The sun is shinning and I've been busy

Like Us!

First I want to say thank you to everyone who responded, it made my decision on what to do much easier and briefly the blog will stay here and you can click on the pictures if you like.  I have also added the blog to our Facebook page if that is easier for you, it will show up on Airlie's Facebook Page and an excerpt will be on the Airlie Winery website that will lead you here.  Be sure to check out our new website and thank you again.  Now back to what else I have been doing.  The last few days have been beautiful.  I love the longer days and I even find getting up in the morning easier.  The downside to these clear days is the cold nights but so far no hard frost and the buds are just barely showing so they should be safe for a little while longer.  Our trusty Chard vine is ready to go and you can see the buds swelling on the closeup.

I am sorry I didn't write last week but I was actually quite busy.  I attended a very good seminar on sulfide production in wine up in Portland on the same day that the wine was loaded onto the container for Japan.  I left my camera with Mary so you get to see how full the container was in the end.

Madrona Tree

On Friday Mary and I attended the annual LIVE meeting.  The meeting is a great chance to catch up with peers, learn about various problems or new processes and enjoy a nice lunch.  This year the meeting was held at the NW Viticulture Center in Salem, what a great venue and very apt for a group of grape growers to get together and share information.  The only comment I have to add is that I am ashamed more of my fellow winemakers were not in attendance.  I'll have to get on them next year.  For those of you unfamiliar with LIVE it stands for Low Input Viticulture and Enology and is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing vineyards and wineries with both education and certification of sustainable practices.  The vineyard and the winery are certified separately and in our case only the vineyard is certified though we wouldn't have any problem passing the winery.  If you would like to read more about LIVE, click here.
So this week on Monday Mary and I received a Facebook lesson, ergo all the recent activity if you are a Facebook follower, be sure to like us if you are not!  This morning I linked this blog to the account so as I said you can also catch up with me there.  Have to try and keep up with the social media stuff you know.  So the reason the blog will not be moving is that I found the new web design program too frustrating to work with so while I will post an excerpt at www.airliewinery.com the main article will still be here.  I know you are relieved Wade, remember to keep clicking on the pictures!

Moving on.  Tuesday I drove down to Sweet Cheeks Winery which is just southwest of Eugene.  What a beautiful day for a drive and a lovely winery.  I'll just tantalize you with a shot of the gate.  I went down to pick Mark Nicholl's brain, he is the winemaker there, about how to make sparkling wine and I'm glad I did.  Not only did he have some great ideas but he has gotten me motivated to work on it.  I think I was feeling a bit intimidated and overwhelmed.  Mark pointed out a few experiments which would be easy since I am using encapsulated yeast.  Encapsulated yeast is what it sounds like, instead of being loose the yeast is trapped in 2mm alginate beads which allow the wine to flow through but not the yeast particlaes.  This type of yeast takes out both the growing up the yeast culture step, the beads are a direct innoculum, and the riddling step, where all the yeast is worked down into the neck of the bottle prior to disgorging.  So yesterday I put a few bottles in the freezer/fridge to cold stabilize them and next week I'll make up a few bottles of bubbles varying the amount of yeast and sugar in order to see how much of each I need to create the perfect amount of fizz.  More details to follow.  (After I figure them out myself!)
So this brings me to today.  We were able to obtain the necessary glass for bottling so that should show up any day now and then I can get the other white wines out of tank in to bottle.  I always feel much better when bottling is over.  So I need to run lab work on all the whites, make sure I am happy that they are the best they can be and maybe next week get them in bottle.  Provided of course the glass shows up.

And in case you thought I hadn't been quite busy enough to get out of writing we have been painting at home, the office got painted three more times and is on the docket for tonight.  Please let this be the right color!  The front room got painted three times and that is now the right color.  We went from nursery yellow, very cheerful but didn't suit the house to Dijon mustard jar yellow, the walls were closing in - let me out! - to a very subtle gray green that is going to make my mother's artwork pop on the walls, after we get the rest of the flooring in.  Yes we finally started laying the kitchen floor over the weekend and it looks great!  Last night we put in another three hours, no updated picture but we are past the fridge and to the pantry door and now need to rip up carpet.  So you know what I'll be doing this weekend, ripping up carpet and laying more floor.  Feel free to stop by and provide entertainment, Advil or alcohol depending on your temperament.  We'll be home!

Please Comment 'Yes' or 'No'

Our new website is about to go live and to be honest I am having a difficult time with the new editor.  It is not really designed for what I am trying to do here but I am going to work with it for a while.  One of the features I really don't like is how difficult it is to manipulate pictures.  Now for me a big part of what I enjoy about  posting is sharing pictures of what I am seeing around the winery.  So my question is this and I really would like a response, just yes or no is fine: Do you click on the pictures to expand them?  I realize no one would click on all of them but do you ever click on any of them.  The reason I ask is the new editor does not seem to allow the image to be expanded so I have to figure out how to do it.  I am sure there are work arounds (is that a word?) such as making a picture a link back to Picasa and when you click on it it will load the picture from there.  Part of the problem is that I don't know how to add links yet with the new editor, another thing that did not seem  intuitive the last time I tried working with the editor.  The last interesting thing I have run into is that I can't center a picture.  This seems very strange to me.  So the editor I am using is called Textpattern and any help, advice, links, etc would be much appreciated.  And if you know how to preview a page before it goes live please let me know.  Thanks.  And of course I need your response of yes or no so I know if all this hassle is even worth it.

So back to the winery.  I didn't write last week because I basically sat at my desk and wrote thank you cards to all the people who took the time to meet with me on my trip.  And if any of you are reading this, thank you one more time.  I did have an interesting time on Friday walking the vineyard with a soil specialist from Oregon Vineyard Supply.  He was pulling samples from various blocks around the vineyard and in about a week we should get an analysis of the soil samples.  Hopefully it will help us to better treat the various areas especially one section in the 'new' Foch where the vines are consistently thinner than the surrounding area and there is usually less fruit.  The sun was out for the first time this spring I think and so it was a great way to spend the day.  Our winery cat, Bob of the broken leg, was taken full advantage of it and the empty dog bed!  Just the right amount of sun please.

This week I have been catching up on lab work, checking SO2 levels and pHs, tasting through all the barrels and now I just have topping left.  I took the wines home this time in order to better evaluate them and am pretty happy.  I am surprised at how much variation there is in the different lots right now, disregarding the four barrels that still haven't finished ML.  I checked them this week too and on paper they still aren't done.  Three of the four actually taste very close but one is still quite tart.  I also tasted through the 2009 Reserve Pinot barrels.  Those are tasting lovely.  I am looking forward to putting them together in the fall and watching them develop.

The big new for this week and what we spent yesterday working on is getting eight pallets of wine, thats 448 cases or 5,376 bottles, ready to ship to Japan.  Yes, we are going international!  And it is all due to Barry's hard work.  I think this has been in the works for close to 2 years and then to have the catastrophe happen last month in Japan I thought that might put the whole thing on hold again but fortunately no and maybe the wine will raise a few peoples spirits.  The container going over will also contain wine from Belle Vallee, Viridian, Jigsaw and a winery from California (I'm not being a snob I don't know the name).  We agreed to be the staging area so yesterday was spent receiving all the Oregon wines and getting them ready to be shipped.  They each had to be repacked on a pallet which had been specially fumigated for export and then each case labeled with a sticker printed with the export company's name; From Oregon with Love.  How great is that!

Everything is to be loaded into a climate controlled container on Friday and then it is off the Seattle and then Japan.  Maybe one of will get a trip out of this, hint, hint.  Though even I have to admit that it is probably Barry who should go.

 More painting.  Chad decided he wanted a green office, I think it came out great.

Remember, please, comment yes or no.

Ferb is watching . . .

Final days of January

It's sometimes hard to believe how fast time passes as an adult.  I remember as a kid how a month of school seemed like an eternity.  Now I look at how little time it is especially when I think about all the things that I enjoy doing and trying to find the time to do them.

Slush (1-2 hrs) vs. Hard (24hr.) Freeze

The winery is still quiet.  Monday I added cream of tartar to the whites to help finish cold stabilizing them this week.  The same as used in cooking and much cheaper so if you are ever in need hit up your favorite winemaker.  I buy it in 50# bags versus the 1.5oz containers that the grocery store sells.  That's over 530 little containers.  The chilling system seems to be hanging on and getting the job done thought I think we still need to work on it a little.  I checked the Gewürztraminer yesterday to see if it is cold stable and I think it is.  Yeah!  The slush freeze didn't throw anything and the hard freeze was just medium light.  The cream of tartar is doing its job.  Since the GT passed I'll check the Pinot gris and Riesling on Monday.  If they both pass then it is time to start filtering.  Filtering won't be quite the major operation it normally is because I have so much less wine and I sure won't need to create a filtering schedule charting out all my moves like last year.

Yesterday I went over to Roth's, a local grocery store chain, to show a few of my wines to the wine stewards for all the different stores and hopefully to drum some sales up in Oregon.  The advantage of the tasting is not only to remind the stewards what the wines taste like but also to give them a few selling points for when they are talking with customers and for them to have a face, mine of course, to put with the wines.  I like working with Roth's stores because I feel that they do a great job supporting local businesses; wineries and farms alike.  They are also good about labeling local produce and meats and stating where all their seafood is coming from, something that is of up particular importance to me.

I think our new website is getting close.  There have been some technical problems which is why our website was just a black and white page for a day or two but that seems to have been straightened out.  So in the next few weeks we should be making the switch.  When we do I'll post a link here.  Would it help if I put a link on the Airlie Winery facebook page too?  Leave a comment and let me know what is the easiest way for you to continue to follow what I am doing.

Today is a good day

I have no idea what happened to last week, somehow it just slipped away from me.  It was a good week and the white ferments are going well, the ML is bubbling away in the barrels, I did build them a fort to help them stay a little warmer and I got in a little cooking; French Pork Stew courtesy of Cooks Illustrated.  Pretty good if I do say so myself though it needs a little tweaking.  The fennel was a little too soft for me and my husband it turns out isn't much of a fan of prunes and Mary thought it was a little pasty.  Critics all!  However it was excellent with a bottle of Airlie 2002 Two Vineyard Old Vines Pinot noir, just the right amount of structure and sweetness in both the wine and the food.  I also checked the progress of the ML fermentation over the weekend and all the barrels seem to be progressing.  And before you ask, all the barrels not in the fort would normally be full and I would be heating the whole room.

The rains seem to have come to stay for winter though it hasn't been overly cold and the vines have been dropping their leaves.  Though in the time it took me to write this post and go out to get a few pictures the sun came out in spectacular fashion.  Our Chardonnay plant is starting to look a little bedraggled.  You can see some of the fruit that we left behind.  In a normal year there would be no grapes on the vine at this time of year.  The clusters with no fruit on them were eaten by the birds. Ugh, sort of depressing.  Any way, last week the vineyard was a spectacular gold color.  I wanted to get a picture but somehow the camera, the day and my energy level never came together.  So you'll have the settle for this lovely shot of the driveway below Mary's house looking west.  Our star Chardonnay plant is the first one in the Y were the driveway splits.

I also lost some time last week setting up our new office computer.  The hard drive on our old one up and died and true to form no one had backed up in forever so much information has been lost.  I must say though that not much very critical and we had a surprising amount of information in e-mails or on random disks so it hasn't been too bad and has actually provided some much needed housekeeping.  The scary day was when two days later Mary thought she had lost our contacts file, the backup of which was on the now dead office computer.  Ten years of customer information on about 3000 names just magically gone, that was a little nerve racking.  Fortunately my guru husband got me pointed in the right direction and we were able to recover the files after only a little blood, sweat and tears and now Mary might be more serious about backing up her own machine which is the only place all the company bookkeeping files are kept.  I guess that is one of the appeals of cloud computing, someone else is holding your information for you.  I also had to replace the ballast in one of our winery lights.  I had no idea what I was getting into when I lifted off the reflector!  I guess 4 bulbs need a lot of wires and then we have a motion detector on it as well.  It was a little uncertain at one point but with the help of the internet which provided schematics on both the light and the motion detector I was able to get it up and running.  Now it just needs to be rehung, I need the forklift for that.

So back to wine making and why today is a good day.  We bought some Riesling juice so I get to make Riesling.  I'm so happy!  I love Riesling and was very sad about not having any to play with let alone drink, slight exaggeration I know.  Fortunately Amity Vineyards decided that they had more then they wanted and were interested in selling.  The fun part is that I am getting a blend of 3 vineyard, all LIVE certified for those who are interested, and that will be the same blend that Darcy has at Amity.  She will be fermenting the pieces separately and leaving the finished wine a little bit sweeter than I but it will be fun to compare the two wines in a few months.  So the juice is arriving today and is ready to be inoculated unless it is still too cold.  I'll take its temperature after I pump it into one of my tanks and make a decision on the number.  If not today it will be tomorrow.  Turns out it's only 34F, I might be waiting a few days.

So other than that things are quiet.  I have to do some publication redesigning because of the lost files, not necessarily a bad thing and we are setting up a new website.  I don't quite know when it will be up but when it is I'll move the blog there.  Our web design people think it is for the best and apparently I shouldn't have it in two places so I hope you will all follow me.  I don't really know how fast it will happen but I will be sure to post a link here so that you can follow me with only one extra click.  I might even be able to put the 'follow me' link on the new page, I'll have to look into that.

A non-Winemaking Week?

This week has seemed to be less about making wine and more about taking care of other things. I designed a new sign for the tasting room, see if you spot it next time you are in, and we are finally getting a new web site. While this is quite exciting it has taken the viewing of many other sites, deciding what we like or dislike, some writing and lots of discussing. Anything that you would particularly like to see or a website that you think is a great example of something to do or not to do, please let us know. As you know, we love feedback. In fact, we are also redesigning our labels so the next time you are in the tasting room spotting the new sign ask Mary to show you the new ideas so that you can let us know what you think works and what doesn’t. Everyone’s input on the 7 label was invaluable and I think that label came out great.

I have been doing some winery work. This was the week to check SO2 levels in the wine and adjust as necessary. Everything smells good, well almost everything, and flavors are developing nicely. I still have a few problems barrels that have reduction, more delicately known as ‘that barnyard aroma’ which I have been working on fixing, I hope to get them clean in the next week or two. It takes almost a week to run the trial in the lab and then another week to administer the correction in the winery. A slow process especially if I don’t get it all cleaned up the first time and I need to go back and run the trial again.

The weather has been erratic to say the least. Sitting in my windowless office I never know what the sky will be showering down when I step outside and for the last few days if I don’t like it I just go back in the my office and re-exit a few minutes later. Everything will be different. Unfortunately if I do like the weather of the moment it changes a little while later anyway. The vines and the poppies seem to be happy and are growing well; the guys are removing suckers from the vine trunks and will start cleaning the heads shortly. Bloom should happen this month, Sebastian says the foch should start in the next ten days or so.  Just hope for no rain during bloom, if the flowers are damaged they may not set fruit and then we won't have much of a crop.  The picture to the left is a close up of the our friend the chardonnay plant (pictured above).  The green balls will be the flowers and you can see how the grape cluster will develop.  Later when I talk about removing shoulders I'm referring the short branches at the top, well in this picture the bottom, of the cluster.  Shoulders tend to run behind the rest of the cluster in physiological development and it is often best to remove them.  The flowers won't be much to look at but they smell great.

Just for laughs, Phineas and his new box . . . if at first you don’t succeed . . .