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Reviews

Stephen Tanzer (July 2005)
Wine Advocate (June 2005)

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The 2003 Tablas Creek Vineyard Mourvèdre is Tablas Creek's first bottling of its 100% Mourvedre. The wine shows the classically cherry, fig, mocha and spice flavors, medium to full body, and a spicy, appealing finish of saddle leather and loam of the Mourvedre grape.

We use most of our Mourvedre in our Esprit de Beaucastel each year. However, in 2003, we were so pleased by the Mourvedre that we harvested that we reserved one foudre plus a few barrels of Mourvedre for a single-varietal.

As with all our wines, our Mourvedre grapes were grown on our 120-acre certified organic estate vineyard.

The 2003 vintage was tremendous: warm and sunny, with cool nights that prolonged the hangtime of the grapes and led to wines with excellent acidity. A relatively early flowering, combined with a warm but not overly hot summer produced unusually long hangtime, and grapes with concentrated flavors and a distinct minerality. The extended harvest meant that we harvested varietals multiple times, with Mourvedre (as usual our latest-ripening red varietal) harvested between September 25th and October 29th.

The Mourvedre grapes were destemmed and then fermented using native yeasts in a balance of small open-top and enclosed stainless steel tanks. After three weeks, they were pressed, and moved to a balance of new and old French oak barrels to complete their fermentation. The red wines were assembled in June of 2004, and aged for an additional year in 1200-gallon foudres, before being bottled in May 2005. The wine underwent only a light filtration before bottling, and should be expected to throw a sediment over time.

The 2003 Mourvèdre displays a classic nose of roasted meats, cherries and spice. Juicy and full in the mouth, it features lingering notes of coffee, chocolate and leather, with a pronounced mineral finish.