Decoy Limited Alexander Valley Red Blend

The name is clear about the where and quiet about the what: it gives Alexander Valley and calls the wine a red blend, but which grapes go into it is not something we can confirm. The place, at least, is well drawn. Alexander Valley runs about twenty miles along the Russian River and the benchlands beside it in northern Sonoma County, and regional guides describe warm, dry summers there, cooled by Pacific air that moves inland along the river, with the day-to-night swing and the reach of that cooling changing from one vineyard to the next. It is a federal wine district, guides note, a name more exact than Sonoma County or California alone. Decoy says the brand began in 1985 and became its own winery in 2008.

We do not have a shopper rating for this wine; across the wines shoppers have scored, the middle rating is 4.71. Our September 2026 checks put it between $26.99 and $39.99.

Decoy's own pages fill in more of the who, even if not the exact blend percentages. The producer introduced the Limited tier in 2020, describing it as wines sourced from some of California's most acclaimed vineyard sites, including Alexander Valley, Paso Robles and Sonoma Coast. Two of those Alexander Valley sites carry names: Ridgeline, a mountainside estate on Oak Mountain that Decoy acquired in 2012, and Brownell, a valley-floor estate near Geyserville acquired in 2013; the producer's vineyard pages state that both supply the Bordeaux-variety fruit that plays a defining role in its Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Red Blend. For the current 2023 release, the producer's own tasting note describes aromas of boysenberry and muddled strawberry with cedar and toasted cinnamon, and a palate of silky tannins and bright acidity carrying blackberry pie flavors and subtle oak spice, in the producer's words. Winemaker Dana Epperson leads the winemaking program behind the Decoy label.

Our call: this suits a shopper who buys on named vineyards, since Decoy's own pages put two estate sites, Ridgeline and Brownell, behind the Alexander Valley fruit in this blend and credit a named winemaker with the wine. Pass if you want the blend spelled out or a shopper rating to lean on; neither the grape percentages nor a shopper score has reached our record for this bottle.

The Grocery Store Wine Desk · written Sep 16, 2026 from our research file for this wine. Numbers reflect our latest checks.