Hiyu Tzum Feis 2022

Where: Hood River County, Oregon - Columbia Gorge Valley
Grapes: Zinfandel, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc,
Merlot, Malbec, Carménère, Petit Verdot, Tannat
Body: Medium
Category: Red Wine

Hiyu is winemaker, Nate Ready, a former master sommelier in various fine establishments, including the lauded Thomas Keller’s French Laundry in Napa Valley and his partner, China Tresemer, the estate’s co-founder and agriculturalist. She is also a talented illustrator who paints all of the labels.

Tzum wines come from small, specific fields, situated between the rainforest and the desert, throughout the Gorge. These parcels embody diverse terrains, vantage points, and climates. 

Nate on this wine: Scorched Earth Vineyard, leased a 9.83-acre site farmed by Hiyu since 2016 in the desert east of Lyle, Washington State (30 miles east of Hiyu). The site is on the banks of the Columbia River at sea level and the vines are planted in black (basalt) sand. The Feis, a one-acre parcel, is closest to the river, where the soils are a bit deeper and have more organic matter than the pure sand or basalt cobbles found in other parts of the vineyard.

Making of: Hand harvest, a full month on the skins. Aged in neutral oak barrels, unfined and unfiltered.

Personality: “The wine expresses itself as pure perfume, more like an enveloping cloud than a liquid. It was not what we expected when planting in such a warm place with these kind of grapes. It lacks the mundane aspects of fruit, acid and mineral that draw most wines to earth. Instead one is swirling with more aerial versions of these things. It smells like a thicket, bramble or hedge; of leaves dense with aromatic oils, ripe raspberry, blackberry and plum, the pollen laden legs of bees and red dust that somehow contains the essence of summer,”

ORGANIC  //  no Sulfites Added // Woman Owner // Vegan

2022  //  750ml