Cadarcă

Cadarcă is a grape variety originating in the west part of Romania. When Transylvania was part of the Austro-Hungarian empire, the red wine from Cadarcă grapes was considered to be one of the best red wine in the empire. It was preferred by the emperor house.

The grapes are usually late harvested, can have between 150 and 220 grams/ liter of sugar. The wine can be drink young but the best quality is reached after 2 or 3 years of aging when it gets fines forest fruits and spices flavors.

The wine-making style from Miniș area (village in the west part of Romania) assume the fermentation of the fresh wine together with over maturated dried grape berries (raisins). This way the wine obtains the best complexity of body and taste.

The dried grapes are obtained only in the best years by removing some of the vine leaves. In October the raisins are placed on the mats. After a few days, only healthy grapes are selected and the dried ones are placed in a high tub, in a dry place, for 5-6 days. After which they are knead by hand resulting in a mild composition that is distributed in containers with good quality red wine on top. The containers are covered and the mixture is left for fermentation for 4-6 weeks, while mixing it with a wooden shovel and gathering the seeds. After the fermentation the wine is kept in 100 liter containers and it is consumed usually after 1 or 2 years and it can be aged.

Cadarcă’s color is ranging from purple to dark red, because of this the locals named this wine as “bull-blood”, reputation still preserved that defines the color, personality and power. It has a particular and consistent fresh fruit aroma of red ripen fruits,  full body, velvety and can be acidic. Due to the usage of the raisins the wines produced are oxidative with favors of cloves (beside the red fruits) and slightly astringents.

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