Finished up the season's bottling yesterday - 5 cases of our '06 Marsanne/Viognier blend. Along with two '05 reds (Merlot and Syrah), the '06 Pear wine, and the small batch of '06 Pomegranate dessert wine; all in all a good year. Plenty of wine now in the cellar awaiting corks to be pulled. Highlight of the year has to be the Marsanne/Viognier blend. The decison to blend the two was a complete fluke; a friend had some unspoken-for Viognier on the vine that we vinified, and the relatively low volumes of each (ended up with a total of 11.5 gallons of the blended wine) seemed to beg blending them. We're thrilled we did. The wine has an aromatic nose of citrus and peach, and a crisp palate although somewhat short finish. Only wish we had twice as much. Low point of the year - the '05 Merlot. What a disaster. H2S problems caused us to throw out much of the vintage early. We thought we had salvaged 5 gallons - but there is still a hint of some strange circumstance on the nose. But "she-who-must-be-obeyed" likes it, which is good enough for me! Looking forward to this next season, despite the loss of much of our fruit due to the April frosts. Will be purchasing our red wine grapes, but planning on the same 70-30 Marsanne/Viognier blend again. Cheers to everyone else - and hoping that your cellars are full.
- posted
16 years ago