Is it a new release if a wine is over five years old?
How about 10?
Personally, I think most new-release events happen one to three years too soon. Most wines aren’t given any time to evolve in the bottle before they get shoved out the door.
Our older customers may remember the Paul Masson winery ads, “We sell no wine before it’s time.” But the rest of the sentence would have been, “Our accountants tell us when it’s time.” Bankers and accountants are behind the myth that white wines don’t age, and you should drink them fresh. It certainly isn’t true! Château d’Yquem? Les Grande Marques Champagnes? White Burgundy? We can make a long list of wines we cannot afford to drink that have aged significantly.
Well, we are finally releasing our 2015 Paradisos Red. The original plan was to release it in 2020. Traffic to tasting rooms started declining after 2008; we were still on an up trajectory, but after 2016 the trend was definitely down. We were caught by our optimism.
But the wine has evolved very nicely with the extra five years. It should be lovely for another five or more.
This vintage brought Cabernet Sauvignon back into significant contribution along with Malbec and Cabernet Franc. We planted those in 2012 and harvested enough to make a full contribution in 2015; the 2014 harvest was pretty tiny and only contributed about 1-2% of the 2014 Rojo Paradiso.
Is it better? How is it different from the 2014 vintage?
That is a personal opinion, of course. Most folks who blind-tasted both vintages had a hard time discerning differences; their preferences were split.
I like them both; I can’t say I have a clear preference. The 15% of the blend from the new varieties brings a bit more of those molecules we call tannins, even if most aren’t. Firmer structure? More depth? More complex? I’ll agree with those perspectives.
The vintages before 2014 had grapes from our friends at Konowoc Vineyard, not certified organic but mostly so.
After 2013, we committed to Zero Pesticides in our vineyard and making wine only from grapes grown without pesticides. So, 2014 was a bit of a variant, hence the name Rojo Paradiso; the largest parts were grape varieties from the Latin-speaking places of some of my migrant ancestors.
This is therefore our first Paradisos Red with all the cultivars we wanted, in the quantity we wanted, and made entirely from Zero-Pesticide grapes. I know, I know, only exciting to me. But hey, I got to my long-time goal! This wine started in 1991, when I decided to make a wine meant to shine with a great, hand-crafted pepperoni pizza. This wine checks all the boxes except one. The international wine bottle trade was thrown into disarray in 2017, with stupid tariffs on Chinese wine bottles. Suddenly, the made-in-Seattle, clear glass, 90% post-consumer recycled, lightweight bottle we were using got sucked up by the big wineries.
We are tiny; we don’t buy truckloads of bottles. We are not at the top of the customer list. So, we were left with made-in-China, lightweight, recycled glass, but in green, which is much less likely to get recycled.
But the grapes!
Sangiovese, Temprañillo, Cabernet Sauvignon, Lemberger, Zinfandel, Cabernet Franc, Malbec: the varieties I wanted, in the proportions desired, not just Organic but actually Zero Pesticide, ingredient-labeled, which wasn’t possible in decades past. Large producers of alcoholic beverages got ingredient-labeled products made illegal!? Thanks to a movement led by Ridge Winery and California representatives, the rules finally got changed.
They don’t want you to know what they use. We do.
So, folks, it’s ready to leave home. As always, satisfaction is guaranteed, so there’s no risk in buying without tasting.
