September 27, 2011
Today Father Chuck Tilley conducted our Harvest Blessing on the first grapes to come in to the winery, our Sierra Madre Vineyard Pinot Noir.
2011 Rains
Many people have asked how the latest rains have affected the vineyards. Here is a report from Bill Brosseau, our Director of Winemaking, regarding his visit to our Monterey County Vineyards this week.
Most of our vineyards in Monterey county were at the tail end of a rain pattern which dropped about a half inch of rain during flowering. The clusters have difficulty self pollinating as the pollen gets washed away or the protective ‘cap’ of tissue gets stuck on the ovary, impeding pollen fertilization. Fortunately, most of our vineyard in the county were either pre-bloom or post bloom. Bloom is considered 50% of caps have fallen and the ovary (future berry if fertilized) is exposed to pollen.
When I traveled through the Brosseau Vineyard, I was expecting devastation, but fortunately, we had not really hit full bloom yet. There appears to be some caps sticking, but no more than a 10% or so potential loss. As I traveled across the valley at the southern end, some of our ranches, such as Dos Rubios, had 25% or more stuck caps. If the caps do not dry out and blow off, pollination won’t occur on those potential berries. I put in a call to Kirk, the owner to get in and lift the trellis catch wires in the hopes of knocking off the stuck caps, increasing our berry set potential. Working up towards Doctor’s vineyard, the stuck cap syndrome was starting to taper off and when I got up to Garys’ and Rosella’s, no real concern as they were at the tail end of flowering.
Now comes the challenge keeping mildew and rot at bay. We normally do not get rain at flowering, but in regions where it does, the disease pressure goes up exponentially. In our vineyards, we are actively removing leaves near the fruit on the shaded side of the vine, such that anti-fungal sprays can be more effective. We are being cautious though, not to over-strip the vines as a potential heat wave could burn fruit.
These are challenging, yet exciting times, seeing our vineyard managers perform at their best and make the most of a challenging season.
2010 Harvest Notes
Tuesday, September 14th
Had a meeting with our full-time production staff to review harvest strategies. We have been very fortunate to have the same harvest crew in place since 2006. Each year, I try to give an added level of responsibility to each member and this definitely has translated into higher wine quality year after year. We finished the day with a training session on carbon dioxide generation by fermentation. Anytime we end a tank or a press, we follow a list of guidelines to ensure we are being safe in the workplace.
Thursday, September 16th
Big bottling day. We had a successful day bottling of about 1,000 cases of wine. It takes 6 people about 10 hours (not including set up and clean up) to get this done on our line. Bottling is the only time in winemaking where a healthy pace is essential to product preservation and integrity. If we have too many gaps during the day, the bottling line can pick up yeast and bacteria that can cause potential issues in wine to be bottled later that day. It has been a big learning curve with our new bottling line, but we attribute the consistently of our 2008 vintage to this new addition to the production center here at the winery.
In our weekly meeting Rob Jensen, Testarossa Proprietor, and I reviewed some of our upcoming facilities projects. I also forewarned Rob that we will be sorting fruit more aggressively this year as the long, cool and moist year did not help with fruit integrity at our late-ripening sites.
Friday, September 17th
Headed out toward Monterey County to check on vineyards. I did a whirlwind tour of all our vineyards and found there to be about a two to three week spread on ripening. When I got to Sleepy Hollow Pinot Noir, I was caught off guard at how good things tasted, especially as this site tends to be our last harvested site. I guess it is going to be a brief harvest period once we get some heat. Working south through the Santa Lucia Highlands, I hit Rosella’s, which always wins the beauty pageant for best looking vineyard. Gary Franscioni, the owner, really hates dust so he paved all the roads and maintains green grass on the periphery of the vineyard. Then down to Garys’ vineyard where the crews were dropping fruit that had some heat damage from the heat wave earlier in September. Doctor’s vineyard tasted the ripest, but unfortunately the yields were looking quite low. I finished up at Brosseau where I really wanted to pick Saturday morning, but too much of the block needed more time. The most challenging part of winemaking is probably changing my mind once it’s already made up! Seeds were a touch green and the berries still too firm. Fortunately, the wild boars are leaving the Pinot Noir alone.
At the winery, we put the finishing touches on our new reverse osmosis system for water treatment. This system, AKA: RO, generates ultrapure water, relatively close to distilled water. In the quest of increasing quality and site specificity in our wines, this was a natural decision for our wine program.
Saturday, September 18th
I planned to head to Santa Maria Friday night late, but a flat tire got in my way. I decided to regroup at Brosseau Vineyard and stay the night there. I got an early start and visited our newest vineyard, Dos Rubios. There are some real nice flavors developing in this site and I talked with Kirk, the owner, about picking in about 10 days. Seeds were about 75% ripe and acids were still noticeably high.
Sunday, September 19th
One of our Sierra Madre Pinot Noir tanks jumped down to 5 brix in only 4-5 days. We did extra punchdowns to ensure we were getting good extraction. The other tank of Sierra Madre Pinot Noir was still lingering in the 20 brix range. The only difference with these two tanks was the block they were picked from. The fast fermenting tank lends me to believe that that block was more fertile and provided more ‘goodies’ for the fermentation yeast. We’ll probably be draining this to barrel early in the next week.
Tuesday, September 21st
We are busy sending our 2009 Santa Lucia Highlands Chardonnay blend to tank before harvest gets crazy. This wine replaces our central coast Chardonnay of previous vintages. It is showing vibrant acidity and nice citrus notes already. Should be a stunning wine with a little time in bottle. We are also putting the finishing touches on our 2009 Santa Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir as it is sitting patiently in tank for bottling. This Pinot is showing really well and is a great morale boost going into harvest. There is nothing I would do to change this wine, even if I could do anything. It is very hedonistic and I have a feeling it will do well with wine critics. I had the chance to do some tasting notes Rosellas 08's and they are showing quite nice right now. It is always tricky tasting bottled wine and fermenting wine as the acids and tannins in the fermenting wine tend to linger in the palate, much like drinking coffee that is too hot.
On the fermenting front, I made the decision to drain Sierra Madre Pinot Noir off of its skins Wednesday and rack clean (few solids) to barrel, the other tank of it on Thursday goes direct to barrel (with fine solids). I wanted to do an experiment in barrel with clarified and non-clarified to see the impact on the palate. Years past, we tend to prefer the wine on solids.
Friday, September 24th
I hit the road again visiting Monterey county vineyards. I visited Brosseau, Dos Rubios, and Pisoni to name a few. This year, the first time for Brosseau and Pisoni vineyard, I elected to demarcate the hillsides from the swayles (or low points) in our blocks. The swayles tend to be developmentally behind due to deeper richer soil. In this cool vintage, these differences are much more noticeable so I want to make sure we are maximizing quality and picking separately. We won't know which is higher quality until we compare the different sections in barrel, but that is the fun part about winemaking. It is exhilarating pushing the quality envelope each year, trying to out-do ourselves.
At the winery, we are processing the first batch of Bien Nacido 113 Block N. These are from younger vines on a 10% gentle slope. Diana Jensen texted me and said the fruit looked beautiful. Later that day, we processed some Brosseau Pommard clone Pinot Noir from the hillside sections of the block.
Saturday September 25th
I continue south to Santa Maria to see Bien Nacido, Sierra Madre to name a few. It was quite toasty in the valley, probably around 90F, where the normal daily high is 78F. We had some Bien Nacido from older vines that needed some more time from the pick of 113 clone. The Mt. Eden clone block is tasting ready to we will pull the trigger on it. The 2A clone still needs a week. It is very tempting to pick at the same time and hope it turns out fine, but I would rather error on the safe side and pick each clone at its optimum, and blend later in the winemaking process. The Bien Nacido Chard still is 2-3 weeks out as the berries are hard and tart. The Sierra Madre Chardonnay is all that remains for us and I elected to wait out the heat wave. I was going to pick Monday, but it is just too hot and the vines still seems like they are holding up well. We are set to go for Thursday.
When I got back to the winery that night, I came upon a forklift stuck in the dirt. We have a compost pile out in the field for grape waste and one of our workers got it stuck. Mike, our cellarmaster, and myself try to pull it out with my ford explorer, but to no avail.
Sunday, September 26th
Success, we found a bigger truck and pulled the forklift out of a rut. Hopefully this is the last time we get our forklift stuck (mind you a 12,000 pound beast!). At the winery, we tasted through some of the fermenting tanks as well as the barrel fermenting Brosseau Chardonnay. It is neat to see the differences emerging in the Brosseau lots already. I think my favorite one is the Wente clone from the hillsides.I'm starting to get a barrage of calls as it has been in the 90's for the last few days. Growers always get anxious when the temps are high. I have a feeling next week will be a wild ride, more wild than getting the forklift out of a rut!
Monday, September 27th
Grower panic day. I must have gotten 10 calls before lunch: “The sky is falling, we’ve gotta pick” and “The fruit is falling apart, it’s not gonna make it.”
It was probably the three straight days of heat causing the growers to get anxious. These conditions tend to drive sugars high and lower yields. I decided to make a drive down to the Monterey County vineyards, relieved to see that the vines were not suffering as the growers were implying. There were some basal leaves (leaves next to the clusters) starting to turn yellow, but not much more. At one vineyard, I eased their minds by throwing out a projected date for picking later in the week (with the intention of visiting the vineyard before that date in case I wanted to buy some more time).
I elected to pick Pisoni today as the wine chemistry was good this past weekend, but the seeds needed a little more heat to brown them completely. We only picked the hillside fruit, and idea that got a nod of approval from Mark Pisoni. We will pick up the remainder of the fruit later in the week.
At the winery, we received our new tanks for the current vintage. It is always a harrowing experience to get such a bulky piece of steel moved and erected without it destroying anything in its path.
We also ran some lab analysis on our reverse osmosis water treatment system; just to verify its quality. We are looking forward to using this ultra-pure water when the tests come back.
Lastly, I updated the grape receivables timeline for Adam, our Assistant Winemaker, to see. I know I will shock him with 150 ton of fruit coming in this week!
Tuesday, September 28th
At the vineyards, we elected to pick Bien Nacido Pinot Noir Mt. Eden clone. This block always makes our Single Vineyard bottling and I did not want it to go through the remainder of the heat wave.I tasted through our first lot of Pinot Noir today starting with the Sierra Madre Pinot Noir, in barrel. It seems like just yesterday we were harvesting the Santa Barbara County grapes. It tasted a little tart and firm, but all important elements are showing at this stage. We don’t want it tasting too good now- that wouldn’t bode well for age-ability. The Brosseau and Bien Nacido are both in tank on their skins; these wines still taste like sweet nectar, on the verge of fermenting. “I need more power!” Darn it, the power goes out at 5:30pm. With all the heat outside and activity inside, one of our fuses blows, shutting down the party. With tanks coming late tonight, we decide to wrap up for the day. Ken, our facility guru, is up in SF and on his way back to fix the electrical. Bien Nacido Vineyard at dusk.
Wednesday, September 29th
Early AM, Ken gets us back up and running, fortunately many of our cellars retained their cool temperatures during the delay.
At the vineyards Keegan, our production assistant, headed down to Doctor’s vineyard to oversee the pick of our block. We were lucky enough to get into the best part of the Ranch early in the season. Unfortunately, low yields may lower the amount of fruit from this block. Fortunately, Keegan was able to charm them into giving us more 667 clone Pinot Noir than we were originally slated for. They were a little mixed up on marching orders as their Vineyard Manager had been ill but the day went from a “no-pick” to getting 15 tons of fruit, not bad! Fortunately with Keegan on site we were able to push forward with the pick, assuring our allocation of some of the best fruit on the property. At the winery, we moved the last of the new tanks into place. Check out the video on YouTube!
We also finished cleaning the floors in the barrel rooms, so that the airspace will be fresh during the aging process.
Thursday, September 30th
I’m back in the saddle again, visiting vineyards in Monterey. I checked out Sleepy Hollow and made the final call to pick Saturday. Then onto Doctor’s Vineyard to look at some other clones such as the 828 and Calera clones. These tend to need more time than the block we picked on Wednesday. Interestingly enough, the young vine blocks are delayed in ripeness compared to the older vines (it is usually the opposite).
Dos Rubios is looking and tasting great. The skins and seeds have really good consistency, and should make a stunning wine out the gates. Kirk, the grower, agreed to do a cosmetic clean up and drop any fruit with damage from birds, heat, etc so I met with a labor foreman to review the fruit drop in preparation for our scheduled pick on Saturday.
At the winery, activity is building with our bottling operations coming to a close, new barrels being prepped and fruit being processed. I can tell Adam is afraid to answer my texts with updates on grapes as I tend to keep adding to an already full plate. As long as we keep high quality fruit rolling in, the espresso machine fully charged, and the kitchen stocked with food, we can let our passion be our guide and get through the formidable experience of harvest.
I finished up my day visiting vineyards in Santa Maria Valley. At Bien Nacido, our last block of Pinot is ready to pick. The Chardonnay block tastes good, but is still tart, it will probably be ready to pick in 10 days. I stayed the night in Buellton, home of ‘Sideways,’ to rest up for tomorrow’s trip to the Santa Rita Hills.
Friday, October 1st
I wake up to a find that we got enough rain to knock down the dust overnight. I drive out to Sanford and Benedict Vineyard from the town of Buellton as the sun rose through the clouds. The S&B Chardonnay is getting close as the flavors are there, yet the skins are still firm and the juice is tart. We will probably pick in a week or so, assuming favorable weather. On the way back to Monterey, I check out Dos Rubios again for ripeness. As a new site for us, this vineyard necessitates more visits to gauge ripening speed. Everything is holding up nicely and we decide to pick the 115 and 667 Dijon Pinot Noir clones on Saturday. Today, they went ahead with our schedule fruit drop.I head back to the winery later that night and it is abuzz with activity. The fermentations in the tank room smell beautiful. I tasted through all the tanks and I am really pleased with the intensity of flavors and great acidity. Should be some stellar wines coming from 2010!
Sanford & Benedict Vineyard at sunrise.
Saturday, October 2nd
I get to Sleepy Hollow Vineyard at 6:45am to observe the picking. I noticed that they had run their irrigation system recently and the ground was quite wet. I decided to cancel the picking as poorly timed irrigation can lead to vapid, weak wines. We’ll have to reschedule for next week. I head down to Doctor’s where we are picking some Pommard Pinot Noir. Here, the crew is doing great and the ground is nice and dry. I then head further south to Dos Rubios and check in with them. We are getting slightly higher yields than expected. Given that the berry weight is slightly higher, we will remove a percentage of the juice to ‘distill’ intensity and tannins in the remaining juice. We perform this task following processing at the winery. It is referred to as a ‘juice draw.’
Later on in the day, I check out Garys’ vineyard and the Pinot Noir tastes great. I talked with Mark Pisoni and let him know that we would pick early next week. The Syrah on the other hand, is about 3 weeks out. Up the road to Rosella’s, the Chardonnay is getting close and the Pinot Noir needs about another week. Gary Franscioni could not meet up with me as he was at the Giants game (he’s a big fan).
Sunday, October 3rd
Harvest Festival today! The Hospitality team got the winery ready for our biggest event of the year; unfortunately we were too busy upstairs to partake in the festivities. With every tank full, it takes now 3 hours to punchdown (push the floating skins back into the fermenting tank). We typically do 3 punchdowns a day during peak fermentation. We also had a chance to drain the Bien Nacido Pinot Noir, which had amazing color and aromatics at this stage.
As of today, we are about 30% received of grapes, with a chance of rain this week in the forecast. Should make things interesting!
