2001 Pax Syrah Lauterbach Hill
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Tasting notes
The 2001 Syrah Lauterbach Hill’s (245 cases from a north-facing hillside vineyard planted on gravelly/sandy soils by the well-known Lee Martinelli)opaque purple color is accompanied by a gorgeous nose of bacon fat, smoke, vanilla, and copious quantities of red as well as blackberry fruit. Thick, opulent, and juicy with well-integrated acidity, wood, and tannin, it is a hedonistic pleasure bomb to enjoy over the next 7-8 years. Fax (707) 591-0784
Critic scores
Average Score
Robert Parker
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
More reviews and scores
(from a vineyard farmed by Lee Martinelli, next to the Martinelli family's Hop Barn holding) Good full ruby color. Musky, smoky aromas of cassis, game and flint; distinct suggestions of the gravelly soil. Sweet and lush in the mouth, with a softer impression of acidity than the Castelli-Knight bottling. Shows a truffley, herbal note, but also sweeter and deeper than the Castelli-Knight example, with more dimension. Mahle told me this parcel features the same clone and spacing as the Hop Barn but that he picks the fruit at least two weeks later. These vines throw a huge crop, and only by having two-thirds of the crop dropped on a second pass through the vines in the middle of veraison was Mahle able to keep the yields here below two tons an acre.