Pax Wines Sonoma Hillsides Syrah 2021

Why is this Wine so Yummy?

The Sonoma Hillsides Syrah is the flagship wine of the estate. Described by Antonio Galloni as “one of the very finest wines in Northern California for a number of years now”, it also has the distinction of having once been awarded a rare 100-point score from the same reviewer.

Hillsides is followed by the single-vineyard designations, and then the North Coast and Sonoma Coast blends. It’s a tiered classification approach, with the cream of the crop designated to the Hillsides. In terms of winemaking, for Syrah Pax plays with a straight bat: all 100% whole-cluster, all 100% Syrah and all crushed by foot. Nothing that could change the natural environment of the winery is permitted, so no commercial yeasts are used. He adds more stems in cooler vintages to buttress the Syrah and provide textural richness. He never destems unless necessary (he has a very expensive destemmer in his winery that’s been used twice in 10 years!)

Inspired by the Syrah based wines chiseled from the slopes of St Joseph, this 100% Syrah is becoming a reference point of its own for Syrah in the new world. Just like in St Joseph, we pulled this blend together from multiple sites and utilized the most interesting expositions of these meticulously cared for vineyards. Hillsides that show the freshness and vibrancy that Syrah can only achieve on cool-climate slopes. Blended together in a single cubic concrete vat, this wine is the epitome of density, finesse, style and deliciousness.

Pax

About Pax Mahle Wines

It would be difficult to think of a producer who has had more impact on Californian Syrah than Pax Mahle. After years as a sommelier and wine buyer on the east coast of the USA, in 1997 Pax and his wife Pam moved to California, where he would take the coveted role as Corporate Wine Buyer with prestigious epicurean purveyor, Dean & DeLuca. Required for this role was a deep understanding of Californian wine, a topic Pax freely admits to knowing close to nothing about at the time—his expertise and personal drinking preferences were decidedly Eurocentric. Long story short, his prospecting led him to the North Coast of California, where he fell hard for the cool freshness of Syrah from the region. These were the kind of wines that bore resemblance to his favourite wines from the Northern Rhône.

Stunned by the region’s untapped potential, in 2000, Mahle realized he needed to be on the frontlines of winemaking rather than behind the scenes. Drawing on his many visits to the Northern Rhône, Pax aspired to make the kind of wines his heroes would be proud of. To this end, the cool and foggy AVAs of the Sonoma Coast provided the perfect combination of terroir and grape. The soulful wines of Raymond Trollat and Pierre Gonon served as significant influences, and the experiences tasting in the cellars of these great producers stand as some of Pax’s most cherished. As an ex-master sommelier student, he delightfully quips that he tries to return to the Rhône Valley each year to “relearn the things that are correct and unlearn the things I’ve always been told”.

As one of our Californian friends put it, if there’s something Pax doesn’t know on the topic, it’s not worth knowing—25 years honing his craft, spanning the length and breadth of Sonoma County has served him well. And although he exudes the kind of confidence derived from expertise, he remains a portrait of self-effacement, attributing his success and the universal acclaim for his wines to his sites rather than himself. Full of tone and sinew, these wines not only express a purity of fruit and expression of place seldom encountered, but they are also impressively structured and incredibly balanced.

The video below was shot during the 2020 harvest

The discussion traverses Mahle’s evolution as a winemaker and learning restraint.

Levi Dalton interviewed Pax in 2014, listening makes an interesting comparison with the video above shot 6 years later

In the Vineyard

Initially, Pax had to lease nearly all his vineyards to ensure they were farmed to his high standards. Twenty years later, the vineyards Pax now sources from are independently owned by small, like-minded growers and are farmed organically, although certification is not deemed necessary. Pax spends a lot of time in these vineyards and is involved in every aspect of decision-making when it comes to his fruit: “It’s a partnership, a relationship of trust – when things get tough, you need to be able to trust that they will do the right thing”. Although his rich and powerful expressions of Syrah put him on the map, by 2006, Pax had recalibrated his style towards fresher, lower alcohol profiles and began working with new vineyard sources in cooler, coastal areas of Sonoma.

Pax’s all-star line-up now includes the coastal vineyards of Armagh and Griffins Lair, both farmed organically and located in the cool Petaluma Gap. In the Russian River Valley, Walker Vine Hill inevitably plays a crucial role in Pax’s emblematic Hillsides Syrah. Here the diurnal shift and south-facing slope mean that fruit ripens fully without burning off its acidity. The Nellessen Vineyard is just to the west of downtown Sebastopol and with its eastern exposition, hardly gets past 12.5% ABV no matter how long the hang time. Even the Castelli-Knight Ranch, Pax’s warmest site, is tempered by cooling orange Haire clay soils, resulting in fruit with a distinctly Rhône-ish feel. And, while Mahle does not own any of these vineyards, he spends a lot of time in the vines with the growers. He’s involved in every aspect of decision-making when it comes to his fruit. “It’s a partnership, a relationship of trust,” he says. “When things get tough, you need to be able to trust that they will do the right thing.”

In the Winery

By 2006, Pax had naturally evolved his style towards the fresher, more savoury and lower alcohol profiles he gives us today. He took new oak out of the equation and began to home in on more marginal vineyard sources in the cooler, coastal areas of Sonoma—usually north-facing and late-ripening vineyards.

Hillsides is followed by the single-vineyard designations, and then the North Coast and Sonoma Coast blends. It’s a tiered classification approach, with the cream of the crop designated to the Hillsides. In terms of winemaking, for Syrah Pax plays with a straight bat: all 100% whole-cluster, all 100% Syrah and all crushed by foot. This technique is known as Carbonic Maceration. Nothing that could change the natural environment of the winery is permitted, so no commercial yeasts are used. He adds more stems in cooler vintages to buttress the Syrah and provide textural richness. He never destems unless necessary (he has a very expensive destemmer in his winery that’s been used twice in 10 years!)

Where in the World is Pax Mahle Wines?