Tag Archives: 30 days of Rosé | 2017

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30 Days of Rosé | #04 | Bonny Doon | Vin Gris de Cigare | 2016

Bonny Doon Vin Gris de Cigare | Beverage Warehouse, VT

30 Days of Rosé continues at the Beverage Warehouse – today, we are featuring Vin Gris de Cigare by Bonny Doon

30 Days of Rosé | #04 | Bonny Doon | Vin Gris de Cigare | 2016 | $14.99

From bonnydoonvineyard.com:

2016 Vin Gris de Cigare | Pink Wine of the Earth

The wine does not overwhelm one with fruitybombasticity; it’s charms are seductively subtle. An extremely elegant and complex Vin Gris de Cigare.


Wine Specs

  • Vintage:  2016
  • Varietal:  49% Grenache, 19% Grenache Blanc, 13% Mourvèdre, 12% Carignane, 4% Cinsaut, 3% Roussanne
  • Appellation:  Central Coast
  • TA:  6.3 g/L
  • pH:  3.47
  • Serving Temperature:  50-55º F
  • Label Artist:  Chuck House
  • Alcohol %:  13.5

This wine is quite emblematic of the great sea change that has occurred at Bonny Doon Vineyard since the sell-off/ draw-down of the Ginormous Doonamath, whereby we have essayed a most sincere effort to make “quieter” wines in a more natural, less manipulated fashion. As such, this Vin Gris is made from bespoke grapes and is not a byproduct of red wine production, per se. We harvested at the appropriate ripeness level for its style. The essential principle here is that less is truly more.

Tasting Notes

The ’16 Vin Gris is a bit of a departure from recent vintages, somewhat deeper in color and definitely a bit fruitier than some, though the fruit is perhaps (at least at this stage) more of the dark and brooding variety, particularly suggestive of black currants, Damson plum and rosehips. In our modern world, one must never, ever, ever, make anything like a health claim for an alcoholic beverage. Les français, on the other hand, have no difficulty believing that a properly selected wine can remediate, if not cure almost any medical or existential complaint. So, no, I’m not saying that the Vin Gris has a calmative effect on jangled nerves, nor that it creates an immense feeling of well-being almost immediately upon just scenting it, even before the first sip. (Though it does smell an awful lot like any of the sundry tisanes (tilleul, eglantine) that will definitely do you some good.) Its perfume is subtle, haunting, not vulgar or tawdry, like some of the louche rosés de la nuit. Enfin, this wine is all about elegance and restraint. Rosehips, cassis, fraises de bois, citrus rind, with a wonderfully austere stony finish.

Vineyard Notes

The Grenache for our Vin Gris came principally from the Alta Loma Vineyard, harvested at the appropriate maturity level for this elegant style of wine. The Mourvèdre came from Del Barba Vineyard in Contra Costa County. About 22% of the wine is composed of traditional white Rhône varieties in substantial part from the Beeswax Vineyard, adding a surprising richness and foundation.

Production Notes

We also employed the practice of post-fermentation bâtonnage—the stirring or resuspension of yeast lees—to give the wine a certain creaminess of texture.

Food Pairing Notes

Just begs for oysters or stone crab.

Wine

30 Days of Rosé | #03 | Broc Cellars | Love Rosé Blend | 2016

Broc Cellars | Love Rosé Blend 2016 at the Beverage Warehouse, VT

30 Days of Rosé at the Beverage Warehouse continues!

     We are most delighted to highlight Broc Cellars in this edition.  Broc Cellars (CA) is one of those wineries in which we buy all the wine we can as we are allowed.

 

     Chris is known for crafting unique, delicious wines from varietals you may not have heard of but are friendly to any palate.  Our Broc Cellars offerings greatly expand and contract throughout the season so be sure to ask for us to point out any specialties from Broc we might momentarily have.

     Enjoy!

#03 Broc Cellara |Love Rosé | Blend | 2016 | 750ml | $17.99

From broccellars.com:

Chris Brockway | Winemaker + Owner

Broc Cellars was nothing more than an idea not that long ago, an idea about making wines that were “site specific.” Where the wines’ true character came from using only organically or biodynamically grown grapes from areas that most would consider marginal. Believing that vineyards develop ‘true’ character and complexity when they have to struggle to survive. In the cellar we try to continue this practice using minimal intervention, in an effort to let the grapes speak for themselves.

Broc Cellars | Love Rosé Blend | 2016

  • VARIETALS: 70% Valdiguié, 20% Zinfandel, 10% Sauzao
  • VINEYARDS: 10,000 Buddhas (Valdiguié), Arrowhead Mountain (Zinfandel), Fox Hill (Sauzao).
  • LOCATION: “North Coast” – Mendocino + Sonoma County
  • ALCOHOL: 11.8%
  • TOTAL PRODUCTION: 933 cases

WINEMAKER’S NOTES:

The fruit was destemmed and then pressed into stainless steel. All 3 varietals fermented together just over 30 days. The wine was bottled at the beginning of the year. It has high aromatics with juicy watermelon notes for easy drinking. Color comes from the Sauzao, spice from the Zinfandel and acidity from the Valdiguié.

VITICULTURAL AREA:

Both the 10,000 Buddhas and Fox Hill vines grow on sandy loam. Fox Hill delivers rustic fruit and is about 20 years old. The vines from 10,000 Buddhas are 90% organic and 60 years old. Arrowhead Vineyard is non-certified organic, 20 years old and on volcanic rock.

All of our wines are made naturally, meaning no use of inoculated yeasts or bacteria. We use only native yeast to spark fermentation. We do not add any powdered tannins or enzymes. A minimal dose of S02 is added 4 weeks before bottling to some wines.

 

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30 Days of Rosé | #02 | Inman Family Wine | Endless Crush

Our magically delicious 30 Days of Rosé blast with a NEW Rosé feature EVERY DAY continues!

Today’s Rosé comes from the Inman Family who not only craft scrumptious wine, but does so with great care and responsible environmental practices.

#02 Inman Family | Endless Crush Rosé | 2016 | 750ml | $35 online price but only $19.99 at the Bevie!

 

From inmanfamilywines.com:

 The first time I had an elegant dry rosé wine was on a simple but romantic picnic with my husband Simon in Provence twenty five years ago. Local cheese, bread, fruit, the fabulous, dramatic scenery and that Provençal wine with its delicate salmon pink color, crisp acidity and floral aromas forever linked in my mind rosé wines and al fresco dining with romance. In 2004, Simon and I harvested Olivet Grange Pinot Noir on September 1st, which was our 20th wedding anniversary. To celebrate and mark the occasion I made a special rosé, which I called “Endless Crush”.

Some rosés are made as a by-product of red wine by bleeding off (saigner) some of the juice early in the production process to create a higher ratio of skin to juice, which will concentrate the resultant red wine. “Endless Crush” is not made in this manner. The intention from the start was to create a rosé separate from our Pinot Noir. Rosés made intentionally, rather than simply by drawing off the freerun juice, tend to have greater complexity and structure because the grapes are pressed.

 Whole cluster are destemmed, left for 2 hours to extract color, aromas and flavors. The fruit was pressed on a delicate white wine cycle and then fermented with Provençal yeast in stainless steel. No oak, no ml.

This 2016 vintage of “Endless Crush” was made entirely from our Olivet Grange estate fruit; like that first rosé I enjoyed in France, this wine is a beautiful, pale, delicate pink and is crisp and refreshing. The 2016 vintage, not unlike the 2015, yielded about 20% less fruit at Olivet Grange Vineyard due to poor weather conditions at bloom.

Aromas:

Wild Strawberry, watermelon, ruby grapefruit, honeysuckle.

Flavors:

Strawberry, ruby grapefruit, blood orange, watermelon, and mineral

 

Wine Specs

  • Vintage:  2016
  • Varietal:  Pinot Noir
  • Appellation:  Russian River Valley
  • Vineyard Designation:  OGV Estate
  • Harvest Date:  August 2016
  • Acid:  0.6
  • pH:  3.3
  • Aging: stainless steel
  • Bottling Date:  December 2016
  • Alcohol %:  12
  • Cases:   Only 672 cases produced

Natural Winemaking
Perhaps Pinot Noir’s greatest characteristic is the ability to convey a sense of the place it was grown, showing subtle yet unique favors that reflect the soil and micro-climate of the vineyard. The French recognized this ability one thousand years ago and named it terroir.

Our non-interventionist and natural winemaking practices allow unique vineyard characteristics to show through. We often pick our fruit earlier than most of our neighbors to help maintain the natural acidity of the fruit and naturally lower alcohol levels. Fermentations start with native yeasts, only adding organic yeast nutrients when necessary. As a rule, no other water or acid is added, and enzymes or tannin preparations are never added.

Sensitive Farming
Modern farming techniques often emphasize production at the expense of soil health and eco-system integrity. While this may be an acceptable part of the business for some, we work tirelessly to solve every farming need at the Olivet Grange with a solution that not only produces excellent quality wine grapes, but also enriches the environment around us. We believe that every measure that we take to maintain the natural health of our vineyard directly contributes to the unique flavors of our Estate wines.

Environmental Responsibility
Positive efforts in the vineyard and crush pad can easily be negated by irresponsible behavior in the rest of the business of running a successful winery. To ensure that we maintain environmental responsibility at all levels, we work every day to reduce our consumption and use environmentally sensitive products wherever possible.

 

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30 Days of Rosé | #01 | Kermit Lynch | Chinon Rosé | Charles Joguet

Kermit Lynch | Chinon Rosé | Charles Joguet | Beverage Warehouse, VT

 

We’re delighted to kickoff a new delicious promotion… 30 days of Rosé!

Every single day for at least the next month, we will be featuring a craveable Rosé in stock as they flow into the Beverage Warehouse.

We LOVE Rosé and can’t wait for the majority of our pre-orders to arrive and open the floodgates of these liquid delights!

The first one is a rare beauty, stay tuned and thirsty!

#01 | Kermit Lynch | Chinon Rosé | Charles Joguet | 2016 | 750ml | $16.99

Only a few cases of Joguet Rosé made it into Vermont so claim your bottle of deliciousness while you can!

From kermitlynch.com:

     We have imported the Joguet rosé since the 1970s, but it still flies under the radar, overshadowed by the apparent sexiness of basically any rosé that comes from the south of France. Refreshment is needed in the north, too, far from the crystalline waters of the Mediterranean. They have rivers in the Loire, so grab a bottle of Chinon for the next time you plan a picnic next to a stream. Smoked trout, paté, or a Loire chèvre with a crusty baguette will pair quite nicely with this juicy Cab Franc rosé. –Clark Z. Terry

 

Chinon Rosé “Charles Joguet”

  • Juice is obtained by saignée, with attention paid to gentle extraction
  • Long, slow fermentations at cooler temperatures in stainless steel
  • The wine does not undergo malolactic fermentation – a choice made to keep the freshness of the grapes

 

TECHNICAL INFORMATION

  • Vintage 2016
  • Bottle Size:  750mL
  • Blend:  Cabernet Franc
  • Appellation:  Chinon
  • Country:  France
  • Region:  Loire
  • Vineyard:  30 years average
  • Soil:  Sliceous alluvial sand
  • Winemaker:  Kevin Fontaine
  • Farming:  Organic
  • Alcohol:  13%

 

Charles Joguet

The wines of Chinon have long been celebrated. French humanist and native son, François Rabelais, sang their praises as far back as the sixteenth century. However, the distinction with which the appellation is regarded today is due in part to the legacy left by a more contemporary icon: Charles Joguet. This young painter and sculptor abandoned a budding art career to assume direction of the family domaine in 1957. He soon began to question the common practice of selling grapes to negociants, as his own family had done for years.

The Joguets owned prime vineyard land in between the Loire and Vienne Rivers, with some of their finest found on the left bank of the Vienne, just outside Chinon, in Sazilly. These very lieux-dits had been recognized for their character and defined before the Renaissance—some even date back to the Middle Ages. Variations in the soils of these alluvial plains were substantial enough to realize that he was sitting on what would be considered in other regions as premier cru and grand cru vineyards. To sell the grapes off or to vinify these individualized plots together would have been madness. Separate terroirs, he believed, necessitate separate vinifications. Over the course of his tenure, Charles took the risks necessary to master the single-vineyard bottling with an artistry that A.O.C. Chinon had never before seen. In so doing, he realized the true potential of the land.

Charles has since retired. Today, the young, eager, and talented Kevin Fontaine oversees the vineyards and the cellars. He and his team farm thirty-six hectares of Cabernet Franc. Closely adhering to the tradition of Charles, the domaine bottles nine different cuvées, handling each one as a unique terroir and microclimate with individualized care and attention.  That ethic trickles into the cellars as well, where careful deliberation and experimentation bring about gradual change.

The wines are divided into two lines: precocious cuvées and those for long-aging. Precocious cuvées, like the “Cuvée Terroir” and “Les Petites Roches” (Little Rocks), are made to be consumed young. If premier crus were permitted in Chinon, Les Varennes du Grand Clos would certainly be considered one of them. Clos du Chêne Vert and Clos de la Dioterie are perhaps their greatest wines—certainly of grand cru quality—with excellent aging potential. Those who are convinced that the best Cabernet Franc grows in Bordeaux may quickly transfer their allegiance to the Loire upon tasting these classic, appellation-defining Chinons. The purity of fruit, the exceptional delineation of aromas and flavors, the soulful reflection of terroirs, and the extraordinary seductiveness of the texture make the wines from Joguet second to none.