The Berryessa Gap Zinfandel 2017, Yolo County, represents my ideal of what a zinfandel wine should be. The color is a medium yet totally transparent ruby-cherry hue, nothing over-extracted; aromas of raspberries and currants are infused with hints of cloves and cinnamon bark and a high, wild note of cherry skin and blueberry; it’s a lean, lithe and spare zinfandel, intensely flavorful yet almost ineffable in its elegance and delicacy and a tannic structure both rigorous and lacy; a few moments in the glass unfurl meadowy hints and touches of graphite and wood-smoke. The surprise is the alcohol content: 14.8 percent, an element the wine wears as softly as a silk scarf wrapping a warm shoulder. [...] The next time I have to taste a big, over-ripe, jammy, stridently spicy, high-alcohol zin, I’ll think of this one with a sigh. Excellent. Frederic Koeppel, Bigger than your Head