Kinkead Ridge Vertical Reds

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Saturday night, before Krewe, we went to a Kinkead Ridge Verticals tasting, hosted by our friends David and Jan Lazarus. David and Jan have several bottles of every Kinkead Ridge vintage. Kevin and I? We've got 1 each of an older Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon and three bottles of the 2006 Viognier-Roussanne.

Not even thinking of how the others would age, we drank the rest in our cellar. This was a pleasant move on our part, most definitely, but one I'm regretting a little. It turns out that the Kinkead Ridge reds age remarkably well. This particular tasting focused on the reds – cab franc, cab sauv, syrah, and the Revelation blends. As many of you know, I'm not necessarily a cab franc fan, but I was quite impressed with how these tasted with a few years on them. The biggest revelation for me, however, was the syrah. We've never purchased their syrah because we weren't ever blown away by it in the tasting room. Shows what we know. With a couple years in the bottle, these syrahs were tasting excellent – very impressive! As big a fan of their whites (especially that Viognier-Roussanne), it looks like I need to move out of my comfort zone and start buying more reds.

Ron and Nancy, the winemakers, were also rather happy with how the wines were tasting. As a small winery, they sell everything and don't have any bottles sitting around. Interested in their upcoming releases? Case quantities are low, thanks to that crazy Easter frost in 2007. Here's what they'll be releasing this year:

2007 Cabernet Sauvignon: 247 cases (in comparison, 344 cases were released of the 2005 Cab Sauv)

2007 Cabernet Franc: 216 cases (in comparison, 383 cases were released of the 2005 Cab Franc)

The 2008 whites (estate grown Viognier/Roussanne, white Revelation blend of Sauvignon
Blanc/Semillon, off-dry Riesling and Rock Springs Vineyard Traminette) will be released on Memorial Day.

Here are a few photos from the vertical, one from Nancy and the rest from my poor little camera phone.

A sampling of the selection

Kevin pouring a cab franc

Kevin and Shel with winemaker Ron Barrett of Kinkead Ridge (thanks Nancy!)

One of my favorite things at the Lazarus home

Posted by Michelle at 6:28 am in Cincinnati, Local, Local Wineries, Tastings, Wineries | Permalink | Comments (3)

3 Responses to “Kinkead Ridge Vertical Reds”

david says:

February 25, 2009 at 8:33 am

hannah appreciates being included in your blog!
Amy in Ohio says:

February 25, 2009 at 7:46 pm

You looked so pretty! And love the pup!
KinkeadRidgeWinery says:

February 26, 2009 at 12:10 pm

The case count list is just to show the difference in production from 2005 to 2007… all 2005 wine is long sold out at the winery! You can see how an Easter frost affects case production. Nancy.