2017 Skylark Pinot Blanc Orsi Vineyard 750 ml

A California “Best Buy” White

Aside from a string of stellar vintages, here’s the big story of California wine in the last decade: the new world-class whites that are loosening Chardonnay’s grip on the Golden State. Think of Dan Petroski’s Massican, Steve Matthiasson’s namesake gems, and Andy Erickson’s Amador County whites. To this honor roll you can add the mouthwatering, aromatic, and unoaked 2017 Skylark Pinot Blanc Orsi Vineyard Mendocino County, a Wine & Spirits 92-point Best Buy, and a straight-up steal at just $16.99 on a case or more.

If you’ve got a love for super food-friendly, unoaked whites that show beautiful aromatics, excellent concentration, and an energetic, mouthwatering finish, this is one to stack by the case. It boasts an impressive, complex nose of stone fruits and florals and incredible texture across the palate that makes it scream for fresh cheeses, shellfish, and seafood—and has just the right structural components to go with a huge range of other dishes. All that, and priced like a party wine. Don’t miss it.

John Lancaster and Robert Perkins, Skylark’s founders, met while working together at the James Beard Award-winning Boulevard Restaurant in San Francisco. Both harbor a deep love for regional French wines, and they have gone out of their way to source forgotten, underrated, or out-of-the-way parcels that match their Old World-inspired ambitions.

In the case of the Pinot Blanc, they found their perfect plot on the alluvial soils of the Russian River (the actual river, not the Sonoma County AVA) in Mendocino County. That’s the location of the Orsi Vineyard, a vanguard parcel planted in the 1970s by John Fetzer of the eminent Mendocino wine family. Lancaster and Perkins made their first wine from these vines in 2005, and that first vintage is what inspired them to get serious about producing an expressive, old-vine Pinot Blanc. Sticking with the extraordinary Orsi vineyard was a given. They also banished wood from the winemaking process, investing in Mueller stainless steel barrels, which allow the winemakers to micromanage how the wine develops in order to let the vineyard’s inherent characteristics shine through.

The result, twelve vintages in, is a unique, historic, and delicious single-vineyard white—at a price that will inspire the good kind of sticker shock in those accustomed to Napa and Sonoma prices. This is a Wine & Spirits 92-point Best Buy for good reason. It’s an unbeatable value, and the kind of unique find that’s making this the Golden Age of white wine in the Golden State.