The big story in classic French wine regions like Burgundy and the Northern Rhône is the rise of micro-négociants—boutique-scale “merchant bottlers” whose relationships with their contract grape-growers are much more symbiotic than was typical a generation ago. Rather than simply purchasing grapes (or wine) from growers, “finishing” the wine in their cellars, and releasing bottles under their labels, the best micro-négociants view their growers as partners, not just vendors, and this phenomenon is not unique to France: California has micro-négociants, too, one of the best of which is LIOCO Wine Company. 

Run these days by co-founder Matt Licklider and his wife, Sara, LIOCO covers an incredible amount of ground, bottling a dizzying array of micro-batch wines from a distinguished roster of vineyards. The LIOCO winery itself is housed within a cooperative facility in Santa Rosa, but their grower-partners span some 200 miles across Mendocino, Sonoma, and Santa Cruz counties. Today’s exquisite Anderson Valley Pinot Noir is a regional bottling with serious single-vineyard street cred: Left without an anchor source for “La Selva” in 2018, Licklider decided to de-classify a barrel each of four vineyard-designate wines and use them in today’s wine. We’re talking about premium Anderson Valley real estate—Kiser, Demuth, Edmeades, and Abel vineyards, each one contributing something unique to the final product. You won’t find a more spot-on evocation of cool-climate Anderson Valley Pinot Noir, especially at this price point. Rather than feature one regional “grand cru,” they opted for four—sounds like a great deal to me!

The “micro-négociant” moniker is particularly apt because Matt and Sara focus primarily on Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, the classic Burgundian duo. Most of their wines are produced in quantities numbering in the hundreds, not thousands, of cases, and the detail they provide on each release is exhaustive. Look through their current releases at any given time and it’s like a who’s-who of California viticulture, as “La Selva” (“the forest”) well demonstrates: This 2018 really shines a light on the Anderson Valley, which, despite being relatively small, has a diverse topography and geology. A strong Pacific Ocean influence is felt throughout the valley, with soils of sandstone, clay, and shale and elevations ranging from 400 to 800 feet.

Licklider was more than happy to go into geeky detail on some of the characteristics imparted by the different vineyard lots used in this wine. “The Demuth site,” he writes, “is a warmer mountaintop parcel above Boonville, giving the wine grain and structure. The Edmeades in mid-valley gives a Morey St Denis-like red fruit base, and the two deep-end sites, Kiser and Abel, provide blue fruit and hallmark floral notes.” In the long, even 2018 vintage, the maturation of the grape stems encouraged him to incorporate 20% “whole clusters” during fermentation. This practice lent some nice crunch to the final product, which came in at a cool 13.3% a.b.v.

Picture yourself in a misty grove of old-growth redwoods, munching on wild berries picked right off the bush, and you’ve got a great feel for the 2018 La Selva. In classic LIOCO fashion, the wine is bright, balanced, perfumed, and evocative of its place—a terrifically taut, floral, spicy Pinot Noir. The total package. In the glass, it’s a medium/light ruby with pink highlights at the rim, with enticing aromas of wild strawberry, crushed blackberry, black tea, dried rose petals, sandalwood, and lots of forest floor notes. It is medium-bodied, with silky tannins and great freshness. The Morey-Saint-Denis shout-out is a fair one: This is plush, refined Pinot that is ready to drink now and over the next 5-7 years. It doesn’t need much time in a decanter to start singing, I’d say 30 minutes, and it’ll show its best in Burgundy stems at 60 degrees, paired with some cedar-plank salmon or, to take it in a completely different direction, Sichuan Pork (Licklider’s suggestion). The tannins and alcohol are gentle enough to accommodate a little spice, so don’t worry—this has the makings of something special!