I’ve posted a portion of a report on a March day-trip with Sasha Verhage of Eno Wines to several Paso Robles wineries and tasting rooms. A full report on all of the visits is on the Grape-Nutz.com website:
Paso Robles - March 2013
Denner Vineyards
Epoch Estate Wines
Nicora Wine
Brian Benson Cellars
Law Estate Wines
Sasha Verhage and Scott Hawley
Law Estate Wines
Sasha and I headed out to Vineyard Drive and arrived back at Denner to find Anthony and Paul enjoying a Friday late-afternoon beer. But we had more wine to taste so we walked down to the barrel room once again and met Scott Hawley there. Scott has his own label – Torrin Vineyard – but Sasha and I were mainly there to taste wines from Law Estate Wines, a brand-new project that he also makes the wines for. Both the Torrin and Law wines are currently produced at the Denner facility. Don and Susie Law are from Colorado, and planted their vineyard site along Peachy Canyon Road on the Westside of Paso Robles in 2008. The label’s first releases, around 160 cases from the 2010 vintage, will be released later this year. Four wines will make up this initial release: “Audacious,” a blend of 44% Grenache, 26% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Syrah, 10% Petit Sirah; “Beguiling,” with 94% Grenache and 6% Syrah; “Sagacious,” featuring 44% Grenache, 42% Syrah, and 14% Mourvèdre; and the 100% Syrah “Intrepid.”
Noted Central Coast viticulturist John Crossland of Vineyard Professional Services designed the vineyard layout, with input from both the Laws and from Scott. At an elevation of about 1,900 feet, most of the vineyard is planted to several clones of Grenache and Syrah along with Mourvèdre, Petite Sirah, Cabernet Sauvignon, Petit Verdot, Carignane, and Tempranillo. Scott told us that the vineyard soils are mostly the calcareous shale typical of the area. He noted that the environment of this area is similar to parts of Spain, so it’s appropriate that the grape varieties planted at Law are based largely on those used in the Priorat region of northeastern Spain. A new gravity-flow winery – with design input from Scott – should to be completed soon, located just across Peachy Canyon Road to the south of the main vineyard site. A tasting room there should be open by October and Laws plan to release their first wines at that time.
Scott told us that the vineyard currently has about 40 acres planted, and about 15 additional acres will be planted on the winery side of the road and about 6 acres more on the north side of the road. The Laws added more Mourvèdre since it did very well in 2010 and 2011, and they plan to interplant some Viognier and Roussanne with new Syrah vines, about 2½% of each white variety – Scott feels they will gain aromatics from the Viognier and texture from the Roussanne. Scott noted that at the high elevation, the vineyard is above the fog line, so the fruit came in riper in the cooler 2010 and 2011 vintages than at many lower-elevation vineyards that were more affected by fog. But he told us that even though the sugars can climb fairly high, the fruit retains lots of acidity. They are working on methods to modify the vine canopies to help keep sugar accumulation lower, and Scott feels that as the vines mature, they will regulate the sugar/acid balance better. He said ideally they would like to dry-farm the vineyard, but it’s still too early to tell whether this will be feasible.
The centerpiece of the new winery will be 22 new concrete fermenters made by Sonoma Cast Stone. Scott said they are about 3½-ton capacity and are roughly conical in shape, and they have a large top opening that will allow punchdowns on fermenting fruit. Heating and cooling coils are embedded into the concrete tank walls. Scott feels that the thermal aspect of the concrete tanks is their main attraction. The Law Grenache is all aged in puncheons, and Scott noted that they have a lot of newer ones at this point since their program is just getting started but the idea is to have more neutral puncheons available in the future.
All of the Law wines are made with estate-grown fruit. Wines are blended around July or August of the year following harvest, and the lees is kept in the barrels. The blended wines are then returned to barrel where they are aged until bottling the following May or June. Scott told us that in addition to the four current wines, Law may produce a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Petit Verdot, and Syrah in the future. He also said that his main winemaking goal for the Law wines is to dial in the texture, looking for weight and feel in the wine from the front to back of the palate.
We tasted seven barrel samples of 2011 wines with Scott. He started us out with a 100% Grenache sample, from head-trained Alban and Spanish clones. Made with about 30% whole clusters, Scott said this went through a long, slow fermentation, spending 5½ weeks on skins. Bright and fruit-forward, this had aromas of ripe strawberry and spice, with a minerally mouthfeel and medium-big tannins.
All of the remaining wines we tasted with Scott had already been blended and will be bottled in the coming months. We tried a sample of the “Beguiling” blend, about 85-90% Grenache along with a little Syrah and Mourvèdre. With a noticeably darker color than the first wine, this also displayed a darker fruit profile and a grippier tannic finish. We followed that by the “Sagacious” – about 40% Syrah with 30% each Grenache and Mourvèdre. Very darkly colored, this had floral scents along with black fruits, pepper, and earth, with a great texture. The first three samples had all been tasted from puncheons, and Scott then pulled a sample of the “Sagacious” from a barrique – he told us the final wine will be about half each from puncheon and barrique. This had a more charry oak and coffee character, with less upfront fruit and chewier tannins.
Moving on to another sample from barrique, we tried the “Intrepid”, which is 100% Syrah. Scott described this as being the big Paso-style wine of the bunch. Mostly 174 clone Syrah from near the top of the vineyard, this was very dark in color, big, ripe, and fruit-forward, with some notes of spice, tar, and coffee. We shifted gear briefly to taste Scott’s 2011 Torrin “Akasha.” Another 100% Syrah but from a site situated more in the cooler Templeton Gap area, this featured distinct cool-climate character, with olive and herb, pepper, smoked meat, dark fruit, and fine tannins. Our final wine of the day was the Law “Audacious” – about 40% Grenache, 30% Cabernet Sauvignon, plus some Syrah and Petite Sirah. Scott mentioned that future “Audacious” blends may add Carignane and drop the Petite Sirah. Almost inky color, this displayed a stony, minerally component along with blueberry and plum fruit, some coffee notes, and a grippy tannic finish.
I’m sure that Law Estate Wines will make a splash when they release their first wines later this year. The wines that Sasha and I tasted with Scott are very much in the mold of those from other highly-regarded Paso Robles producers. Favorite barrel samples included the Law Grenache, “Sagacious” from puncheon, “Audacious,” as well as the Torrin “Akasha.” As I’ve found with other new wineries sourcing fruit from very young estate vineyards, it will probably take a few years for the Law wines to really find their own style, but with Scott working on them from the start, I think he’ll lead them in a distinct direction before very long.
Denner Vineyard
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