2016 Brewer-Clifton Pinot Noir Machado
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The 2016 Pinot Noir Machado showed beautifully, with the rounded, supple, and opulent style of this great vintage front and center. Loads of candied cherries, raspberries, spice, and floral notes all define the bouquet, and it has no hard edges and wonderful balance. It’s going to continue drinking brilliantly for another decade or more. This was another thrilling lineup from Greg Brewer, and I consistently rate these wines as some of the greatest in the Sta. Rita Hills, as well as all of Santa Barbara County. In addition to the latest releases, I was also able to taste retrospectives of his Chardonnay 3D and Pinot Noir Machado, which only reaffirmed my belief in the quality and age-worthiness of these wines. These are brilliant wines.
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Jeb Dunnuck
Antonio Galloni, Vinous
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The 2016 Chardonnay Machado is a very pretty wine. Intensely mineral and savory, the Machado is also a wine of notable precision. The lemon confit, almond, dried flower and earthy notes are rather subdued in the Machado, where minerality and overall structure are such distinctive signatures.
The 2016 Pinot Noir Machado is quite tight-knit after its very recent bottling, unwinding in the glass with notions of cherry, strawberry preserve, rose petal, cinnamon and orange rind—seemingly the most floral and high-toned of these 2016s. On the palate, the wine is medium-bodied, supple and fine-boned, without the power and richness of the Hapgood or 3D, but endowed with lovely energy.