Winemaker Notes
The Rosé begins with a brief maceration, a traditional Provencal technique, which develops an orange hue in the wine, stopping before it turns pink. Think Alaskan Sockeye Salmon. Many favorite roses exhibit this color. After whole-cluster pressing, the Cinsault, Grenache, and Syrah were co-fermented together for a few days then aged without oak in stainless steel.
Blend: 52% Cinsault, 24% Grenache, 24% Syrah
Professional Ratings
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Wine & Spirits
Tension and layering mark Greg Harrington’s 2021 pink, a blend of cinsault, grenache and syrah. With scents of apples and onion skin, this is firm and mouthwatering in its up-front acidity, providing a cranberry tartness for a grand plateau de fruits de mer.
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Wine Enthusiast
Cinsault makes up just over half of this pale salmon-colored wine, with the rest equal parts Grenache and Syrah. The aromas are generous, with notes of watermelon, yellow strawberry, herb and wet stone. The flavors are full-bodied in feel, showing a lot of textural richness.
Whether it’s playful and fun or savory and serious, most rosé today is not your grandmother’s White Zinfandel, though that category remains strong. Pink wine has recently become quite trendy, and this time around it’s commonly quite dry. Since the pigment in red wines comes from keeping fermenting juice in contact with the grape skins for an extended period, it follows that a pink wine can be made using just a brief period of skin contact—usually just a couple of days. The resulting color depends on grape variety and winemaking style, ranging from pale salmon to deep magenta.
A large and geographically diverse AVA capable of producing a wide variety of wine styles, the Columbia Valley AVA is home to 99% of Washington state’s total vineyard area. A small section of the AVA even extends into northern Oregon!
Because of its size, it is necessarily divided into several distinctive sub-AVAs, including Walla Walla Valley and Yakima Valley—which are both further split into smaller, noteworthy appellations. A region this size will of course have varied microclimates, but on the whole it experiences extreme winters and long, hot, dry summers. Frost is a common risk during winter and spring. The towering Cascade mountain range creates a rain shadow, keeping the valley relatively rain-free throughout the entire year, necessitating irrigation from the Columbia River. The lack of humidity combined with sandy soils allows for vines to be grown on their own rootstock, as phylloxera is not a serious concern.
Red wines make up the majority of production in the Columbia Valley. Cabernet Sauvignon is the dominant variety here, where it produces wines with a pleasant balance of dark fruit and herbs. Wines made from Merlot are typically supple, with sweet red fruit and sometimes a hint of chocolate or mint. Syrah tends to be savory and Old-World-leaning, with a wide range of possible fruit flavors and plenty of spice. The most planted white varieties are Chardonnay and Riesling. These range in style from citrus and green apple dominant in cooler sites, to riper, fleshier wines with stone fruit flavors coming from the warmer vineyards.