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Irony
Napa Valley
Merlot 2004

Size: 750 ml
Price: $15.97

Get A 10% Discount!
12 Bottle Case Price: $172.00

This Napa Valley Merlot displays rich, ripe raspberries, black cherries and blueberries with notes of cedar and dark chocolate. A backbone of moderate tannins provides the structure for this full-bodied wine, which features a lush, lingering finish. Enjoy this wine with roast beef, grilled chicken, baked ham, a classic cheeseburger or rich minestrone soup.

The 2004 vintage was an interesting race. The season started fast due to a warm, dry spring, which prompted an early bud break. The season progressed with steady summer temperatures allowing for good flavor and acid development. Late summer “sprints,” bursts of hotter weather, led to one of the earliest harvests in recent years. As a result, the grape crop was smaller than average, but of exceptional quality. Fewer, small and tightly packed clusters of grapes give the 2004 Napa Valley red wines rich, concentrated flavor and color, and firm acidity and tannins that support these full-bodied reds.

Most of the grapes for this Napa Valley Merlot come from vineyards in the Yountville area. Yountville is one of the coolest growing regions in Napa as it receives much of the marine influence from San Pablo Bay south of Napa Valley. The cooler climate produces grapes with big tannins and concentrated flavors. Our grapes develop intense flavors as they grow in the mix of loose gravel and clay, and they receive equal exposure to sunlight and light winds due to the VSP (vertical shoot position) trellis system in the vineyards. The bright berry flavors characteristic of Yountville Merlot is due to the abundance of late afternoon sun that reaches these vineyards on the eastern side of the valley.

Winemaking for Irony Merlot begins in the vineyards. Shoot removal in early spring, and allowing fuller canopy development during the summer moderates sun and wind exposure to ensure full flavor development and maintains acidity. The grapes for our Irony Merlot were harvested in the cool morning –- most were hand-harvested -– to maintain the full fruit character of the grapes as they fermented. Stainless steel fermentation was followed by full malolactic fermentation before the wine was racked into barrels –- a combination of new and used oak of French and American origin.

Appellation: Napa Valley

Alcohol: 14.5% by volume

Residual Sugar: 0.06g/100ml

Total Acid: 0.71g/100ml

Final pH: 3.33

Sugar at Harvest: 25 Brix

Cases Produced: 10,000