WTN: Harrington Tempesta '16...(short/boring)

Continuing to work thru my recent Harrington arrivals, I tried last night:
1. Harrington Tempesta HeirloomRanch/Lodi Calif RW (76% Corvina/24% PinotNoir; 13.2%; 100 cs) 2016: Very light garnet/near rose color; quite fragrant cherry/PN some herbal/Corvina/earthy very spicy slight mushroomy/chalky very perfumed nose; lightly tart/tangy spicy/cherry/PN some earthy/mushroomy/Lodi light/spicy very attractive flavor w/ light gentle tannins; long bright cherry/PN/very spicy/cinammon light mushroomy/earthy some complex finish w/ light gentle tannins; a rather light very spicy good drinking bit nervy/high-strung red that would not play well in Monktown; light like a rose but far more interesting and not just a simple fruity Grenache; reminds a lot of a Jura Poulsard or Pinot, some of an AltoAdige Schiava; an absolutely fascinating glou-glou red. $27.00
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A wee BloodyPulpit:
1. Bryan has made the first Corvina (one of the Valpolicella grapes) in 2015. It was quite a light wine, much like this one. This year he chose to blend in some PinotNoir (from RonSiletto vnyd??) for gawd only nose what reason. AnyWho...it works and made a very good vin de soif.
Tom

[Jenise]

Sounds wonderful. I have loved every Harrington I've had.

This is what Bryan had to share about this wine:

Yep, this one is close to my heart. Love what the Corvina does out in those sandy Lodi soils. Such dramatic aromatics. By the way, last year down in San Benito County, we T-budded old Viognier vines over to Corvina and just got our first fruit this harvest. Tasted the wine yesterday for the first time since the press and it is very different from the Lodi Corvina. More structured, with a darker hue. Sure this is because San Benito is a much cooler region and the vineyard is sited on limestone and granite river deposit soils. Less fruit expression, more spice-driven aromatics and flavors. So it would seem Corinva shares Pinot's ability to reflect terroir quite transparently. I hope other growers will start planting it throughout the West so we can all learn together about this beautiful grape.

As for why blend Corvina, well, as I'm sure you know, they blend Corvina with all kinds of grapes in the Veneto. It is most often blended with Corvinone, Rondinella, Molinara and Negrara but we don't have all those vines here yet... at least not officially. They also do a ripasso style wine by pressing thru Cabernet or Merlot skins to get more color and gravity. It seemed a shame to bury those incredible Corvina aromatics under Merlot or Cab just for the color so I did a series of blending trials with other varieties in the winery. Nothing really worked till the Pinot Noir. A natural fit as Corvina is a descendant of Pinot Noir, separated by four generations by way of Teroldego and Lagrein. The blend didn't really help the color much but really powers up the density, structure and length of the Tempesta. As there are many Pinot Nero vineyards just up the hill from Valpolicella in Trentino and Alto Adige, it is surprising to me the Venetians never tried such a blend in the marketplace.

Funny you should mention Schiava. We are pulling some cuttings from the FPS collection this year. Haven't decided where to plant it yet but we will need to settle soon on a higher altitude site with either limestone or perhaps some igneous porphyry. Stay tuned.

Tom