Wine & Spirits - Winter 2019 - 40

Top 100 Wineries

ERIC
BAUGHER

RIDGE'S MONTE
BELLO VINEYARD

Ridge
CALIFORNIA | SANTA CRUZ MOUNTAINS
Ridge presents two faces of California wine: deep-rooted
traditions of old-vine mixed blacks and the fashionable
elegance of coolly ripened cabernet sauvignon.

FOUNDED :

1886

OWNER:

Mr. Akihiko
Otsuka
WINEMAKERS:

Eric Baugher,
John Olney
VITICULTURIST:

David Gates
ACRES OWNED:

316
CASES PRODUCED:

85,000
ESTATE GROWN:

75%
40

THE RIDGE THAT GROWS Ridge's Monte Bello has been
planted to vines since the 19th century. It began its march
toward contemporary fame in the 1960s, when four Stanford Research Institute engineers started making wine from
vines planted in the 1940s. Ridge's viticulturist David Gates
now farms a range of parcels rising from 1,300 to 2,700
feet, where the vines explore a limestone uplift, once a seabed, now 15 miles from the Pacific coast. Winemaker Paul
Draper, who joined in 1969, recently passed the baton to Eric
Baugher, who started at Ridge as an assistant chemist in 1994
and became a COO of the company in 2016. The 2016 is the
first Monte Bello since Draper's retirement, and the firm,
potent, energy-packed cabernet blend is a powerful demonstration that the legendary vineyard and wine are in good
hands.
David Gates also tends the generations of vines at the
Lytton Springs estate, on the rolling benchlands between
Sonoma's Alexander and Dry Creek valleys. COO John Olney
oversees the zin-focused winery at Lytton Springs, drawing on estate vineyards and other old-vine zinfandel parcels
throughout Sonoma County. And the team's deep experience working with old head-pruned vineyards-not to mention the experience of the vines themselves-was especially
crucial in a vintage like 2017. "We had four days in a row that
were 110 or 112 degrees. The last time I saw that was in Death
Valley," Olney says.
The vines at the Ponzo Vineyard managed the vintage's
heat with particular grace. It's a warm spot in a cool zone, at

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the bend where the Russian River turns west toward the
sea. The Ponzo family planted their vines in 1952, mixing zin with petite sirah; they also planted a block of pure
zinfandel in the 1990s. Olney first bottled it as a single
vineyard wine in 2002, a year after he took over winemaking at Lytton Springs. "It has this bright acidity and
focused red fruit-that raspberry fruit sweetness," he
says. Despite the heat, the 2017 Ponzo is zinfandel in the
mode of pinot noir, the fruit caught at a beautiful point
between lushness and delicacy, its gentle warmth a delicious counterpart to Monte Bello's cool grandeur. -J.G.

2016 Santa Cruz Mountains Monte Bello Vineyard ($225,
96 points) A wine destined to evolve for decades, the 2016
is a muscular vintage of Monte Bello. It's a strapping young
cabernet, infused with energy, concentrated with flavors of
fresh blackberries and blueberries, with a density that mutes
any overt oak influence. The ridge where it's grown provides
an awesome view of the San Francisco Bay and the redwoodclad Santa Cruz Mountains, and this wine has the potential to
inspire the same sort of awe.
2017 Russian River Valley Ponzo Vineyard Zinfandel
($35, 95 points) Zinfandel accounts for 98 percent of the
blend (there's only a touch of petite sirah), and the wine transforms the thin skins of the grape into a delicate, transparent
structure. A roseate red, displaying clarity in the tannins with
notes of raspberry seeds and crushed black peppercorns, this
wine's energy and stamina are pumped up with luscious grape
gentleness. A California beauty.
2016 Alexander Valley Boatman Zinfandel ($35, 93
points) Ridge introduced Boatman with the 2014 vintage. At
this rocky, east-facing hillside, the morning sun instills freshness in the wine, even as the tannins remain savory and
intense, giving off spicy, high-toned aromas, like fennel seeds
and hibiscus, before releasing fresh berry flavor. Hold onto it.

Wine & Spirits - Winter 2019

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