Dark and velvety, this generous pinot leads with wild strawberry notes adorned by oak accents. The oak conveys richness without being obtrusive, the fruit ripe, the texture suave and sleek. The wine feels like it’s pushed to the limit, even as it manages to stay grounded.

A highly perfumed and elegant nose is vaguely reminiscent of a fine Chambolle villages with its almost delicate aromas of airy red berry fruit and spice wisps. The mouth feel of the equally refined medium weight flavors is also quite elegant with lovely detail and a sense of underlying tension, all wrapped in a lingering, balanced and once again mildly austere finish. This is every bit as interesting as the Shea though the respective character of the two wines is quite different.

From four mostly old-vine Pommard blocks, BergstrOm’s 2011 Pinot Noir Temperance Hill was the nail-biter among nail-biters this vintage, and he says that even after the experience of 2010, this was the last site to convince him that it would actually ripen, much less excel. But excel it did! Wild cherry laced with tangerine and lemon rinds on the nose lead to a spine-tinglingly bright and piquant palate of tartly bright berry fruit mingled with citrus oils. Where the amazingly successful 2010 led me to imagine that “Riesling, Viognier or perhaps even Gruner Veltliner had been blended in,” given how invigoratingly piquant, bright and incisive that wine was (and is), here we have practically a black Riesling. “I think a cool site in a cool vintage like this can deliver that on-the-fringe-of-disaster satisfaction,” suggests Bergstrom. Extremity of location compounded by extremity of season has led to something quite remarkable, though it will by no means please everybody. Exhilaratingly bright and mouthwateringly saline, intensely citric yet also stuffed with ripe fresh berries, this penetrating and improbably exercise in Pinot will probably prove worth following through 2022 if not beyond; but there isn’t really any precedent (other than its immediate 2010 predecessor). Tasted alongside, I still give the 2010 reported on in Issue 202 the edge in clarity, refinement and complexity; but what a pair they will be compare all the way down the stretch (whenever that occurs)! - David Schildknecht