The 2006 Santa Barbara County Syrah combines fruit from most of the vineyards we work with. As usual, it is big and bold, and clearly more than the sum of its parts. This year’s vintage has flavors reminiscent of Croze Hermitage - powerful, dark, tar-y, fruit, spicy stuff, with a sweet, full finish. It is a serious wine that is approachable in its youth. Sharing the same farming and winemaking techniques as our vineyard designated wines, it is a wine of great complexity and lower price. (998 cases produced)
• This wine includes fruit from the Thompson, Larner, Lafond and Verna’s vineyards.
• Larner Syrah harvested between October 28th (Clone 174 25.8 brix, 3.4 pH) (Clone 383, 25.4 brix, 3.6 pH)
• Verna’s Vineyard Syrah harvested between November 6th (Clone 174, 26.0 brix, 3.6 pH) (Clone 877, 26.4 brix, 3.5 pH).
• Thompson Vineyard Syrah harvested October 24th at 26.0 brix, 3.35 pH.
• No Viognier was added to this wine.
• The fruit was stemmed but not crushed. Intact, whole berries were placed in small bin boxes for fermentation.
• RC212, D254, and W.S. yeast used.
• Fermented on the skins for 14 days as individual lots in small bin boxes. Cold soaked for 48 hours before primary fermentation was initiated,
• Went through ML fermentation, completing in April
• Slightly less than one third of the barrels used for aging were new, and the rest were older. Roughly half of the barrels were made of American oak. The rest were French oak.
• Wine was racked in July, and again before bottling.
• Unfined and lightly filtered.
• Bottled in August 2007.
Food Pairing: This is a highly flavored wine which works well with similarly flavorful food. Try dark sauces, even some with dark fruit. Makes a great reduction sauce. Try spiced or BBQ pork, lamb, or beef. Slow roasted short-ribs in syrah reduction cannot be beat. Seared, spiced Ahi is a favorite, as is smoked salmon.