2023 Littorai Pinot Noir The Return

The 2023 Pinot Noir The Return is deep, expressive, and focused, with pure notes of cranberries, spice, pine, and fresh flowers. It’s long and savory. The year 2025 marks the 30th anniversary for Littorai. Heidi and Ted Lemon operate Littorai from their Gold Ridge Estate in Sebastapol, where they produce Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from exceptional cool-climate vineyard sites on the Sonoma Coast and in Anderson Valley. Ted is, hands down, one of Sonoma's most important farmers and winemakers today. Though they farm biodynamically, they prefer to describe their practices in the vineyards as “generative farming,” a term intended to include the human relationship to the stewardship and shaping of the land as part of modern nature and integrated farming. In the winery, all the wines undergo spontaneous fermentations, with the reds going through two to three weeks of fermentation, and although Ted is not dogmatic in his approach, each of the wines is raised similarly. All of the wines for this report were tasted at the estate.

The 2023 Pinot Noir The Return unfurls dramatically on the nose from flint and tea leaves to pure wafts of strawberries, blackberries, raspberries and pennyroyal. The medium-bodied palate is bursting with spicy, fragrant flavors. It’s framed by fine, dusty tannins and mouthwatering acidity and has a long, earth-laced finish. It will be long lived in the cellar. 256 cases were made.

This is an individual vineyard block formerly part of Savoy vineyard that was purchased in 2016 from Rich Savoy along with the One Acre vineyard. This block, the steepest of all the vineyards that Littorai works with, sits just opposite One Acre at 1,550–1,750 ft on Bear Wallow loam over marine-origin sandstone. Replanted in 2005, this site is farmed using organic and biodynamic methods but is not certified. It has recently merited its own separate bottling from One Acre as its character is quite distinct. Free-run juice from a combination of destemmed fruit and 32% whole clusters ferments with ambient yeasts in a combination of steel and wood, utilising both punchdowns and pumpovers, with the wines pressed at dryness. Aged for 14–17 months in 20–25% new French oak on the lees with no racking. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. 256 cases produced. Aromas of sweet raspberries, flowers and cherries. Bright raspberry-pastille flavours mix with citrus-peel brightness as amazing acidity makes for a mouth-watering experience on the palate. Gauzy tannins stiffen slightly over time, providing a fence around a vibrating core of berry-and-citrus brightness that is breathtaking. The paradoxical combination of being at once lithe and stony gives this wine a living sculptural quality. Staggeringly great – one of the best California Pinots I've tasted in years. (AY)