2023 Pas a Vendre no. 6 Cabernet Sauvignon

Winemaker Notes

This wine is for the family dinner table and circle of chairs pulled close. Cabernet has always been comforting and grounding. And, this wine has always been “Not For Sale” as we drew ice axes on shiners in parking lots. This wine doesn’t need your attention, but you’ll give it a peek. Sometimes the simplest of wines can hold the deepest truths.

Pair with: Bruce Springsteen – My Hometown

Vintage Notes

The season began just as the previous one ended with calm and silence. Winter carried a heavy weight as snow pressed into the soil and rains penetrating deep. Moisture that would carry these vines well into their development. Spring arrived late. Budbreak lagged and bloom delayed. We sweated every day looking at the calendar, worried and wondering if the vintage would ever catch up as it were in 2022. The vines always seem to know that time is not obedient. And, they moved at their own rhythm, as they always do.

Summer followed with kindness. No punishing heat spikes and no withering scorch. There was just steady warmth. The days were golden and the nights were cool – the balance of the oft-spoken diurnal shift. Veraison took its time as ripening was slow and clusters colored at a glacial pace. September arrived and suddenly the vintage revealed itself. 2023 was balanced and assured. This vintage seemed to know itself even before we fully came to understand.

Harvest reflected that same cadence. There were no mad dashes, no panicked phone calls at 4 a.m. Fruit arrived when it was ready and confident. We picked, we processed, we fermented, we barreled and pressed, we put the wines in to a deep sleep. The cellar hummed with the rhythm of a season in harmony and balance. The wines that emerged carry that composure. They are wines of presence and not performance; they are not in a hurry to impress. Put simply, they are present.