Still Waiting For Red

At this point in the season, the grapes out in the vineyard are relatively ripe. But to figure out the absolute optimum time to pick, you have to do some work in the lab. Today, armed with samples of Merlot from each row of the Hermes block, Nick is measuring brix and pH, or the sugar and acid levels. Ultimately, these details allow the winemaking team to turn a ballpark timeline for harvest into a detailed picking schedule. And while there is no telling how Mother Nature will behave, we do know that attention to the little things is essential to make truly great wine. This particular test requires some really technical work, like “squishing” the berries until you have enough “juice” to measure. No picnic, but it sure looks like we packed one...

Harvest 2012 Is Here!

The first Sauvignon Blanc from Persephone Ranch arrived last week! And according to winemaker Sara Fowler, "the grape quality is the best we have seen in several years". She also indicated that as in previous harvests, we are picking SB in multiple stages for varying ripeness levels.

The earlier picking brings in fruit with mouth-watering acidity that gives the wine those bright citrus and grapefruit notes. By the third round, we are getting fruit with higher brix levels. These berries are responsible for our Sauvignon Blanc's super aromatic and luscious tropical fruit character. The multi-step process involves a lot of timing and planning, but it is the only way to achieve a balanced wine with such layered and diverse fruit flavors.

Now that harvest has officially begun, the winery is buzzing with activity, but not quite in full swing. In between is still a quiet anticipation for the road that lies ahead. Cheers to Sara and her team on a smooth start to a very promising year!

It's time for the homestretch





The sacrifices we make in order to create great wine can be heart-wrenching. Take the process of thinning, or dropping fruit. A huge number of clusters were recently cut from our Merlot vines, and I must admit it is sad to see them shriveled up and baking in the dirt. But this is such an important practice because it ups the concentration of flavor in each remaining grape. Timed just a few weeks after veraison, which marks the point when the grapes begin to accumulate more sugar, thinning allows all of the plant’s energy to be channeled into a smaller amount of fruit. So from now until harvest, all of the earthiness from the soil and the ripeness from the sun is distilled, condensed, to make wines that are more powerful and refined.

These vines are pretty young, so even after thinning, the clusters are more than bountiful

On the other side of the winery, the HB Cabernet Sauvignon looks sparse in comparison. This block has seen many more years of thinning so it has a naturally lower yield--and is the source of our magically delicious Rutherford Estate Reserve.

  

         



At this point we have also stopped watering, which means the nectar in those grapes will be even more intense. All in all, it’s a rigorous time for the vines and a super exciting time for us as we wait patiently until the optimum time to pick. If the growing season is a marathon, this is about the 22^nd mile. Close enough to taste, but the absolute most important part, as that last week or so of ripening will make their journey complete.    

 















Introducing...Cabernet Sauvignon Persephone

Here in Rutherford, Cab is King—the noble grape is known for making wines that are uniquely complex, earthy and concentrated and it is an integral part of the district’s rich history. So it comes as no surprise that Peju’s flagship wine was the 1982 Cabernet Sauvignon.

This month we are celebrating another Cabernet first with the Wine Club release of our 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon Persephone . This is a “Vineyard Designate” wine—meaning 95% of the grapes must come from a single vineyard. However, that single vineyard is located not in Rutherford, but in Pope Valley at our Persephone Ranch. This property was acquired by Tony Peju in 1996, and since then its grapes have been blended into our “Napa Valley” tier of wines. But with the 2008 Cab Sauv Persephone, the training wheels are off and Persephone Cab gets a chance to shine on its own.



Some freshly packaged Persephone Cab



Pope Valley has its own distinct character and is known for its focused mountain fruit flavors and consistent quality. To release an entirely new wine is an infrequent occasion for any winery, considering the labor and resources required to produce a specific bottling. But we think this Cab is truly special because it is a testament to Pope Valley as an up and coming grape-growing region. It also represents a milestone for Peju, as we now officially represent vineyard-designate Cabernet Sauvignon from two separate areas of Napa. For these grapes to go from a blending source to their own exclusive bottling is akin to stepping up from the farm team (no pun intended) to the majors. So welcome to the big show, Persephone! We know you’ll be a hit. 

For the time being, this wine is available only to our wine club members—but it is an exciting development nonetheless and more news from Persephone is soon to come!

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes...

Veraison! Here is one of the first clusters on the HB block that has just started to ripen--the first indication that harvest is truly on its way. Funny to think these little babies are half a step closer to becoming wine, and amazing to watch this VERY gradual process as it unfolds a bit more each day. Most of the grapes are still green right now, protected from the harsh rays by a nice full canopy.

And here is one last shot of some other growth happening on the property :)

A Quick Note on Tasting Notes

For most wine drinkers, tasting notes can offer an accurate summary as to what is inside the bottle. Descriptors of the more fundamental aspects— body, tannin structure, and acidity—account for the majority of what makes up a wine’s general style. However, a great deal of emphasis is placed on listing subtle hints of flavor and other, more nuanced characteristics—qualities which have far less bearing on whether we will actually enjoy the wine. One is far more likely to hear “this Sauvignon Blanc is too acidic,” than “this has too much grapefruit. I prefer more nectarine.”

So why do wine enthusiasts and professionals tend to rattle off names of obscure fruits, spices and minerals when assembling tasting notes? Because specificity of flavor does matter. In part, because we are fascinated by the many ways a grape’s varietal character can be expressed. And in the tasting room, this helps distinguish our wine from the dozens of others our guests have tasted throughout the day.

But it also matters because smelling and tasting wine can be the most satisfying way to exercise our sense memory. For example, you may find the fruity aromas that jump from the glass difficult to pick out individually, but your brain is screaming “Fruit Loops!” This is a valid tasting note! Or perhaps you smell something that reminds you of yet another wine you have tasted in the past. You have just confirmed your knowledge of a common thread that exists throughout Malbec, for example. In either case, you have worked your memory muscle and sharpened your understanding of wine in the process.

Ultimately, the road to fully understanding wine is unending. But the more we forge connections concerning smell and taste, the larger our network of reference points, and the more it all makes sense. Just like with art or music, the beauty is in the details. No need to spend hours dissecting it, but pay attention, and you may discover something amazing!

Check out 12x75's "7 Word Wine Review" for a neverending list of short and sweet (or dry) tasting notes and add your own when tasting your next bottle of Peju.

#7wordwinereview | Fine Wine Blog | 12 x 75.com

Time to Relax: Some Thoughts on Rosé

Put on your rose-colored glasses, because as the weather grows warmer, my refrigerator gets pinker. An easy-drinking, fun-loving wine, rosé begs to be simply enjoyed. That said, rosé is no doubt misunderstood, undervalued even, and I think it deserves better. Take the word “rosé” for instance—a bit more complex than we realize. In French, it is quite common to turn any noun or adjective into a past-tense verb, should the situation call for it. The word “rose” without the accent simply means “pink”. But add that tiny, but powerful little dash above the ‘e’ and the word denotes something slightly different. The wine is not just pink in color…it has been pinked! The term sounds slightly less elegant in English—and sort of makes it seem like we bonked the wine over the head with a splash of color. But in a sense, we did. Making rosé involves a unique process in which the juice is held in contact with the skins and seeds for only a short period of time.

If wines are people, rosé is the free-wheeling, rebellious teenage cousin of the lot (hehe). To start out, it behaves the traditional, expected way—but just as it begins to develop into a grown-up Syrah or Pinot Noir or Grenache, it is racked off, and its journey to serious red-dom stops short, remaining forever in adolescence. Skip the lengthy maceration, malolactic fermentation, and the barrel or bottle aging. This sucker wants to be in a glass, partying by the pool, now! And you have to admire its haste. Winemaking is always a process, but rosé represents the instant gratification we all crave this time of year. Produced relatively quickly, and drunk young, it is the ultimate ephemeral pleasure.

So if you’re wary of its unfashionable reputation, don’t be. Perform a little experiment by setting up a tasting with your friends and let the results unfold. No need for paper bags or pages of notes—just see which one is a hit. As they say, “The best bottle is the first one emptied!”

Earth Day Meditations

Wine is the consummation of human nature-love. People care so passionately about the quality of the fruit produced to make the wine that the care we take of the vines is unsurpassed in its attentiveness and devotion. In wine, the whole concept of terroir communicates how winegrowing encourages humans to be attuned to the Earth, the systems at work and the interconnectedness of it all. How often do you think about how the climactic conditions your banana withstood affected its flavor(s)? We care more now as a collective society than we did in the recent past about where things come from and how they came to be, but we’re probably not quite there yet in terms of thinking holistically about all of our choices. Anyway, terroir is more than just the soil, the microclimate and the location. It is the mark made by all the aspects of the Earth around that vine. Think: the ‘nurture’ influence on humans in the nature/nurture duality. No two wines will ever be the same and what's more fun than discovering the subtle differences with your palate?

In Rutherford our soil is full of sandy loam. Blocks farther from the Napa River at the back edge of our property produce the most concentrated fruit, as they have to burrow deeper to find a water source.  The little section of vine which grows under the shadow of the Eucalyptus tree behind the winery takes a bit more time to ripen than the rest. The south facing vines ripen more quickly than the north facing vines. There are an infinite variety of observations to make. And again, one discovers these facts through one’s senses. Tasting the grapes and paying attention. Wine is an ode to the human capacity to smell, to taste, to feel, to see, to discover and to enjoy.

I grew up in a society that spends more of childhood in a classroom learning about nature from a book than discovering it at the source itself.  Maybe that’s why being in nature is so precious to me. I experienced its majesty for the first time in early adulthood. It’s been captivating, wondrous and new every time ever since.

I write to you now with my belly in the dirt, splayed out in the middle of the vines, listening to the birds chirp, watching the grasses and the just-sprouted leaves on the vines move in tandem as the wind whispers through them. A spider scurries across my notebook; ants scuttle over tiny clumps of dirt and teeny rocks and miniature sticks along an unknowable but evidently determined path to fulfill their purpose. Contemplating our own ‘purpose’ can feel like an inscrutable burden of our elite human consciousness, but for me, being in nature makes me feel closer to it- whatever it is. The ‘purpose’ of being alive. And it feels almost simple. When the birds sing and perch on the vines and flutter around each other in instinctual patterns, and the wind blows warm, dry air through my hair and across my face, and when as far as the eye can see, plants move like jazz music in the infinite patterns created by the wind. I feel still and at peace. The American conception of what is happiness is a confusing one at times, but nature is always there to remind us of what is real. Perhaps the fact is simply that we exist.

In gratitude, I pledge to be better about using my travel coffee mug (did you know these are called ‘tumblers’?) rather than turning a blind eye to the number of to-go cups I rack up in one week. And I plan to fight against the New Year’s Resolution Syndrome and actually still be in the habit of using said tumbler a few months down the road. Check in with me.

Peju farms certified organically in Rutherford and sustainably elsewhere with CCOF certification on the horizon, has 10,000 square feet of solar panels contributing 36% of our annual energy, composts, recycles, offers incentives to employees to buy hybrid cars, and is generally committed to continually converting our daily practices to always improve on our sustainability. We started using biodegradable flatware when silverware is not a viable option this year. Every little bit really does count. What will you do differently? Starting TODAY!

I'm back at the computer now, but it was nice to take a moment with the Earth to honor her on her  special day. It’s a pretty rich sense of belonging to feel once you tap in to the fact that you are very much a part of this Earth and a part of the whole system and that we are all in this together.

Watched a beautiful movie recently which communicated this visually. ‘Life in a Day.’ Directed by Kevin Macdonald. Produced by Ridley Scott. Distributed by National Geographic Films. Made from 4,500 hours of footage submitted in 80,000 submissions from 192 nations. Watch it.

Thank you, Earth and Nature.

Thank you, Life!

Now go outside and enjoy being alive!

Cheers,

Britt

Bud-break in Rutherford

The Vineyard Gets Its Hairs Cut

It's pruning season all over the valley. The vineyards, which have been slumbering in dormancy since late November/early December, are now completely dormant and ready to be pruned. Today, the vineyard crew systematically works their way from one end of the vines to the other at a steady pace, talking coolly, quietly, and rhythmically among themselves to pass the time. These were some of my most favorite moments when I worked on the tiny vineyard in France- finding myself in a whole new type of conversation, one with a different tempo, rhythm and beat. It's conversation for the sake of conversation, rather than for conveying a point or winning an argument. Conversation whose primary purpose is to entertain/amuse/pass the time. Spending the entire day working with your hands and your eyes (your senses) and requiring less production/output with your intellectual mind allows a different way of relating to your coworkers. You're not passing in the hallway making quick jokes as you cross going different directions to different ends. You're spending the whole day in the uninterrupted company of your coworkers, outside, conversing casually and genuinely with no pressure to say anything particular at any given time.

We prune to limit the number of grape clusters the vine will produce, ultimately to limit that vintage's yield or to balance the vine. At Peju, we prune to have only two grape clusters at hand-distance intervals on the vines, varying slightly by age and size of the vine. This ensures that the vines concentrate their energy to produce two high quality fruit clusters rather than many lower quality (less concentrated, 'flabby') fruit clusters.

Winemakers have to be vigilant about when they choose to prune, as pruning often nudges the grapevine to awaken from dormancy and inspires bud-break not long after. The key here is not to get bud-break before the morning frosts of Spring have ceased.

Rains can continue until the cows come home, but morning frosts are not our friend. Luckily our Rutherford location usually spares us much worry. The threat of damaging frosts is low in our prime Rutherford real estate.

Before (left) and After (right)

One Tangled Rod at a Time

Exercise Your Taste Buds

Winemaker Sara Fowler tasted through sixty different barrel lots of the 2009 and 2010 red wines in our cellar yesterday. She called it "checking in with the wine." What was she checking for?

"I'm checking to see how the wine is maturing, how it's progressing, and to see if any of the individual barrels need attention."

Sixty glasses of wine lined the Production office. Incredulous, I asked her how she could possibly maintain the ability to taste the subtleties in numbers fifty through sixty (or even after #20). She chuckled and said,

"Sixty is nothing! I used to have to taste hundreds of wines in a day at one of the other wineries where I've worked. I'll just take a break after the first thirty, do something else for a couple of hours, and then come back to the last thirty."

At Peju, we age our Napa Valley tier reds for 16-18 months, and our Reserve wines for 26 months, so at this time, Sara is tasting through the 2009 Reserves and 2010 Napa Valley tier reds.

"The 2009 Reserves are dee-licious!" She says with glee. Our Reserves are Cabernet Franc- and Cabernet Sauvignon-predominant Bordeaux blends made exclusively from fruit grown certified organically on our Rutherford Estate. "Though each barrel will impart slightly different flavor characteristics-- and we purchase barrels from several different cooperages for this reason-- all the 2009 reserve wines themselves are full of rich, ripe, dark fruit flavors. 2009 was the last great year before the trickier two to follow, but I've been pleasantly surprised at the way the 2010's are tasting today, as well."

"I have the best job in the world," Sara said, as I turned to leave. "It just doesn't get much better than making wine in the Napa Valley. I can't wait to play with these delicious [barrel] lots and start blending later this month!"

May 2012 Be Golden

Peju Tower by Afshin Atapour, December 2011

A guest took this stunning photo of the Peju tower yesterday and passed it along for our use. Who needs a white winter when you can have a golden one?

Production has been shut down between Christmas and New Year's, so there hasn't been much to report from the wine-making side. 2011 Whites are resting quietly in their tanks and barrels until Sara begins to taste and blend them sometime in January.

The tasting room has been poppin', however; the Valley seems fuller than usual with holiday passers-through. First day of rain in a long time yesterday, but it was more of a sprinkle than a downpour. Actually, the weather has been incredible these past couple of weeks. I love snow, but there is no denying the effect that so many days of sun throughout the winter takes on my psyche. I'd go so far as to say it's universal. Evolutionary, even. But I don't know how p.c. my theory is, so I'll save it for another time. The incontrovertible fact is that the sun makes people smile, feel good, and relax.

Peju is open tomorrow, New Year's Day, so come on by for a taste of something special! And with that, I'll sign off with the promise of writing you again in 2012. Hope everyone has the best New Year's Eve ever tonight! Party tiime! (Safety first.)

Sincerely,
Britt

Hot air balloons sailed directly over my head as I stepped out of my front door this morning.

Good Night Sky

What do you see?

Nature made art in the sky as the sun set over the Napa Valley this evening. Sometimes it's good to stand on your head for a fresh perspective. Or if you're at work and/or wearing a skirt, to flip a photo around so that you force your brain to actively organize what you're seeing as though it's seeing for the first time. And so that you force yourself to look carefully, to see what's actually there. Sometimes I forget to look with intention at what's around me and I allow my brain to recycle old material to create my present reality. We would exhaust ourselves trying to practice this intentional sensory awareness all the time, but at least once a day starting today, I'm going to make sure I practice what I am now referring to as Intentional Sensory Awareness, ISA for short. One thing I learned while living in France was that if it has an acronym, it's legit. So, ISA. Fifteen minutes. Everyday. I might start over a glass of the 2007 Peju Cabernet Sauvignon I have waiting for me at home. Yum. 


This is actually one of the reasons wine is my beverage of choice. There is so much going on in every bottle of wine, and every sip is unique in its experience, so it invites this kind of simultaneously acute and expansive sensory awareness, no matter what kind of person you are or how many bajillion things you just did earlier that day. Wine brings us home in ourselves, inviting us to be fully present and to enjoy our senses. I think I'll go have that glass right now! When was the last time you felt fully present in your senses? 


Cheers & Good Evening! 


Britt.

Frosty Was Here

Another beautiful morning in Napa Valley. By 10 am, the radiant sun in the clear, blue Californian sky has melted away the frost. Late risers would never know it had been there. This is only the second time this year that I've seen frost and this time I caught it! Here it lives in temporary eternity on the internet. 

On December 13, it's 53 degrees Fahrenheit in Rutherford, CA. What is the weather like where you are and what will you sip tonight to stay warm?
Happy Winter and Happy Tuesday! Cheers!

A Harey Vineyard Amble

The vineyard is spectacular today. On my mid-afternoon, head-clearing stroll, a huge hare appeared about 20 rows away from me. He leapt casually out of a row of vines and paused, staring in my direction with an air of mischief and invitation before bounding away behind the next row. Naturally, I jogged on tip-toe past the rows between us with my camera at head height until I neared where I thought he might be. Slowing to my stealthiest step, I peered around each vine until finally discovering him halfway down a row of Estate Cabernet. Now with camera pressed firmly against my face, I crept down the row like the Grinch stealing Christmas. Surely, he was welcoming my advance. Despite the unavoidable crunching under my feet and the approaching shadow of my giant figure, Mr. Hare didn't flinch, didn't move, didn't budge. For some animals, this might be explained by the defense tactic known as 'playing dead' or 'camouflage'. Although the latter is conceivable-- he blends pretty well, don't you think?- he definitely knew I knew he was there. He beckoned me closer.

And then, like so many handsome hares before him, just as he had me under his spell and drawing near, he darted through the grapevine and off into the wilderness whence he came. Fare thee well Mr. Hare. It was fun while it lasted!

Hare one minute, gone the next.

Well, folks, that concludes today’s adventures here on the Crush Chronicles. This evening is the company holiday party, so I am off to help prepare. A wonderful weekend to all!

Birds, too.

Hanging on/Hanging out.

One Cluster Left Behind.

One cent shipping special today through 12/11 for purchases of 12 bottles or more. Cheers!  http://bit.ly/holidaycatalogblog  Call with questions: 800-446-7358

No More Monkeying Around in the Cellar for Me

From Friday: 
Today, I write to you from my brightly lit desk in the very tame upstairs offices. Actually, ironically, I just heard a cacophony of high-pitched hollers from the other end of the offices. Sounds like a big sale came in, woo-hoo! The holidays are an exciting time for Patti, Jess & Christina who take care of phone sales. Anyway, it is the first Friday in two months that I've had to iron before clothing myself presentably, and that I’ve come to work to spend the day wielding the almighty mouse and keyboard. Slightly different strengths required than those for wielding the heavy hoses and 20-gallon buckets of juice in the cellar. I am in the office today because finally the seasonal work requiring so many extra hands has come to an end. There is still much going on for the full time cellar workers, but they've got that under control. We drained our very last tank yesterday to press and barrel down today- Cabernet Sauvignon from one of the later-ripening blocks on our Persephone Vineyard. Almost all of the leaves have fallen off the vines, which are now dormant and will remain so until spring when the weather warms, rousing the vines out of their winter stillness to begin again to do what they are meant to- to photosynthesize, to pull nutrients out of the ground to create leaves and eventually to flower and to bear fruit. 

'Dormancy', as defined by Wikipedia, is "a period in an organism's life cycle when growth, development, and (in animals) physical activity are temporarily stopped. This minimizes metabolic activity and therefore helps an organism to conserve energy." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dormancy)  My organism can relate to that.

Dormant Vines on Peju's Rutherford Estate

 Next week Winemaker Sara, Assistant Winemaker Joe, and Production Planner Sheri will begin tasting through the 2011 whites to see how the now two-and-a-half-month-old wine is tasting, and to start thinking about how they’ll want to blend it in a month or two. Blending involves systematic tasting through barrel-aged versus tank-aged lots, lots in French versus American and new versus neutral oak, and then blending varietals with any combination of these variations. I love how winemaking involves doing science with your taste buds. 

Most of the work that’s going on in the cellar these days is to take care of the older vintages of reds that were laying low in their barrels while Harvest's new crop, like a needy newborn sibling, took all of the attention. Mostly, it's the topping I mentioned in a a recent blog post that the crew is busy with now. On a monthly rotation, the crew will bring all of the hundreds of barrels in our Estate cellar out to the crush pad to make sure the headspace in each barrel is at a minimum, lest the wine breathe too much oxygen and lose its youthful vigor.

Naked Vines Soak Up the Winter Sun

And as the vineyard rests for winter, the sales team springs to action for the most wonderful time of year for us humans! It is certainly true that some of the best gifts in life are free. But wine is always a great gift too. Cheers!


Brittany Starr for Peju Province Winery

View from Peju, December 2011

Tank Vacancy & Pre-Turkey Day Topping

The cellar is an eerie place these days. Its spotless, vacant walkways lined with hollow tanks give no indication of the furious activity this very space beheld just a couple of weeks ago. The action is outside now and the crew continues as though nothing much has changed. It’s as though we are all in on this little secret that was the hectic harvest and now we continue at a normal pace as though this is how it’s always been. But I guess that’s just how life is. We share a meaningful moment with others and it feels like life should pause for us to appreciate together its significance, but of course life cannot. Time barrels ahead leaving us alone to process the fleeting moments through our individual recollections of them. It’s the times like Thanksgiving, which give us the opportunity to pause together and to reflect collectively. This year I am thankful for a time to give thanks!

Lony and Pablo topping barrels of 2010 Chardonnay.

Anyway, the action is outside the cellar on the crush pad now. The press runs with the contents of the last few tanks of young wine, the newly-filled barrels of Chardonnay are brought outside for stirring, and the older vintage wines brought outside for topping.

 Peju’s signature Sycamores have been stripped of their leaves for the winter, their spindly, exposed limbs a beacon for the brisk season ahead.

Well I wish you all a joyful, meaningful, restorative, fun and delicious Thanksgiving weekend. What will you drink with your turkey? I wonder how many people don’t actually eat turkey on thanksgiving… food and wine for thought...

Have a good one!

Cheers,

Britt

Topping

Peju Sycamores, Trimmed for Wintertime

With All Our Grapes Safely in Tank and Barrel, We Begin Our Descent Into Winter Calm.

The last of the fruit-carrying bins
leave the crush pad

 That's not quite all folks, but we have brought in the last of our fruit. Friday the 4th marks the end of the 2011 Crush, nearly a month later than 2007's October 11 end date, but sooner than we were thinking it would be a few weeks ago.

With the number of work orders diminishing each day, the cellar dance has changed from a swift and sprightly Viennese waltz to the more moderately-tempoed American variety. I watch the team work now and I imagine the cellar like one giant music box with the song coming to an end and all the players slowing simultaneously to a halt as the box lid closes us inside the dark, quiet of winter. We can no longer celebrate (or commiserate in) the craziness of being ‘in the middle of Harvest’, yet there is still work to do. Interns and temporary workers are starting to prepare for their migration to the other side of the equator for the next one. The high of Harvest end’s cheer and festivity gives way to the realization of what will pretty immediately follow: a (relatively) cold, wet winter with less time in the day and less people in the Valley. But whoa woe, it is also the Holiday Season! Americans’ favorite time of year! A time when opportunity abounds to spend quality time with family and friends. A time of reflection and joy and thankfulness and snuggling in tight. A time of cooking up old traditions, of getting inventive with those that have gone stale, and a time when red wine never tasted so good. 

Much of what is now 2011 red wine in the Peju cellar has been drained and pressed, though a handful of ferments are still finishing up. When a ferment finishes, Sara usually lets the wine mingle with the skins in the tank for a bit before pressing off the skins and putting the wine into French and American oak barrels to age. This prolonged contact of the wine with the skins at the end of fermentation is called ‘extended maceration.’ Maceration is simply the name given to the process by which all that good stuff in the skins is extracted by the juice. This occurs naturally upon contact with one another. Phenolic compounds give color to what would otherwise be clear(ish) juice and tannins give structure/body to the wine, which also give it the potential to age. Sara does a cold maceration at the beginning of each ferment, too, to allow the pre-fermented juice to extract water-soluble components. The water-soluble components are less likely to be extracted once alcohol is produced in the juice during fermentation. It is all of these numerous steps taken to ensure that the wine maximizes complexity, concentration and integration which distinguishes ‘fine wine’ from the rest, and makes it so-o fine.

Below is the mouth of a tank that has just been drained and sent to press and then barrel. What you don’t see is that in order to empty the tank to the extent it appears here, a member of the team has to climb into the tank through this very opening to shovel out the skins, all the while attached by a harness to a fellow crew member outside the tank in the event of a Carbon Dioxide overdose, which is an actual cause of death during every harvest!!! Yet another example of just how much goes into the production of a bottle of wine.

Quality Control Lab Tech Nick presses the last truck samples for testing.

The last yeast inoculation.

Asbel represents our collective joy at this being the last time we will have to clean the crusher-destemmer!!

And resourceful, winemaker Sara sabers a bottle of bubbly with a draining-valve clamp to honor a Phase-One well done.

Cheers!

The Cellar Team at the After(Crush) Party on the Peju Crushpad

Stay tuned because there is work left to do and words left to write for Harvest 2011!

Until next time,

Britt

Be sure to check out our spanking new Holiday Catalog. It's hot off the press with a whole slew of lip-smacking new releases from Peju. 

May you always have cheer in your cheeks and great wine in your glass! 

Yellow Vines, Whinnying Winds, Seasons Change. That Was Fast.

Three days ago I looked around at my cluttered desk and three-page to-do list and decided to take a stroll through the vineyard. Perspective was indeed gained when I stepped outside and into a different season. Wasn't it just last week that the vines were green, that we were in the midst of harvest, and that much to everyone's relief, the midday sun shone hotly on our ever-ripening fruit? With a high of 60 degrees F, 20% chance of rain, and wily, whispering winds blowing yellow leaves from the exposed vines, today we have no choice but to accept that Autumn is here, and Winter confoundingly close. 

Cabernet Sauvignon Vine, Peju Rutherford Estate
Mid-Morning, November 3, 2011

Cabernet Sauvignon Vine, Peju Rutherford Estate
Mid-Morning, November 3, 2011

Cabernet Sauvignon Vine, Peju Rutherford Estate
Mid-Morning, November 3, 2011

Cabernet Sauvignon Vine, Peju Rutherford Estate
Mid-Morning, November 3, 2011

Tomorrow, we bring in the last of our fruit. But of course there is still much work to be done. Fermentations will be finishing, we will drain and press and clean out tanks, and transfer freshly fermented wines to their new homes in French and American oak barrels where they will live and breathe and age and develop for the next 12-36 months, depending on the wine. 


I can't believe I took those photos above just this morning. I'm feeling a strange mixture of marvel at the novelty and beauty of the changed surroundings, and anxiety about the frenzied, fleeting passing of time. But this is nothing new!


What's the weather like where you are?


Autumn cheer and cheers!
britt