Syrah Alturas, Halcon Vineyards 2018

The 2018 Syrah Alturas offers a more vivid, Côte-Rôtie-like style and has beautiful notes of black raspberries, spring flowers, peppered meat, and violets. More sappy underbrush and even a kiss of bacon fat emerge with time in the glass. and it's medium-bodied, has a silky, elegant texture, wonderful mid-palate depth, and enough tannins to warrant a year or three of bottle age. Beautifully done, this complex, elegant Syrah is going to evolve for 10-15 years or more. 2020-2036

This intriguing, enticing wine is powered by savory elements of black pepper, grilled sage and roasted meat flavors, and is backed by medium body and firm but silky tannins. Paul and Jackie Gordon grew the grapes at 2,500 feet in elevation and used 50% whole clusters in the native-yeast fermentation.

96% Syrah, 4% Viognier. No new oak. 50% whole cluster. Deep crimson. Slightly less distinctive than their other wines. Sweet and round. Less obviously fresh than their other reds. But there is very definite structure. Quite long. 2022-2028

The 2018 Alturas bottling of Syrah from Halcón Vineyards includes four percent viognier in the cuvée this year, utilized fifty percent whole clusters and was raised entirely in used oak this year (for the first time). It comes in at a very civilized 13.4 percent alcohol and delivers gorgeous nascent complexity in its bouquet of cassis, smoked meats, pepper, lavender, woodsmoke, a nice dollop of youthful stem spice and a superb base of soil tones. On the palate the wine is pure, full-bodied, focused and soil-driven, with an excellent core of fruit, firm, buried tannins and outstanding length and grip on the youthfully complex and impeccably balanced finish. This is a great bottle of young syrah, and if you are lamenting the end of Marcel Juge and the old school in the northern Rhône, here is a wine that will stop your grieving. 2028-2065.