Technical Notes:

Crush: October 9th, 2005
Fermentation: in open top vessels with the old world punch down by hand technique for a gentle extraction. The fermented grapes were pressed “direct” without using a pump on the sixth day after harvest.
Yeast: L2226 Rhone selection. The malolactic fermentation was completed in barrels.
Aging: Fifteen months in 50% new European and French oak barrels, the rest in two year old barrels.
Blend: 100% P. Sirah
Bottling: 650 cases. The wine was fined with two and a half egg whites per barrel and lightly filtered before bottling.
Alcohol:14.5 %;
-0.57g/100ml; pH: 3.81;
Residual Sugar: 0.03%.

Miro Cellars 2005 Petite Sirah

This is my fifth vintage of making wine from this California variety and I'm still very much in love with it. This time the grapes are from another Dry Creek Valley vineyard—Somers. The small four acre vineyard is on a steep slope facing South-East with red volcanic soils. The 2005 harvest was relatively long with cool weather requiring a long "hang time" for the grapes to fully ripen, resulting in richly flavoured wine with silky soft tannins (for Petite Sirah!) and deliciously long and juicy finish. The budwood for that vineyard was selected from a vineyard in Cloverdale planted last century.

Tasting Notes:

Somers Vineyard is well known for its Zinfandel and Petite Sirah. The unique combination of slope, exposure and soil type are perfect match for Petite Sirah-with sufficient heat during the day and rapid cooling at night. The wine is inky dark, almost opaque with purple hue. On the nose the wine opens with intense blue berry, roasted coffee and minerals aromas and a hint of brown sugar. Further aeration reveals deeper and complex layers of ripe plums, blackberry, hint of white pepper and graphite. On the mouth the wine is remarkably soft and supple (for Petite Sirah!), full bodied with long and juicy, mouth filling finish. Longevity is to be expected for next-5-8 years. Cheers.
Miroslav Tcholakov
Owner/Winemaker