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Cass Winery 2003 Paso Robles Syrah

Cass Winery 2003 Paso Robles Syrah

What We Say 2003 Paso Robles Syrah

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Mission Codename: Pass the Cass

Operative: Agent White

Objective: Revisit Cass Winery in Paso Robles to taste their Syrah.

Mission Status: Accomplished!

Current Winery: Cass Winery

Wine Subject: 2003 Paso Robles Syrah

Winemaker: Dan Kleck & Lood Kotze

Backgrounder:

While Pinot Noir is considered the most influenced by the specific clone, Syrah is not far behind. ENTAV, or L’Etablissement National Technique pour l’Amélioration de la Viticulture, founded in 1962 is the French agency responsible for identifying, preserving and cataloging the various grape varieties with the purpose of commercializing only the best of those varietals. By using Syrah clones identified by ENTAV this wine truly crosses the divide between old-world and new-world style.

Paso Robles, located in California’s southern central coast region in San Luis Obisbo county is well known as one of the earliest regions where vines were grown in California with records indicating grapes have been harvested since the 1790s.

Wine Spies Tasting Profile:

Look – Deep and dark purple with an almost black inky core. Along the edges the deep color only lightens slightly to become garnet along the very edge of the glass. When swirled, garnet reflections fade to blackness and two distinct layers of legs ring the side of the glass. The lower cluster with narrowly spaced fat legs and the upper with widely spaced fat legs.

Smell – Bold and redolent with ripe and earthy red and black berries including cherry and blackberry. Well developed and distinctive earthy notes of mushroom, soft floral and herbal sage components and white pepper are revealed.

Feel – Rich, plush and full-bodied, this wine starts with a spicy kick of white pepper that softens as it opens. Firm, but fine tannins and balanced acidity carry this smooth textured wine’s rich and concentrated flavors through to the finish.

Taste – Concentrated and bold flavors of fresh, ripe and earthy dark fruit backed by a spicy white pepper kick. Complex notes of toasted oak, leather, tobacco and briary underbrush are revealed as you explore this wine’s lovely flavors.

Finish – The wine finishes long and persistent marked with focused flavors of ripe dark fruit, earth and lingering white pepper spice.

Conclusion – While many of the wine’s from Paso Robles tend to be overly extracted, we are never disappointed with the quality of what we have tasted from Cass Winery. The 2003 Paso Robles Syrah is rich, bold and powerful, but also shows elegance in its complexity that is interlaced with ripe flavorful and juicy fruit.

Mission Report:

Agent Red was able to sit down with Cass Winery’s winemaker, Lood Kotze, for a short interview when we last featured a great Cass wine. Here is a transcript of that conversation:

AGENT RED: Hi Lood!

LOOD KOTZE: Agent Red. Thanks for coming by.

RED: Is it always this hot here in Paso Robles?

LOOD: Not quite always, but, yes, it gets hot here.

RED: What effect does that have on the grapes – and the wines that are made from them?

LOOD: It’s hard to generalize about Paso Robles, but I would say that the wines from here are deeper and more concentrated. They are very rich, intense and strongly flavored. People love Paso wines for their accessibility. I think that wines from here are more universally appealing.

RED: Tell me, Lood, who do you make wines for?

LOOD: I tend to make wines that I personally like to drink. Luckily, that happens to match up with what fans of our wines also like!

RED: Good thing. I think that left to their own devices, some winemakers would end up making wines that only they like! Tell me, what would you say is your winemaking style?

LOOD: Well, I really believe that the terroir give the quality of a wine and the winemaker just maintains the quality. Great wine really begins in great vineyards. Starting with the best fruit, I tend to allow the wine to do its own thing with minimal input.

RED: Do you ever have to tweak a wine at all?

LOOD: Of course, but always in the most subtle ways possible. Really, the vineyard does most of the work, I just take care of the wine throughout the process.

RED: Before I let you go, please tell me what’s going on in the winery right now.

LOOD: Well, the vineyards are looking great, with shoots that are more than a foot long! In the winery, we just finished up with one round of bottling – and so now my focus is on our 2008’s.

RED: And, before you know it, harvest will be here!

LOOD: Don’t say that! We still have the summer and into the fall… but, yeah, before you know it, harvest will be here.

RED: Listen, I love Cass wines. The Rockin’ One is honestly the best Syrah, Grenache, Mourvèdre blend I have ever tasted.

LOOD: It is a great wine. Most blends of this style are usually reductive and austere. The Rockin’ One is way expressive and very delicious.

RED: It rocks!

LOOD: Indeed!

Wine Spies Vineyard Check:

The approximate location of the Cass Winery can be seen in this satellite photo.

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What the Winery Says Cass Winery

Cass Winery
Cass Winery

About This Wine:

Planted to several exciting new ‘ENTAV’ clones originating from France, our fledgling Syrah vines produced a paltry 100 pounds of fruit per acre. Anticipating a wine of bold intensity from these low yielding blocks, we opted to ferment in small bins, manually punching-down the cap, to fully extract color and character from the skins. The resulting wine is deeply pigmented, with fresh berry flavors and unique nuances of white pepper on the palate.

About The Winery:

Cass Vineyards and Winery is located in the rolling, oak-studded hills between Paso Robles and Creston on California’s beautiful Central Coast. This area that the vineyard calls home offers quiet serenity for the visitor and a perfect growing season for wine grapes.

Sited due east of the “Templeton Gap”, we receive the evening’s cooling breezes that the west side of Paso Robles is noted for. We also rest far enough from the coast to generate the heat needed to optimally ripen the Rhone varieties grown in our vineyards.

One hundred percent of the wines crafted at Cass Winery are Estate Grown. Our vineyard surrounds our Tasting Room and winery. You can literally touch, taste, see and smell the grapes from the block where they were harvested.

The Tasting Room offers picnic fare and our chef prepares lunches daily 12-4pm at the Cass Café to enhance the feel of this special environment. Scenic paths lead to oak-shaded picnic areas for our visitors’ complete wine country sensory experience.

A unique feature of our wine making is that all of the Rhone grapes we grow are ENTAV certified. ENTAV (Establissement National Technique pour l’Amelioration de la Viticulture) is the national agency of France responsible for the quality of wine grape varieities. Over 90% of all French Vineyards are started with ENTAV certified plants and are only recently available in California. Consequently, these are among the very first wines made from ENTAV grapes grown here.

Technical Analysis:

Alcohol: 14%

Appellation: Paso Robles

Year: 2003

Cass Winery 2003 Paso Robles Syrah 750ml Wine Bottle
Offer Expired Jun 26, 2009 at 11:59 pm
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Cass Winery 2003 Paso Robles Syrah 750ml Wine Bottle
Offer Expired Jun 26, 2009 at 11:59 pm
Register to get notified when this wine is back in stock:
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