Sonoma County · Appellation

Dry Creek Valley

Zinfandel has grown in Dry Creek Valley since a French immigrant first planted it here in the 1870s, and gnarled, own-rooted vines from before Prohibition still bear fruit on the valley's benchlands today, making this arguably the most historically continuous Zinfandel ground in California. Established as an AVA in 1983, the valley draws a sharp line between its gravelly, sandy-loam floor — cooler, higher-yielding — and the rockier, well-drained hillsides that produce the more concentrated, sought-after fruit. Narrow, sheltered, and consistently warm, it remains Sonoma's clearest answer to what old-vine Zinfandel is supposed to taste like.