2022 Terret Noir
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The Tablas Creek Vineyard 2022 Terret Noir is our seventh varietal bottling of this rarely-seen Chateauneuf-du-Pape grape, propagated from budwood cuttings from the Château de Beaucastel estate.
While we have also begun using Terret Noir in our red blends, it is a fascinating grape on its own, unlike anything else from the Rhone. As a varietal bottling, we feel it expresses well what our 1904-edition French ampelography calls its "qualities of lightness, freshness, and bouquet".
Tasting Notes
A nose of watermelon and mint, sweet green herbs and a little menthol spiciness. The mouth is similarly lifted, like all the parts of a wild strawberry (fruit, flower, leaves), a little fresh oregano herbiness, and a clean finish with notes of sagebrush and cranberry and a little tannic bite. A tamer version of Terret than in the past, but clean, pretty, and fun.
Technical Details
Appellation
- Adelaida District Paso Robles
Technical Notes
- 12.0% Alcohol by Volume
- 70 Cases Produced
Blend
- 100% Terret Noir
Certifications
Recipes & Pairings
Recipe Suggestions
Food Pairings
- Dried sausages
- Salty cheeses
- Santa Maria tri tip
- Coq au vin
Production Notes
Terret Noir is a little-known blending grape from the south of France; in addition to being one of the permitted grapes in Chateauneuf du Pape, it was once (before 1850) the most planted variety in the department of Herault. The half-acre that we planted here in Paso Robles is California's first. Terret Noir is a large-berried grape that produces wines with pale color, good acidity, and a spicy, floral, earthy wildness.
The 2022 vintage was our third year of drought, but because the rain that we received came early, the vines showed good health though with cluster counts down by about 15%. A cool first half of the summer was followed by our hottest-ever August and September, producing an early start and an even earlier finish to harvest. The vintage's extremely low yields produced concentrated flavors, noteworthy texture, and intense fruit.
The Terret Noir grapes were grown on our Regenerative Organic Certified™ and biodynamic estate vineyard.
The fruit was destemmed and fermented on the skins for two weeks in a 1-ton microfermenter, punched down twice daily, to extract maximum flavor from this thin-skinned grape. Only native yeasts were used. After two weeks, the berries were pressed and this was combined with the free-run juice into neutral oak barrels. In May of 2023 we blended about half of the vintage's Terret Noir into our Le Complice blend. The remaining three barrels of Terret, selected for their balance of juiciness and tannic grip, were aged in neutral barrels until their bottling in Feb 2024.