REVIEWS
Wine Advocate (Jun. 2008)
Vinography.com (Jan. 2008)
Tanzer's IWC (Nov. 2007)
Wine Advocate (Aug. 2007)

In exceptional vintages, Tablas Creek Vineyard produces small quantities of Panoplie: a Mourvèdre-based cuvee from meticulously selected grapes, made in the model of Château de Beaucastel's Hommage á Jacques Perrin. In 2005, only 320 cases were produced.

The 2005 vintage was one of nature's lucky breaks, with excellent quality and higher-than-normal yields. The wet winter of '04-'05 gave the grapevines ample groundwater, and a warm period in March got the vines off to an early May flowering. The summer was uniformly sunny but relatively cool, and harvest began (relatively late for us) in the 3rd week of September. The grapes spent nearly a month longer than normal on the vine, and the resulting wines were intensely mineral, with good structure and powerful aromatics. Our first lots of Syrah came in on September 29th, followed by Grenache on October 5th, and Mourvedre on October 11th.

As with all our wines, the grapes for our Panoplie were grown on our 120-acre certified organic estate vineyard.

The grapes were fermented using native yeasts in open and closed stainless steel fermenters. After pressing, the wines were moved into barrel, blended, and aged in large-format French oak demi-muids before being bottled in July, 2007.

The Tablas Creek Vineyard Panoplie 2005 is a barrel-by-barrel selection of the most intense lots of Mourvèdre, Grenache, and Syrah in the cellar, structured for long aging. It is a dense purple-red in color with a rich plum nose, ripe and sweet with coffee and eucalyptus notes. The complex palate shows full flavors of red and black fruit, licorice, pepper, and roasted meat. It is concentrated, dense and elegant with a wonderfully long licorice and spice finish.