Spring has sprung I think

We had a glorious weekend out here in Oregon this past weekend and so I didn't sit and write my March blog I went out and enjoyed it.  The birds are singing, this junco was so cheerful, the daffodils are blooming and the red dogs have gotten their spring cut.  Don't they look handsome!  We also have a new puppy here at the winery if you come out during the week.  Gus belongs to Sue our marketing manager and is quite a handful!  He definitely thinks the vineyard is here for running and takes full advantage of it.

On the winery side we got the whites bottled, always a relief for me and I racked some barrels of pinot that needed to get off their lees.  Most of the pinot has finished going through ML and I did reinoculate the chardonnay barrels which I suspect aren't moving.  I also tasted through all the pinot barrels.  The ones that haven't finished ML are tough to evaluate because the acidity is out of whack but I'm excited to see what is coming.  I think there are going to be some great fruit flavors with a nice balance of structure.  We even have a barrel of our new vines!  Yeah!  This is the first year I'll be able to taste what might be coming off our new plantings in the vineyard. 

In the vineyard the sap is starting to run and bud swelling is just starting in the foch.  I posted two pictures so you can compare the slightly larger buds of the foch to some pinot gris buds that haven't started.  The sap drips on cuts that haven't completely healed over yet.  So hope for a warmish spring with some good rainfall and I'll let you know this month how things are going.

Just under the wire!

So I wrote last month I would post once a month and I managed to bring this one down to the last day.  Not a a good start!  However, the month has been productive and educational.  A plus in my book (pun intended.)

I started off with filtering the white wines to get them ready for bottling.  I use a pressure leaf filter with diatomacous earth (DE) to get them from settled but still cloudy to sparkling.  The wines are not sterile at this point so I still need to maintain sulfur dioxide levels (SO2) which works as both an anti-oxidant and an anti-microbial.  It's great when one chemical will do two things.  I use a blend of grades of DE, hence the color differences.  It starts out as a very fine dust and forms a cake when it gets wet and is under pressure creating the filter.  The screens inside the filter housing are just there to catch the DE and to start the cake forming.  I find it fascinating that it works.

We had some great tartrate formation this year in the Gewurztraminer.  Here it is starting to lift off the door when I started cleaning.  It doesn't always come off this easily, usually it glues itself and only hot water and elbow grease get it off but sometimes you get lucky.  Transitional art and easy clean up.

I also attended a Riesling tasting this month with other Oregon winemakers.  I love it when I get the chance to sit down and taste what other people are doing and to hear how they are making it.  I tasted a few beauties that I will definitely be looking for in a few months.  We were tasting unbottled samples and many were still not filtered as well which does mean the wine will change before it is on the shelf but regardless there are some great 2012 Rieslings on the way.  The feedback from my piers is invaluable as well as seeing/tasting how my own wine compares to others: is it drier, sweeter, bigger, more acidic, more delicate?  What about fruit flavors or floral aromas?  Some of the things I am looking at when I taste Riesling.  Thanks to Penner-Ash Cellars for the lovely facility.

In the vineyard the crew has finished pruning and done most of the tying down.   It looks like we might have pinot blanc this year too which would be exciting.  Look at those happy grafts!  I always like how tidy the vineyard looks after pruning and Riley thinks it's great for running.  As my dad would say, the vines are all potential.  Here's to a great growing year.

Happy New Year

They say that January is time for new beginnings and resolutions.  Therefore here is mine in regards to this blog, I'll post once a month.  After missing the past four months and trust me I thought about writing but found I had no desire, I decided that maybe a monthly update might be more easier for me to do. The trade off will be that I won't write such detail about what I do from day to day but I think I have written about most of my usual tasks which was part of the writing problem.  I didn't want to repeat myself.  Hopefully this will provide a nice balance of keeping you in the loop as to what's happening around the winery and be a reasonable and enjoyable amount of writing for me.  I love to be able to share my picture too, another excuse for this blog.  Now to the business of writing.

Marechal Foch - mid verasion

Gewurztraminer - end verasion

We had a very nice harvest.  The weather cooperated by staying fine until we got everything ripe and picked.  A wonderful change after the past two years.  I was happy with the fermentations and look forward to seeing what you think of the wines.  The Gewurztraminer will be the first to be released and will feature the new label, it should be available late spring. 

Two rather special things also happened during harvest.  One is that my parents came to work.  I know, crazy!  But, it was great to have them and they enjoyed seeing what I do during my busiest time of year.  My mother was here last year so she was prepared but it was a first for my dad.  Thank you to them both and I hope they come again next year.  The other great thing that happened was that many people chipped in and built me an office with windows!  Yes, windows!  Very exciting.  I still spend time in the cave, it's more convenient for lab work but as I sit here and type I can look out at the falling rain.  And as you can tell by the picture we do get some sunshine!

And as always, lab work continues, here I was checking sugars.  Also racking wines to get them ready for filtering and bottling next month.  I love the colors in the pinot gris lees.  The yeast settles out first, the yellow streaks showing through, and then the little bit of color in the wine drops out creating the pink layer on top.  I've also been taking advantage of the cold weather by getting in a little disgorging.  If you haven't tried our bubbles I highly recommend getting a bottle.  I think they have continued to get better with time.  We had a cold snap at the start of the year which allowed the crew to get right into pruning.  The frosting of everything was great to see (pictured above) as well as the accompanying sun.  Now back to work, I need to do some topping and check MLs.