Yeast Whisperer of Newton Vineyard

The first days of the Newton Chardonnay harvest are stressful.

We pick it, we press it, we choose the best French barrels and… nothing happens. For days, the juice is quiet, viscous, cloyingly sweet.

Nothing… No matter how much I stare inside the barrels or glue my ear to the bung holes until the side of my face shows a ring of toasted oak smoke.

It’s only when I start getting that recurring dream of hot tubs filled with bubbling grape juice, around the 6^th or 7^th day, that our tricky indigenous yeasts deign offer some hope. Suddenly, the whole cellar is filled with the gurgling sound of the starting fermentation and I breathe a sigh of relief.

That makes Julian laugh.

Julian Cendejas (pictured at right) has worked at Newton since 1989. Over his more than 20 harvests, he’s learned to be patient and that the fermentation will start. Some years it’s fast -just a couple of days- some years it takes up to 10 or 12 days. Once a lot of Chardonnay is fermenting, the whole cellar follows.

Julian always knows when this will happen: I have a theory that he’s somehow communicating with the yeasts that come from our vineyard. He’ll say “Tomorrow, this lot will start”. I’ll look in the barrel he is showing me, shaking my head: “Naaah, there is not even any froth.” The next day, he’ll be right.

Now, all the 2011 Chardonnay is fermenting, some lots well on their way to dryness. It was a cool growing season and even if the sugars remained lower than in the past years, the flavors are exotic and complex. There are apricot and grilled pineapple notes but no hint of the quince paste that characterizes over-ripe vintages. The musqué lots are delicately floral without being too wisteria or lilac-like.

This should be a vintage for aging. But shhhh… Don’t tell our yeasts: they are not done with their job until Julian says so!

Cheers!

Frederique Perrin
Associate Winemaker, Newton Vineyard

Harvest Hustle & Making Chardonnay at Peju Province Winery

Finally! The cellar is cranking!!! Today is the first day that it feels like harvest is in full gear. Most other times when I’ve skipped over to the Production office to chat Sara up about what’s going on, she is excited to talk to me. She beams and expands willingly on what we’re doing and why we do things the way we do. (Always for superlative quality.) She talks about the grapes with a Science-minded mother’s balance of rational analysis and though somewhat-concealed, nonetheless fuzzy, tender babymama love. As any good mother, she knows she has little control over the laws of Nature and will love the grapes, all of them and every vintage, for who/what they are, while she guides them to realize their potential slash achieve perfection. (So there’s a streak of Tiger mom...in the name of perfect wine!)

When I ask Sara what is going on in the cellar today, I get bullets:

•                  “draining and pressing,

•                  “barreling down,

•                  “crushing,

•                  “sorting,

•                  “topping,

•                  “stirring the Chardonnay,

[pause.]

•                  “Rocking and rolling!” She exclaims. “It feels like Harvest!”

All of our Chardonnay has finished its primary fermentation, has been consolidated into oak barrels, and is now going through Malolactic Fermentation (MLF), or as it’s sometimes referred to, quite simply secondary fermentation. Primary fermentation is when yeast convert the sugar in the juice into alcohol and CO2 to produce wine (obviously a drastic oversimplification). MLF is when (via specific bacteria) we convert the Granny Smith-reminiscent malic acid into the lactic acid that is found in milk.  Diacetyl, a prominent compound in butter, is produced, which is what gives so many California Chardonnays their characteristic ‘butteriness’.  By stirring the lees once per week (lees are the dead yeast cells and un-soluble solids) for approximately 6 months in what’s called sur lie aging,  our winemaking team allows the diacetyl to dissipate a bit, resulting in the more elegant, subtle hint-of-butter sensation that you might have noticed in our Chardonnay.

Though Sara had to be concise with me today, after a few moments of rattling off the facts, she couldn’t help but gush a little over how delicious the Malbec and Petit Verdot are tasting. This is the first year that we’ve gotten much yield from those small blocks on our Rutherford estate since they’re just a few years old and it takes three years for a vine to start producing. Last year we got less than a ton of each. This year, however, we got enough fruit to put to good use, and apparently, it is tasting excitingly delicious. Sara is not sure where she will blend these lots once they are ready, but looks forward to being able to make a true Bordeaux blend with such high quality fruit in all five requisite varietals.

It’s sorting fruit, inoculating yeast, and pumping over the ferments for me tomorrow in the cellar. (YAY!!) Stay tuned.

britt starr for Peju Province Winery

see this post in its context

All Whites Are In, Reds Begin at Peju Province Winery

Yesterday, we processed the last of our Chardonnay. All of our white grapes, both Sauvignon Blanc and Chard., have now been plucked from their vines and have begun their journey to becoming delicious white wine.

The first bit of Sauvignon Blanc that we picked on September 6 and inoculated on September 9, allowing a few days for the lees to settle out, is dry! (‘Dry’ in winemaking means that all of the sugar in what was once juice has been converted to alcohol in what is now wine. In wines with what we call ‘residual sugar’, not all of the sugar was converted to alcohol, and the wine remains ‘off-dry’ or slightly sweet. There are a number of reasons that this will occur, some intentional, some not…) With much of our Sauv. Blanc dry, this means that technically, we have 2011 wine!

But it’s not quite finished wine. It’s baby wine. Born and alive, tangible and functional, but so fresh off the boat (out of the womb/off the vine and the lees) that it hasn’t really come into itself yet. Foregoing a discussion (monologue) on nature and nurture, suffice it to say that wine and humans make for amusingly comparable subjects for consideration. The point is that you take what ‘God/Nature/Insert-Name-Here gave you’ and then you take advantage of what Life throws your way. You try to cultivate your best self and you enjoy pondering how you got to be that way. Wine lacks the ability to introspect, of course, so we have to ponder its constitution for it.

Our 2011 Sauvignon Blanc has been born tasty, bright, and fresh. Soon a small percentage will hang out in neutral oak barrels for complexity, flavor, mouthfeel and structure. Then it will be time for Sara to work her magic, blending from the different tanks of S.B. separated by vineyard blocks and ripeness-levels-at-crush, to create what we are proud to call Peju Sauvignon Blanc. Forgive the shameless self-promotion, but it really is delicious!

The first Zin to come in (hill-side vineyard block - less water retention in the soil)

Oh, and also, we brought in our first red grapes on Friday, which was very exciting, as it has been a long time coming. The reds still aren’t quite there yet, however, in terms of ripeness. And the rain yesterday and today has everyone feeling a little nervous. As long as we get sun after the rain though, all should be well. Friday, we brought in the little bit of Malbec and Petit Verdot from our Rutherford property. Yesterday, it was Zinfandel grapes from the Persephone Vineyard. Friday, I’ll be working crush with the crew so stay tuned! Can’t wait!

- Britt Starr at Peju Province Winery

Click on me to read this blog in its context.

Pablo, Lony, Juanito & Frankie wave 'Hello!' from the sorting table

Video: Napa Valley Chardonnay Harvest & Flavor Profiles

With the heat spike over the last two weeks, the 2011 Napa Valley Harvest is switching into high gear! Throughout the valley wineries are picking white varietals (as well as a few early reds) and have generally moved from Sauvignon Blanc into Chardonnay territory.

In the spirit of the Chardonnay harvest, check out the fun video below featuring Bo Barrett (Chateau Montelena), Cameron Parry (Chateau Montelena) and Armando Ceja (Ceja Vineyards) sharing their thoughts on Chardonnay flavor profiles.

Full Moon Musings

I love sleep, so perhaps the most challenging thing about harvest is the lack of it! But the challenges of a sleepless ten weeks are easily overcome by the magic of night harvest. In Napa Valley during harvest, it is like an underground club. You drive up the Trail to your harvest destination and you see all the lights at all the different wineries, and you think, ‘Oh, they’re picking that block today.’ You run into the same people at Model Bakery or Starbucks as soon as they open and give each other a knowing nod, or a ‘How’s harvest?’ One of the best treats is being able to drive through St Helena with no traffic.

But my favorite part about night harvest is the moon. And last night’s full harvest moon was exceptionally lovely, and on this cold crisp night, I could really sense the changing of the seasons and I know we have only a few more weeks to go.

Last week was our busiest week, and we harvested almost 30% of our total production in one week! Merryvale finished harvesting our Chardonnay on Friday, which concluded the harvest of all of our white grapes. After today, we have only one block of Merlot left to pick, having brought in Buena Vista selection Merlot from Hyde Vineyards this morning.

We still have a lot of our Cabernet left on the vines, and we look forward to a little warming later this week to get some more Cabernet into the winery as the week ends.

We have already pressed some reds, and harvest parties are already on the schedule. We look forward to bringing in the rest of our Cabernet, and are optimistic about the quality we are seeing in the cellar so far. Cheers! Remi Cohen

Midway at Miner

Now that we are well into the 2009 harvest, here is a run down on grapes we've brought in thus far at Miner Family and a quick assessment.

Day 1 of harvest came after Labor Day (a rarity for us) with the arrival of just over 5 tons of Sauvignon Blanc from Oakville Crossroad Vineyard. We will produce 350 or so cases of SB, which is down from the 800 cases we made in 2008. Also during week one, we brought in some Tempranillo and Grenache from Mike Naggiar's Vineyard in the Sierra Foothills. Beautiful, ripe, and tasty, these two reds were pressed off skins and are now in barrel (See Miner's first post, our amateur video of Tempranillo going to barrel).

All of our Viognier from Simpson Vineyard has been brought in: 75 tons this year and down from the 100 tons in '08. Fueled by Rutherford Grill ribs and cornbread, our fierce night shift crew (Wes, Ben, and Gabrielle) pressed Viognier until the wee hours (think 3am) for six consecutive nights. We barreled down some of our Viognier but the majority is slowly fermenting in tanks. After being kept at finger-numbing temperatures, our Rosella's Vineyard “777” Pinot Noir has now started to ferment in half-ton bins in our warehouse. A whopping 325 cases worth of Carneros Pinot Noir from Sunset Vineyard came in this year - an indication that vineyard yields would be up,and indeed yields look like they are up across the board for Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. Case and point, our first block of Chardonnay to come in from Stagecoach Vineyard yielded 33% more than last year and Hudson Vineyard Chardonnay in Carneros also came in with yields above average. We will have plenty of top notch Chardonnay to go around this year and we're planning on doing 3 vineyard designated Chardonnays: Hudson, Hyde and Genny's Vineyard.

We brought in just over 5 tons of Marsanne from Stagecoach Vineyard last week for our La Diligence bottling (a partnership with Domaine Francois Villard/Rhone Valley, France). As for Napa Valley reds, it's looking like they will be ripe soon and we will be prepared for an onslaught in the next week as Cabernet Sauvignon yields are likely to be high.

The winery is starting to smell good as we approach the harvest '09 half-way mark with around 250 tons in so far. Until next time, when we come up for air... or beer

Gary Brookman
Winemaker, Miner Family Winery

Race Horse Runnin'

Time goes by like a race horse runnin', open up the gates, she takes off
a-runnin'
--"Race Horse Runnin'", The Nickel Slots

Everybody, everybody, let's get into it.
Get
stupid.
Get it started, get it started, Get it
started...
--"Let's Get It Started", Black Eyed Peas

The horses are at the gate...and they're off!

Today we finally got things REALLY under way. I've got to keep this post brief as it's 6pm and I still have to press 7 ton of Chardonnay fruit tonight.

I'm ecstatic with the quality of the Chardonnay we picked today. Tomorrow we jump into Merlot and will probably finish Merlot for the season. Cabernet is not far behind.

We celebrated a blessing of the grapes today, officiated by long time family friend and minister, Pastor Ted Muller. The sound is a little low, and it's typical Andy Shaky Cam, but video below.

Cheers!

--Andy Schweiger, Winemaker, Schweiger Vineyards.

Harvest continues at Merryvale

Harvest is moving at full speed in Napa now. Due to hot weather all week, we have accelerated picking Chardonnay, Merlot, and Cabernet. By the end of next week, we anticipate finishing our Chardonnay harvest. This week, we have really begun to harvest the Bordeaux varieties, particularly Merlot and early Cabernet blocks.

Fortunately, the heat was not as intense as originally forecasted, and the highs are only sustained for a short part of the afternoon. Forecasts are for a return to seasonable or below average temperatures beginning early next week. That will likely slow down the ripening in the remaining Cabernet blocks.

This morning we harvested small portions of two blocks of Cabernet from the Schlatter Family Estate in St. Helena. Attached is a pic of a few lug bins in the back of the truck.

Remi Cohen
Merryvale Vineyards

Finally, we’re off and rolling!

We started with Sauv. Blanc 18 days later than last year which is about where we think we are for the whole harvest, though this heat we’re living through is trying to force our hand. The photo is a shot of Leigh Meyering, our Associate winemaker, Ron Rosenbrand our vineyard manager, and me yukking it up because we have something to ferment.

The grapes looked great and since the 18th we’ve brought in some more Sauv. Blanc and a bit of Chardonnay, and everything is looking and tasting great. Reds are now our next target with Pinot Noir leading the way; yes I said Pinot Noir, it’s a small project we do from grapes we grow at about 1600 feet elevation that surprisingly produce some lovely Burgundian like Pinot. We’re also looking at some Merlots that are on the edge of being ready.

The winery is getting that wonderful CO2 fermentation aroma which means harvest is really under way so stay tuned as the fun has just begun!

Jac Cole
Spring Mountain Vineyard

The Nighttime…Is The Right Time….

…For picking Chardonnay!

OK, I know it doesn’t rhyme and isn’t as much fun as what the blues standard refers to, but it sure makes good wine. Night harvesting the chardonnay ensures that we receive cool and plump fruit. The cool temperature is important for minimizing extraction of any bitter flavors, helps the settling process, and means that we use less energy chilling the juice. The more humid night air allows the grapes to recover from any dehydration the previous day, and the firm berries transport better than hot mushy ones – they don’t breakdown as much in the bins, which gets back to the extraction point above.

The other important and too often overlooked aspect of night harvesting is that the conditions are much better for the people doing the harvesting. I know that if I had to run up and down the rows 50 times in long sleeves and pants while carrying a 40 pound box of grapes on my head, I’d much rather do it in the cool morning air rather than the mid-day heat.

Now, I’ve been talking an awful lot about Chardonnay in these last few posts and I don’t want you to get the wrong impression, so you’ll be happy to know that in the last week we brought in the first Cabernet Sauvignon from here on the Estate. We’ve got three little tanks full of some of the blackest Cabernet I’ve ever gotten my hands into. Tremendous color and plenty of great ripe berry flavor to go with it. The first full crop of our Takahashi Ranch Merlot – a blending component for our Napa Valley Cabernet – also came in this week, and it also is showing fantastic color along with some of the best flavor that we’ve seen from Merlot here at CM. If these first few tanks are any indication, this will be a fantastic vintage.

This week we will continue bringing in Cabernet from our Estate vineyards as well as from our Napa Cab growers, and we should be finishing up the Chardonnay within the next 10 days. The first of the Estate Zinfandel is on deck today, so come on by and have a look!

Until next week – Cheers and may you “be with the one you love.”

Scroll down for our intern Daniel's latest post.

Cameron Parry - Winemaker

Chateau Montelena Winery

Harvest Simple Joy

By: Daniel Orrison

9/22/09

Legs, back, arms, mind… tired. Hands, shirts, shoes, socks… stained. Harvest is officially in full swing. Grapes are coming at a faster pace than ever expected while the room for storage is quickly running thin. But away from specifics and onto experience…

I meet a man on my day off (first in 7 days), who took one look at my hands and asked first, ‘how’s harvest going?’ and second, ‘dead yet?’. I laughed at the later part of the question and replied with a modest but accurate… ‘almost’. He then went on to tell a story from his first harvest (he has now worked over 20), and it went something like this: He was young, out of college, ready to take the wine world by storm (sound familiar?), and his boss at the time said “son… this line of work is not pretty, you won’t be tasting wine all day, meeting women or having fun. You will be working, on call, always. Every part of you will hurt at one point and you will wish you were dead, this I promise, especially here.”

Quite a first conversation with your boss if you ask me… Cameron’s first words were much more welcoming.

The boss then said: “Because son, I’ve seen kids like you come and go, and here’s how it’s going to work. After the first week you will think you are tired. After the second, exhausted. And by the third… dead.” I can now honestly say this is a very accurate description of the harvest lifestyle. Days run together, the workload seems impossible, and the word tired takes on new meaning.

However, I feel the old man’s boss forgot a few parts of this story. He forgot to say how much fun you will have along the way (the laughs and memories), how rewarding it is to look back on everything you accomplish each day, how special it is to be a part of a tradition much larger than yourself, and how educational the experience is for anyone who loves wine. Sure, at points we’re tired, but in my eye that’s what makes it so great! The understanding that everyone is tried, everyone’s hands hurt, everyone could use a day off… but still, day after day, year after year, people all over the world wake up to celebrate the ups and downs of harvest. For instance, he didn’t mention that at 10pm, while cleaning presses in the pouring rain, listening to your cellar master, Gilberto, sing ‘life is beautiful’ you will laugh harder than you ever have. He left out how wonderful a feeling it is to put your feet up on a couch after working an 18-hour harvest day (something you can only understand after doing). Or how calming the feeling that surrounds a winery at midnight can be. The small joys, the subtle moments, and the silent “thank you” wine constantly offers its maker that reminds us of how worthwhile what we are doing is. This area, he most certainly forgot to mention. Because harvest, simply and unexplained, is about truth, hard work, discipline and tradition. These words are not to be thrown around, but respected. And while some days may be hard, tough and stressful the final product is worth every scrape… this, exactly, is what makes it so great. It’s not easy and because of this its rewards are not plain -- but amazing, incredible, and transcending (think 1973 Montelena Chardonnay). Or, in my eyes, what makes the industry move round. What excites us each morning to wake up and work hard.

Tasting on my day off. Life is good. Respect the small stuff.

God bless from Napa.

Cheers,

Daniel

Everybody is out there waiting for harvest!

One never knows, here at Chateau Boswell, who is going to get first pick but usually it is the wild turkey. Wild turkeys are the great bane of the growers in the Napa Valley, but I am also blessed with resident Pileated woodpeckers, kit foxes, and deer and I would not have it any other way.

As I spend each dusk and dawn patrolling our estate vineyard I am on the search for all of these wonderful creatures enjoying the fruits of our labor. As my husband says who could blame them!? Organically grown grapes from an owner who is willing to share to keep nature’s balance by employing only distress bird noises, irri tape, fencing and radios to deter these stealth creatures from taking more than their share!

Seriously though...this is going to be one of the Napa Valley’s finest vintages; a long growing season with phenological ripeness and for many varietals ripeness without high sugar indexes.

However...as always this is another vintage where quality wines will be made in the vineyard first followed by precision and lack of further compromise in the winery. This was a year of paying close attention to powdery mildew issues, in fact one of the most challenging years for growers...proper timing and a reduction in unnecessary spraying was of the essence. Suckering and leaf thinning were primary and if close attention was paid to just the right balance between canopy management and irrigation conservation the rewards will be significant this year.

What is happening in our facility thus far? A small amount of Chateau Boswell Chardonnay, some Arietta Sauvignon Blanc and Morlet Family Vineyards Pinot Noir and Realm's Sauvignon Blanc and Viognier.

Did anyone notice that we did not have the annual blast of high heat on Labor Day weekend?...and how crazy is it that we had rain last week and incredible high heat today. Maybe the sun will get to my hillside fruit before my dear resident poachers?

Happy Harvesting to all and to all a good wine!

Susan Boswell, Owner
Chateau Boswell Winery

The Grapes Are Good

At Cakebread Cellars, we began our 2009 cabernet sauvignon harvest this morning with a load of night picked fruit from our Maple Lane Vineyards.

So far we are very happy with the condition of the fruit that has come in, especially with our whites (sauvignon blanc and chardonnay). The cool season has left the vines in prime condition and the fruit is in remarkable shape with very little disease pressure or sunburn. Overall, we are seeing good flavors at very desireable chemistry as we have been able to reach a high level at maturity at very modest brix levels.

Looking forward, we expect this trend to continue as the phenolic levels in the red grapes look very good as does the weather outlook. We have spent the last few days assessing our vineyards with regards to their ability to weather the upcoming heat and we are confident that we are well prepared and any impacts will be minor.

Toby Halkovich, Viticulturist
Cakebread Cellars

Oh the Glory of It All!

St. Supery's cellar is in full swing as we are bringing in the last trucks of our white grapes: Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Semillon and Muscat Canelli.

Our grapes started coming in the beginning of August and the scent of fermenting juice permeates the cellar (and the office, too!). We all know what happens to the juice but what about all the other stuff? Stems, seeds, pulp, skins and goo (collectively known as pomace) that is collected in the large dump bins situated outside the winery?

On a busy day in the vineyard, our crew can pick enough grapes to fill four bins with pomace. Each black "bin" contains about 40 tons of pomace.

What do we do with it? Because St. Supery practices sustainable farming, we try to reduce and reuse everything we take out of the vineyard. These black boxes are trucked back to our family-owned estate vineyard and its contents emptied into our compost 'mini-mountain'. On an average year's harvest, we can turn almost 800 tons of pomace into compost. It takes about 10 months to fully decompose the waste into nutrient-rich compost that is tilled back into the vineyard.

This past year, our vineyard manager, Josh Anstey, brought 2 bins to our adopted school, Valley Oak, to replenish their learning garden. Valley Oak, a continuing education high school is part of the NVV sponsored 'Adopt-a-School' program.

Onward and upward! Looks like some of our Dollarhide Cabernet Sauvignon is coming in early tomorrow morning. More pomace!

Tina Cao, PR/Marketing Manager
St. Supery Vineyards & Winery

Hurry up and Wait!

The season started back on September 1st with some Sauvignon Blanc followed by one block of Chardonnay and some Pinot Noir from the Las Amigas Vineyard in Carneros over the next week. However, patience has been the name of the game for the past week after the valley received some rain and cooler temperatures last Saturday and Sunday.

If we look at the report from last year, we had already picked all of the above grapes, but we had also brought in Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Viognier and even a block of Cabernet Sauvignon by this time. Waiting is okay, but the danger for the near future could be that everything will be ready all at the same time...meaning the Brix and Acidity levels are at the perfect point we desire for our wines. That can be an issue because there just are not enough hours in the day to pick everything at once.

Hopefully the waiting game will be over by this weekend and we can start picking again. First up...Merlot!

Cheers

Pierre Birebent
Vineyard Manager & Winemaker
Signorello Vineyards

I Love The Smell Of Fermenting Chardonnay In The Morning...

From Daniel Orrison - Intern at Chateau Montelena
9/16/09

Things around the winery sure are picking up. Over a 160 tons of Chardonnay has been crushed in the last week alone and several tanks have started fermentation. Workdays have gone from 8-hour shifts to an average of 13... and our (the interns) long weekends spent wine tasting and relaxing around the Valley are officially over. I know, the tragedy! This aside, though, life is good-- actually, life is great. The experience we are gaining is priceless and the work is incredibly rewarding. Our responsibility level has also been greatly increased – which means no more babysitting, constant monitoring, or safety tutorials as the amount work at this time of year simply wont allow. But on to a few things I’ve been surprised by thus far.

I’m amazed at how quickly the circumstances of any particular day can fluctuate. There is absolutely no formula or set of guidelines one can follow if he/she wishes to live the harvest lifestyle. Anything can happen! This week alone two presses have broke down, grapes have shown up late, more have come in than expected, rain has been in the forecast (followed by extremely high temperatures), new machinery needs to be adjusted, and the interns are asking about everything… which undoubtedly takes up precious time. Flexibility is key to any great wine we have been told.

I think it’s safe to argue that the winemaker is today’s version of a Renaissance Man… that is, he/she has to do and know a bit about everything. He must be an engineer (who can fix a press when it breaks on the spot… well done, Cameron), a scientist (concerning the who, what, when, where, why, and how to pick the grapes), a romantic (naturally, due to the nature of the business…), an artist (as a wine is most certainly painted), and a craftsmen (for there is always something’s around the winery that must be adjusted by hand). The position is truly interesting as making wine is the perfect mixture of exactly that – craft, art, and science.

In other exciting news around the winery, yesterday we crushed our first batch of Estate Cabernet. The grapes are MUCH smaller and also more thick skinned than the Chardonnay. Which, for the interns, means much easier to sweep and clan up. We also just received a new sorting table (MOG separator) for the crush pad. I’ve been told this too should make our life a bit easier. Spoiled, I know.

But as Cameron has said, the crew really is coming together as a team. Harvest looks to be picking up more so with the heat wave coming through and things should really start to get interesting. Lunches are better than ever… 2260 pounds and counting.

Up or down? What’s you call?

Best from Montelena,

Cheers,
Daniel

Two Weeks In and Holding Fast!

It has been a busy week here at Chateau Montelena since the last post. As of yesterday we have processed 160 tons of Napa Valley Chardonnay! If it sounds like a lot, it is (for us). The numbers are pretty revealing – last year (2008) we harvested 162 tons of Chardonnay in a total of 11 days, so far this year we have picked 160 tons in 7 days, and we still have 6 of the 12 blocks let to pick! Now, to be fair, it is not just that yields are high this year (they are), but rather that yields were down last year across the north coast due to unfavorable weather conditions last spring. That’s farming for ya! Good news is that we’ll have plenty of great Chardonnay for sale in 2011, bad news is that we all have bags under our eyes from the long days – and it is just the beginning.

The past week wasn’t without its challenges either. We had a mechanical failure on our whole cluster press, which took it out of service for about 2 days while we were figuring out where to get the parts, which then had to be overnighted from Ohio. On a brighter note, we received our brand new custom built post-destemmer-sorter (otherwise known as a MOG separator - follow this link to see a video of it in action), designed to ensure that only grapes (no raisins or stem chips) make it into the tank or press. It is working well, but required a lot of fine tuning to get it just right – Chardonnay can be kinda tricky since it is a thin skinned grape.

The crew is holding up well and really coming together as a team – the great harvest lunches this year have definitely helped. The photo at top right is our pre-season weigh in – 2260 pounds of grape crushing force – a veritable ton of fun! We’re going to get a post season weight as well, so we’ll see just how good the crush lunches really are.

Our intern Daniel Orrison will have his post ready for tomorrow, so check back then.

BTW - Daniel is third from the left in the front row and I'm in the back with the spectacles.

Until next week, cheers!

Cameron Parry - Winemaker

Chateau Montelena Winery

...After the rain has fallen

"Thunderbolt and lightning-very very frightening me"
--Queen, "Bohemian Rhapsody"

"There's a threat of rain on the dark horizon and all that's left is a
quarter moon of light"
--Sting, "After the Rain has fallen."

The astute weather watcher out there knows that Napa went through a bit of a rollercoaster this past weekend. Saturday morning, 2:30 AM, I'm in my back yard in old wildland gear and boots, monitoring the fire band radio, wondering if we're going to have to deal with the "Napa Wildfire of '09". Fortunately, the dry lightning stayed well South of us.

Sunday evening had very light sprinkles, great for keeping the dust down. In fact, it was just enough to clean the dust off our solar panels, and our array is back up to 100%, no water or squegee required!

The system dropped about 0.16 inch of rain to us here at the top of the Spring Mountain District, giving our red varietals a much needed drink...we dry farm here...so this is the first sip they haven't had to work for since the springtime. This has resulted in both sugar and acid levels droping fairly uniformly across the vineyard...more waiting.

The only serious concern was our Chardonnay, which is still about a week away from harvest. Although we had no signs of Botrytis going into this weekend, we want to make sure our fruit stays clean and mold free. Fortunately, the sun was out, and a gentle breeze dried off most of the fruit quickly. Chardonnay grows in very dense and tight clusters, and these tend to trap and hold moisture...what we needed today was a really large blow drier: enter the minds of Fred and Andy Schweiger...

What you see below is something quite novel this time of year, my father, driving an empty sprayer...it's our BLOW DRIER! Our spray rig is equipped with a very large, powerful fan, producing about a 50 mph breeze through the vines. Although you can't see it in the video, droplets of water are blowing out of the clusters, providing us with clean, dry fruit.

Cheers,

Andy Schweiger, Winemaker and blow dry stylist, Schweiger Vineyards.

ZD Wines Anticipating Harvest

Bright and early this morning the ZD Tasting Room troops met up with Chris Pisani, our Winemaker, and Rafael Llamas, our Vineyard Manager, for a taste of life in the vineyards pre-Harvest. There has been a lot of waiting and watching taking place at the winery these days as we anticipate the Harvest crush and, today, the Tasting Room staff was granted a behind the scenes look at what this waiting entails.

Pulling into the deLeuze Family Vineyards from the Carneros Highway, you are greeted by a charming old house surrounded by vineyards for as far as the eye can see. A small chicken coop near the back door filled with peeping chicks is a welcome reminder that you’ve arrived someplace special and seemingly untouched by the buzz and hum of Napa Valley, the destination. You are immediately transported back to the agricultural roots that make this location so unique.

Walking over to the vines you can see chickens in a range of colors scampering about and snacking happily on vine-loving insects. They are one faction of ZD’s sustainable farming techniques designed to harmoniously marry the art of winemaking with healthy vines and soil. Gazing at the chickens stand Rafael and Chris who are ready to lead the group through the vineyards for a closer look at the grapes that make up our wines.

First up is Chardonnay. The grapes are developing beautifully and we are anticipating Harvest in the coming week or two. Sampling some of the grapes was such a treat and we all found ourselves steeling quick nibbles of the sweet grapes, warmed and mellowed by the morning sun.

The Pinot Noir grapes are planted furthest from our starting position and, as we meandered over, the deep purple fruit looked picturesque hanging in small clusters along the vines. Chris trimmed a bunch of the Hanzel-selection grapes for the group to try. The tightly bunched clusters of smallish grapes are a point of pride for Chris and the winemaking team. The sparsely irrigated vines result in low-yielding, intensely flavored grapes ideal for our Pinot Noir.

Using a Pressure Bomb to test the stress-level of the vines (I’m hoping to try the Pressure Bomb on myself later today), we were able to witness the small droplets of liquid eked out of the tested vine, revealing how the surrounding environment has affected the plant. The Pressure Bomb measures the amount of pressure that exists in the vine between the roots and the tips and is used to evaluate how much need the plant has for water or how well it has adapted to its environment. The results? The vines are in peak condition for harvest.

Bringing samples back to the winery, Chris will test the brix and ph levels in the grapes to further forecast our Harvest date. In the meantime, the cellar is sparkling as the Winemaking Crew has scrubbed, sprayed, cleaned and prepped in anticipation of the first truckload of grapes. Hopefully we will have some more harvest news to report in the coming days! Stay tuned.

ZD Wines

Harvest Continues at Merryvale

Even with this week's high temperatures, harvest continues steadily, but not frantically, at Merryvale and Starmont. By tomorrow, we will have finished harvesting Sauvignon Blanc, and on Thursday we completed harvesting our Pinot noir, all from the Stanly Ranch in Carneros. We started harvesting Chardonnay, and Chardonnay will be the main focus for the next two weeks. Today we harvested some Hyde Chardonnay from an enticing block of mixed clones that exhibit exotic floral flavors.

We have begun harvesting some Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon from earlier ripening sites, but we anticipate continuing to harvest Cabernet throughout the rest of this month and into October. Attached is a picture of us harvesting one of our earliest Cabernet lots from this morning at our Estate in the foothills overlooking St. Helena.

We are really excited about the early flavor development, and are finding developed and concentrated flavors, the disappearance of green flavors, resolved tannins, and brown seeds at lower Brix than recent years.

Cheers!
Remi

They're here....

They’re here…. Chardonnay grapes that is, not the poltergeist of Alfred Tubbs (he’s always here).

The delivery of 17 tons of Chardonnay from one of our growers in the Oak Knoll District of Napa Valley marked the official start of the 2009 Harvest for us here at Chateau Montelena. This is the 38^th consecutive harvest under the current ownership, but there is a much longer history, dating back to the first harvest in 1882 under the direction of the above mentioned Alfred Tubbs – the founder of Chateau Montelena. But enough with the history lesson; that was 127 years ago… So, yesterday’s grapes were both Dijon clones of Chardonnay, clones 809 and 96 to be precise, and this is the first time that we’ve worked with them here at Montelena. So far we’re quite excited about them – we saw great early flavor development without high sugars, which means lower final alcohol, something that we work hard to achieve every year. Yields were very good - about 3.25 tons per acre – especially considering that these vines were T-budded over from Merlot only 2 years ago. The juice tastes great in the tank, so we’ll see how the flavors change during fermentation and aging, but it won’t be until we pull everything out of barrel before bottling next August that we really find out how these new clones fit (or don’t).

The next round of fruit will come in tomorrow – another Dijon clone (76) – so if you’re in the area, stop by in the morning to watch us load the presses. Get here early though, as all of our Chardonnay is harvested at night in order to assure that we receive cool firm fruit – this preserves the delicate flavors, helps prevent damage or unwanted microbial growth in the picking bins, and reduces the amount of energy needed to cool the juice during the initial settling. After that, we should be off and running, with fruit coming in every day from that point on. I expect we’ll be picking the first Estate Cabernet Sauvignon grapes sometime next week….

Until next week, Happy Harvesting and Cheers from the top of the Napa Valley!

Keep reading to see what our Intern Daniel Orrison had to say about the past week.

Cameron Parry – Winemaker

Chateau Montelena Winery

First Day of Harvest 9/8/09

The last few weeks have been relatively calm around the winery… cleaning tanks, racking wine, sanitizing (everything you can imagine), cleaning more tanks, and for the interns, trying slow but sure to learn the ins-and-outs of Montelena-- an area I’ve found comes far more from experience than anything else. Fortunately however, experience, is something Montelena does very well. Certain members of the cellar staff have worked at the winery for over 20 years! They may not be able to offer you the book definition of malolactic fermentation, or the theory behind volatile acidity, though, working with them daily I have learned more about wine than I could have ever imagined. For example, the importance of hard work, responsibility, care, dedication to trade, and professionalism (even in the most mundane and simple tasks) that must take place daily for any wine to be successful. In this area alone I have grown as a person and my appreciation for wine and its process has been heightened without the sign of a single grape!

But who wants to talk about topics that don’t involve grapes (especially on a day that will go down in books as the official start of my FIRST harvest)? We received over 13 tons of two different chardonnay clones. They came in early, and if I may, left very late… The day lasted around 13 hours, from 7am to 8pm, which, I’ve been told is relatively tame for any harvest day. Though for me it was the perfect start… I got to marvel at the sheer quantity and quality of fruit brought to the property. I got absolutely soaked, several times I should note, in juice, water, sweat, and more juice throughout the day. I ate my first freshly picked chardonnay grape and took part in my first, ‘famous’ Montelena Harvest lunch. (It lived up to all the hype, fantastic actually… lasagna, salad, garlic bread, fresh fruit, and a dangerously tasty fudge brownie. All consumed in about 15 minutes. They say you are supposed to lose weight during harvest, but at this rate, I’m not so sure… 167 and counting.) The day however seemed to move at a feverish pace, for as quickly as it started, looking back, the ending was quite similar (bike ride through the vineyards to our lovely home on Old Toll). Tomorrow is another day. Can’t wait!

Best from Montelena.

Life is clean. Life is beautiful. Life is pure.

Cheers,

Daniel Orrison