May 2010
“Like a number of his colleagues in Sonoma County, Eric Sussman compared 2008 to 2005, with the proviso that “2008 has more depth than ’05,” adding that yields for his pinots were off by about 30% from 2007 levels. He believes that fans of powerful wines should be gathering up 2007s while they can “because those wines have both ripeness and structure.” The frosts of 2008 were the worst in recent memory, he added, which no doubt contributed to the low yields and subsequent concentration of many wines. Sussman believes that 2009 will represent a new high-water mark for his wines “because they achieved complete ripeness at pretty low sugar levels, so we got intensity without excess richness, and that’s exactly my definition of great wine.””
–Josh Raynolds