2019 Watkins Family Winery Zinfandel Taylor Mountain Vineyard Sonoma County 750 ml

Randall Watkins’ 2019 Watkins Taylor Mountain Vineyard Zinfandel is a micro-production bottling crafted by an all-time Wine Access favorite. Grown on a one-acre hillside vineyard farmed by Randall’s family since Live Rust came out, made in a tiny 110-case quantity, it’s the kind of bottle that is getting harder and harder to find in Sonoma County in these days of anonymously sourced, mass-produced wines. 

Randall grew up on the Taylor Mountain Vineyard, which occupies the warmest pocket of Sonoma’s Bennett Valley, on a gentle slope. Today, he lives on the property, in the ranch house next to the head-trained Zinfandel vines that his father planted 40+ years ago.

When Randall was a kid, his parents would throw harvest parties, inviting friends over to pick the grapes and take turns at the exhausting labor of hand-cranking a manual destemmer. Now, it’s Randall’s friends at the harvest parties, and today he’s the one tending the vines—aided only by his wife, plus legendary Sonoma vineyard manager Phil Coturri, who counts Harlan, Araujo, and Andy Erickson as clients.

The wall of stones ringing the Taylor Vineyard gives some clue to the terroir within: the soil is extremely rocky, testing the mettle of these old Zinfandel vines, many of which date back to the original 1979 planting. There’s Petite Sirah here too, lending this wine its dark fruit and perfume, and by some happy accident, two rows of Grenache, which contribute spice, dense strawberry fruit, and juicy acidity.

Randall picks at optimal ripeness. He doesn’t wait for raisins, but he looks for when grapes become slightly dimpled. This, and the relatively cool microclimate of the site, make for a Zinfandel of incredible freshness.