2017 Estate Viognier - Pelletiere Estate Winery

Juicy papaya, crushed rock, chilled peach purée. Peeled clementine, fresh ocean air, hibiscus tea. Canned pineapple and lemon-lime zest emphatically join forces honeysuckle, plumeria, and gardenias in a brilliantly bright and fragrant bouquet. Ripe honeydew melon and orange oil continue the procession of exceptionally aromatic decadence again followed by notes of sweet florals plus a touch of raw honey. The expansive and outgoing nose transitions seamlessly onto the palate where guava, brûléed pear, and beeswax emerge to provide wonderful texture and breadth. Despite obvious broadness up front a lovely earthy crunch lies waiting on the finish where impressions of limestone, sea salt, and stony minerality balance unctuousness with precision. Full bodied and generous yet pleasantly fleshed out by just under moderate acidity. This 2017 Estate Viognier by Pelletiere Estate Winery is a wonderfully complex and delicious single vineyard white from Paso Robles.

While Viognier often produces wildly aromatic wines packed with ripe fruit and floral notes it is not typically considered a very terroir-expressive grape. This bottling, crafted by Pelletiere Estate Winery using Viognier grown on their estate in the Willow Creek District of Paso Robles, proves that this variety can be both terrifically aromatic and wonderfully reflective of its place of origin. Thanks to its emergence from a vineyard site completely riddled with calcareous shale this wine gleefully radiates lightly saline mineraly and a distinctly stony crunch. It gushes plenty of ripe tropical fruit and fragrant florals yet its earthiness is what truly sets it apart. This is an outstanding expression of place that frames Viognier in a lens through which it is not often seen.