No Girls Grenache 2017

No Girls celebrates the belief that empowered women create empowered wine—and champions this profession's many talented and independent women and beyond.

The wines are crafted by Elizabeth Bourcier, Resident Vigneronne for Cayuse Vineyards. After co-producing the first vintage with Cayuse Vigneron Christophe Baron in 2008, she has had carte blanche on all aspects of the wine creation for the 2011 vintage and beyond. The wines have earned routinely high accolades, with Wine Spectator calling them "some of the best Washington wines ever rated" by the magazine.

The grapes come from the La Paciencia vineyard, which means patience in Spanish—appropriate since the project was ten years in the making. The tightly spaced vines, planted on an angle in the Stones of the Walla Walla Valley, give No Girls a personality all its own, and the wines are focused and pure. Food-friendly creations reflect finesse, elegance, charm, and character.

Historically, women were excluded from the critical stages of wine production, hampered by the prevailing societal belief that it was strictly "a man's work." No Girls offers a new narrative driven by women's strength and resilience. The wines are as modern, opinionated, and powerful as the name suggests.

Critical Acclaim

97 Robert Parker's Wine Advocate

 A masterclass of finesse and elegance, the 2017 Grenache la Paciencia Vineyard explodes with seductive floral tones that immediately capture your attention. Brilliantly defined dark cherry notions with aromas of rose hip and black spice tones sashay out of the glass. Nuances of dusty leather and wild strawberry float on top of the glass with red floral bouquet aromas. With 13.5% alcohol, this pure, medium-bodied wine is chock-full of flavor, bursting at the seams with a subtle smoky tone that perfectly frames the ripe red fruit. The palate is balanced with a velvety mouthfeel and energizing acidity to age for more than a decade. It displays expertly managed tannins and spiced red fruit that continues to unpack and evolve with mind-blowing complexity. The long-lived finish has mineral tension and offers up notions of wild strawberry, dark cherry skin, newly opened peonies and luxurious and elegant black spice tones—another brilliant bottling from Christophe Baron. The only thing that is disappointing about this wine is that there are only 347 cases for the world to share. 

95 Jeb Dunnuck

The 2017 Grenache from this terrific label knocks it out of the park with its beautiful wild strawberry fruit intermixed with notions of damp earth, sweet mulch, lavender, flowers, and hints of tapenade. Incredible complex, it’s ethereal and elegant on the palate, with medium-bodied richness and depth, silky tannins, and a great finish. Reminding me of a Vosne Romanée (Domaine Dujac?), it’s going to keep for 10-12 years, probably longer. 

92 Vinous 

Good medium red. Wild aromas of red berries, gunpowder, mocha and white pepper, plus hints of smoked meat and underbrush. Dense, savory, saline and smooth; can't quite match the high-pitched complexity and primary fruit intensity of the Cayuse God Only Knows Grenache but it firm and long, finishing with a solid tannic grip. A touch dusty and meaty on the back end, and less floral than the God Only Knows. Good for this bottling but not special, as it does not have quite the intensity or thrust of the '16. In a distinctly saline Old World style. Still, I raised my score by a point when the wine developed more fruit sweetness with extended aeration.