The base appellation 2016 Pinot Noir Santa Lucia Highlands is a beauty and certainly competes easily with the single vineyards. Brought up in 52% new French oak, it offers a beautiful perfume of black raspberries, black cherries, mulberries, and spice. Medium to full-bodied, seamless, and silky, it’s one of the smoking values that readers should snatch up.

Pale to medium ruby-purple colored, the 2016 Pinot Noir Santa Lucia Highlands is scented of red currants and black cherries with a spicy background of cloves and cinnamon stick, plus a hint of garrigue. Medium to full-bodied, it fills the mouth with juicy red berry and baking spice flavors, marked by soft tannins and oodles of acid freshness, finishing long. 1,341 cases were made. -Lisa Perrotti-Brown