2022 - Fried Chicken - Skin Contact Chenin

Swan Valley

Zero additions

603 bottles made 

Back by popular demand: Fried Chicken. 

Our second go around with this wine, and a very different wine from last year which was a super limited run of sous voile oxidative style Chenin Blanc with the highest degree of turbidity we’ve ever produced (it made the Turbulent Juice blush). This year it is a very different, much cleaner beast. 

This year the fruit came from 5 rows of vines we pruned considerably later than the rest of the block. As a result, the fruit ripened two weeks later. Picked February 6th, crushed February 8th to two nally bins, the wild ferment took a few days to kick off in earnest. It remained on skins for only 6 days before pressing, the delayed pruning having resulted in smaller berries and a higher skin-to-juice ratio leading to a high degree of extraction for the relatively short amount of time on skins. The attractive chalky phenolics contained within the skins were a character we wanted to lock into the wine, though with careful attention so as to avoid over-extraction.

Pressed directly to tank and locked down for 6 months, during which time a nice healthy flor developed (almost as if the wine understood its esteemed lineage and followed suit). Reductively racked once in late August, and bottled a week later on August 27th with no additions. 

The Fried Chicken is as delicious as it is peculiar. Spicy curry leaf on the nose, green apple on the palate, chalky phenolics providing length and interest and some background VA to give it all some drive and lift. Chewy, textural, caramelised citrus and a mouth watery acidity.