A nose of great depth without heaviness. Torn rose petals, brambles and dusty dark fruit. As it opens in the glass (or decant it) one gets balsamic drizzled baked figs, sous bois, kalamata olives and blackberries. Silky tannins - a spellbounding wine. Something Southern Rhone-esque, crossed with slightly Italian notes. A worthy wine of these special vines.

If you haven’t heard of the Evanghelo vineyard, well - you’re about to be introduced to something truly special. This is the oldest known Carignan vineyard in the world - some 140 years old. Head trained, dry farmed, twisted vines that even survived phylloxera due to the sandy soils. These ancient vine’s roots roots dig deep down, up to 40 feet to find water, producing superbly balanced, out of this world fruit. It is doggedly maintained by owner Frank Evanghelo amid the encroachment of developers and San Francisco's suburban sprawl. As co-owner and winemaker Jack says; stepping onto the Evangelho vineyard, you feel like you are on another planet, the large head trained, arthritic knuckled vines are grown in powdery sand dunes and stranger yet is the rarity of grape vines in Contra Costa."

Winemakers Jack Roberts (Mathiasson Wines Assistant Winemaker) and Johanna Jensen (formerly with Scholium Project and Broc Cellars) have come together to create wines influenced by the old world with less ripe fruit, minimal manipulation and great ageability. In the vigneron tradition they do much of the work themselves from vineyard to bottling.