If you are not familiar with #Cabernet Day, it's a social media wine tasting event where wine lovers around the world celebrate Cabernet Sauvignon and share a virtual tasting in coordination with live pourings in all of the great Cabernet growing regions around the world!
We will be sharing our 2007 Aurielle Cabernet, the wine Robert Parket gave 93 points and called "Exuberant and Opulent; A new discovery".
As harvest approached, careful scientific analysis of both sugar and acid levels were conducted almost daily. The final picking decision however, was decided strictly by flavor profile as determined by the educated palettes and collective experience of the winegrowers and Aurielle’s winemaker, Chad Alexander.
Harvest was conducted in the cool morning hours and the grapes were rushed to the winery for crushing and de-stemming. The must was then chilled to 55 degrees and the wine was left to cold soak for 1 week before a gradual rise in temperature enabled the natural yeast to begin fermentation. Twice daily punch-downs were conducted in small open –top fermentors. After fermentation to dryness was completed, the wine went through an additional 3 week extended maceration process to extract maximum color and tannins that perfectly match the intense flavors of the mountain grown fruit.
A state of the art bladder press was used to extract the wine from the must and only free-run juices were kept. The wine was aged following a complex barrel program designed to create a unique and distinctive flavor and aroma profile of exceptional complexity. French oak was used exclusively with 80 percent of barrels being new and 20 percent being used once. Four different premium coopers were represented and 20% of the barrels were specifically sourced from The Limousin forrest in France Howell Mountain and Mount Veeder Mount Veeder
