EXTENDED!! Wishing everyone happy 2018 with 25-35% discounts! Thanks for taking a minute to check out a small producer and contemplate benefits of slow ripening in cooler corners of Napa Valley. Grateful to be part of BDay fun since 2012. Last year, 44% of my orders were repeaters! All forgone margins worth this sweet TN:
Has Anyone Been Drinking BerserkerDay Wines Lately?
Post #197 by Michael Martin » Sat Apr 29, 2017 7:16 pm
2008 Virage. Cab Franc Merlot. Awesome Bordeaux blend wine. I’ll buy these again.
Post #128 by Michael Martin » Thu Mar 23, 2017 6:46 pm
2007 Virage BDX blend. This wine was a real treat. Prime drinking window for a cab franc/merlot dominated right bank type blend. After being open an hour it really sings. God I love Berserker Day just for getting a chance to buy wines like this one.
[u]Good descriptors on CT: 3/23/2017 - Mootsie Likes this wine: 93 Points[/u]
Three KILLER deals: – Flat Rate Shipping $15 About the wines: Depth, complexity, rich dark stonefruit, savory minerality and balance are signatures of these cool-climate CabFranc/Merlot/CS blends. Each vintage unique, all sisters. Grown in volcanic Forward soils of Carneros hillsides, the venerable Hyde Vineyards, plus red Aiken soils on Atlas Peak–nearly at the top, looking out over Stagecoach. 50% or less new, all French oak: Ermitage, Taransaud, Vicard, Saury, Alain Fouquet. I strive to produce wines reminiscent of the great blends of Right Bank Bordeaux.
More on why they taste so good below the photo of the Carneros vineyards… let’s get to the deals:
Top Berserker Faves 4PAK - $184.80 – 30% discount Click to Order
2 x 2007 Virage - 71%CabFranc 24%Merlot 5%Cabernet Sauvignon, <20 cases left
2 x 2008 Virage - 56%CabFranc 41%Merlot 3%Cabernet Sauvignon, ~10 cases left.
An irresistible chance for new Berserkers to catch up, with perfectly-aged library goodies.
Form Your Own Opinion 6PAK – $295.75 – 35% discount One-Click to Order!
Taste through this vertical of Virage reds in stock and choose your own favorite: One(1) each of 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012 and the extraordinary 94Pt 2012 Barrel Select (it’s to die for). Some vintages riper, some more subtle. Lots of details on the website, follow the link. KILLER KICKER: Taste thru and decide your favorites, I’ll honor this discount for any 6+bottle re-order shipped by end of May 2018!!
Winemaker Fave 6PAK - $304.20 - 35% discount One-Click to Order!
Vintner loves all her children, but when it came to evacuating during the Napa fires, with limited space in the Subaru, I grabbed a case of Virage 2007 Red, every 2012 Barrel Select in my cellar and two cases of my favorite rosé ever, 2015 Dry Rosé of CabFranc, sheer crisp minerality for winter seafood. I also took all the old Howell Mountain cabs Of course the dog and cat went first, then you look around and realize, the only things that matter are gifts, and creative things someone made by hand. And favorite CD’s… This is my MVP (for drinking now anyway!) bundle with two (2) bottles of each. Life is short and stock is low: y’all really should not miss these. Only 10 cases of 12 Barrel Select left…
OK, 4th Offer, the Wildly Popular Rosé 6PAK! $105.30 ($17.55ea!) One-Click to Order!
This is my favorite rosé ever produced by Virage, 2015 Dry Rosé of CabFranc, sheer crisp mineral and bone for winter seafood and salads and fish tacos in Spring. I’ve been making dry, direct-pressed rosé since 2010. This vintaqe I was lucky, with the only lot processed that harvest day, Labor Day, I got to split the grapes; half whole-cluster pressed and half de-stemmed and crushed/macerated, side by side. Hogging both presses all day. Oh, how we winemakers love an experiment. The ethereal aromatic bright clean whole-cluster (think sparkling wine before the secondary fermentation, totally colorless) and the tasty guava-pink macerated juice, fermented separately then blended, what a perfect combination. Nice CT Reviews!
UNLIMITED BONUS DEAL - 25%
Use COUPON code BDIX25 for 25% off any additional wines of your choice, including the 2012 Barrel Select! (3-bottle max per person). Make the 4PAK a 6PAK, the 6 into 12, all the same shipping cost! Have fun!
Formal press on Virage wines http://www.viragenapavalley.com/press
Of course, I’m available all day to answer questions, just REPLY below, or if you’re shy, PM me! Or email me emily@viragenapavalley.com
SHIPPING NOTE: Please ship to a business address; or, I’ll likely ask you to pick up at your local FedEx (except for full cases, I know that’s a PAIN). Just put in the notes OK to Hold at FedEx, or note your fave FedEx location (street name & City is good), all the local ones pop up when I create the order. Not only does it save me five bucks (you want to help your small winery keep prices down!), but you never miss the truck. In any case, I’ll be in contact before shipping, sometimes it works best to home deliver as FedEx does residential ground deliveries Saturdays, good for a 5-day-distance city IF YOU’RE SURE TO BE HOME. I cannot ship to NY, NH, KY, UT. Remember you can buy wine from CA, pay CA sales tax, take possession in CA, and I’ll deliver to a local Bay Area service of your choice so you can ship your wine to yourself. I recommend BODEGA SHIPPING ST.HELENA. My website explains how to do this: put the winery address or your shipper address, choose “Winery Pickup” as Shipping Method, and I’ll deliver N/C to your shipper with your contact information.
More on the benefits of cool climate for those interested… Initially, some find the idea of cooler weather to conjure images of green, thin wine; in fact, while counter-intuitive, a temperate climate can be a significant advantage (consider say, Bordeaux). Above a certain heat level, many wine grapes simply shut down and do not progress–Cabernet Franc seems to be one of them; like a redhead, she is not happy in powerful sun. I guess I relate. That’s not to say she can’t survive; I live in St. Helena, but I hate the heat! Zinfandel and that robust cross of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc can thrive in heat, where more sensitive varieties fall behind. One benefit of cooler daytime highs is the natural acid complexes are not lost through transpiration. I just prefer the character of natural acids to added tartaric acid powder. So we hang longer, develop nuances of character with later-harvested grapes, seeking optimally riped tannins, flavors and aromatics–all together. Of course, the same happens with high-altitude, mountain fruit, which is expensive to farm. There are many ways to optimize a varietal by site, and I find the volcanic soils of the little valleys tucked into Carneros hills above Hwy121 (essentially the pre-foothills of Mt. Veeder to the north) to be one of those spots with conditions just right for growing incredibly supple, intoxicating Cabernet Franc and richly-structured Merlot, and blended they create magic, as they do in Right Bank Bordeaux.
OK, so why rosé?? In California, a lot of CabFranc was planted in places it just doesn’t excel (hence the misunderstanding of the varietal as lean and green). Luckily, I encountered a few of those spots and decided to try harvesting at low brix (21-22) to produce a direct-pressed dry rosé–which is how a Right-Bank Bordeaux blender came to produce southern-French style rosé from CabFranc! And a clean, minerally, savory non-floral rosé it is, which really hits the mark for me. I have found outstanding CabFranc Rosé from the Loire as well (love Domaine Vacheron and Cuvee Marie Justine from Chinon). Opportunity borne of gratuitous happenstance years ago before the rosé madness, when there was literally ONE producer of good dry rose’ in all of Napa Valley (Sinskey, who also appreciates the cooler days and warmer nights of bay-close Carneros). With most California rosés being created of saignee from high-brix wines (it’s a whole nuther paragraph to explain why, for me, that doesn’t work), at that time I was a case-a-year habit with that gorgeous Bandol Rosé, Domaine Tempier, introduced to me when I was in culinary school. Well, enough, pardon me running on…
A personal note to my Berserker Friends: This day means a lot to me. Where have I been all year?? Managing a wine business is brutal in Napa Valley, especially in 2017 when we were not once but twice declared a disaster zone. Check out the 120+ foot Douglas Fir tree that blew down against my cute historic cabin here in the foothills in the February storms! I live and work in 700sf; can’t lose my sweet guest cabin. I’d die without visitors. Just one of me to go around, so the daily battle with insurance, brokers, contractors–and now lawyers–meant no bottling in 2017 and unlikely I’ll be producing in 2018. But, on the bright side, my little compound didn’t burn in the fall fires! Needless to say, I so look forward to this day of fun for a cheery change of pace.
Shameless sympathy shot–quite the scene…