Opaque • Cured Salumi • Vibrant
Best enjoyed at 55° - 60°F
Suggested drink window: now - 2029 - 2038
Sourced from our longtime grower partner, Beckhorn Vineyards, this saperavi is a small planting on Howard gravelly loam soils, a soil series common throughout our cellar. This vineyard is planted exclusively to Eastern European varieties, which makes it unique to the region. Originally hailing from the country of Georgia, the saperavi grape is one several in the world classified as teinturier, where the pulp of the berry is pigmented, making the characteristic dark and opaque hue one of the main features of the wine. Another unsubtle feature is the grapes’ natural acidity; it can yield some very intensely acidic wines and with some lengthy barrel and bottle age, those acids soften up over time, making this variety incredibly age-worthy in bottle.
Winemaking
• 100% Saperavi
• Vineyard location: East side of Seneca Lake
• Soils: Howard gravelly loam
• Harvested October 13th
• Unfined & unfiltered
• Vegan
• Certified New York Sustainable Winegrowing
• Brix: 22.0° │ pH: 3.59 │ TA: 7.3 g/L │ RS: 0.07 │ ABV: 12.5 │ Bottled: 2/19/2025
• Cases Produced: 45
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2023 Vintage Notes
As the harvest season approached, and all things pointed to 2023 being a lovely year. In the vineyards, our team worked tirelessly to ensure the cellar got to play with the best grapes possible come harvest time. Summer of 2023 was drastically different from the several previous seasons with a decent amount of rainfall, hot and humid days, but unusually cool nighttime temperatures. This means we were able to maintain a strict disease management protocol with timely shoot thinning and positioning, aggressive leaf thinning, and our hybrid organic/conventional spray program.
Many have asked about the frost event in late May and how we fared. In the days following the event, we were very nervous as we saw many small shoots go from green to black. After a few weeks, the vines started to push their secondary shoots and subsequent clusters, and we started to see life back in the hard-hit blocks. We feel very fortunate as we saw a fairly normal season as far as yields went, but we know some of our neighbors did not fare as well. These moments help reinforce the strength of the agricultural community and how we as consumers and neighbors can all help one another during challenging times by buying local, supporting small businesses, and always keeping a positive attitude!
