2014 Richards Family Vineyard Syrah

One of the stars in this packed lineup is the 2014 Syrah Richards Family Vineyard. Coming from a site on Sonoma Mountain, it offers a stunning, singular perfume of sweet red and black fruits, lavender, spiced meats, and a complex, herbes de Provence-like character. This full-bodied beauty builds incrementally on the palate, has loads of concentrated fruit, ripe tannin, and a huge, seamless finish. It’s going to rival the otherworldly 2009 at maturity. This is another brilliant lineup of wines from the Donelan Family, with the wines made by Joe Nielson. While their estate Obsidian Vineyard was lost in the fires last year, they’re already in the process of planning and replanting the site, and I was thrilled to taste through a small retrospective from what’s unquestionably one of the great terroirs in California. Looking at the 2015s, which are by and large the current releases, these are structured, tannic wines that are going to benefit from short term cellaring.

Deep garnet-purple colored, the 2014 Syrah Richard's Vineyard has an incredibly complex nose giving up layers of Indian spices, fertile soil, chocolate-covered cherries, preserved plums, unsmoked tobacco, lavender and charcuterie with wafts of Provence herbs and garrigue. Medium to full-bodied, it's rich and seductive on the palate, with a solid backbone of grainy tannins and great freshness supporting the great depth of flavors, finishing on a lingering mineral note.

The 2014 Syrah Richards Family Vineyard is dense, powerful and unctuous. Stylistically, the 2014 Richards is an especially ripe, unctuous wine by Donelan's standards. A few more years in bottle should help assimilate the new oak more fully. A rush of red cherry jam, tobacco, game, iron and smoke builds into the dense, concentrated finish.