The first time I had an elegant dry rosé wine was on a simple but romantic picnic with Simon in Provence nearly twenty years ago. Local cheese, bread, fruit, the fabulous, dramatic scenery and that Provençal wine with its delicate salmon pink color, crisp acidity and floral aromas forever linked in my mind rosé wines and al fresco dining with romance. Last year, Simon and I harvested Olivet Grange Pinot Noir on September 1st which was our 20th wedding anniversary. To celebrate and mark the occasion I made a special rosé which we have called “Endless Crush”.

Some rosés are made as a by-product of red wine by bleeding off (saigner) some of the juice early in the production process to create a higher ratio of skin to juice which will concentrate the resultant red wine. “Endless Crush” was not made in this manner. My intention from the start was to create a rosé separate from my Pinot Noir. Rosés made intentionally, rather than simply by drawing off the freerun juice, tend to have greater complexity and structure because the grapes are pressed.

“Endless Crush” was made entirely from our organically grown Olivet Grange fruit; three half ton bins of clones 114, 115 and 777 were destemmed and the whole berries and freerun juice were set aside to cold soak while we processed the rest of the our Pinot Noir. The bins were intermittently punched down during the six hour cold soak to help extract color and then moved by hand into a small bladder press; I pressed only until the color was just right and before any bitterness from the skins was noticeable. The juice was fermented in a small stainless steel tank. The result was 60 cases of Rosé of Pinot Noir bottled on 22 February 2005 with Stelvin closures. (No need for a corkscrew when you take this wine to the beach or out on a picnic!) Like that first rosé I enjoyed in France, this wine is a beautiful, pale pink with a hint of copper and is dry, crisp, and refreshing.