Bottling and Grafting are Done!

Yes, it has been another 2 weeks since I wrote but we really were busy around here.  And to add to the mayhem the bottler didn't run like a perfect dream the whole time which I really needed it to because we were supposed to have 4 jam packed bottling days.  Instead we had 4 full days complete with plenty of stoppages, a few broken bottles and lots of brainstorming.  Then after grafting we had to take on one more day to finish the pinot gris and rosé. Throw in a little sunburn and a bad head cold and the hall bath that just won't finish and you have the last two weeks of my life.  And we are still working on those new labels, closer, closer . . . I must admit a little quiet time would be appreciated!

On a positive note we think we know what the problem with the bottler is and I spent this morning partially disassembling it to get to the part we want to get fixed.  Of course, along the way I had to fix and tighten everything else that I can now access.  Fingers crossed getting this one part straightened will solve all our problems.  You can stop laughing now and I only meant all our problems with the bottler.  Really, stop laughing.  Instead admire our beautiful rosé and dream about the beautiful summer weather coming perfect for enjoying it on the patio.

After bottling we all moved out to the vineyard and spent a whirlwind Monday and Tuesday last week grafting about two thirds of the the maréchal foch over to pinot blanc.  The advantage of grafting as opposed to replanting is that we will only lose one year of production.  The process was straightforward but multi stepped.  First we went through and cut off the upper part of the foch trunk, cleaned away all the brush and sawed a few cuts into the base of the trunk to bleed off the rising sap.  Then the grafting crew came through and did the delicate work of actually grafting two pinot blanc sticks onto a foch trunk and taping up the graft joints.  Next we went through again and hand painted every trunk, joint and fresh cut with grafting sealant, the black paint.  Just a note, there is no comfortable way of spending the day painting something two and half feet off the ground.  You either hunch over or get on your knees.  We did have beautiful weather to do it in, hence the sunburn, and it was neat to watch the process.

The crew has gone through and cut the trunks again to bleed the sap, apparently the rising sap can push the graft off the trunk and next we need to go through and repaint the sealant anywhere it may have cracked.  Keep your fingers crossed that every graft takes.  It won't happen but it doesn't hurt to wish.  I've included two videos of the grafting process, one is of the process on the trunk and the other of what happened to the pinot blanc stick.  The second video is short, the grafter is fast but what he is doing is shaving the stick, trimming the end and then adding a slice so the trunk and the stick slide together making several layers.

The bathroom is grouted and as of last night the toilet and sink are in, now to run some caulk, hang the mirror and cabinet and rehang the door and I think we will be done!  Yeah!

Getting closer to all sorts of things.

 Since my last update the rosé blend has been decided and the light fining we decided upon has been done.  Currently the wine is settling in barrel and on Wednesday will be racked to tank to start cold stabilizing.  It came back protein stable which was a nice treat, so no fining there and I can immediately turn on the chilling after I get the wine moved.  The whites I moved two weeks ago are still chilling but haven't stabilized as fast as I would have liked so I'll be adding cream of tarter, yes, like what you use in baking, to help speed up the process.  The cream of tarter particles seem to cause the tartaric acid in the wine to precipitate out.  I think by providing a surface for the tartaric to cling to besides the walls of the tank.  It would be great if I could start filtering next week and be ready to bottle in the beginning of April before the weather starts warming up. 

The sparkling wine on the other hand hasn't been cooperative at all.  I still don't have a consistently successful way for getting the yeast out of the bottle.  It just seems all too messy for one!  I'll just have to keep trying though because labels are in the works and we want you to have this lovely stuff!

The labels are coming along nicely.  We had a great meeting last week with our designer Cindy and our label company and we really hope you like what we have created.  If you are in the tasting room in the near future ask to see the new mock ups.  There are two below for the rose and the sparkling wine.  We are always glad to have another opinion to add to the mix.

And last but not least Sue, our new Marketing Director, and I have joined a research group at OSU (Oregon State Univ.) and are learning a new way of evaluating wines.  It has been surprisingly difficult to break my old patterns to follow their protocol but I think there are some benefits to tasting wines the way they are having us.  Flip side being I wouldn't want to do it all the time nor do I think it would be a good way in all circumstances.  What has been more interesting and educational for me is the spiked wines.  Last week we were presented with 12 wines that had been spiked with something, i.e. black pepper, raspberry, cherry, green pepper, canned beans, mushrooms, flowers, and we were expected to identify the spiking agent.  Harder than it sounds, especially when you have no idea what the possibilities are.  I had just recently done a similar experiment and found I did better this time than last.  One of the most interesting wines I thought was spiked with cigar tobacco which I identified as cedar.  Close but no cigar!  Ha ha.  One of the interesting things about aromas, which you'll know if you read Proust, Remembrance of Things Past, is how strongly it is linked with memory, ahh those petites madeleines.  Ergo smells generally cause a memory to occur and then you have to sort through the memory trying to identify the smell.  Quite interesting when you are trying to do it consciously.

We got another dusting of snow this morning.  Isn't it lovely.

Memorial Weekend is here!

I had a good week I must admit.  We bottled on Wednesday and it went very well.  Maybe one of the best days ever.  I am sure it helped that it was a relatively light day as far as cases bottled but the fact that nothing went wrong was great.  For some reason that seems to be the rarity rather than the normal.  Due in part probably to the fact that we only bottle twice a year and what worked or didn't work for the previous vintage may not hold true for the current one but regardless this time things went well.  Neither filter plugged, we didn't break anything on the bottler, the glass was dust free and the corks went in cleanly.  I even had an intern helping out which meant I didn't have to be on the line the whole day.  Another plus for me.  And in case you were wondering we bottled Pinot gris and the Riesling.  As I mentioned before we decided to hold off on the Gewürztraminer and the sparkling wine will be a entire day by itself.  As far as when for the sparkling wine I am hoping to bottle it in the next two weeks.  Next week I am going to open the sample bottles and finger crossed they have fermented to dry, so I will be able to decide how much sugar to add for the ideal amount of bubbles/pressure in the finished wine.  Then I'll set up for that.  I think I will have to borrow a filler as the bottles will not fit on our machine but more on that when it happens.

As for the rest of the week I attended an interesting lecture in McMinnville on some new products and if any one has $32K laying around there is this beautiful piece of lab equipment that would make my life sooooo easy.  The salesman was trying to justify the price to us and how quickly it would pay for itself.  I tried not to laugh out loud.  I don't think anyone in the room thought they could justify the money in two years like he was trying to show.  But it was cool anyway and it would allow me to run some tests that I don't run or have to send out for but that's okay I probably could use a second press more.  We also got set up for the Memorial Day Weekend Festivities.  The winery and grounds are cleaned up and ready for your arrival.  We have some great bands coming in and hopefully the weather will cooperate.  The schedule is on our website www.airliewinery.com.   I should be out there Sunday afternoon so if you see me feel free to come up and tell me how much you enjoy my blog! ;-)  Otherwise have a great weekend and I'll write again next week.





PS I've been meaning to ask.  Does anyone have any experience pruning climbing roses?  This one has been in the ground just over a year and I'm not sure how much I should shape it or where the best place to prune it might be.  Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks.

Are you suffering from WIBS?

pic courtesy of Van Duzer Winery

Chances are you aren't unless you are a winemaker on the west coast this fall and more specifically one in the Willamette Valley at which point I am almost 100% sure you are among the suffering.  I myself was an unknowing sufferer of the disease until I was recently diagnosed by my good friend and fellow winemaker Jerry Murray at Van Duzer Winery, about 45 minutes north of here.  Jerry says that Weather Induced Bi-polar Syndrome (WIBS) can be aggravated by repeated checking of the weather forecast and then looking at fruit in the vineyard.  The symptoms are feelings of elation when the sun is out and the thermometer reads 80 followed by extreme lows and the conviction that no grapes will be harvested this year when the clouds roll in, rain threatens and the temperature isn't above 62.  The fact that these highs and lows can occur on the same day only increases the severity of the swing as well as raise stress levels and here at Airlie has caused Mary to run to the coast and go crabbing.  I am very appreciative that Jerry formally diagnosed the disease and gave it a name.  I am hoping that he is working on a drug to alleviate the condition as I type.  I was thinking something alcoholic (smile . . . feel high) but then remembered that none of us have any fruit to be making alcohol (sigh . . . another low).  If you are interested in reading more about Jerry and his philosophies click here, you'll be taken to Jerry's latest comments on the vintage, beautifully expressed I think. 

As far as what else I have been up to, last week we bottled the 2009 Willamette Valley pinot noir, it went very well, and the little bit of 2008 Dunn Forest Pinot noir that had an extra year in barrel.  We were scheduled to bottle the infamous port on Saturday but the bottler was giving us problems so that didn't get bottled till Monday of this week.  Mary had some friends in town who took on fixing the problem piece on the bottler.  Thank you Orv and Alan it worked great on Monday.  I must admit that I feel at loose ends with almost no wine to look after and that I'm not scrambling to get get ready for fruit to be picked.  Just the 7 barrels of 09 pinot I held over for another year of aging in barrel.  They look so lonely.

Muller Thurgau,      Pinot noir,      Marechal Foch

Yesterday Sebastian pulled our first samples of grapes for me to test.  And apparently my blogging brain was turned off because I didn't take any pictures.  I still had the juice sitting on the counter this morning so you can see the three grapes we sampled and the color difference though amongst the three.  The Muller and Pinot noir have oxidized in the jar over night so aren't as green or pink, respectively, as they were yesterday.  Isn't the colour on the Foch amazing!  I'll explain the process next week when we sample again but suffice to say the grapes are not ripe.  The Marechal Foch has at least 10-14 days and that will be the first fruit to come in.  I went looking at past numbers to see if I could give you and me both an estimate for how far behind we are and it turns out I have never sampled the Foch at as low a number as it is right now.  The closest year was 2007 and the fruit then was a degree of brix higher, about a weeks worth of ripening, on September 13th, versus October 6th.  And we didn't pick for another 19 days.  Deep Sigh!  I never should have gone and looked.  I should add checking past vintage numbers to the list of don'ts while suffering from WIBS.  I think I'll go join Phineas on the couch and hide my head under the blanket.  Let me know if the sun comes out.

Sunny days are here again?

According to the weather report we might be due for some sun, that would be excellent and the longer it lasts the better.  Right now it is beautiful outside and warming up nicely.  Sebastian sprayed a ripening agent this morning also in an attempt to urge the grapes on to greater sweetness.  The birds have started arriving, another problem with a later harvest and right now the only grape they are even remotely interested in is the Foch so there is something with sugar out there.  The birds won't eat green fruit and are one kind of indicator of ripeness.

Sebastian on the tractor

Pad filter open and loaded

In the winery we bottled the 2009 Chardonnay and 2009 Marechal Foch.  Both days went well and weren't particularly long.  We have 2 days of 2009 Willamette Valley Pinot noir and a half day of port and 2008 Dunn Forest Pinot noir left for next week.  Yes, we are finally bottling the 2005/2006 port and once we get a label for it you will be able to buy it.  I'll keep you posted.  The 2009 Chardonnay will be out in a few months but the other 2 wines you probably won't see for almost 2 years.  Just imagine them developing in the bottle waiting for you to enjoy.  The pad filter pictured above is at the end of the day.  I opened it so you could see the pads.  The wine only flows through one pad and I can use as many pads and plates as I need to get the job done.  That is always bit of a guess so I usually guess high.  Below we are cleaning the bottler with hot water, it takes about an hour and a half to sterilize the machine in the morning and then another hour to clean it in the evening when we are done.  Mary is cleaning the four jaws that compress the cork in order to get it in the bottle.

Cleaning the bottler

Mary cleaning the corking jaws

If you are looking for something to do this weekend I recommend heading down to the Fall Festival in Corvallis.  The Benton County Wineries Association is trying something new this year.  There will be just one booth and you will be able to taste wines from most of the wineries in the association.  So come down and check out some labels that you might not be as familiar with as well as our own of course.

My apologies . . .

 . . . for not posting last week but somehow I just couldn't get inspired.  I didn't have any nice stories and my husband is gone right now on a 10 day trip and somehow I get more lethargic when he is away.  Plus the Netflix disk came in for our Wii and I got to spend far more time than normal watching movies.  Geez, doesn't that sounds pathetic!  However, just so you don't think I didn't do anything I did get a large patch of dying hebe ripped out in my own yard and replanted with plenty of flowers and a few grasses, now I am impatient for everything to grow.  Which reminds me, I do have a story.

Our property backs a creek and so we have a fair collection of wildlife that wanders through,  in fact, planting is always risky because it might well end up being a deer snack but that's for another time.  So this weekend we had a wild turkey wander through while the cats were outside.  Talk about close encounters of the third kind!  Phineas and Ferb had no idea what to do with this comparatively giant creature and the turkey clearly knew it was in no danger so there was a lot of circling, investigating, quiet observing and maybe even a little posturing, on the part of the turkey of course, but no problems and eventually the turkey strolled on to eat someone else's grass.  It was quite entertaining for me to watch as well.  By the way you can see the afore mentioned hebe in the background.
We did finish bottling the whites last week, that was a great accomplishment.  A full day of Pinot gris and another full one of Seven, and now the bottler gets to rest until fall.  Not however the bottling crew.  The guys are outside replanting a section of bank that the December freeze killed off in a rather strange pattern while trying to dodge the rain and soak up the sun, ahh spring.  The dogs are running around getting gloriously dirty and I need to slink off to the barrel room.  I need to taste all the Chardonnay barrels, only 17 of them so it should go quickly, as well as check the individual pHs.  I also will be pulling samples of all the BeckenRidge Pinot noir barrels to sit down and taste tomorrow morning at home.

As far as the vineyard goes, bud swelling has started and even a few future leaves are starting to distinguish themselves.  So no more FROST!  If we have a frost now we could lose part of this fall's potential crop in a few short hours.  So everyone keep your fingers crossed, especially during the next full moon in about two weeks.

Bottling has arrived!

Bottles, cases, pallets everywhere!  And the noise!  Okay I dramatize but I was feeling that way.  Actually right now everything is cleaned up, put away and looking very tidy.  That is always soothing to my soul.  As far as bottling the 2009 Riesling and 2009 Muller Thurgau are in the bottle and half of the 2009 Seven.  The rest of the Seven, as well as the 2009 Pinot Gris, will be bottled in two weeks when the remainder of the glass arrives.  Overall the process of bottling isn't particularly unique.  We do own our own line, not all small wineries have that luxury, which makes it easier for us to set our own schedule.  Bottling takes a five person crew and we can bottle about 2 cases (24 bottles) a minute if everything is running well, in an average day we can do 14 pallets or 784 cases or 9408 bottles.  Okay, now I wish I hadn't worked that out.  Ugh! 
The glass bottles get blown out using nitrogen gas, are placed on the conveyor belt and filled while going around the carousel.  As the bottles come off the carousel the level of wine in the bottle is checked and set by gas, again nitrogen, and finally the cork is inserted.  After the bottles are returned to the conveyor belt they travel to the end where two people wipe them clean, check them for flaws or problems and put them in the box cork down if you are curious.  The flawed ones get returned to the beginning of the line for fixing.  Finally the boxes are stacked on a pallet and stored until it is time to label the wine for you to purchase!

Outside the winery we had a neat visit from a few elk, they stayed on the neighbor's side of the fence so I don't have a great picture but it was amazing to see them.  Grasping their size is always difficult and part of what makes them so grand. Also outside the winery but inside the fence there is plenty of spring cleaning and planting going on as well.  The dam has been covered in compost and a hundred plus plants have been put in the ground; grasses, shrubs and flowers abound.  Well there will be flowers, they aren't blooming yet.  I look forward to their growth, I think the bank is going to look amazing this summer and next year . . . I can't wait.