Kokomo Winery - Dry Creek Valley
The 2016 Gopher Hills Block Pinot Noir took a perfect 100 at the 2018 North Coast Wine Challenge, the first perfect score the contest had given in six years. The vines went in the ground in 1982, on two clones.1
Why go
Erik Miller grew up in Kokomo, Indiana and took a business degree at Purdue.2 A college spring break in Sonoma County settled it.2 He interned a harvest at Belvedere in Healdsburg, took winemaking classes at UC Davis and apprenticed under Rick Hutchinson at Amphora.2 He started the winery in 2004 with a Dry Creek Valley Cabernet and named it after home.2 The logo is a coastal cypress, for the move.2
Randy Peters is his partner and the man who farms everything. He is a fourth-generation grower and a longtime Cloverdale basketball coach.1 He used to manage the fruit orchards at Timber Crest Farms. Miller's winery now sits among those 120 acres of benchland.12 Peters planted the Pinot Noir in the Sebastopol Hills in 1982, on ground that had been an apple orchard.1 He used Pommard and Waldenswil because those were the only two clones you could get.1 Fog comes through the Two Rock Gap and stretches the hang time.1
They pick each single vineyard several times and blend the ripeness levels.1
Order this / avoid
- Order: the Peters Vineyard Pinot Noir. It is the wine that took the 100 and the vines are the 1982 planting.1
- Order: the Cellar Lounge tasting, five limited-production wines for parties of one to six.2
- Order: a single-vineyard designate, whichever is open. Peters farms all of them across the Russian River, Dry Creek and Alexander valleys.1
- Avoid: walking into the wrong door. Papapietro Perry pours at this same address and is a separate winery.
What locals & experts say
- Chris Munsell, a judge at the 2018 North Coast Wine Challenge and director of winemaking for E&J Gallo, on the wine that scored 100:
It jumps out of the glass. It has what they call that pinocity – a pinot characteristic that is so vibrant.
And on the texture:The mouthfeel was silky and smooth, with no rough edges.
1 - Erik Miller, on what he is aiming at:
Our main objective is to show that purity of place that no one else gets … that's where we have to hang our hat.
On the picks:I use them almost like the bass and treble in music, to compose it together as one song.
1 - Randy Peters, as Miller quotes him:
I farmed these grapes 364 days a year, and Erik gets them for one day.
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Good to know
- Open seven days, with three formats on Tock: the Cellar Lounge, the members-only Cypress Room and a patio tasting.2
- No fee or hour is published. The winery's own visit page returns a server error and its tasting-experiences page 404s, so book through Tock or call.
- The award was the bottle's, not the building's. The 100 points went to the 2016 Gopher Hills Block Pinot Noir from Peters Vineyard, priced at $44.1
- Miller's stated price target:
I want to make affordable wines that people in Indiana want to buy.
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Verdict
should-visit — That score came out of 1,014 wines judged by 28 people, one of them Gallo's director of winemaking, who found what he called pinocity in the glass and a mouthfeel with no rough edges. Randy Peters farms every vineyard Erik Miller bottles and picks each one several times so the ripeness levels can be blended, which Miller describes as bass and treble. The Sebastopol Hills fruit grew on a former apple orchard where fog through the Two Rock Gap stretches the hang time. Call before you drive up Dry Creek: the winery publishes no fee, no hours and no current score.