2018 Big Basin Homestead Red Blend, Central Coast, California, USA
ABOUT THIS WINE
Grenache from Brosseau, Coastview and our estate vineyard provides the backbone of this wine. Additional components include: 90+ year old, dry farmed Carignane from the Cienega Valley located below Calera's Mount Harlan AVA and Syrah from the Coastview Vineyard located just miles South of Mt. Harlan at 2400 ft as well as Brosseau vineyard in Chalone. This vintage has a smaller amount of old vine Mourvedre from the Rodnick Farm Vineyard in Chalone (formerly Antle). This wine embodies the vivacity and freshness we strive to capture in every wine we hand craft. Just as with our top cuvées, all fermentations are with indigenous yeast, never larger than 1 1/2 tons and minimal intervention. Only neutral and used barrels were used to age this wine preserving the purity of fruit.
ABOUT THIS PRODUCER
Our 10 acres of estate vineyards are CCOF Certified Organic. Mountainside sites can be challenging environments for grapevines to thrive in, so we employ sustainable and organic farming practices with our partner vineyards, as well, utilizing composts to attain optimum soil health.
Our terraced hillside estate vineyards are challenging and strenuous to farm organically, but we think the special character of the fruit makes the effort well worth it.
Balance is key. We prune, thin shoots, and drop fruit to avoid excessive canopy growth and overcropping. We harvest when the stems are fully lignified so that we can utilize whole clusters in our fermentations without imparting astringency or excess tannin to the wine. And in our high rainfall region, we maintain a cover crop in the vineyard to hold the soil.
All vineyard work is done lovingly by hand to ensure that the grapes we grow represent the fullest expression of the vineyard and vintage.