2021 Concentric Wine Project Capt. Charsanne Rouchard

Capt. Charsanne Rouchard is an orange wine.  No, this is not a citrus wine; no oranges were used in the winemaking process.  “Orange wine” (amber wine, skin contact white wine, etc.)  refers to a winemaking process where white wine grapes are processed and fermented while in contact with the grape skins (how red wine is made).  Most of the time white wine grapes are pressed immediately, separating the juice from skins/seeds.  Grape skins and seeds are responsible for color and tannins in wine, and with most white wines you try and avoid any added color and tannins.  We ended up fermenting and aging this wine on the grape skins and seeds, sealed in a tank, for 82 days.  The resulting wine is a big white wine with some hefty tannins behind it and a seemingly endless flavor and aroma profile.

As for the unusual name, during the long-sleepless-exhausting hours of harvest certain lots of wine are bestowed fun names by staff members while working through states of delirium.  I don’t recall who started calling this wine Charsanne Rouchard (50% Chardonnay, 50% Roussanne word-mashup), and I don’t recall who thought that name sounded like Jean-Luc Picard (Star Trek), but because Jean-Luc was a Captain in the Starfleet, we figured our Charsanne Rouchard needed to be promoted to a Captain.  Enter: Capt. Charsanne Rouchard.  Fun and silly wine names don’t always make it on the bottle, but when they do, it’s usually a Concentric wine.