2023 Birichino Grenache Besson Vineyard

At last, we release the 2023 Besson Old Vine Grenache. Once before, with the 2019 vintage, we waited months beyond the usual date to bottle. Every once in a while, a wine just achieves a higher state of expression, requiring time and patience to allow its distinctive somewhereness to emerge in full flower. 2023 is a superior vintage of our flagship – the wine which most persuasively displays the qualities we esteem in a wine. It adheres to the classical template for Grenache, yet tastes like no other Grenache. The site is ideal for this variety, quite warm, though not infernal, with exceptional sandy, gravelly, rocky, loamy soil. This is dirt one should absolutely keep one’s nose in. Besson is one of the last pre-prohibition Grenache vineyards remaining in California, planted in 1910, and lovingly cared for by the Bessons since the 1940s. Sampling in late Fall is a pleasure, and a wonderful example of a great site communicating its virtues. As the crop ripens – sometimes progressing north to south, sometimes east to west – it sends out a clear signal denoting optimal maturity. After many years experience, one can taste a clear switch being flipped. That does not happen with such definition in most vineyards. The resulting wine carries the scent of botanical tinctures, fruit liqueur and something unaccountably alpine for such a relatively low altitude site. That specific Besson-iness usually begins to reveal itself in barrel in April or May. It did not rise up in the 2023 until five months later, a behavior not experienced other than in 2019, the previous best vintage ever. Sometimes we need to wait, and indeed keep our noses in the dirt, for the clarity to appear. - Birichino