pretty.