2013 Dolin Malibu Estate Pinot Noir Sta. Rita Hills Central Coast 750 ml

Bargain Pinot Noir at its Best

Perfectly aged Pinot Noir from a top producer doesn’t come around all that often. When it does, you can usually expect to pay a boatload for it. But this one, the 2013 Dolin Malibu Estate Pinot Noir, from the increasingly important Sta. Rita Hills AVA, bucks convention in this and so many other ways. It does so with a balance of exuberance and sophistication that we just can’t stop talking about: lush, ripe red fruit, generous baking spice, and flashes of perfect bottle age in notes of dried cranberries and pomegranates make Dolin’s Malibu Estate Pinot Noir nothing short of miraculous.

We shouldn’t have been surprised: Dolin Estate’s owner, Elliott Dolin, has been making waves since he started producing wine from the breathtaking estate vineyard located just outside of his home in Malibu. In fact, his work there was one of the main catalysts for the establishment of the Malibu AVA. Before that, he had a career in music, recording with Johnny Cash, Manhattan Transfer, and Don Everly, among others. Clearly, he is the kind of guy who, when he sets his mind to something, will accept nothing less than perfection.

That quest for perfection finds a ringingly clear expression in his wines. This growing site in particular is brilliantly suited to producing age-worthy bottlings that nonetheless shine in their youth, too. The nearby Pacific Ocean keeps the climate cool, which in the best years—like 2013—leads to Pinots of freshness, balance, and concentration where juicy strawberry and pomegranate mingle with oak influences, like baking spice and licorice, in a gorgeous harmony.

The 2013 vintage was a season that, from the very beginning, was just about perfect. Wine Spectator praised its “near-ideal growing conditions,” and specifically called out the reds “for their power, concentration, [and] deep dark colors.”

Five years after the fruit was picked, this is a Pinot at its peak. This just may be your new favorite “house wine.” No one will ever know what you paid, and even if you told them, they probably wouldn’t believe you anyway.