• 1/2 Case Discount: 10% Off
  • Case Discount: 15% Off
  • 24 Bottle Discount: 20% Off
2022 Slow Crawl

2022 Slow Crawl

Red Blend
IN - Indiana Uplands
$20.00 / 750 mL Bottle
  • Alcohol 13%
Some folks think I am a little crazy with winemaking and I am fine with that.  I bounce all of my ideas off of science and if scientifically, it seems to make sense, that day's "art project" moves into production.  Winemaking and blending is an art based in sound science.   We had a record harvest (thank goodness) of Frontenac and St. Croix in 2022.  In 2021, our west coast grower of syrah just couldn't get the grapes picked fast enough so the grapes over ripened.  Sitting in oak barrels was sweet syrah.  Tasted great, but..... So here came the idea.  After making enough Frontenac and enough St. Croix, we blended the rest of the grapes together, got fermentation going, then came up with a radical idea.  Let's put this syrah in it.  We can't do anything else with it.  Once a strong fermentation gets going, the yeast should be able to handle the alcohol of syrah.  It did!  What a great wine we have going. Then there's the other part of the story.  Our west coast grower had a problem.  Suddenly his buyer for Black Muscat in 2022 backed out.  "Jim, can you help me?"  What the heck is Black Muscat?  At that price?  Yeah, I'll give it a test drive. As soon as we got in the grapes, I knew exactly how to make the wine.  Ferment on skins for 2 days, press and finish the wine as a sweet wine.  But tank restraints said otherwise, so a dry wine on skins became the route to take. Well, I don't like dry Black Muscat.  It's not flawed, it's just not something anyone is going to buy.  Love the back-end spice of the grape.  Hey, wait..... Yep, going to bottle the Front/Syrah/St. Croix, but I wonder what it would taste like with a little of the spice from the Black Muscat added in.  One word answer, tremendous! Lots of upfront fruit with classic berry-cherry notes but that spice on the back end....Lovely