I first fell in love with Waltz Vineyards when I had their Cherry wood Merlot back about three or four Eastern Wineries Exposition. I’ve been following them ever since. But I haven’t had a chance to try their other wines until they hosted the East Coast wine tasting coordinated by Paul Vigna. Luckily for all of us, Jan and Kim Waltz volunteered to host the historic event. Two Waltz wines were featured.
In my opinion, Waltz is one of he leaders in wine in Pennsylvania as well as on the east coast. They are an excellent producer!!!
The winery is a beautiful place, filled with color and light, and beautifully appointed. Hard to find a prettier winery set in the country that does quality wine such as this.
The first was the Waltz Chardonnay Reserve 2013. This is a straight up wine. De-stemmed, sat on the skins two days, and pressed. A simple wine, in a world of funky techniques made for 95. 96.and 76 Chardonnay clones grown with traditional VSP trellising. The run is aged in older French oak, except for one barrel which is new oak. I like all of this because this is a truly honest wine. No tricks or funky things. Shows what solid growers can do.
The first thing that hits you is a big pear and baked aple that come across instantly. A light tropical note is over powered by a big lemon, citrus presence. Then there’s oak, with hints of toast and vanilla that leads into a lemon custard nose. The palate follows through almost exactly but with that lovely lemon custard after taste. Amazing. The nice part of this was that the oak was very nicely integrated, present, a nice compliment, but not over powering. The fruit was very pretty and fresh. They made 150 cases, and though it’s in a few restaurants,it’s mostly sold through the case club members and the tasting room. Fantastic.
The second wine came near the end of the tasting, mostly because of how big it was. The Waltz Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon 2013 comes from the 20-year old Crow Woods Vineyard. Made from 169 and 337 Cabernet Sauvignon clones, that were green thinned in August, and harvested in Mid-October. There was some leaf pulling on these vines which are lined up more or less North-South. The leaves were pulled more heavily on the eastern side of the vines, where they get the good morning sun. The wine was made in three different lots.
This wine is 80% Cabernet Sauvignon and 20% Merlot, and aged in oak, and then bottle aged the wine for one year. This was a big, dark, jammy wine. Cassis and blackberry jam. Mocha and cocoa, as well as hints of toast and vanilla. And nice, big tannins. A big, layered, complex red wine, very well balanced. If I didn’t tell you, it almost comes across as California, it’s so big! A wonderful wine.
But it's not just these. It's the entire line up. I've had a number of their bottles. The wine is good all the way down the line.Quality. Well done.
Compliments to Jan and Kim!
