2022 Amber Gewürztraminer
White WineThis wine is a result of the winemaking team going rogue while the Winemaker was away!
Our 2022 Amber Gewürztraminer is an ‘orange wine’ – a wine made from white grapes, but instead of pressing the grapes before ferment, this wine was naturally fermented ‘on the skins.’ The result is a white wine with some colour and a lot more texture than traditional white wines. Many orange wines are also ‘natural wines,’ or wines where nothing is added (yeast, nutrients, sulphites) along the way. Natural wines can also require an undying belief in natures process – fermentation can be fast or slow, the wine can ‘go sideways’ during the ageing process, and the startling taste mid-ageing eventually turns into a delicate and delicious wine. Luckily this wine came around for us to enjoy.
Only 66 cases were made.
TASTING NOTES:
The first thing you will notice when you lift your glass to smell this wine will be the classic Gewürztraminer aromas of rose petal and lychee intermingled with a floral perfume. The delicate flavours include pears, peaches, apricots and oranges. You will taste orange marmalade and dried orange peel mixed with a hint of cinnamon and cardamom. This is a dry wine with a citrus finish.
WINEMAKING NOTES:
This wine is a result of the winemaking team going “rogue” while the Head Winemaker was away! The Gewürztraminer fruit arrived at the crush pad and the team decided to make a skin fermented Gewürztraminer . The fruit was destemmed and put into an open top fermenter where it was left to ferment naturally without commercial yeasts or additives. The must was punched down twice a day during its slow fermentation. This method extracts colour and tannins from the skins into the wine. Once the wine was fermented to dryness it was pressed off the skins and put into neutral oak barrels to age for 8 months before bottling.
WINEMAKER’S COMMENTS:
Winter was long, spring even longer. Cold and wet all the way into July. Luckily for us, August showed up with aplomb. We had the warmest August on record in the South Okanagan, and it began a run of weather that “saved the vintage”. There was a 6 week stretch of near-perfect weather, and week by week we started to see the vines catch up and reach near-perfect maturity. Slowly but steadily each variety started to come into form and ripeness. Harvest lasted well into November. The wines are fantastic!
NOTES:
Production – only 66 cases produced
Alcohol – 12.0%
Varietals – 100% Gewürztraminer
Vinification – hand-picked, destemmed and naturally fermented (no commercial yeast or additives) in open top fermentor, aged for 8 months in neutral oak barriques
Cellaring – we’ve never made one of these… who knows?!