2012 BY Unrefined Rose
| Vintage: | 2012 |
| Varietal Composition: | |
| 65% | Cabernet Franc |
| 25% | Merlot |
| 10% | Syrah |
| Harvest Date: | September 14-October 21, 2012 |
| Sugar: | 20.4 avg brix |
| Acid: | 5.14 g/l |
| PH: | 3.62 |
| Aging: | Virginia Oak - 7 months |
| Barrel Aging: | |
| 7 months | |
| 100% | Neutral Virginia Oak |
| Ageability: | drink now |
| Fermentation: | Virginia Oak |
| Bottling Date: | June 21, 2013 |
| Residual Sugar: | 0 |
| Alcohol %: | 12.5 |
A really cool coppery salmon colored wine with intrigue all the way through. The nose is perfumed and inviting with pomegranate, strawberry, rose petal and even a rosemary note to it. The palate is almost alarmingly full and round for a Rose which at first is shocking, but then just lovely. There is a creaminess with the delicious strawberry preserve type notes that just keeps you coming back for more. It is all balanced and held together with just enough acidity showing the nature of 2012. A very cool Rose like none other.
The fruit came from the Road block of Nevaeh Vineyard which is the flattest part of our vineyards and dominated by heavy red clay (Penn Silt Loam) creating lighter more fruit driven wines. We also bled off some of the juice from the Merlot and Syrah juice with a little more richness and complexity. The Cabernet Franc from this block tends to be a bit lighter and more elegant with brighter characters lending itself well to Rose. Harvest Conditions: The 2012 is said to be one of winemaker Jordan Harris’ favorite vintages to date. While some vineyard around the state did suffer from a little too much rain at harvest, many of the sites that Boneyard Wines works with really got away lucky. Nevaeh in particular with the small rain shadow of the Catoctins and the weather patterns that follow the Potomac really meant that Nevaeh didn’t receive any rain through the 2012 harvest season. It only benefited from the slightly lower resulting temperatures of nearby rains and the lack of humidity. In the end the 2012 season was about having some of the best balanced wines we have seen to date. The season started very early with an almost alarmingly warm and early spring causing bud-break in late March. It stayed warm so there were no significant frost issues that we were worried about. After that the summer never really heated up too much with the exception of the last two weeks of July and the first week of August. All together that put the harvest back on normal schedule which was superb since a worry had to harvest in the heat of the summer. The prolonged and generally mild season resulted in vibrant acidity, massive flavor concentration, moderate alcohol and beautifully ripe tannins. An overall very well balanced year unlike any we have seen in a long time.
This is a Rose like no other. We decided to take a completely different path in making this wine, looking for creaminess and a richness to complement the charming fruit of this heavily Cabernet Franc Rose. The Cabernet Franc was destemmed and pressed whole berry so got very little skin contact and therefore less color. The Merlot and Syrah were saignee portions pulled from the red lots to add some depth and character. The wine was all fermented in neutral Virginia oak with indigenous yeast. The late season ferment stayed pretty cool fermenting outside so dragged on for about 4 weeks to dryness allowing great aromatics to be preserved. We then allow the wine to go through malo-lactic fermentation to get a more round mouthfeel and a luxurious creamy note. The wine stayed in barrel for 7 months with lees stirring every other week. The wine was bottled in June 2013.
This is a Rose that works well with some of the richer foods most don’t think of with Rose. Awesome with Game birds like Guinea Hen or Quail served in pan juices with potatoes au gratin. It is also pretty awesome lounging by the pool though. Hey, this us Boneyard baby, there are no rules.
222 cases