The Wine
Soft purple in colour with a ruby hue, initial notes of earth and spice lead into aromas of fresh blackberries and cherry oak. The palate is soft and balanced with spiced currants and blackberries up front. As the wine moves through your mouth notes of dark chocolate and sour cherry take over. The wine finishes with a savoury earthiness and soft palatable acidity. Enjoy with lamb pizza, or pasta ragu.
Winemaking
The grapes for this wine were sourced from a grower in the Myrrhee Valley, a small section of the King Valley. This grape variety tends to be quite juicy, so once the fruit was pressed twenty percent was drained off to increase the concentration of wine. 50% of the grapes were fermented in stainless steel bins and the other 50% fermented in open top concrete vats. We used hand plunging to aid soft extraction of the tannins and flavours. The fermentation temperatures were kept between 24˚C and 28˚C to maintain fruit characters and help develop the mouth-feel of the wine.
Maturation
Type of oak: 100% Gamba, 30% Nevers, 40% Fontainebleau, Trancais 30%
Oak age: old large barrels
Fining agent: egg white
Oak toasting: 100% medium
Filtration: Crossflow filtration
Final Analysis
Alcohol: 13.8%
Alc/Vol Acid: 6.2 g/L
pH: 3.54
Bottled: June 2018 Released: July 2018