WineSmith 1999 Crucible
Matt Kramer, eat your heart out! This is "real wine" with incredibly dense, melted
tannins. Its two-ton harvest was the entire focus of our winemaking
consulting team for the '99 harvest. Picked on November 1st at the
peak of phenolic ripeness, these small berries yielded very low
volumes of intensely tannic juice packed with the blueberry aromas
typical of Tulucay Vineyard on the east edge of Napa town.
Midway through fermentation, free-run was drawn into barrels to help extract its incredible color and to add body
and sweetness. The remaining juice macerated the skins for an additional 28 days. A special tank was then
fabricated for the wine's exact volume, providing the height requirements to enable the use of some new
techniques to elevate its tannins into a dense, fine structure with powerful properties of aromatic integration.
Color is the key to refined structure. Our goal was to achieve three years of maturation, marrying
together elements of fruit, oak and tannin into an integrated structure of great mass, refinement and depth.
To accomplish this, we began a pre-malolactic micro-oxygenation, stabilizing the wine's considerable pigment.
During a six-week period, this massive wine was able to absorb 100 barrel-equivalents and still remain reductive!
Incredibly, the wine asked for a post-ML refinement of the tannin at eight barrel-equivalents of oxygen,
not barreling down until June of 2000, which enabled an additional 26 months in wood. Lees removed during
initial élevage were returned to barrel. Weekly lees stirring enrobed the tannins, resulting in a creamy
supporting structure. Because of the enormous dimensions of this structure, a complete tertiary
Brettanomyces fermentation was well incorporated, enhancing the wine's soulful profundity.
"Great wine should offer us an immediate impression, an instantly recognizable personality," says Clark.
"What you have here is Schwartzeneger in a tux."
| 90 cases were produced. |
Retail price $100 per bottle. |
Maximum order 6 bottles. |
No discounts. |
Tell me more about:
- Micro-Oxygenation
- Color and structure
- Lees & structure
- Brettanomyces and profundity
- What's Up with Matt Kramer?
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