100% Zinfandel

Food pairings: Lamb and venison, grilled or roasted beef and pork, hearty stews, grilled portobello mushrooms or roasted eggplant, aged Cheddar or Gouda, and dark chocolate.

Winemaking: The grapes are 100% destemmed and given a five-day cold soak on the skins, then fermented with indigenous yeasts in French oak, with full malolactic fermentation on the lees and daily bâtonnage. The wine is aged for about ten to eleven months in French oak, 40% of it new. The 2023 vintage was, in the winery's words, late and big: after an exceptionally wet and cool winter, bud break came more than a month later than usual, fruit set was excellent, and a moderate to cool summer with very few triple-digit days let the clusters develop slowly and evenly. Winemaker Courtney Robinett Wagoner makes the wine with consulting winemaker Erin Green.

Vineyards and terroir: Vigneto di Evo is a barrel blend from select Martinelli single-vineyard Zinfandel sites, all estate grown: Jackass, Vellutini, Lolita and Giuseppe & Luisa. The Vellutini, Lolita and Giuseppe & Luisa vineyards were planted with cuttings from the family's 135-year-old Jackass Zinfandel vines. These vineyards lie in cool parts of the Russian River Valley, which favors deeper, darker fruit flavors rather than the black pepper of warmer sites.

Family and history: The Martinelli family has grown grapes in the Russian River Valley since the 1880s, when Giuseppe Martinelli and Luisa Vellutini, aged 19 and 16, eloped from their small village in Tuscany and came to California. Giuseppe, a winemaker in Italy, was hired to plant a vineyard for a farmer in Forestville, and within two years bought land of his own; working side by side on a slope of more than 60 degrees, the couple planted Zinfandel and Muscat of Alexandria vines that became the Jackass Hill vineyard, still the steepest non-terraced vineyard in Sonoma County. Their youngest son Leno farmed it from the age of 12 until he was 87, and today Lee Martinelli Sr., his wife Carolyn and their children carry on the family's farming and winemaking. The wine is named for Evo Martinelli, who was raised on Martinelli Road: the son of Fred Martinelli and Lee Sr.'s first cousin, Evo gave Lee Sr. one of his first jobs outside the vineyard and impressed on him the importance of going to college.

In the pictures: The Martinelli family; old vines on Jackass Hill above the Russian River Valley; and the garden terrace at the Martinelli winery on River Road in Windsor (photos courtesy of Martinelli Winery).