2024 Massican Pinot Grigio, cool and zippy
Founded by Dan Petroski, Massican was the first to champion a lean, mineral-driven style inspired by Italy’s Friuli region, long before freshness, restraint, and balance became buzzwords. In a landscape dominated by overripe fruit and heavy oak, Petroski’s wines have always stood for the opposite: purity, energy, and clarity of flavor.
The 2024 Massican Pinot Grigio is a perfect distillation of that vision. This is not your average domestic Pinot Grigio. It is alive and deeply refreshing, a wine that proves California can make whites with the same tension and verve as the best of Northern Italy.
Massican sources fruit from the coolest pockets of its vineyards, where fog and morning breezes preserve natural acidity. A small addition of Cortese (the great white grape of Gavi) adds lift and brightness, sharpening the wine’s already electric backbone. The result is a Pinot Grigio with serious cut. Zesty citrus and green pear framed by a saline edge and a cling peach ripeness that marks it unmistakably as Californian.
A whole-cluster press brings a gentle texture to the mid-palate, that subtle, satisfying grip that makes the wine as much about feel as flavor. The balance between weight and freshness is extraordinary.
If Friuli is the spiritual model, Napa is the canvas, and under Petroski’s hand, the two meet beautifully. The fruit is a touch riper, the aromatics a bit more generous, yet the structure and precision are unlike nearly any Pinot Grigio produced in the U.S.
This is California’s benchmark for cool-climate white wine, a bottle that proves ripeness and refreshment can coexist with California sunshine.
93 Points, James Suckling
A bone-dry, nervy, restrained white that offers floral, peach-skin aromas and tangy grapefruit and lemon zest flavors. Light-bodied, alive with acidity, palate-cleansing and minerally. A generous peach flavor swells on the palate with more sipping. Drink now.