Rarezitas Torcidas (rah-ruh-ZEE-tas Tor-SEE-das), [SP] n pl., 1. literally, Twisted Little Freaks, 2. A bunch of gnarly Spanish clone Grenache vines (Spain is the new France) growing on a hillside in Vallecito that produce this killer combination of bright fragrance and bold fruit that you are currently drooling all over the table waiting to taste... er, here's a towel. (A Twisted Few Exclusive! Not a member? Join now!)

Torcido is made from Grenache grapes grown in our own vineyards in Vallecito - totally Estate Grown, dude! - to learn more (and to see that fancy stuff), scroll down to our Geek Sheet.

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You remember when you were a little kid, and there was this little store round the corner that had a nice man behind the counter who would sell you a big bag of the best candy for a nickel? We don’t either, no one is that old! But if we were that old, this wine might just remind us a little of those days, with aromas of strawberries, raspberries and spicy oak; and flavors of zingy raspberry, grape sours and a touch of black licorice - maybe even that coffee candy you used to think was yucky - finishing with impressions of lavender, lilac and strawberries. Whoops, I guess we wandered into the toiletries department, but I think you get the idea...

The inaugural release of Torcido also happens to be our very first fully estate grown wine from the Red Hill property in Vallecito. Vineyard manager Mark Skenfield (we call him Marco, but no one can remember why) oversaw the planting of this vineyard while we were all busy trying to build a damn winery back in 2002/2003. These Garnacha (Spanish clones of Grenache) vines are planted on very tight spacing in very volcanic rhyolytic tuff soils with lots of water holding capacity, but very little nutrients. Some additional Grenache from our larger planting just up the property a bit more was blended in as well as a touch of Graciano from the that block for some extra “oomph”. 2005 was our first vintage off of these plantings. The season started off with budbreak in a very uncharacteristically warm February. However once March hit, it rained for what seemed like three full months. Once the rains let up, we experienced a beautifully mild spring and early summer. Mid-July then set in with an extreme month-long heatwave that left our water supplies reeling!! Fortunately mid-August calmed down and we had a very mild late summer finish with helped keep the acids high enough in the grapes for us to pick them fully ripe.

Upon harvesting, these Garnacha grapes were run through the crusher very early that same morning, but 30% of the grapes were left uncrushed and allowed to ferment as whole-berries from the inside out. This gives an extra little bit of “fruitiness” in the final wine. The must fermented over a period of 10 days in small bins. We then pressed the fresh wine off of the skins and racked it directly to barrels for secondary fermentation and ageing. We used roughly 20% new French oak, 20% 1 year old French oak and 60% neutral oak. After 10 months in barrel, we blended in 14% Graciano and an additional lot of Grenache. The wine was bottled 11 months after harvest.