TASTE BENCHMARKS |
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Profile #1
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Appearance |
Dense gold. |
Aroma |
Stylized white Bordeaux style. Grassy notes well integrated into a complex nose with licorice and peach accents with a faint weediness very much in the background. |
Flavor |
Rich and structured with excellent acidity. |
Balance |
Full, good alcohol balance, mild acidity offsets fatness. |
PRODUCTION CORRELATIONS |
Oenological |
Extensive barrel age and lees stirring. |
Viticultural |
Capable of large scale, economical precision viticulture similar to the factory farms of the Monterey AVA, resulting in rich wines which are quite affordable. Doug Meader can be credited with the introduction os Sauvignon Musque, whose floral jasmin notes are used today to offset the region's herbal tendencies. |
Terroir |
Although this appellation has sunken river bed to its west which shelters vines from wind, this is reserved for red wines, and whites are grown mostly on the exposed alluvial fan to the east, owing their richness, ripeness and natural sweetness to its distance from the Pacific and its rocky subsoils. |