2009 Midan al-Tahrir A Blended White Wine
This is our first blended white wine, a companion to the 2008 Gardens of Babylon. It originated in the (for us) vast amounts of Verdelho that we made in 2009. As always, it seemed more interesting to us to multiply distinctions, rather than erase them— so we segregated portions of the fruit that we brought in from three different vineyards (Lost Slough Verdelho, Lost Slough Gewurz, and Bokisch Verdelho) and in each case treated the segregant differently than the primary wine that we intended to make. We had to see where these shadow wines went; eventually it became clear that the strongest possible wine would be made from all of them, in combination with two other interesting single-vineyard wines.
We have been aging the componenets patiently since the fall of 2009. They were born as Gemella— the baking-spice press wine that is the twin of Naucratis; less tannic Marcher sur La Lune Verdelho from the hillsides of Bokisch; super-fragrant skin-contact portions of Gewurz, also from Lost Slough; muscular Chardonnay from Tenbrink; and finely-chiseled Sauvignon Blanc from an old vine vineyard adjacent to Glos in Napa, Morrow. Each one of the wines was barrel-fermented, and barrel aged without racking, stirring, or SO2. The blend is complex, rich, and deep. It is in complete counterpoise to the freshness of Naucratis, but not as crazy and extreme as Choepheroi.
The wine is named in honor of Liberation Square in Cairo. This naming is such an insignificant gesture next to the passion, heroism, and wisdom embodied in that square and the movement born from it. How can one not want to be part of this in whatever way is possible? This gesture was irresistable, especially because our main wine from Lost Slough is named for a city in ancient Egypt, not so far from al-Tahrir.