The 2022 Tenor Merlot is comprised of three small vineyard parcels within the greater Columbia Valley: Wallula Gap Vineyard in Horse Heaven Hills, Scarline Vineyard along the Royal Slope AVA, and Red Mountain Vineyard in the Red Mountain AVA.
During the 2022 vintage, our winemaking team worked with each vineyard manager to proactively restrict yields, which created extremely concentrated berries. Cool, fall nights preserved a sense of freshness in the wine, while flavor continued to develop. The harvest of all three vineyards took place in the cool early mornings between October 1st and the 15th.
Once arriving in the winery, the fruit was cluster-sorted, de-stemmed, and berry-sorted. The wine spent 48 hours cold-soaking, before careful fermentation, lasting 14 days. The wine was left in tank for extended maceration for an additional period, to further extract the unique aspects of the vintage and provide maximum integration. The free-run wine was cellared in varying formats of 100% new French oak. After 21 months in select cooperages, 11 barrels were meticulously selected and carefully blended.
The wine was bottled unfined and unfiltered to ensure everything was preserved as intended: purity, vibrancy, and intensity. Only 254 cases were bottled.
