California's Top Zinfandels: Tasting at ZAP 2024 : Vinography

Gone are the days when 500 Zinfandel producers and 8000 members of the trade and public would descend upon both major pavilions of Fort Mason for almost an entire day to taste more than a thousand Zinfandel wines at the annual ZAP Zinfandel Festival.

By the end of those tastings, things usually got quite sloppy, with drunk patrons and a party-like atmosphere. But there was definitely something energetic and exciting about them if only the sense that San Francisco was a wine-loving epicenter of all things Zin.

In this day and age, ZAP has become ZinEx, the Zinfandel Experience, a much more sedate gathering of a few dozen Zinfandel producers and a few hundred people who are dedicated lovers of the grape. While I don’t get the chance to spend all day tasting with hundreds of producers, I can’t say I mind the absence of jostling crowds stacked 8 people deep who all want a taste of the latest Turley or Ridge releases.

It’s a fundamentally different scene these days. The wines are also different.

Thankfully, the pendulum has swung away from monster wines featuring massive extract, lots of sweet new wood, raisined flavors, and unreasonably elevated alcohols. Zinfandel being Zinfandel, of course, we’re not talking about alcohols regularly down in the 13% range, but it’s nice to taste many more things at 14.8% alcohol rather than 16.1%, along with accompanying acidity and fresher fruit flavors.

Indeed, in my two-hour tour through the trade and media tasting, I ran into raisined, overripe fruit far less than ever before, even among those producers pouring wines from the rather warm and dry 2022 vintage. Many, however, were pouring the glorious 2021 vintage, which remains one of my favorites in recent memory, and certainly seems to have given Zinfandel producers great raw materials.

My favorites below contain very few new names or surprises. I will admit that there were a number of producers from whom I did not taste (especially because I didn’t want to wait around for an hour for the organizers to reset the room between the trade tasting and the public tasting).

That said, with a few prominent exceptions, Zinfandel does not seem to be attracting many new-generation winemakers. Sure, some adventurous folks are making crazy Zinfandel pet-nats and suitably ironic renditions of White Zinfandel in various shades of pink, but those aren’t nearly as common as one might hope.

As I noted, I didn’t stick around for the public tasting, but most of the folks wandering around the trade event, and those lined up outside for the public tasting were of an… (ahem)… certain age.

Have we come to the point that Zinfandel is an old person’s wine? Sadly, it seems like the entire wine industry is slowly going that direction, but Zinfandel seems to have lost its “cool factor” sooner than some other grapes.

This is, of course, a shame, not least of which because Zinfandel represents such an incredible part of California’s wine heritage. The hundreds of acres of ancient vines that still remain in California need a reason to remain in the ground, and the only way that will happen long-term is if people keep drinking the wines they produce. Sure, the rise of red blends such as Apothic and its imitators will help, but I hope people will continue to enjoy the grape for its own particular charms, which are numerous.

On perhaps a not unrelated note, the prices of good Zinfandel continue to climb. Just as a point of reference, looking back on my report from the 2006 ZAP Zinfandel festival, of the 47 wines I rated at 9 to 9.5 or higher, twenty of them cost $30 or less. Taking inflation into account, that’s $45 in today’s dollars. But of the 25 top-scoring wines in the list below, only five can be purchased for $45 or less.

I hope you will continue to seek out excellent examples of Zinfandel, especially those made with old vines, and I hope my scores below can point you in the direction of some reliable bottles or even new discoveries.

Wine Scores

At large walk-around tastings such as these, my goal is to taste widely, and as such I record only scores, not tasting notes. These wines were tasted rapidly over the course of a couple of hours. While I am quite confident about my quality judgments, knowing the circumstances under which these scores were recorded, you may consider taking the ratings with a grain of salt.

I have linked the top-scoring wines to Wine Searcher (when results are available) to facilitate searching and purchase of these wines. The prices listed were provided by the wineries, which means you can usually find these wines at retail for slightly less.

Wines With a Score Between 8.5 and 9

2019 Bella Vineyards “Lily Hill Estate” Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley. $60
2021 Bella Vineyards “Rocks Edge” Zinfandel, Rockpile, Sonoma. $68
2017 Bella Vineyards “Block 10” Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley, Sonoma. $68
2020 Corkwood Cellars “Steele Vineyard” Zinfandel, Sierra Foothills. $50
2022 Dashe Cellars “Dry Creek Reserve” Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley. $38
2020 Dashe Cellars “Todd Brothers Ranch” Zinfandel, Alexander Valley. $44
2020 Dry Creek Vineyard “Wallace Ranch” Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley. $46
2021 Furious Wines Zinfandel, Paso Robles. $48
2021 Furious Wines “Anarchy” Zinfandel, Paso Robles. $57
2022 Hartford Family Winery “Old Vine” Zinfandel, Russian River Valley. $40
2021 Hendry Wines “Blocks 7 & 22” Zinfandel, Napa Valley. $42
2021 J Dusi Winery “Dante Dusi” Zinfandel, Paso Robles. $48
2020 J Dusi Winery “Paper Street” Zinfandel, Paso Robles. $68
2020 Limerick Lane Cellars “Estate” Zinfandel, Russian River Valley. $85
2018 Three Wine Company “Bigelow Vineyard” Zinfandel, Contra Costa County. $38

2021 Once & Future Wine “Old Hill Ranch” Zinfandel, Sonoma Valley. $55
2021 Peachy Canyon Winery “D-Block” Zinfandel, Adelaida District, Paso Robles . ??
2020 Quivira “Anderson Ranch” Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley. $60
2019 Rosenblum Cellars “Del Barba Vineyard” Zinfandel, Contra Costa County. $40
2021 Saddleback Cellars “Old Vine” Zinfandel, Calistoga, Napa. $58
2021 St. Amant Winery “Mohr-Fry Ranches Old Vine” Zinfandel, Lodi. $20
2019 Storrs Winery “Umunhuna Ridge” Zinfandel, Santa Clara County. $34
2019 Storrs Winery “Rusty Ridge” Zinfandel, Santa Clara County. $34
2021 Trentadue “Estate” Zinfandel, Alexander Valley. $36
2021 Trentadue “Old Patch” Red Blend, California. $18

Wines With a Score Around 8.5

2021 Calafia Cellars “Florence Vineyard” Zinfandel, Rockpile, Sonoma. $45
2019 Corkwood Cellars “Steele Vineyard” Zinfandel, Sierra Foothills. $50
2023 Covenant Wines “Mensch” Zinfandel, Lodi. $22
2018 Covenant Wines “Landsman” Zinfandel, Sonoma County. $60
2022 Dashe Cellars “Vineyard Select” Zinfandel, California. $24
2021 Dry Creek Vineyard “Heritage Vines” Zinfandel, Sonoma County. $28
2021 Dry Creek Vineyard “Old Vine” Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley. $45
2019 Felline Zinfandel, Mandura, Puglia, Italy. $39
2021 Hendry Wines Primitivo, Napa Valley. $38
2022 Macchia Wines “Mischievous – Old Vine” Zinfandel, Lodi. $23
2021 Macchia Wines “Voluptuous” Zinfandel, Lodi. $27
2021 Peachy Canyon Winery “Willow” Zinfandel, Willow Creek District, Paso Robles. $46
2021 Peachy Canyon Winery “Nancy’s” Zinfandel, Adelaida District, Paso Robles. $46
2020 Peachy Canyon Winery “Mustard Creek” Zinfandel, Adelaida District, Paso Robles. $47
2020 Quivira Zinfandel, Sonoma Couny. $28
2006 Ravenswood “Old Hill Ranch” Zinfandel, Sonoma Valley. $n/a
2021 Rosenblum Cellars Zinfandel, Rockpile, Sonoma. $55
2021 Rosenblum Cellars “Old Vine” Zinfandel, Russian River Valley. $50
2021 Rosenblum Cellars Zinfandel, Sonoma Valley. $48
2022 Saddleback Cellars “Old Vine” Zinfandel, Calistoga, Napa. $58
2020 St. Amant Winery “Speakeasy Bootleg Society” Red Blend, Lodi. $24
2019 St. Francis Winery “Giovanetti Vineyard” Zinfandel, Russian River Valley. $54
2021 Trentadue “La Storia Block 303” Zinfandel, Alexander Valley. $34
2021 Tres Sabores “Por Que No?” Zinfandel, California. $38
2015 Vino Noceto “Original Grandpere Vineyard” Zinfandel, Shenandoah Valley, Amador County. $34
2019 Vino Noceto “Original Grandpere Vineyard” Zinfandel, Shenandoah Valley, Amador County. $34

Wines With a Score Between 8 and 8.5

2021 Corkwood Cellars “Steele Vineyard” Zinfandel, Sierra Foothills. $50
2019 Epoch Wines “Paderewski Vineyard” Zinfandel, Willow Creek, Paso Robles. $65
2020 Hendry Wines “Block 28” Zinfandel, Napa Valley. $42
2020 J. Rickards Zinfandel, Alexander Valley. $30
NV Myka Estates “Unapologetically Zin” Zinfandel, California. $30
2021 Nalle Wines Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley. $52
2020 Nalle Wines “Ranch Red” Red Blend, Dry Creek Valley. $48
2020 Pedroncelli “Bushnell Vineyard” Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley. $38
2019 Storrs Winery Zinfandel, Central Coast. $29

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