You’ll have to do a bit of searching for the Purple Hands Oregon Red Wine 2007, because the ‘08 version is on the market. The ‘07, however, is a wine of such marked individuality that I urge you to track it down.

This is a product associated with Ken Wright Cellars. If you cast your minds back, you’ll remember when Wright was the winemaker for Domaine Serene and Panther Creek before setting out on his own to make small lots of vineyard designated pinot noir (and a little chardonnay and pinot blanc).

Purple Hands 2007 is a blend of 85 percent merlot, 10 percent pinot noir and 5 percent cabernet franc. Now to many people, myself included, using pinot noir as a blending grape is anathema; pinot noir, the great Holy Grail Grape, stands on its own merits! Yet in Purple Hands ‘07, pinot noir lends some fleshiness and spice to a pretty damned seductive wine. It’s warm and funky and meaty, wild and exotic, bursting with black currant, black plum and blueberry scents and flavors that contain hints of cedar and mulberry, lavender, rose petal and gravel. The wine ages 11 months in French oak, only 10 percent of which are new barrels, so wood remains in the background as subtle, supple support. Nothing subtle, though, about the wine’s briery, brambly elements, its touches of damp earth and moss-like tea. A few minutes in the glass bring up layers of fine-meshed, slightly grainy tannins. It’s gratifying to come across a wine that expresses a personality unlike all the other wines out there. Very Good+. About $18-$20.
Purple Hands ‘08 should be different; it’s a blend of 50 percent merlot, 35 percent syrah and 15 percent pinot noir.

A sample for review.

We were having swordfish, a great fish to cook at home because it’s so easy, and LL made a smoked tomato sauce to go with it. With swordfish, the requirement is to cook it carefully and briefly, so it doesn’t dry out. You douse it with salt, pepper and lemon juice before searing or get a bit fancier and marinate it in lime juice, minced fresh ginger and garlic and a bit of soy sauce and white wine (or mirin). The point is to sear it on each side for a couple of minutes, so it’s a little crusty on the outside and just beyond rare at the center.

For the smoked tomato sauce, you start by lining a heavy pot with a double layer of heavy-duty aluminum foil. Make sure that the lid still fits on the pot tightly. Drop a handful of wood grilling chips, like mesquite or hickory or grapevines, on the bottom of the pot and set a grid of some kind over them, (to hold the tomatoes), put the lid on and turn the burner to high. Let those wood chips start smoking and then put quartered Roma tomatoes on the grid and replace the lid on the pot. When the tomatoes are nicely smoked, put them in a food processor with some olive oil and puree until smooth. Voila! Smoked tomato sauce. It’s pretty damned heady and flavorful, and it made a great accompaniment to the swordfish. On the plate here is also a medley of braised broccoli, turnips and roasted red peppers.

A couple of nights later, we used the smoked tomato sauce on meat loaf, which pepped up the flavor, and that weekend, for the Pizza-and-Movie-Night pizza, I used what was left of the smoked tomato sauce as the base for the pizza ingredients, which included slices of fresh tomatoes and a julienne of dried tomatoes, as well as marinated mushrooms, black olives and chopped salami. Yep, it was one of the good ones.

With all of these meals, we drank wines from V. Sattui Winery, a Napa Valley institution that sells its products only at the tasting room south of St. Helena or by mail order through the winery’s website. The company was founded in San Francisco in 1885 by the merchant Vittorio Sattui; 90 years later, Vittorio’s great-grandson Dario re-established the business at its present site, conceiving the unique idea of not selling the wines to wholesalers or restaurants. V. Sattui makes about 40,000 cases of wine annually, comprising 45 different wines. The company owns 230 acres, mainly in the Napa Valley, and also sources grapes from vineyards in Napa, Sonoma, Amador, Lodi and Mendocino counties. Winemaker is Brooks Painter. You can’t miss V. Sattui from Highway 29. It’s an extensive Italianate compound with winery, tasting facilities, picnic grounds and a store that sells all sorts of ready-to-eat foods as well as more than 200 cheeses.

With the swordfish, we tried the V. Sattui White Riesling 2008, Anderson Valley, Mendocino County. Made all in stainless steel, this exhilarating riesling offers a touch of sweetness on the entry, but that factor is easily balanced with crisp acidity and a prominent limestone element. Aromas of green apple and spiced pear are woven with hints of honeysuckle and roasted lemon, while in the mouth, a texture poised between the spareness of acid and minerality and the slight lushness of ripe peach and pear flavors is highly pleasing. The wine finishes with a touch of grapefruit austerity. 607 cases produced. Excellent. About $24.

With the meat loaf, we drank the V. Sattui Preston Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon 2006, Napa Valley, which blends a dollop of Carneros merlot with the cabernet from a well-known Rutherford vineyard. This is a terrific old-fashioned Napa cabernet, sinewy and muscular but bursting with black currant and black cherry flavors and hints of cedar, bell pepper, tobacco and baking spices. It’s actually pretty sleek, with polished oak and smooth tannins providing framework and a little resistance — you feel that slight gravity of the tannins — but no interference to the fruit. Balance and integration are everything here, with each element eloquently making its case. 2,934 cases produced. Excellent. About $45.

Finally, well-matched with the pizza, was the V. Sattui Crow Ridge Zinfandel 2007, Russian River Valley, Sonoma County. The 94-year-old vines include, as is typical of Sonoma County zinfandel vineyards planted a century or more ago, a field blend of other varieties, including carignane, petite sirah and alicante bouschet, each represented here by a smidgeon. Again, this is a gratifyingly old-fashioned zinfandel in which the blackberry, black currant and plum flavors are twined with notes of black pepper, briers and brambles. It’s profoundly earthy and layered with granite-like mineral elements, yet, as with the Preston Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon 2006, this Crow Ridge Zinfandel 2007 embodies an innate sense of balance among fruit and essential acidity, tannin and wood — 15 percent new American oak, 20 percent new French oak and the rest used barrels up to five years old. The alcohol level is 15 percent, but there’s nothing hot or overbearing or over-ripe about this wine. It’s a little shaggy, a little foresty, completely authentic and mainly delicious. 702 cases. Excellent. About $33.

Samples for review; further blandishments included small samples of three cheeses to pair with the wines.

Is it possible to make such a statement?

As many readers know, Saturday is Pizza-and-Movie Night in our house, and it has been for many years. If we suffer under the burden of a social or cultural obligation on Saturday, we can switch Pizza-and-Movie Night to Sunday, but it feels weird. Occasionally, LL and I joke about how many pizzas I have made, and the closest approximation we can calculate is somewhere between 500 and 600, which is pretty damned approximate. Trying to ascertain, from that number of pizzas, which is the best would seem fruitless folly.

Of course some pizzas are better than others. Once we situate ourselves to watch the movie and the wine is poured and the first bites of pizza taken, LL will usually say something like “Great pizza” or “Wonderful” or, occasionally, “Brilliant.” And sometimes a silence ensues, and I, suddenly worried, will sort of clear my throat and hem and haw a bit, and she will say, “Not one of your best efforts.” Well, come on, we can’t be perfect all the time.

In late Summer and early Fall this year, I went through a Golden Age of pizza-making, where it seemed as if I could do no wrong. Then I went into a bit of a slump. Usually the flaw with a pizza is not in the toppings, though sometimes there can be a Clash of Ingredients; no, the flaw — or the perfection — of a pizza is in the crust. Having created as many pizzas as I have, the making of the dough long ago became routine, yet there must be minute variations of which I am unaware that affect the outcome, an ounce more water one week, a smidgeon less olive oil another week, an extra minute spent kneading the dough while I’m distracted by other matters. Who knows?

Last Saturday, though, by whatever conjunction of physical, philosophical and spiritual elements aligned in utter harmony, the crust on the pizza was perfect. I mean, it was perfect. Thin but not too thin. Toothsome and almost flaky, but not “short,” as a pie crust would be. Around the edges, it was light and puffy, making little air pockets that crunched gracefully in the mouth. The toppings were a handful of shiitaki mushrooms, sliced thin; little red and green peppers, sliced thin; chopped yellow onion; diced salami, medium hot; one sliced Roma tomato; mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses; a scattering of thyme, rosemary and oregano. Scrumptious.

I opened a bottle of the Murphy-Goode “Liar’s Dice” Zinfandel 2007, Sonoma County, a wine that I have not tasted in five or six years. The winery was founded in 1985 by veteran vineyard developers and managers Tim Murphy and Dale Goode and their friend David Ready; in 2006, the estate was acquired by Kendall-Jackson. Murphy-Goode perpetually displayed a marked fondness for assertively ripe and fruity red wines; a predilection for sumptuous, voluptuous textures in red and white wines; and, in chardonnay and sauvignon blanc, an addiction to new oak so severe that a 12-step intervention — “Hi, I’m Bob, and I’m an oakaholic” — would have improved things greatly. I blew hot and cold about Murphy-Goode wines throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, generally cottoning to the reds better than to the over-manipulated, syrupy whites, so it was with some interest that I recently received a trio of reds (samples for review) from the winery, or, I should say, from Jackson Family Wines.

True to form, the Murphy-Goode “Liar’s Dice” Zinfandel 2007, Sonoma County, is rich and ripe, sleek and exotic. At 15.4 percent alcohol, it packs a heady hit as well as the sweetness that a high alcohol level often conveys. Black currant and blueberry flavors, with a hint of fleshy boysenberry, are threaded with briers and brambles, polished tannins and dusty granite, and sweet, spiced plums. The wine slides through your mouth like plush velvet woven with iron filings. This is a blend, with three percent each carignane and petite sirah grapes. Winemaker David Ready Jr. calls the “Liar’s Dice” ‘07 “our most passionate wine.” It could use less emotion and more thoughtfulness, though, I’ll admit, its unabashed nature managed nicely with the hearty, earthy, slightly spicy pizza. Drink now through 2011 or ‘12 with cumin-and-chili-rubbed pork roast, barbecue brisket and the like. Very Good+. About $21.

Curious about my reaction to previous vintages of the “Liar’s Dice” Zinfandel, I checked the archives of the newspaper for which I wrote a weekly print column for 20 years, and found a few references:

<>Exquisitely ripe and flavorful, the Murphy-Goode “Liar’s Dice” Zinfandel 2000, Alexander Valley, is a crowd-pleaser of sensual appeal that manages to be almost sophisticated. Very Good+. About $19.50.

<> Like mainlining blackberry jam and brandied plums – that’s about all you need to say about the extraordinarily vivid and vibrant Murphy-Goode Liar’s Dice Zinfandel 1999, Sonoma County. Fortunately, this wild thing has a full complement of minerals, oak and plush tannins to rein it in (sort of). Excellent. About $19.

<> … the Murphy-Goode “Liar’s Dice” Zinfandel 1998, Sonoma County, [is] a bit lighter than the previous vintage but delicious for its bright, ripe currant-cherry-plum flavors and touches of smoke, minerals and spice. Very good+. About $17.

In other words, the owner may be different, but the philosophy is the same.

Overlooking for the moment the issue, which seems important to me, that there are no rules about using the term “old vines” on wine labels in America, I’ll propose as a model of what an old vines zinfandel should be the Sausal Century Vines Zinfandel 2007, Alexander Valley. The dry-farmed vineyard from which Sausal draws the grapes for this wine was planted before 1877, according to available records. That makes these zinfandel vines at least 132 years old; by any definition, these are old vines indeed, and they make a wine of profound depth and dimension as well as balance and integration.

First, what the Sausal Century Vines Zinfandel 2007 is not. It’s not over-ripe or jammy; it’s not “hot” with alcohol; it delivers no cloying boysenberry scents or flavors; it’s not massively tannic. The alcohol level is 14.7 percent; yes, legally that’s give or take a point on either the up or down side. Still, the wine does not fall into the category of almost port-like zinfandels that soar over 16 percent alcohol. I mean last week I drank a lovely, delicate pinot noir from the Willamette Valley that carried its 14.5 percent alcohol like a zephyr, so 14.7 for a zinfandel is child’s-play.

The Sausal Century Vines Zinfandel 2007, Alexander Valley, offers a beguiling bouquet of clove-and-black pepper-infused black currants and blueberries that unfolds to reveal ground violets and lavender, crushed gravel and a hint of mocha. The wine is notably clean and fresh and pure, a graceful amalgam of power and elegance that never loses its sense of being rooted in the earth. Black fruit flavors are rich and spicy but subdued by vibrant acidity and supple tannins; a year in French oak lends a touch of suavity to the wine’s texture and firmness to the structure. Altogether, a pleasure to drink, indeed an exemplar of presence and resonance, now through 2012 or ‘13. Excellent. About $40.

We drank the Sausal Century Vines Zinfandel 2007 with chuck roast braised in wine and onions, with root vegetables, the second time I made this dish in a month.

Sausal Winery is owned by the Demostene family, whose ancestors came to Sonoma County’s Alexander Valley in 1901. The winery makes all red wines, chiefly several zinfandels, cabernet sauvignon and a Chianti-like sangiovese.

This wine was a sample for review.

Antoine Favero, winemaker for Mazzocco, specializes in risk-taking, by which I mean that he fashions wines, primarily zinfandels, that are very high in alcohol, usually towering at 16 percent and higher, while trying for some kind of sane balance and a revelation of single-vineyard characteristics. In the wines he produced though 2005, I was on board for this agenda; many of Mazzocco’s Dry Creek Valley vineyard-designated and reserve wines were thrilling in their combination of broad dimension and fine detail. The Mazzocco Maple Reserve Zinfandel 2005 was on my list of “50 Great Wines of 2008.”

I’m not quite as convinced by the renditions of Mazzocco’s zinfandels from 2006. Evidently nothing has changed in the winemaking process: the barrel regimen is still 18 months in French oak, the alcohol levels still hover from the mid 15 to upper 16 percent, and each zinfandel usually contains a dollop of petite sirah, that is, perhaps three or four percent. Despite that consistency, however, and despite some admirable qualities, I find that the Mazzocco zinfandels from 2006 do not embody, as the ’05s did, the principle of power balanced by elegance that has always been Favero’s rather paradoxical goal, by which I mean that creating a balanced, poised table wine at, say, 16.9% alcohol can be a Herculean task. The alternative is making a wine whose primary attributes reside solely in the “bigness” of its elements, that is, bigness for its own sake: big alcohol, big tannin, big (over-ripe) fruit. I’m afraid that a few of these wines fall into that camp.

>Mazzocco Warms Springs Ranch Zinfandel 2006. 16% alcohol. 450 cases. About $32.
Spice cake, dried currants and plums, cigar smoke, tobacco leaf; big, rich, jammy; port-like; wet dog, bacon fat, roasted and fleshy; very dry, austere finish. Serious and alluring. Excellent.

>Mazzocco Stone Zinfandel 2006. 15.9% alcohol. 600 cases. About $29.
Raspberries and blueberries covered with bittersweet chocolate; smolders with exotic spice and potpourri; pencil shavings and granite; inky, broad, strenuous tannins. 2010-’12. Excellent.

>Mazzocco Pony Zinfandel 2006. 16.1% alcohol. 500 cases. About $32.
Wheatmeal, fruitcake; pure, intense, concentrated; big, juicy, luscious; very dry, big, assertive, austere finish; pretty hot, fairly raisiny. Over the edge. Very Good, if it’s your style.

>Mazzocco West Dry Creek Zinfandel 2006. 16.3% alcohol. 150 cases. About $32.
Pure blackberry pie and blueberry tar, um, tart; very intense and concentrated; daunting tannins and minerality; very dry and austere, a real smoky afterburn of lead pencil, potpourri, bitter chocolate. 2010-’13. Excellent.

>Mazzocco Lytton Zinfandel 2006. 15.7% alcohol. 900 cases. About $29.
Very pure, very intense and minerally; rich and jammy, plangent acidity; granite, iodine, sea salt; luscious but amazingly clean; ripe and vibrant black fruit flavors. Like a beautiful wooden ship with a metallic keel. Through 2012 or ‘13. Excellent.

>Mazzocco Maple Zinfandel 2006. 15.8% alcohol. 300 cases. About $40.
Bright, bold, brash blueberry and boysenberry, bitter chocolate and mocha; huge, dry, tannic, forbidding austerity on finish. Very Good.

>Mazzocco Reserve Warm Springs Ranch Zinfandel 2006. 16% alcohol. 200 cases. About $50.
Very ripe boysenberry, blueberry, blackberry; very spicy, rich and warm; balsamic complexity, ancho chili; a massive wine, combo of tannins and alcohol overwhelming; very dry, titanic finish. Very Good to Very Good+.

>Mazzocco Reserve Maple Zinfandel 2006. 15.8% alcohol. 170 cases. About $60.
Cigar smoke and tobacco, spice cake & plum pudding; intensely aromatic; penetrating tannins and minerals. 2011 to 2013 or ‘14. Very Good+

>Mazzocco Reserve Smith Orchard Zinfandel 2006. 16.2% alcohol. 500 cases. About $50.
Rich, warm & spicy, but staggering immensity of tannin and minerals married to sweetish alcohol; finish is both cloying and Olympian. Difficult to judge. Perhaps for masochists. Very Good+ with a Big Question Mark.

>Mazzocco Reserve West Dry Creek Zinfandel 2006. 16.7% alcohol. 250 cases. About $50.
You have to push through the alcohol here, as if you were wading through it as toward a shore; there you find an intensity and density of black and blue fruit so wild and ripe, jammy and port-like that it’s almost bizarre; tannins are mossy, briery and bountiful, the alcohol feels flammable. Maybe Very Good to Very Good+ but not to my taste or palate.

>Mazzocco Reserve Pony Zinfandel 2006. 16.1% alcohol. 170 cases. About $50.
Smoke and ash; jammy, plummy steroidally-ripe boysenberry and black cherry; powerful fruit cake component; throbbing, brooding tannins. Forget any concerns about the mythical balance of power and elegance; this is all leather boots and tire-burned asphalt, and if that’s what you want in a table wine, well, freakin’ good for you.

>Matrix Zinfandel 2006. 16.1% alcohol. 225 cases. About $45.
Matrix is a sister winery to Mazzocco, where Favero also makes the wines.
Big, heady whiff of alcohol; very jammy, very dry. The alcohol makes it difficult to judge except on that point.

My favorite of the Mazzocco wines that I tried recently is the Mazzocco Petit Verdot 2005, Monterey County. Coming in at a relatively mild and certainly more rational 14.5% alcohol, this is earthy and minerally, fleshy and meaty; flavors of black currants, black cherries and plums, flecked with mocha, are permeated by briers and brambles, dusty, cedary tannins and polished granite. The texture is dense and chewy, resonant with lively acidity. Best from 2010 through 2014 or ‘15. 150 cases. Excellent. About $35.

The Lodi Winegrape Commission was kind enough to send me 12 zinfandels selected by a “panel of experts” that chose these “outstanding” representatives from a field of 48; I applaud the panel for eliminating 75 percent of the candidates.

Still, I have to say that the palates of these experts must have been made of sterner stuff than mine; some of these zinfandels were so high in alcohol, so rife with jammy over-ripeness as to be untenable. It continues to boggle my little pointy head that bigness in zinfandel is equated with quality. People make these 15.9 and 16 percent alcohol wines, pack them with blackberry marmalade, thwack them with American oak and send them out into the world with macho names like Gargantua or Roadkill or Jackboot in Your Face and assume that we’ll all settle down like sweet woolly lambs and say, “Thank you very much, sir. Please, may I have some more.”

Having gotten that issue off my chest, I will say that I did enjoy several of these zinfandel wines from Lodi and bestowed Excellent ratings on four of them; two I found so unbalanced, unwieldy and overbearing that I rated them Avoid, which I don’t do often. Some real bargains are included here too. The sequence is from cheapest to most expensive.
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Here’s some good news. The Talus Collection Zinfandel 2007, Lodi, is a terrific wine at an incredibly reasonable cost. Zinfandel grapes make up 80 percent of the wine; the rest consists of petite sirah (11%), merlot (7%) and 2 percent “blending grapes.” This zinfandel is remarkably intense and concentrated for the price. Scents of blackberry, black currant and plum are wreathed with brambles and black pepper. It’s a satisfying mouthful of wine, with good heft and vibrant acidity to buoy dark, spicy — mocha and cloves — black fruit flavors wrapped around a potent core of lavender, potpourri and minerals. Tannins are robust and slightly shaggy. The alcohol content is a comfortable 13.4 percent. Very Good and a Great Bargain at about $7.
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Eola Hills Winery is a well-known producer of pinot noir in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. For the Eola Hills Zinfandel 2007, the company reaches down to Lodi for grapes picked, for a change, from young vines and aged 10 months in older American oak. The result is a zinfandel whose color is more a ruddy-magenta hue than the deeply extracted inky zinfandels we see so much. Interesting, too, is the bouquet, an amalgam of spiced apple, plums and blueberry with a slight mineral edge. As captivating as all this sounds, however, 15.1 percent alcohol gives this zinfandel a size that belies its initial impression. This is a mouth-filling wine, packed with big, dry, dusty tannins that dominate the ripe, moderately spicy black and red fruit flavors. I found this zinfandel to be oddly attractive and appealing, and at the price, one could hardly help experimenting. Production was 529 cases. Very Good. About $13.
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The Oak Ridge Winery OZV Zinfandel 2005, Lodi, made from 50- to 100-year-old vineyards, comes in a hair under 14 percent alcohol, which feels like a blessing in the wine. This is classic, a bountiful basket of black currants and plums with one or two ripe boysenberries and an overlay of blueberry tart. In the mouth, we get raspberry and damson plum marmalade infused with port stuffed into a fruit cake with all that confection implies of dried cherries and citron and dates, chopped walnuts and baking spice. Lordy, you’re thinking, this sounds over the top, and it would be except that the strict contours of wood, from French and American oak, a sinew of vibrant acidity and the weight of dense, chewy tannins keep it honest. The making is interesting; the French and American oak comprises 60 percent of the aging, while the rest of the wine was kept cold in stainless steel tanks to ensure bright, crisp fruitiness. Excellent, and a Great Bargain at about $15.
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The Van Ruiten Vineyards Old Vine Zinfandel 2007, Lodi, made from vines “over 50 years” old and clocking in at 15.5 percent alcohol, is an earthy, funky wine that features aromas of cinnamon and Moroccan spices, roasted meat and wet fur, coffee and mocha, and dried currants and blueberries. One feels the imbalance in the mouth; velvety, iron-inflected tannins provide a texture so dense that it’s almost viscous, while black fruit flavors are stridently spicy and too roasted. A hot finish provides further evidence that this incoherent wine carries individualism to extremes. This is a blend of 84 percent zinfandel, 8 percent petite sirah, 5 percent cabernet sauvignon and 3 percent syrah. Avoid. About $16.
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Now, here is what we want in a Lodi zinfandel and at a great price. !ZaZin Old Vine Zinfandel 2007 takes grapes from a 108-year-old vineyard, adds 15 percent petite sirah and ages the wine 15 months in French and American oak barrels (75 percent new). The result is a dark, intense and concentrated zinfandel packed with dusty tannins, earthy minerals and ripe blackberry, black currant and plum scents and flavors. Those flavors are smoked and roasted, a little meaty and fleshy, wrapped around a core of lavender, licorice and granite; there’s a touch of blueberry tart, but no boysenberry, no over-ripeness. The wine is sizable, robust, dense and chewy, permeated by briers and brambles, deep and long in extension and finish, which brings in more of a loamy, mineral edge. !ZaZin is made by Laurel Glen, well-known for Sonoma cabernets. Excellent, and a Great Bargain at about $17.
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The Bargetto Old Vine Zinfandel 2007, Lodi, bottled with this nice “retro” label, is first characterized by what it is not: Not too big, not over-ripe, not raisiny. So, what is it then? A well-balanced combination of black and red currants and dusty plums, married to a touch of fruit cake, a whiff of black pepper, and a dense, chewy texture. The evidence of aging 18 months in American oak is mainly revealed in a firm structure and a mildly spicy nature. Well-suited to hearty pizzas and pasta dishes and burgers. The wine is made of 100 percent zinfandel grapes picked from two adjacent 100-year-old vineyards. Very Good+. About $18.
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Aged 18 months in new American oak and measuring 15.5 percent alcohol, the Mettler “Epicenter” Old Vine Zinfandel 2006, Lodi, is partly an expressive and classic Lodi zinfandel and partly an over-wrought blockbuster. Florid, penetrating black currant and plum flavors with a hint of boysenberry deliver a spice and mineral afterburn; these flavors take on more size, turning more macerated and roasted in the glass and offering notes of mocha and licorice. All of these aspects would be fine — there’s a pass at elegance — except that a pretty damned hot finish deprives the wine of final balance and integration. This is a blend of 91 percent zinfandel, 7 percent petite sirah and 2 percent cabernet franc. Very Good. About $20.
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Here’s an amazement: An old-vine, dry-farmed, 16.1% alcohol-zinfandel that manages to be as fresh and clean and bright as some winsome young thing and yet retain proper gravitas for impressive power, purity and intensity. The Macchia “Oblivious” Old Vine Zinfandel 2007, Lodi, offers a purple/black hue; the nose displays remarkable minerals depths under generously proportioned, macerated and roasted black and blue fruit scents permeated by briers and brambles, forest and moss. This confluence of fruit, earth and minerals finds even more dimension in the mouth, adding rollicking spice, potpourri and an edge of smoke and charcoal. For all that, the wine is buoyant, lively and appealing. Production was 200 cases. Excellent. About $24.
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Thank god for acidity, for without its keen and lithe electricity the Harney Lane Old Vine Zinfandel 2006, Lodi, from the 105-year-old Lizzie James Vineyard, would be unmanageable. At 15.6 percent alcohol, this zinfandel is very spicy, very brambly, bursting with scents of ripe blackberries, black currants and polums with a hint of boysenberry. The wine is deep and dense, rich and succulent, and its black fruit flavors, infused with lavender, violets, minerals and plum dust, stop just before the point of being jammy. A few minutes in the glass bring in notes of new leather, and the aromas shift to black fruit compote, black cherry and black pepper, all heightened by a wild, untamed, even risky quality. In the finish, oaky, minerally austerity takes over. We drank this wine with flank steak tacos, exactly the kind of fare it needs to accompany. You wouldn’t mistake this wine for anything made anywhere else in the world, and of course that’s the way it should be. Production was 221 cases. Excellent. About $28.
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The m2 Soucie Vineyard Old Vine Zinfandel 2007, Lodi, is an ambitious wine that doesn’t quite hold together. This is quite rich. dark, dense and chewy, a velvet-and-iron-filings wine, emitting layers upon layers of dark, wild, spicy exotic blueberry, cranberry and plum fruit. The wine is very dry but luscious, almost viscous, and with its 15.3 percent alcohol level, it bears an overlay of ripe, alcoholic sweetness and heat on the finish, as well as touches of pomander, dark and licorice. It ages 17 months in new and used American oak barrels. The Soucie Vineyard was planted in 1916. Production of this wine was 430 cases. Very Good+. About $28.
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The m2 Artist Series Zinfandel 2007, Lodi, also taps in at 15.3 percent alcohol. The grapes derive from the Soucie Vineyard, mentioned above, and the Maley Vineyard, planted in the 1960s. The wine is a deep purple color; wild aromas of black currant and plum, mulberry and rhubarb burst from the glass in a welter of fruitcake and fresh-roasted coffee. The wine is dense and plush, packed with spicy black fruit flavors ensconced in supple, edgeless tannins. Still, there’s some heat on the finish that detracts from the wine’s purity and balance. The barrel regimen was 18 months in American oak, 60 percent new. 125 cases were produced. Very Good+. About $35.
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At 16.5 percent alcohol, the Michael & David “Gluttony” Old Vine Zinfandel 2006, Lodi — they also make a zin called “Lust”; I’m waiting for “Sloth” and “Anger” — smells, feels and tastes like port, which would be fine if you wanted port, but not if you’re drinking this with, say, a steak. I mean, this is a scorched earth wine in its intensely roasted, smoky earthy nature and overwrought in its sheen of alcoholic sweetness, though dauntlessly dry from mid-palate back. It’s difficult to believe that this blowsy, boozy monster made the cut to join this roster of “The Best of Lodi,’ as well as winning gold medals at several wine competitions. I guess poise and balance are distinctly out of fashion. 950 cases produced. Avoid. About — and this is ludicrous — $59.
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