Ceritas is one of the most in-demand producers in California today. Founder John Raytek sources grapes from along the Sonoma Coast and favours minimum intervention whilst ensuring that everything he produces is both fruit driven and reflective of site.

The Pinots have 60-80% whole cluster inclusion, meaning the wines are saline, with crunchy fruit and a lithe elegance to them. The Chardonnays have the perfect balance between richness and salinity and are enjoyable from the outset but seem to hold together nicely, becoming more complex with a couple of years’ worth of bottle age.

Much like near-contemporaries Rhys (who Raytek briefly worked for), the wines have always been good but have moved into a higher orbit in recent years, as has both critic and consumer recognition.

Pinot Noir Costalina is the introduction to the house style and is a blend of parcel and barrel selections from their Sonoma Coast sites.

Elliot Vineyard, planted in 1981 is made up of shale soils intermixed with decomposed marine sediments with slightly less clay than the neighboring Hellenthal vineyard. It straddles the ridge of parent rock, giving it the unique position of facing north and south. The resulting wine is bright and delicate, offering light perfume and excellent transparency.

Trout Gulch, planted to both Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, is just 3.5 miles from the ocean and 750 feet above the hamlet of Aptos in the southern Santa Cruz Mountains. Uplifted oceanic sandy soils create unique drainage sending the vines deep into marine-derived sub-soils. The wines show extraordinary purity with a saline, marine edge

Chloe Pinot Noir, like the Carex Chardonnay, comes from West Sonoma's Green Valley, close to the Occidental vineyard that was made famous by the Kistler family. The altitude and low fog line creates tiny berries (from the Swan clone - a "suitcase" clone from Burgundy's La Tâche vineyard). These tiny berries create an intense, concentrated wine with amazing aromatics and a balanced finesse and elegance that belies the complexity.

Hellenthal vineyard was planted in the late 1970s by Gard Hellenthal.  “Old Shop Block” refers to the oldest vines on the property, and Ceritas are the only winery that uses the fruit. The soil is a mixture of fractured sandstone and highly decomposed sandstone soils - ideal for Pinot Noir.

Mindego Ridge is a vineyard at an elevation of around 900 feet in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Given its proximity to San Francisco Bay and the Pacific, the wines are very focussed, with laser-like acidity, minerality as well as crunchy fruit. Tensile and mouth-watering, this is proper coastal Pinot Noir.

Carex is located in Green Valley in West Sonoma Coast.  It is a cold site which was densely planted 20 years ago. The wines have deep flavour and complexity along with a freshness afforded by altitude. They age exceptionally well.