Merlot without new oak means you can taste what Merlot tastes like. This wine is earthy and savory with cranberry, pomegranate, cherry, nutmeg, allspice and hoison. The color is stunning and this wine really benefits from a decant, allowing the perfume to integrate and develop. High acid and all the high tones, this wine will age for decades. Yes, decades.
These grapes were destemmed and fully crushed into an open top fermenter and given a loving dose of sulfur. The grapes fermented natively, and the cap was punched down twice a day. Pressed off its skins when dry, after 14 days, and transferred to neutral oak barrels. The wine was given a second loving dose of sulfur after malolactic fermentation, which was also native. The wine was racked once in the first spring after harvest. Bottled un-fined and unfiltered.
72 cases produced.
2018 Pass Sonoma Valley Merlot
$29.00
Ryan: “This is from the very southern mouth of Sonoma Valley, right behind the old Fremont diner. It is jutting out into the Carneros region, heavier soils but lots of wind, cool climate and a lot more like Bordeaux than on top of a mountain. So we’re able to pick with tremendous amounts of acidity, low sugar, but those grapes are fully ripe, with lignified brown seeds. I make this pretty much how I make the Farella, but I use wild yeast and wild ML.
When I first started at Farella, Tom was teaching me about his Merlot philosophies, and he was talking about the reasons his is different and how he likes to make it. The problem with Merlot, and the same with Cab Franc, is that it’s often made like Cabernet, but those varietals are not the same. Merlot needs to be treated more like a Pinot Noir. If you can find a site that will allow you to pick early, you can retain much more earthiness and savoriness out of that grape, and stay away from the big bold jam. That was the case with a lot of Merlot in California.
This is a 12.8% alcohol Merlot, and I think it is a very classic example of Merlot.”