A new wine and a one off, as the fruit from this vineyard is no longer available, the 2010 Syrah Old Stones comes from a particularly rocky section of The Rocks in the southern part of the Walla Walla Valley. Downright exotic, with plenty of wild herbs, meat juice, olive tapenade and crushed stone aromas and flavors, this beauty hits the palate with full-bodied richness, big structure and a broad chewy finish that has serious length. If you don’t like a little meat and funk in your Syrah, this isn’t for you. Drink it over the coming decade. Drink now-2023. In the top tier of producers in Washington State, wild man Charles Smith fashions singular, exotic wines that never lack for richness or texture. While his wines can push the limits in some vintages and be slightly controversial, there’s nothing controversial or over the top with these 2010s and 2011s and they have beautiful purity of fruit, clean, integrated acid profiles and solid underlying structure. In almost all cases, given the quality, they represent incredible values. While this was a slight marathon tasting, when the wines are this good, it’s always easy to keep your motivation. Focusing on low-yields in the vineyards, the winemaking here is straight-forward with almost all of the wines seeing some whole cluster fermentation, time on lees and aging primarily in neutral French oak. www.kvintners.com