While Cabernet Sauvignon has long enjoyed the title of America’s most-prized red wine, Merlot and Pinot Noir continue to battle each other for the runner up position. By most accounts, Pinot Noir, with the help of the 2004 movie Sideways, has secured the number two position.

Pinot Noir is renowned for expressing the soil in which it was grown, resulting in a wide range of flavors and styles. Pinot Noir at its best displays a beautiful elegance, exhibiting complex aromas and flavors on a smooth and silky frame. Warm region Pinots can be quite concentrated with ripe fruit flavors and significant tannin. Cooler climate Pinots more closely represent the Burgundy standard-bearers with more subtle earth and fruit flavors and smooth and supple tannins.

Pinot Noir’s thin skin and genetic instability make it notoriously difficult to grow and ferment. Optimum flavor development is achieved in cool climates with long sun exposure. Oregon’s Willamette Valley and California’s cool climate regions are Pinot Noir leaders. New York and Pennsylvania have also been able to produce good wines using Pinot Noir.