Home Wine U The Buzz Wine Reviews   Review Archive   Rating System Calendar Fun Stuff About Us Key Contacts Search FAQ Links		May 2007 Wine Tasting Notes: 2006 Presidio Gewürztraminer, Viento Vineyard, Monterey County. This wine is straw colored with a light green tinge. The nose starts with intense, unctuous aromas of warm Asian spices (ginger and nutmeg). Medium intensity aromas of gardenias and honeysuckle follow. Candied orange rind, tropical fruit (lychee and passion fruit) and stone fruits are replete. On the palate, medium intensity ripe, effervescent grapefruit is paired with stone fruit and framed by a lightly mineral edge. The mouthfeel is luscious and plush, combining nicely balanced mineral and acid components. Lightly sweet and with well proportioned alcohol, this Gewürztraminer is medium bodied. A straight forward finish is grapefruit-dominant and laced with mineral notes. Cumulative Score: 92 breakdown 13.5% Alcohol                          $15.95.00 Retail (from winery);        350 cases produced This 2006 Presidio Gewürztraminer goes beyond where the 2005 offering left off with its beckoning tentacles of aroma that snake out of the glass and pass, languidly, across the nose. Curvy and seductive and powerful but longer lasting than a summer love. Best served chilled and paired with Asian foods, tropical fruit salads, on vanilla ice cream or lighter cakes over the next 3 to 5 years.       Detail Tell a friend about this wine Cite this review More Presidio reviews More on the Monterey County AVA A late harvest style, this Gewürztraminer was picked form Monterey County's Viento Vineyard and cold-fermented in stainless steel tanks to a residual sugar of 5.2 g/100ml (5%) Residual Sugar Despite its German-sounding name, Gewürztraminer originates from Italy. This popular grape makes approachable wines from light yellow, to deep gold, and even almost copper in color. It shows complex aromas and tends to be high in alcohol. Typical aromas and flavors are of exotic fruit such as lychee, peach and mango. It has floral notes of honeysuckle, gardenia as well as rose petals. It can also express various spices. The name is commonly translated to mean ‘spicy traminer’ but it would seem, by virtue of its character, a better translation is ‘perfumed Traminer’. While the best European Gewürztraminer comes from Alsace, Austria, Germany, and northern Italy, it does well in Australia, New Zealand, British Columbia, Oregon, Washington and the cooler microclimates in California: Mendocino, Monterey, Russian River Valley and Sonoma. (Read more). The 231 acre Viento Vineyard is part of the Scheid Vineyards and Winery estate. Located south of the town of Greenfield, the vineyard sits on a broad bench in the Salinas Valley. The name "Viento" means wind in Spanish. This is probably after the powerful midday winds which sweep south from Monterey Bay. The vineyard's climate and soil combination makes for highly extracted Chardonnay, Gewürztraminer,  White Riesling () and Merlot. The 2006 growing season was longer than 2005. The July heat wave came at the time of veraison for some regions but affected the crops differently depending on AVA (read the complete story). Monterey County started out cool and rainy which slowed bud break and growth. The heat spell was the second bump in the road. By harvest time, early ripening varieties like Chardonnay and Pinot Noir came to the crush pads about two weeks early. The late ripening varieties like Cabernet and Merlot came in about two weeks earlier than usual. That put some wineries in a crunch with tanks not ready for the late-ripening varieties. What this means for wines depends on a winery's line up. If all their stock was in Pinot and Chardonnay, then they did not feel rushed and we may see some great wines. Those that did experience a bottleneck may have rushed the early-ripening varieties and vinified late ripening varieties at greater levels of maturity. Presidio Vineyard and Winery was founded in 1991 as a realization of winemaker Douglas Braun’s vision of implementing Old World wine making philosophy in Santa Barbara County. The estate vineyard is a certified organic and biodynamic vineyard. In addition to Pinot Noir, Presidio grows Chardonnay and Syrah. The Presidio philosophy is focused around minimal manipulation of the wines, aging in the highest quality French oak, and bottling wines unfined and unfiltered. Color  5 points Nose  5 points Palate  4 points Finish  2 points Tannins  5 points Acidity  5 points Alcohol  5 points Aging potential  2 points Overall quality  9 points Rating System explained Back to top Tell a friend about this wine! 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