Calera

Josh Jensen is not a fan of most Califonian Pinot Noirs. "In the past 10 years the style of American Pinot Noir has been blockbuster sledgehammers. They're darker than any red Burgundy and with explosive fruitiness. " This is explicitly not what Josh is after in his wines. Having fallen in love with Burgundy at university in Oxford (where he won a rowing blue in 1966), he went to the Cote d'Or in 1970 to knock on doors and ask for work. The first door he knocked on was Domaine de la Romanee-Conti. Not a bad place to start your formal education in Pinot Noir.

Having spent two years working with Aubert de Villaine at DRC and Jacques Seysses at Domaine Dujac, Josh returned to his native California convinced that the key to emulating Vosne-Romanee or Morey St-Denis was to find limestone soils.

His search lasted two years until he bought a plot of land with deep limestone soils in Mount Harlan. The land had no electricity, no running water, no access by road and no history of viticulture. Today it is feted as one of the state's finest terroirs for Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.

Josh follows a very Burgundian method in his winemaking. Each of his five vineyards are bottled separately, all the better to express their subtly distinct terroirs. The wines themselves echo those of the Cote de Nuits much more closely than many of their compatriots. They are paler and more delicate than the Californian norm, perhaps shyer in the youth with more pronounced acidity and a savoury, mineral note. They will thrill those who prefer subtlety and refreshment to power and sweetness of fruit. There is also the brilliant Mount Harlan Cuvee which draws on all five vineyards and is sealed with a glass Vino-lok stopper.

Away from Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, Josh is an evangelist for Viognier, which he first learned to grow and vinify at a stage at Chateau Grillet in the Northern Rhone. He planted the grape in 1983, long before it became fashionable to do so. Rich and ripe with wonderful perfumed fruit, it sees no new oak to ensure it is fruit rather than wood that you taste. It is undoubtedly one of the best whites in this list.