Wine Club Notes, Summer 2013
It has been a wet Summer! I think that June was the wettest on record, and July shows no signs of abatement (as I write this, remnants of Tropical Storm Chantel are creating a deluge). The last year I remember being this wet was (I believe) 2003 or 2004. Suffice to say that the rain, combined with a late Spring frost, has created challenging conditions for grape propagation this year. One good side is that the vines that are not yet bearing fruit are loving the moisture (last year's three-acre addition combined with this year's four acres).
We were visited by alien invaders for approximately 6 weeks during May and early June. The 17-year cicadas serenaded us with their eerie song and were particularly plentiful in the shady grove. After informing us that they were not harmful to grapevines, the State entomologist changed his mind (thanks, Doug), but their damage to grape vines has been minimal, and easily incorporated into pruning and trellis management. We will remember this for their next appearance in 2030.
Our event pavilion has been completed, and several weddings have been held in it. With its copper colored roof to match the tasting room, open sides to drink in the vineyards, and convenience to the rest of our facilities, it is proving to be a popular place for events. Thank you, Kim for taking care of the arrangements, and dealing with the MOB (Mother of the Bride).
We continue to have live music on the deck on Saturdays and Sundays, and turned the Taters to face the crowd on the hillside during our particularly large celebration for Lucy's Day over Memorial Day weekend. This proved to be a huge fund raiser for the SPCA, and we were able to adopt out 5 dogs on Saturday and 4 cats on Sunday. Thanks to all who participated! Our own vineyard canines, Pumpkin, Clarice and Rosie regularly patrol the property. Rosie continues her reign as SPCA spokesdog. On the domestic front, a pair of red foxes has taken up residence near the vineyard. (Shhhh, they don't know that we know they are there.)
Our winemaker Graham has completed a tour of the State as part of the Governor's Cup Seminar program, educating wine professionals on how he created our 2010 Petit Verdot. The seminars were well received, and the Wine Marketing Board plans to continue them next year. Hearty congratulations to Graham and Kate on their nuptials, which were celebrated in July in Michigan. Welcome to Virginia, Kate!
We are excited about the opportunity to tour three rivers in Bordeaux next summer aboard a river boat, and we hope you will consider joining us for UNIWORLD'S River Royale Boutique River Cruise. A spokesman from UNIWORLD will be at our pickup party on August 11th to talk more about the cruise and to answer any questions.
Now, onto the wines! We have a great and varied choice this quarter as we wrap up summer and move into Fall. The first wine is one that has proven to be our most popular white wine this year. Chardonel is a hybrid grape that we grow on the property. Initially, it commanded only a supporting role, forming one of the bases of our Rhapsody. With time, the Chardonel we had planted produced such nice fruit that it cried out to be a selection in its own right commanding us to give it a position as a headliner. The 2012 Chardonel exhibits crispness with refreshing flavors of apple, citrus and honey. Its clean presentation makes it the perfect warm weather companion to fish or chicken.
Our latest release of Coopertage, vintage 2011, is a blend of 42% Cabernet Sauvignon, 37% Petit Verdot, 10.5% Merlot and 10.5% Cabernet Franc, and it continues our tradition of making a big, Bordeaux styled wine with well integrated tannins and layers of fruit flavors. The way the various components of this wine interact is frankly amazing to me. The complexity evident with each sip is a testament to what we try to achieve as winemakers. Although it is a big, red wine, it drinks well by itself and with all kinds of food, not just the traditional beef and game. Enjoy it now, or cellar it for enjoyment around the fire this Fall. It is certain to be a hit as college football tailgate season commences.
There is simply one word to discuss Sangria and that is “Fun”. We have been playing with various Sangria recipes since our earliest days at Cooper Vineyards when Tom Jankowski created the first cellar mixes. We produced a popular three pack of wine that could be combined with fruit concentrates for many years before moving on to our single bottle Sangria two years ago. This current release is the best we have created in a single bottle format. Enjoy the wine by itself or over crushed ice, or as a refreshing summer cocktail.
Until next time, thank you for being in our club! All the best from all of us at Cooper Vineyards!
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Wine Club Notes, Spring, 2013
Greetings Wine Club Members! I write this on a rainy Spring day, full of hope and promise. We have a great selection of Spring wines for you that I am sure you will enjoy. One of the aspects I like most about wine clubs are the way that they take you different places, retasting old favorites and discovering new ones. Our Spring lineup includes Chardonnay, Rose, and Petit Verdot. More about them later!
Spring always brings with it a sense of renewal. For us, it has the same emotions that some associate with New Year’s Eve; a sense of starting over, fresh beginnings and that anything is possible. Boone and Tyler worked hard in the vineyard this winter, working outside through the cold Spring to ensure that the vineyard would be ready for this year’s growing season. The cold Spring resulted in a little bit delayed bud break, (we are looking for harvest to be a week to 10 days later than last year). We missed the frost event of April 22 (minimum temp of 34°) that affected so many of our fellow vineyards.
Our newest vines were planted on March 30 and 31, adding four acres to the vineyard, bringing our vineyard total up to 21 acres. We got all the vines planted, staked with bamboo stakes, and shielded with grow tubes. The irrigation was ready to go when the vines were planted, and we have kept them moist with water from the pond. They have begun to grow in the tubes, waking up from dormancy and rising towards the sun. This planting is of much needed additions to varietals we already grow.
We had bud break on April 15 in Chardonnay and Chardonel first, rapidly followed by the other varietals. Our vine planting project this Spring included replants in Chardonnay and Merlot, to rejuvenate and fill out these fields. I am happy to report that last year’s additions have burst into life. Usually we cut back second year vines to a 2-bud segment. We had such nice growth last year that we decided to leave them up on the wire and see how they do. Our form of trellising requires the vines to grow up 6 feet and out 2 before they produce any fruit, so we might as well give them a head start!
Festival season has begun again. We are projecting doing fewer festivals this year than last. At the Spring festivals we have been well received, garnering the award for best red wine in Chesterfield’s festival of the vine. We’ve just had a great weekend in Reston that required restocking for Sunday. On our home stage, we will be proceeding with building a permanent structure over our tent pad. It will be an open sided pavilion with electricity and permanent lighting. We will also be able to hang cathedral window style canvas tent sides to enclose it for more privacy for evening events. Be sure to join us at the winery for Lucy’s Weekend on Saturday and Sunday before Memorial Day (May 25, 26). This SPCA benefit includes a blessing of the animals on Sunday and is always one of our most popular events.
Purchase Tickets Here: $15.00 pp Advance Ticket Purchasing Ends Friday 1pm / $20.00 pp At the door day of event.
Graham has been busy in the winery preparing for bottling in early May. He has been making our ice wine, Vida which is undergoing slow fermentation and should be ready to be bottled in early Summer. The 2012 whites that we have put in the bottle (Chardonel, Chardonnay and Viognier) have all been excellent and have shared the common attribute of great fruit expression.
The winter competition season has been kind to us, with a number of our wines garnering gold medals and best in class designation. We are particularly proud to have our 2010 Reserve Petit Verdot included as one of the wines in the Governor’s Case of twelve best wines in the Commonwealth! When you visit the tasting room be sure to look at the blow up of the Wine Spectator advertisement for the Governor’s Case. And, since we got the honor, we have to share it with you! It is in this quarter’s Wine Club Selection.
The first of our Spring wines is our Chardonnay featuring Lottie on the label. Lottie was last year’s Richmond SPCA spokes-dog (our own Rosie is this year’s!). Auctioning off label position to Lottie was a huge fund raiser for the Richmond SPCA. She is a cutie, and we are happy that this wine came out with so many forward and well behaved attributes, just like our label! The 265 case production was all from estate grown fruit (the vines now 14 years old). It is completely stainless steel fermented and aged, expresses great fruit, and is smooth on the palate.
The second selection is our French Provençal style rose from Cabernet Franc fruit. In preparing the Cabernet Franc, we remove approximately 10% of the juice at the time of initial fermentation, and this juice becomes the basis of our Rose, Prior to bottling, additional Cabernet Franc is blended in for color. It has no residual sugar, and expresses fantastic strawberry flavors. This crisp wine is a favorite for lunch in France. Enjoy it with a baguette or Chicken Croissant as a picnic.
As always, we are honored to have you as a member of our Wine Club family. Feel free to call us with suggestions at any time. We want to make the kinds of wine that you want to drink! Please pay us a visit, and enjoy the ambience of our enterprise.
From all of us, thanks!
a votre santé!
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Wine Club Notes, February 2013
Winter is here and glimpses of Spring are to be found wherever we look. Despite predictions from the usual sources of an unusually severe Winter, it has been on the mild side so far! Although we could use more rain to recharge the ground water for our thirsty vines for the summer to come, the clement weather has allowed us to get a start on vineyard work for the coming year. Boone has begun pruning and training on the newest of our vines. Tyler has been repairing the trellises and will tighten the wires once we begin pruning in earnest. We have laid out the vineyard for next year, and by the time you read this will have ripped the field and begun pounding posts.
The new vineyard will be approximately four acres and will be an extension to last year’s planting. Our Petit Verdot continues to amaze and garner awards. (We hope you enjoyed the Petit Verdot selections in recent Wine Club distributions.) We will plant another acre of Petit Verdot next to our existing field. The microclimate in combination with the clone we are using is yielding flavorful grapes with small berry size to create a wonderful wine. We have been happy with the first year growth of the Albarino that we planted last year. Although we have not yet produced wine from it, we are going to double down and double the acreage. Viognier becomes more and more sought after. We will plant more of it and hopefully be able to keep up with demand as our vines mature. The new vines will be rounded out by Vidal Blanc and Chardonel. Vidal Blanc forms the basis of Rhapsody, which continues to surge in popularity while Chardonel was bottled as a successful varietal wine for the first time this year, and is also used in Rhapsody.
Jacque and I have been invited to present a program at the Wineries Unlimited Trade Show to be held in Richmond in March. Our tasting room was voted Favorite Tasting Room in Virginia last year. We will be speaking on our approach to customer appreciation, and our talk will revolve around the tasting room and how it fits in with our winery philosophy and approach to wine making. (We haven’t written it yet, so stay tuned!) We get huge enjoyment out of the tasting room, and hope that all of you enjoy it during your visits. We love the uplifting aesthetics and creation of an exciting and relaxed atmosphere for wine sampling.
Graham continues to exhibit wizardry in the wine making process. What I’ve tasted out of the tank and barrel exhibit lively fruit flavors in well-made wines, continuing with our tradition. The next bottling date is February 26. Some wine club members have expressed a desire to see the bottling process. If you would like to see it, or help out, please let us know. Gary Simmers from Landwirt bottling will bring his mobile bottling line in a tractor trailer truck to give us a professional finish to our wines.
The 2010 reds are all drinking well and are some of the finest we have produced. Following up on the Petit Verdot from last quarter, in this quarter’s selection we have included the 2010 Cabernet Franc. It is quite simply the best one we have ever made. It is a delicious, complex, and yielding wine with that Cabernet Franc friendliness but without the capriciousness usually found in its peers. On a personal note it has made me elevate Cabernet Franc from the minor leagues to a spot on the major league roster. I hope you enjoy it as much as we do.
We have ceased sales of the 2011Coopertage Blanc and saved the remaining cases for the Wine Club. We wanted to make certain that you, our family, get to enjoy it before it is all gone. The Coopertage Blanc is a perfect blend of Chardonnay and Viognier. The Viognier rounds out the sharp citrus from Chardonnay and marries with it to provide a well-balanced, serious white wine. Limitations in the statewide harvest of Viognier will preclude us from being able to produce it from the 2012 vintage, so join us in enjoying it while it lasts!
2011 was a decidedly dicey year for Virginia wines. The great growing conditions of summer gave way to a September month of rain and poor finish to the ripening season. The two exceptions to this were Chardonel and Norton. Chardonel was harvested before the rains began, and was so good that our first varietal Chardonel has been a huge success, and we will continue to produce it in the future (see notes above about additional Chardonel planting!). Our native grape, Norton had the thick skins to survive the month of poor weather, and then took advantage of the extended Autumn to ripen and produce mature fruit. At the end of the day, our 2011 Norton produced a vintage almost identical to the blockbuster year of 2010. It has recently been bottled after extended aging in Virginia Oak barrels. We hope you enjoy it. We look forward to critical tasting of it as part of our Cooper Vineyards Norton Vertical tasting on March 9.
Below are tasting notes for the three wines for this selection. As always, thank you for being on board with us as we journey through the Cooper Vineyards wine adventure.
A votre Sante from all of us at Cooper Vineyards.
Coopertage Blanc 2011 – Delicate green apple notes with undercurrents of pear and peach, enhanced by subtle expressions of toasty oak. 72% Chardonnay, 28% Viognier. Silver 2012 VA Wine Lovers Magazine Wine Classic and Atlantic Seaboard Wine Association.
344 cases produced
Cabernet Franc 2010 – We have long been proud of our Cabernet Franc and the way it has garnered broad appeal. This release is quite simply our finest one ever. Its compelling blend of 75% Cabernet Franc and 25% Cabernet Sauvignon is reminiscent of a right bank Bordeaux. It exhibits ruby color and begins with an earthy, berry nose leading to vibrant ripe fruit expressing currants, raisins and cherries. These are complemented and supported by hearty, fresh tannins that lead into a long, lingering finish. An eager adolescent no more, this wine has stepped into adulthood! Enjoy with duck, pork, roast turkey and filet mignon.
400 cases produced
Norton Reserve 2011 – A perfect blend of ripe, bright fruit and soft, clean tannins combine with silky, mouth-filling intensity to create an exceptional and well-behaved (for Norton!) robust red wine. 100% Norton.
430 cases produced
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