2011 Cabernet Sauvignon

Tasting Notes:
Our 2011 Rangeland Cabernet takes a step towards elegance this year with its higher acidity and fruit forward components.  You're greeted by aromas of ripe black cherry, cranberry, and a hint of vanilla.  The first sip will flood your senses with dark fruit flavors, evoking cherry, blueberry, and spicy notes of clove with a dash of cocoa.  The rich, silky mouthfeel is balanced by fresh acidity born of high elevation limestone slopes.  The long delicate finish is carried by ultrafine tannins. 

Grower Notes:
2011 was the 2nd vintage in a series of cool years that enabled long hang times in what has been our latest Cabernet harvest to date.  This wine is blended from several blocks that demonstrate the diverse geology of our Adelaida Springs Ranch estate vineyard. Blocks 2 and 5 are planted on rocky but rich limestone clays that produce wines of startling acidity (pH 3.3 to 3.5) and delicately exotic, often floral personalities. Blocks 6 and 8, although just downhill from Block 5, have sandstone soils that produce much softer, less acidic (pH 3.6 to 3.8), and earthier wines.  The grapes that were used to produce this blend were grown on 52% sandstone soils and 48% limestone soils.   We like our fruit to express the place and the vintage, so rather than adjust acidity with tartaric acid, we use the naturally acidic fruit growing on our limestone soils and blend these grapes pre-fermentation.