About This Product :
The Grapes: Primo Rosso, “first red,” in Italian, is a blend of many old-world varietals, many which have been grown here for over a century: Zinfandel, Primitivo, Carignane, Petite Sirah and Syrah.
The Appellation: Mendocino, California
The Wine: This creative blend produces a wine of extraordinary balance. This wine has a dark purple-garnet color, with fruity aromas and flavors of plums, blackberry jam, spice and earth with hints of toasty oak. Rich full flavors, ample tannins and balanced acidity seamlessly carry through to a long, complex finish.
The Winemaking: The grapes were hand-harvested at an average of 26.0 degrees brix in the months of September and October. After crushing the grapes into small open-top stainless steel tanks, the must was cold soaked for 4 days and pumped over and punched down twice daily for 2 weeks during fermentation, before being pressed off into French, Eastern European and American oak barrels. The wines are never racked off their secondary sediments leaving them to protect the wine and give the wine an earthy complexity of a wine that is worth many times its price. After aging in barrels for an average of 36 months, the wine was egg white fined, rough filtered and bottled.
Fermentation: 4 day average of cold soak, pumped over and punched down twice a day for an average of 14 days in stainless open top fermenters.
Aging: average 36 months in French and American Burgundy barrels.
Alcohol: 15.0%
Total Acidity: 7.0 g/L
pH: 3.47
Residual Sugar: 0.3% (dry)
Pairs With: Enjoy this wine with grilled steaks, pasta with forest mushroom sauce and lamb chops with rosemary and garlic sauce. Primo Rosso also make a great companion to hard well aged cheeses.
The Winemaker: Greg Graziano. The Graziano Family has a long line of winemakers and grape growers dating back to the early 1900’s. Like his family before him, Greg Graziano, now carries on the family winemaking tradition that his grandfather set the foundation for and that his father Joseph later handed down to Gregory. To this day he is still carrying on the family tradition…as is his oldest daughter, Alexandra Graziano, a UC Davis graduate of Viticulture and Enology. She is currently involved in all aspects of winemaking and is the 4th generation, from Piedmonte of Italy to Mendocino County.
