theCompass mobile application is a winery, brewery, and distillery locator for North America.

This wine is produced primarily from grapes grown in our most mature vineyards at the estate. The budwood in these older grafted syrah vines comes from cuttings originally cultivated at the famous Durrell Vineyard in Sonoma County. Due to the Durrell clone’s naturally low productivity, especially after it has reached a vine age of 10 years, it is now somewhat obscure (alas, the original Durrell syrah vines were ripped out when Kendall Jackson purchased the property). Our Durrell clone of syrah produces meager quantities of grapes (one ton per acre), but they more than make up for their lack of quantity in quality. The berries, always very small with thick skins and dark pigments, produce wines of tremendous character.

The 2003 estate Syrah is produced from over a half a dozen clones. The diversity of our Syrah clones allows us to craft wines with greater complexity and better balance. To enhance the wine's perfume and "Rhone" character, we always blend in a small percentage of wine made from our estate grown Grenache. The Stolpman estate Syrah usually spends a shorter time in barrels, to better reflect the vintage's character and capture the delicious fruit-driven flavors of Central Coast Syrah.

L'Avion (the airplane) is a Rousanne-based wine with small amounts of Viognier and sauvignon Blanc blended into the finished wine to improve balance and aromatic complexity. The Rousanne vines are planted in a long, narrow piece of land running through the middle of the estate, the level topography of which helps to even the ripening of the grapes. At one time, this area was the old landing strip for the Santa Ynez Valley, which inspired us to whimsically name the wine L'Avion.

La Coppa, meaning “the cup” is a field blend. It’s a nice overview of our estate, with many of the varietals we have planted going into this mix. The primary grape varietals consist mainly of 40% Syrah, 35% Merlot, 20% Cabernet Sauvignon with a mere 5% of Grenache. Since we don’t work with Cabernet Sauvignon (because climatically only 1 of every 10 vintages makes a good wine on its own) we’re able to use this fruit as a blending agent to make a nice red table wine. This wine is a bit more extracted than our other blends but creates a wine that is intense, and drinkable immediately upon release. La Coppa is aged in 3 year old neutral French oak barrels for 11 months. The acid in this wine lends for a clean finish on the pallet.

La Croce (the cross) is a co-fermented wine of equal parts Syrah and Sangiovese. Its creation is the product of our close working relationship with one of Tuscany’s most talented consulting winemakers, Mr. Alberto Antonini. The great Super Tuscan wines of Italy have always been a benchmark for our own wines, and we have always dreamed of creating a wine of our own that we felt shared the inventiveness and sophistication of the great IGT’s of Tuscany. It was during a blending session in Spring 2002, at the Stolpman winery, that our team of winemakers discovered the profoundly sympathetic relationship between our Syrah and Sangiovese and created La Croce.

The 2003 Rhone Ridge Cuvèe is a blend of 4 classic Rhone Varietals: 60% Syrah, 20% Grenache, 10% Counois and 10% Cinsault. Like many southern Rhone wines, this is a full-bodied wine with flavors and aromas of currants, blackberries and spiced fruits. A cool September delayed the harvest of many of these grapes to the beginning of November, which resulted in a rich wine with toothsome tannins and a long, sweet, heady finish. These vines range from 5-10 years old. This wine is 100% destemmed, with a 6 day cold soak followed by 20 days maceration at 90°F. This wine matured for 10 months in 33% new French oak and was bottled unfined and unfiltered.

Our Rosato is produced by carefully selecting fresh juice from our best tanks of Syrah and Sangiovese. Usually, a little juice is also taken from our Grenache to add a gentle peppery quality to the wine. After the “bleeding,” the rose colored juice is fermented in neutral barrels with indigenous yeasts. At first, the wine is fermented at warmer temperatures to build a healthy quantity of lees. Later, the wine finishes its fermentation at very cool temperatures to trap the dissolved carbon dioxide, which helps preserve the freshness of the wine. A couple of months before bottling the Rosato spends a short passage of time in newer barrels to give the wine a creaminess on the palate and a subtle hint of smokiness in the finish.