2023 Brecon Zinfandel (Best of Class)
Well who needs AI to replace us vinomakers when all you need is a spiffingly good vintage? Yes, you heard it here, some wines just make ‘emselves. This, by the way, is our first 100% Zin. Nothing added, nothing taken... which for an enologist who has mixology deeply engrained in their blue British Blood, makes it soooo, so hard not to sneak in just a liddle bit of dis or dat. All we could play with was the interplay of fine American and French oaks! Brecon has always crafted quintessentially food-friendly Zinfandels. We do that by solely using hilltop Zinfandel, which gives wonderfully concentrated, balanced fruit with well-integrated acids. Lively and manifestly brighter, rather than jammy, with an intriguing spice layer and soft tannins.
Best of Class Red, Don Galleano Award, Double Gold. Pacific Rim International Wine Comp. June 2025.
93 pts. Jeb Dunnuck, August 2025
Nothing to do on blending day! No hints of other varieties, nothing to talk about here! It just made itself. So perhaps instead we should mention the extensive cold soaking, the open top ferments, the 14 months of lees contact in a decidedly “call of the wild” mixture of French and American, new and once used, 60 and 75 gallon beautiful barrels.
| Vintage | 2023 |
| Varietal | Zinfandel |
| Varietal Composition | 100% Zinfandel, Willow Creek District, Paperstreet Vineyard |
| Appellation | Paso Robles, Willow Creek |
| Acid | .72g/100ml |
| PH | 3.30 |
| Aging | Drink Now - 2040 |
| Residual Sugar | 0.08g/100ml |
| Alcohol | 15.20% |
| Volume | 750 ml |
| Bottling Date | 04/09/2025 |
| Cases Produced | 210 |
Drat and perhaps double drat! Printed the labels before we realized we could have given this a Single Vineyard designation. Mind you, the lead times are so long on our labels that we would not have decided on the final blend at that point anyway. Paperstreet is a rocky, hill-topped Zinfandel vineyard. So high up it even has its own stargazing observatory! (Sadly disused)
