Santa Maria Valley is the country's third oldest official wine appellation, producing distinctive, balanced, cool climate Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Syrah.
At the same time, a rising appreciation and understanding of fine wine around the world has meant unprecedented access to a wide diversity of wonderfully distinctive wines, some from appellations virtually unknown until a few years ago.
At the top are the 10 Beaujolais crus, villages thought to be so distinctive that their names are appellations.
The first two are cru Beaujolais, 10 villages thought to be distinctive enough that their names are appellations.
Both the Tête and the Brun are what's known as cru Beaujolais, wines from 10 villages in the north of the Beaujolais region thought to have terroirs distinctive enough that their names are appellations.
After all, some of the appellations with the most distinctive terroir are from tiny patches of land that are famous in their own right.
And wine bureaucracies, which are often more concerned with increasing the sales of big commercial brands than with promoting the little-known appellations and grapes, visionary producers and distinctive styles that give many wine cultures their depth, mystique, grace and beauty.
Long known primarily for contributing luscious, richly-flavored grapes to wines bearing a Sonoma County appellation, the Alexander Valley AVA has gradually asserted its own distinctive high-toned fruit and smooth tannins, especially in elegant red wines from Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Zinfandel.
Theoretically, at least, they would offer generic expressions of Burgundy, possessing few of the distinctive characteristics that shape and define the more narrowly drawn appellations.
When the appellation was founded, relatively recently in 1956, it was meant to convey the distinctive qualities of these hillsides, in valleys clustered near six villages bound by similar traditions and terroirs: Lemps, Tournon, Mauves, Vion, Glun and St.-Jean-de-Muzols.
