2014 Foxen Winery Pinot Noir La Encantada Santa Rita Hills 750 ml

For Lovers of Profound and Generous Pinot

Mother Nature herself has conspired with the Foxen boys, Bill Wathen and Dick Doré, to produce one of our all-time favorite Pinot Noirs off their “La Encantada” vineyard. The site is situated in California’s coveted Sta. Rita Hills AVA, where blustery ocean breezes treat the Pinot Noir grapes to a cleansing, extremely cool growing season. These conditions cause the grapes to darken and grow thicker skins for protection, and in 2014, gave way to a Foxen Pinot that was more like Chambolle-Musigny, brimming with layered red fruits and a spherical texture, showing softer, more feminine tannins, but still with power and elegance. You’d pay as much as $200-$800 or more for Chambolle-Musigny as bold, silky, and mineral-infused as this Foxen La Encantada. From the winery, it’ll run you $62. Today, lovers of profound, generous Pinot Noir can lock into a case at just $49.99 per bottle. So, 1 bottle of spectacular Burgundy, or 12 of a stunning equal? You make the call.   

The boldest offering from a superb lineup, Foxen’s 2014 “La Encantada” is the must-have purchase of the vintage for coastal Pinot Noir collectors. This bottle off the cool, windswept La Encantada Vineyard, planted by local legend Richard Sanford, impressed Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate, which called it “silky, polished, elegant,” with “finesse-oriented texture that keeps you coming back to the glass,”  Drinking gorgeously now, it has the bones to cellar for another eight years.

Richard Sanford is a living legend in Santa Barbara County — the visionary pioneer of Sta. Rita Hills. Returning to California after a tour of duty in Vietnam, he roamed through the Santa Ynez Valley in an old Mercedes, a thermometer thrust out the car window. He was convinced that Pinot Noir needed a cooler climate to thrive than many winemakers believed at the time. After studying weather charts in Burgundy, he believed he’d found a worthy corollary in the Sta. Rita Hills area. The explosive success of his Sanford & Benedict Vineyard would prove him right.

In 2000, he planted a vineyard on the extreme western limit of the Sta. Rita Hills AVA, one of the coolest spots in the appellation. The elevated, north-facing slopes, situated above the Santa Ynez River, see the full brunt of cold marine winds whooshing in off the Pacific. By morning, a thick, coastal fog coats the vines; by midday, a hot sun beats down, driving supple concentration. The soils — fine, sandy loam, shale, and clay — yield high-toned acidity and mesmerizing minerality. Sanford called it “La Encantada” or “the charmed place.”

The Pinot Noir from this site in 2014 was charmed indeed. In the early-arriving harvest, the vintage’s climatic script bequeathed fruit that made for one the richest, most powerful Pinot Noirs from Foxen’s Bill Wathen and Dick Doré in recent years. The call to pick was postponed well after harvest began at warmer inland sites, giving the tiny crop of small-berry Pinot Noir extra hang-time. At harvest, fruit was richly sweet, even as sugars remained perfectly in check. Acids, as always in this cool-climate destination, were bracing.

But Foxen loyalists — legion among the Wine Access ranks — will tell you the wines speak for themselves. 100 cases of suave Sta. Rita Hills perfection up for grabs, while they last.

— Wine Access Wine Team