2020 Las Jaras Old Vinde Rose...$26.99
Gary Venturi Vineyard: 83% old vine, dry farmed, organic: carignan, zinfandel and petite sirah
Hillside Vineyards: 15% old vine, dry farmed, certified organic: zinfandel
Ricetti Vineyards Carignan: 2% old vine, dry farmed, certified organic: carignan
Yes, this is a pink party wine—but it’s a classy pink party wine. This is a rosé you want to bring home to meet your parents. It deserves to be drunk alongside imported tinned fish, salted butter, and impeccably made, artisanal baguettes. If this rosé could talk, it would have a lilting French accent and quote Godard. Our approach to rosé is to think less about the varietal makeup and more about the style and vibe it conveys. So even though our cépage has changed—past vintages have been 100% carignan or only 35% zinfandel, whereas this vintage is 69% zinfandel—the wine is still an evolution of its signature style. Our goal is a wine that is both fruity and savory, and every year we nudge the wine into the direction it needs to go in a quest for balance, deliciousness and refreshment. On the nose, the 2020 Rosé is all about big red fruit and hibiscus. On the palate, it is packed with acid and minerality, with a bone-dry finish. It is also texturally interesting, as a result of destemming the zinfandel and pressing immediately.
The Carignan for this wine was whole cluster pressed as soon as the fruit was received at the winery. This method of juice extraction gives us a savory and mineral laden wine with a fine texture. The Zinfandel was destemmed as soon as it got to the winery, after which, we added it to the press with its stems. This allowed us to get great red fruit character and avoid extracting too much bitterness. We added 10ppm sulfur and after 24 hours of settling the wines we racked for native primary fermentation. Once these lots had fermented to dryness, we combined them into one tank for storage on their lees until bottling at cool temperatures to discourage malo-lactic fermentation, but it went through anyway. Close to the bottling date we added a small amount of sulfur and filtered the wine.
2019 Las Jaras Glou Glou Red Wine...$23.99
54% Zinfandel, 37% Carignan, 5% Petite Sirah, 3% Pinot Noir, 1% Cabernet Sauvignon
This vintage can make your homebound meal sing. Glou Glou is the kind of light red that tastes like sparkles and bright, summer fruit. It has enough acid to stand up to your favorite pasta and tomato sauce, with intense berry notes that can perfectly complement a smoky, tangy BLT. Serve slightly chilled—this is the most refreshing red wine ever, and the perfect antidote to long evenings at home. Most of the grapes underwent carbonic maceration, the classic fermentation method of the Beaujolais, which means that fermentation happened inside of berries themselves, causing them to explode in happy, boozy ecstasy. That’s how you’ll feel when you drink this wine—it dances in your mouth. It is great, you will love it.
To make this wine we assembled 29 small lots that had been vinified separately using various fermentation techniques to make a layered cohesive blend. Most of the lots were fermented with carbonic maceration, a gentle process that helps to keep early-harvest wines from becoming too tannic. After 5-9 days, depending on the lot, we pressed the juice off its skins where they fermented natively in tank. Then, to keep the wine bright and fresh, half of the lots were aged in barrels and half were aged in stainless steel tank. This wine received no additions except for a small amount of sulfur and it was filtered prior to bottling. We do not degas our wines, so it may have a bit of spritz, especially when young.
2018 Las Jaras Sweet Berry Wine...$29.99
54% Carignan | 28% Zinfandel | 12% Charbono | 3% Cabernet Sauvignon | 3% Valdiguie
Old Vines | Mendocino County
We are so excited to share the 2018 Sweet Berry Wine with you! This was a long, cool vintage, which resulted in a nuanced, refined wine that will age wonderfully. It’s perfect for long, autumn evenings with friends—grab a warm blanket, start a fire, and watch as the flames illuminate the beautiful, deep ruby wine inside your glass. As the days grow shorter and colder, you’ll find even more occasions to pop open a bottle: holiday dinners, après-ski at the lodge, New Years Eve. This wine is loaded with spice and bright, berry fruit, making it wonderfully versatile with food. We hope it’s a wine you’ll keep coming back to for years to come – for your health!
The grapes for this blend are grown on old vines and sourced from vineyards in Mendocino and Sonoma Counties. Most of the Carignan, Zinfandel and Charbono grapes come from Gary Venturi’s vineyard in Calpella, where they are dry farmed using sustainable farming techniques and grown in Yokayo sandy loam soils. Nine percent of the Carignan comes from the organic Riccetti vineyard in Redwood Valley. We also source some fruit from Green Valley in Solano County: Valdiguie from Quail Run vineyard and a bit of Carignan from Parenti Vineyard, both organically grown. The Cabernet grapes are sustainably farmed on Sonoma Mountain at Berger’s Oak Shade Ranch in Goulding on volcanic gravelly loam soils.
