Spicy, blackberry jam, floral, earthy roasted pepper aromas, very nice varietal tones. Round and soft with very forward tannins, has good blackberry jam, spicy, licorice, rootsy flavours. Good balance and will improve with a year in bottle.

Look for spicy, peppery, blackberry aromas with some resin and barnyard and a touch of wax. Round and rich with soft tannins. Long, stylish red, good value. Ready to drink, although it will keep easily through 2003. Fine value.

The VR Chardonnay is mostly barrel fermented and aged for seven months in small oak - half French/half American. Look for leesy, mineral, melon aromas and toasted lees, vanilla, butter citrus and apple flavours. Delicious Monterey and Santa Barbara fruit that is well integrated with oak.

Honeyed scents of caramel and white Rainier cherries lead into this soft, leesy riesling. It's not about structure, just about pleasing sweetness for dessert.

A week earlier, I had stopped at La Crema Winery...and I saw one of the most exciting products on the shelf for value...One of the wines, a 1999 vintage wine called Nine Barrels, costs $75 a bottle, and it's one of the best new pinots I have yet tasted.

But by far, the most exciting thing for everyday consumers is La Crema's new 2000 pinot noir. All things equal, the taste of barrel samples may be an insider's cherished dream, but one sip of the final product tells you that the art of the winemaker is still one of mystery and magic. My wine of the week this week tells the tale. About as complete a wine as you will find for the money, this handsome wine offers strawberry, cherry and clove aromas and a succulence rarely found in a red wine. Not to be missed.

...more distinctive with herbal, strawberry and raspberry tones...they are fascinating in that even though they are above 14 percent alcohol, they are lighter in color than many of the other French clone pinot noirs, and yet more deeply flavored.

...is more herbal and complex, but slightly less succulent...they are fascinating in that even though they are above 14 percent alcohol, they are lighter in color than many of the other French clone pinot noirs, and yet more deeply flavored.

...has violet aromas and delicate cherry and mint aromas and a deep flavor...they are fascinating in that even though they are above 14 percent alcohol, they are lighter in color than many of the other French clone pinot noirs, and yet more deeply flavored.

...one of the finest pinot values on the shelf. The aroma here is pure pinot, with faint herbal and spinach notes amid bright cherry, strawberry and cranberry fruit. The taste is lush and rich, with a faint note of smoke and chocolate from barrel aging. A wine that will improve for at least two years, but simply tastes great now.

While hardly one to impress with complexity or any sense of depth, this direct, vaguely juicy, slightly sweet wine is the very picture of picnic quaffability. And at discount, it fills the bill for warm weather gulping.

Top of the category...

...is surprisingly soft, round, and forward for a Petite Syrah. The wine has plenty of character, an opaque ruby/purple color, and good peppery, blackberry and licorice notes.

Another opulently-textured wine is the 1999 Syrah Eaglepoint Vineyard. This 100% Syrah aged in both French and American oak, exhibits blackberry liqueur aspects along with smoke, creosote, and pepper. It is a full-bodied, luscious Syrah to drink during its first decade of life.

...a wine that many of the judges liked because of its depth, body and intense berry fruit. This Monterey pinot noir is characterized by its rich, full body and forward cherry flavors. Hint of nutmeg and pepper. A very good pinot noir for the money.

Dark color, with a deep, rich, young nose that leaps out and bites you back. Edgy. Serious breeding and awesome fruit. Black-cherry wine. Definitely one for the future.

Medium-Full; Dry; Bright black-cherry and chocolate aromas; medium texture and tannins, juicy flavors, bracing acidity; medium finish.

A gorgeous chardonnay that rivals the best of Burgundy. Highly aromatic with spiced apple and pear wafting from the glass, and backed up with racy acidity and well-integrated oak. Made from Dijon clone fruit grown in Monterey's cool climate, the wine is structured, focused and layered.

Its ripe, well-oaked, eminently spicy aromas make for a very fine start here, and, while the wine's ample flavors similarly begin on a positive note, they run afoul of elevated acidity and palpable heat in the latter going. Still, there is enough depth and solidity evident to make this one worth a gamble, and a wait of three to five years should help immeasurably.

Offering up a bit of the plummy fruit and peppery spice of the grape, this very open and smoothly textured wine shows little of Syrah's potency or richness of feel and flavor. It smacks a bit of simple sweetness and, while perfectly gulpable, stands among the mildest of its class.

The blue glow at the edge of the glass suggest this syrah might be oxygen-starved, but it's not. Instead it's round and generous, the wine filling the mouth with the sphere of its alcohol, the taste filled with black raspberry. It's all about sweet fruit, yet there's a structure there, a stoniness gently insistent underneath.

At first, this is all angles, the clean cherry fruit warmed by coffee, burnt at the edges, slightly bitter, sweetened with vanilla. Then air settles the factions and brings the smooth fruit into focus. It takes on a smoky, masculine Carneros style, expressing its power as a big black wine. Drink it now if you like aggressive, muscular wines, or wait it out for a more graceful conclusion.

This pinot is Russian River Valley in its texture, in the balance of softness and firmness it strikes, the fruit so ripe it's tarry and black, yet still fresh. Flavors of blackberry, rose and cherry merge in a density that remains clean and clear. It's still grapey, a bit blocky in its youth, but this is structured to age.

Potent ripeness takes the fruit to melon and golden grape jam flavors; it brings out a rich soil character as well. This is cool and dense up front, then the oak's tannin kicks in.