A blend of vintages, this Vermouth has spicy nutty flavors alongside more vibrant fresh fruit characteristics. A little sweet balanced with bitter freshness. Serve chilled on its own or add to a favorite cocktail.
Variety: Flora, Viognier
Location: Napa Valley, CA
Alcohol: 17.0%
Production: 415 cases
Complex spices and herbal notes of mint, fennel, clove, and nutmeg on the nose give way to orange zest, pine, fig and cherry cola on the palate with a lightly bitter finish.
The grapes are fermented whole cluster with daily punchdowns to increase the extraction of flavors and phenolics. The wine is macerated for seven days before being pressed and transferred to a mix of old brandy casks and neutral French oak barrels for aging. The young wine is folded into their solera, and the portion bottled each year is a blend of multiple vintages with the oldest wine coming from 2015. The older wine provides dried fruit and nutty aromas which are balanced by the vibrancy and fresh citrus notes of the younger wine. The base wine is mixed with infusions of their own blend of fruit, herbs, and spices, many of which they grow themselves. Homegrown blood oranges, sour cherries, and coriander seed amplify the fruit notes from the base wine. Cardoons from the Matthiasson garden, foraged wormwood, and chinchona bark provide the bitter notes that bring depth and balance the residual sugar. All infusions are made in neutral grape brandy. This is Matthiasson's seventh batch in the twelve years since the first release. The wine is bottled unfined and unfiltered to preserve the complex aromas and flavors from the infusions.
Flora is a rare variety bred at UC Davis in the 1950s to be a base for fortified wines. Flora is a natural cross between Semillon and Gewurztraminer. Each year the fruit is picked very late, with some botrytis and raisins at harvest. A small amount of Viognier was also used, harvested as raisins and fermented whole cluster.