Winemaker Notes
The Red wine drinker’s white! 2017 Roussanne is rich and textured enough to stand up to most proteins from raw or cooked seafood, to turkey, through pork. It has a red wine weight but with a pretty lemon meringue profile. Fleshy textures ride many a layered current through the palate. The wine stays delicate and soft, feathering the mouth with coconut husk and tropical fruit.
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
The 2017 Stolpman Roussanne was aged for 9 months in 25% new French oak, a reduction from its prior elevage of entirely new wood. The nose is oily but poised, with classic Roussanne aromas of stone fruit and jasmine flowers. Its texture is fleshy and supple, bound together by a clean, lively core. This vintage contains 12% Chardonnay to bolster the structure of the finish, and I applaud Stolpman for being upfront about the use of a non-typical variety in the blend.
Full and silky in body but also charmingly crisp, Roussanne is native to the Rhône Valley of France. It is responsible for some of the finest Northern Rhône white wines. Roussanne adds richness and acidity to Marsanne’s soft, fruitiness, making age worthy and highly respected whites. Somm Secret—Roussanne takes its name from the French word, roux, meaning rouge or red because of the berry’s pink glow. In California, virtually all of the 339 acres of Roussanne come from true clones brought over by Tablas Creek and John Alban.
Accounting for only ten percent of the greater Santa Ynez AVA, Ballard Canyon’s north-south orientation provides an ideal pattern of sunshine and martime fog for producing excellent Syrah. While Syrah is planted to half of the total AVA acreage, an additional third is dedicated to other Rhône varieties, red and white.