I have been making Rebel Roan for more than half our life as a brand. It is one of the longest-running wines we make here at Carhartt Family Wines, and after all these years I can tell you the 2023 might be my favorite one yet. I want to walk you through why, because the story of this wine is really the story of a strange and generous growing season.
Rebel Roan is our take on a GSM. If you have not run into that term before, GSM stands for Grenache, Syrah, and Mourvèdre, the three grapes at the heart of the classic red wines of the Southern Rhône Valley in France. It is the blend behind Châteauneuf-du-Pape and a lot of the wines people fall in love with from that part of the world.
Each grape does a job. Grenache brings red fruit and lift. Syrah brings darker fruit and density. Mourvèdre brings the savory, almost meaty backbone that holds the whole thing together. The 2023 runs 34% Grenache, 30% Mourvèdre, 26% Syrah, and one more piece: 10% Petite Sirah, which we add for structure. That last 10% is our own move, a little extra spine that pushes our version past the classic three-grape formula.
Here is the thing about how we make wine. We are not chasing big, ripe, high-alcohol reds. That means the vintage shows up in the glass more than it might at a winery pushing everything to the extreme. In a hot year, we tend to get riper, fruitier, lighter wines. In a cool year, we tend to get darker, more brooding, more structured wines. One or the other, usually.
2023 broke that pattern. It was a long, cool season with strong rainfall early in the year. The fruit hung a long time and reached full maturity while holding onto its acidity. What we ended up with is a wine that does both things at once: the depth and seriousness of a cool vintage, and beautifully evolved, mature fruit at the same time. It is fresh and matured all at once. I don’t get to say that most years.
Rebel Roan is estate grown, like most of our CFW Heritage label, here in the Santa Ynez Valley, in the heart of Santa Barbara County wine country. We farm our own vineyards, we pick our own fruit, and we make everything on site at the family ranch, from fermentation to aging to bottling. We are a family owned, small batch operation, and Rebel Roan is a wine my mom and I make together, the same way we have made our wines since our first vintage in 1998.
We aged the 2023 Rebel Roan for 18 months in barrel, then held it in bottle for about another year and a half before releasing it. That extra time in bottle is a patience move. It lets the different pieces of the blend marry and settle, so the wine arrives already open and generous instead of tight and closed. It is drinking beautifully right now, and it is built to keep going for years. I would put its window at now through 2036 and beyond.
Give it about an hour of air. This wine changes noticeably from the first pour to the last, and the time is worth it. On the nose you get rich red cherry, fresh nutmeg, and even a little cooked bacon. On the palate it is rose petal, savory herbs, and fig jam. It is medium-plus in body with real presence, but the tannin is approachable, so it drinks smoother than its size might suggest.
For food, I would reach for herbed chicken over lentils, grilled eggplant with romesco, or a lamb sausage flatbread. Savory, herb-driven dishes with a little richness are the sweet spot.
If you want to taste it the way we do, come see us. We pour daily at our tasting room in Los Olivos, and there is no better way to understand a wine than with the people who made it.
