The 2004 Tablas Creek Vineyard Tannat is Tablas Creek's third bottling of this traditional varietal from South-West France, known principally in the Pyrenees foothills appellation of Madiran, but originally native to the Basque region. The Tannat grape has intense fruit, spice, and tannins that produce wines capable of long aging, and it is traditionally blended with Cabernet Sauvignon or Cabernet Franc.

When we imported our Châteauneuf du Pape clones, the Perrins' French nurseryman included the Tannat because he believed it would thrive in the rocky limestone soils of Paso Robles. We have planted just under an acre of Tannat, and it has indeed thrived here.

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

The 2004 vintage was excellent, with a very early spring balanced by a long, warm (but rarely hot) summer. The extended ripening cycle gave the grapes intense aromatics, pronounced minerality, good acids, and good structure. The Tannat was harvested on one day on September 29th, and our small block of Cabernet Sauvignon co-harvested the same day and co-fermented with the Tannat.

The Tannat and Cabernet Sauvignon grapes are destemmed and fermented using native yeasts. The wines were then moved to small barrels where they were aged for 18 months. The wine was bottled in July of 2006, and we aged it a further 9 months in bottle before releasing it in March of 2007.

The 2004 Tannat shows a dense purple-red color and has a nose of tobacco, smoke, game herbs (sage and juniper) and ripe berries. The rich palate has juicy flavors of raspberry and plum, with big but ripe tannins, and a long, smoky, generous finish. Although the wine is surprisingly approachable (for a Tannat) now, we believe that it will benefit from 3-5 years of bottle aging and drink well for a decade more.