Although our 2008 Cohort is a red blend of varieties with some commonalities such as the vineyard source, winemaker and Rhone focus, there is also a “twist” as is often the case with Caliza wines. This wine is the first fully estate red wine we’ve produced and in crafting this blend we sure had a wild ride from the grape growing through fermentation and finally blending. In 2008 the Caliza vineyard was only in its third growing season. Therefore the vines were small and not fully matured. You should have seen these “babies” trying to keep up and tolerate the riggers of growing up in Paso Robles. Their little canopies were thin and could not provide much sun protection to the few grape clusters that were allowed to remain on each vine. Now factor in the HOT summers of Paso Robles and you can just imagine we had hurting vines and “toasty” grapes by the time they were harvested. The extreme ripeness of the fruit made for difficult fermentation conditions. This wild wine was crafted from the three Rhone varieties of Syrah, Grenache and Petite Sirah with a kicker of Primitivo (a direct relation to Zinfandel). In the end each of the four varieties banded together as a group of Cohorts creating this unique and amazing wine with extreme depth of flavor, profile and textures.