Beating the Heat, Sonoma Finds a Fresh Voice

Hopes for a flawless 2022 vintage in Sonoma County were quickly tested when a blistering heat dome swept across California in early September of that year, sending temperatures soaring into the triple digits for nearly a week. And yet, after tasting hundreds of wines and visiting dozens of estates, it’s clear that producers across the county overcame the extreme conditions – and in many cases, produced outstanding wines that year.

At Cornell Vineyards in the Fountaingrove District, high in the Mayacamas on the western slopes of Spring Mountain, Elizabeth Tangney, the director of winemaking and viticulture, met us on a hot, dry day last month during our visit. “We’ve become an early site,” she explained. “We picked pretty much before the heat dome, and the other blocks weathered pretty nicely.”

At their sun-drenched, high-elevation site, the emphasis is on boldness – and they’re not afraid of some green flavors and edgier tannins. “We are a mountain hillside and we have a lot of tannin,” she said. “I push to extract. I want that big, representative wine.”

Her Cornell Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma County Fountaingrove District Estate 2022 is a muscular, ageworthy wine of stunning complexity – violets, cherries, blackberries and bay laurel on the nose; a broad, structured palate with mouthwatering freshness; and abundant yet velvety tannins that promise a long life ahead.

Across the 397 wines we tasted for this report, nearly half were from 2022 and 62 had scores of 95 points or higher. The top-performing appellation, Alexander Valley, with 36 wines scoring 95 or above. Knights Valley and Moon Mountain followed with 13 each in the 95-plus-points category, while Sonoma Mountain and Sonoma Valley also stood out.

Among producers, Vérité dominated, taking the top three scores – including the only perfect scorer, the 2021 Le Désir, a cabernet franc-based bottling that may well be the finest of its kind in California. Smooth and silky on the surface, it has intense flavors and tannic energy underneath, driving red and black cherries, rose petals, blueberries, graphite and espresso through a vivid palate and a long, lingering finish.

Anakota, Aperture, Laurel Glen, and Robert Young also had multiple top-scoring wines.

Winemakers described a wide range of strategies they used to manage the extreme heat of 2022. At Aperture Cellars, winemaker-owner Jesse Katz told us his Sonoma vineyards peaked at 112 degrees Fahrenheit (44.4 Celsius) – hot, but still cooler than his Napa sites, which hit a staggering 120 degrees.

"That is a vast difference," he said. "What saved us on the Sonoma side was that even when we were in those peak temperatures, it takes longer to heat up in the morning and cools down faster in the afternoon. Every one of our Sonoma sites sees fog and marine layer almost every day of the season."

Sorting was also critical. Using infrared technology, Katz’s team removed up to 28 percent of the crop in certain blocks – compared with the usual 2 to 4 percent – eliminating raisins and overripe berries. The result? Wines like the Aperture Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma County Alexander Valley Site Specific Del Rio 2022, a luxurious, concentrated wine with blackcurrants, dark chocolate, roses, wild herbs and firm, polished tannins.

When we tasted at Jordan Vineyard & Winery, also in Alexander Valley, winemaker Maggie Kruse said water management was of utmost importance when dealing with the heat. "Our growers were really good about watering," she said. "We were able to pick the merlot before [the heat dome] and the cabernet sauvignon were pretty hardy; they came back." Data from their vineyards showed a high of 116 degrees Fahrenheit on Sept. 6.

She described 2022 (to be released next spring) as a fruit-forward vintage with fewer subtle nuances – but with characteristic Sonoma brightness and freshness. “Because we can source from many different areas of the valley, we are able to build complex textural components," she said, citing the balance between hillside cabernet’s tannic backbone and valley floor merlot’s rich, vivid fruit.

At Vérité, founder Pierre Seillan and his daughter, Helene, told us they picked all their fruit in just eight days at the onset of the heat dome. “In Bordeaux, you have a few days to decide but in California you can lose a harvest in a few hours, Helene said.

Their strategy relies on blending across a patchwork of microclimates, which provided the diversity needed to maintain quality in a volatile vintage.

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Further south, in Sonoma Valley, we tasted with sixth generation winegrower Katie Bundschu in her family's wine cave at Gundlach Bundschu. Katie described how a combination of old vines, organic farming and coastal influence helped them weather the heat dome.

"Historically, the hillside portion of our Rhinefarm estate has been able to weather the climatic changes we’ve seen over the years," she said. "We attribute that to the property's location on the San Pablo Bay, with its cool maritime breezes, and its positioning on the southwestern slopes of the Mayacamas." Organic farming since 2019 has further enhanced the resilience of their 20-year-old-plus cabernet vines.

A barrel sample of the 2022 Gundlach Bundschu Cabernet Sauvignon showed ripe berries and dark cherries, taut acidity, and a plush yet structured feel – a testament to site, vine age and thoughtful farming.

One region that stood out across the board was Moon Mountain, a volcanic range on the western side of Mount Veeder. Wines from here possess tension, minerality, and remarkable power – and they seem uniquely capable of maintaining balance in extreme vintages. Di Costanzo, Hanzell, Stone Edge, Bedrock, Kamen, Hamel Family, St. Francis and Ty Caton are just some of the top scoring wineries from Moon Mountain that we tasted.

At Di Costanzo, founder Erin Sullivan told us about their dry-farmed, 1968-planted Montecillo Vineyard, which develops early and is incredibly resilient. “I used to think that, generally, Napa is warm and Sonoma is cool, but in fact this isn’t a cool climate site," she said. "It is, however, phenolically ripe quite early — earlier than our Napa vineyards and it's complete and beautiful.”

Their Di Costanzo Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma County Moon Mountain District Montecillo Vineyard 2022, picked on Sept. 7, shows harmony and elegance: red and black cherries, olives, roasted walnuts, rich plums, subtle spice and fine-grained tannins.

We also visited John Hamel of Hamel Family Wines at his Nun's Canyon Vineyard on Moon Mountain, where he has been working hard over the last decade to achieve balance, resiliency and site-expressive minerality through dry farming, head training and biodynamic practices. It was a hot morning in June when we were there, yet inside the canopy of his head-trained vines, the young clusters were well protected from the sun with just enough dappled light passing through the leaves.

The Hamel Family Wines Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma County Moon Mountain District Nun's Canyon Vineyard 2021 is a highly structured, intriguing wine that is intense yet buoyant and very drinkable, with aromas of black fruit and earth and flavors of bright red fruit, hibiscus, rose tea and dried rose petals. Its vivid minerality and silky length give way to tea-like tannins.

With over 70,000 vineyard acres spread across 19 distinct AVAs, Sonoma is a region of staggering diversity in soils, elevations and exposures. That diversity, said Katz of Aperture Cellars, makes it hard to define a singular style for Sonoma cabernet.

"It's a very unique region with big extremes," Katz said. "What is exciting about Sonoma is we are still figuring out where the best sites and locations are for these varietals."

Or, as Hamel put it, "The book is not written and done, and I want to find out what is possible here."

– Courtney Humiston, Staff Writer & Taster, and Jim Gordon, Executive Editor

The list of wines below is comprised of bottles tasted and rated by the JamesSuckling.com tasting team. They include many latest releases not yet available on the market, but which will be available soon. You can sort the wines below by vintage, score and alphabetically by winery name. You can also search for specific wines in the search bar.