Winemaker's Diary for Week33-38, 2019

August 11 - September 21, 2019

Monday August 12, 2019

We took some sugar tests in the Pinot this morning and it looks like we will be harvesting for sparkling wine Thursday. We have two sections, one in a lower area which has less fruit and thus also more sugar. We had a reading there of 20+ and the section up North which has more fruit came in at about 19.5. We want 19-20 sugar for sparkling but we want to make sure so on Wednesday Catarino will do a larger sample and then we will decided on where to pick Thursday. It is supposed to be well over 100 degrees in the next two days so we will be ready. We are going to make a rose this year so we will wait for 22 brix, sugar in a week or two so we will leave some fruit.........

Wednesday August 14, 2019

We just finished some sugar samples this morning in the Pinot Noir. We have plenty of fruit that is ready for sparkling tomorrow and it looks like we will have fruit ready for our Rose next week also. We need only half a ton for our red wine which will take another two weeks. Right now we decided to do a sugar sample on many of our white vines so I will be back with that results later.

We have the samples from our white grapes and nothing is ready now. We need another 2 to three weeks which is normal. Tomorrow we are actually picking the Pinot Meunier besides some of the Pinot Noir. Pinot Meunier is used for Champagne in France so we decided to plant 120 vines 6 years ago. We should get about 500 to 600 hundred pounds. In total we want about 2500 pounds of Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier which should eventually produce 50 to 60 cases of sparkling wine.

8:00 PM: It is tomorrow!! It is so exciting, it is the first day of Harvest. I will sleep hopefully and I know I will be up at 6:30 AM. That is when Catarino and his great crew, all Latinos and I hope Trump is coming here tomorrow........I digress, I think all our employees are safe????"

We will see what the first load of Pinot Meunier brings in. We hope for half a ton. If not we have to think sections of Pinot, the South section is 21+, too much for Sparkling but will be fine next week for Rose...........

Yes tomorrow is Harvest!! But it is just the start............................................................

OK, the Stock market. I must agree, I HAVE to know what the Stock Marget is doing, everyday, every minute sometimes........I hate the weekends, because I can not see how TSLA is doing on the weekend with maybe NEWS. I know I am a junky, about the Market.

So yes I love the stock Market but I like Hard Knocks on HBO with the Raiders. It is so much fun for me.........

OK, organization is the name of the game and tomorrow is another day

Thursday August 15, 2019

The Harvest went well today. We took in 1.5 tons total at 20 sugar. We will store the pressed juice overnight at 45 degrees. Tomorrow we will add the yeast and a little water to bring it down to 19.5. That should give us and alcohol of about 11.3. In a few weeks we will bottle it with some sugar and yeast and ferment it. Eventually we should have a sparkling wine at about 12.5 alcohol.

Next week we have decided to make our new DC Fusion. We will pick some Petite Sirah, Grenache and Zinfandel. All of those vines need to be thinned to make sure our red wine will be great. We expect the fruit will come in at about 17% sugar. We will then ferment it with a lot of yeast and then add a bunch of bottled 2010 and 2011 wines. I will go into more detail next week.

Friday August 16, 2019

I definitely do not like Trump, but since he is our president it is more irritating. How can our president only like people who is supported. I understand no president in the past liked anyone who criticized them but they were diplomats.

We have the new sparkling fermenting a 55 degrees.

Amazing I think we found 60 cases of old wine. I know it was still great, but I want to make another DC Fusion. So 6 people moved old bottled wine to a building. We will clean the bottles and get ready to pour all 60 cases into two fermenters. The mass of grapes will ferment and will be at 100 degrees so if this explosion happens, I need to be out in the winery.

The explosion will happen because we are going to Harvest about a ton of low ripe sugar. THEN we will add 3 times the amount of yeast that would be required. Since there was too much yeast put in as you may know, either the fermentation will explode and the sugar will be still in the must. We will be ready..........more to come

Yes, I know, TSLA is down big. I have a big loss, and if I sold now I would still have big profits from the past, but it is concerning......about what IS going on in politics?

Wednesday August 21, 2019

Caterino blended and I blended in our mind.............

So on August 19 we harvested a lot of Petite Sirah and some Grenache. I had asked Catarino to go out and do samples on Monday, August 18. And we thought we had 17+ sugar. He says I did not say to bring in bigger samples so I am in fault. I still make the final decisions. SOOOO

On Monday I took a look at all options, Brad and Dri were here overnight. Brad is the guy who does our website. And so Brad was and I had some nice homemade pizza, me on the BBQ and he on the pizza oven..........

Tuesday, We had 14.5 sugar which would make at the most 8.5 alcohol. Gee, what do I do so this morning about 7am I said : what can I do. Jose came in then and said he got 15.5 brix.............still about 9 alcohol. To ferment at this low alcohol we have to have more sugar to produce more alcohol

I looked into Concentrate. Yes, I can legally buy concentrate at 68% sugar. Gee I thought a long time with research I could buy enough concentrate to make up the sugar level. But adding something we have already

We are trying to make a wine at under 13%. Yes some of our customers like lower alcohol wine and our reds are usually 15.5 alcohol. So this is a challenge.

So to make this new DC Fusion I had to pick more Pinot.

Yes we picked almost a ton of Pinot at 22.5 sugar so better. You have to know since we are up in Dry Creek Valley we have higher temperatures. So I assume we are the only one with high sugars for Pinot..................

So great, we have sugar naturally in our vineyard on August 20.............

It has been an adventure, we are still trying to figure this out.............

So we did a check for acid even after the addition of higher sugar Pinot. I won't go into too much information.......

The acid level on the Must was HIGH!!

We got readings at 3.1 PH which is too low for red wine, but of course........are we making a typical red wine?

So we added Potassium Carbonate to lower the acid and then we added all the yeast SO tomorrow will be a big day to check...................

In the next few days we are going to add the 2010 and 2011 wines to bring the alcohol up...................

Tomorrow is another day

Saturday August 24, 2019

So I went in to see my eye doctor, he is so interesting. Years ago he found out I had a Tesla Model S so he has one now. Long story but he and I agreed we have a Power Wall ordered from Tesla to back up when our power goes down.

I have several people coming in today, you might have forgotten the invitation for our 40 years here managing our vineyard and 25 years since starting the winery in 1994. I also have several past friends who are coming..........one friend and I go back to 1961. I have talked about Joe in my diary so you can look back.

Our DC Fusion is almost finished. The Potassium Carbonate lowered the acid and then we added all the 2010 and 2011 wines about 60 cases. Also we added 150 gallons of 2018 Zp2c still in barrel. We will press Monday and see what the alcohol is.

Monday August 26, 2019

We had a great event, sorry some of you were not here so we are going to offer some of our Library wines

Trump? I figured it out!! He says he does not do drugs and he even said to day he does not taste French wines, but his wife love's them.

So that is why he has so much time to give us his take on all!! He has time and control because he is so into himself and he can't even escape like many of us with some wine. So he is so focus on him self he has time to convince the universe that he is the chosen one, what ever explanation?

This evening I did a taste of Ultimate Cuvee. I will send my choice tomorrow.................

Tuesday August 27, 2019

OK, I liked the the 2016 the first night and the 2018 wine second night, all Ultimate Cuvee. They were all great, I have a Coffaro palate

We are picking Pinot tomorrow and whites on Thursday. We will pick all the Pinot, half for Rose and half for red. The brix were all over 24%. Which ever one comes in higher will go to the red, we have three samples so we will keep separate and check each reading when they come in.

The Gewurztraminer came in at 23.2, one Muscat at 24.4 and the other at 22.5, we want at least 23. The Chardonnay and Sauv Blanc is lower so will be picked later.

We will be out tomorrow at 6:30. We will Harvest the Pinotage and make the first? Rose.

Then we will move on to the Muscat and Gewurztraminer, we hope for the right sugar.......more tomorrow...........

Wednesday August 28, 2019

So we did harvest our Pinotage and Pinot Noir grapes. We had 6 bins so it was complicated. We had some fruit left in the corner near Dry Creek Rd so it was the highest sugar at 24.5, but we were hoping for more sugar so the next small bin only had 23.8 sugar so I stopped destemming and we will ferment this 1400 pounds for red wine.

Then we checked the Pinotage and the rest of the Pinot Noir, and all was about 23 sugar so we will save most of this mass for Rose. I was told we should not send it out for our Wine Club because we do promise no white wines, Rose?

Friday August 30, 2019

So we did harvest our Muscat and Gewurztraminer and the sugar was less than I thought again.................

As you remember Catarino and I accused the other about harvesting the Grenache and Petite Sirah, I should get out and supervise, so yes the sugar came in at 15-16%. and we added to DC Fusion........

Finally we have DC Fusion finished fermenting and in barrels. It will be a little over 12% alcohol so do I give it, some oak, a lot of oak, OR no oak.......it will be tart if we do not drop the acid SO could it be more like a white wine?>????

I am now 76 years old but I still like experimenting. So I tried a new pizza dough tonight. Pat and our two daughters are down in The City to have a Mother Daughter outing for the weekend so I get into experimenting..........

I have some Barley Flour and I read it had incredible amounts of Gluten and Protein so it should be good for pizza dough?

It did not work!!!!!!!!!!!! I have now learned at 76 years old, gluten and protein in dough does not mean the dough will spring back..........

I USED 50% Barley Flour but it was too muc..........h ...........I could not even keep the pizza crust together in any shape. Seriously more like pastry crust but even harder to keep to together.........It tasted OK, I threw the rest away

Pat is away with the daughters so I am here now alone. It should be easy............Catalina is in Texas again........

We have some Pinot Red to punch down but I am sure Jesse and I can.......

Monday September 2, 2019

Jose was just in and our fermentations are going great. We will do some sugar tests tomorrow. It has been hot. Friday Tesla is coming in to install two Power Walls so we may not have power in the winery. I do know for sure the power in our home and office will be out so that means we will have no phone service since we have digital.

8:00 Pm: I am a news junky, not like anyone I know so I am depressed about the storm and I have been keeping track.

Of course I have so many things in my mind.........

I want to look at tennis and i want to look at what may happen in the Stock Market tomorrow.........it has been tough without the market open today

Like I said We will do sugar tests tomorrow.

As some of you remember, I like to ferment hot. I know most wineries keep the temp down below 90 degrees. I prefer 90+. Ed Killian told me once he thought warming up the grape instead of cold soaking would be better. OK, even if I put the fermenters in the vineyard and it was over 100 degrees that day, I am sure the mass of grapes would not heat up by 5 degrees. It is a mass. Sure I could bring in something to warm up, would cost a lot

So I just walked into the first row. There is one vine that is young, probably planted 20 years ago. The fruit on this vine is fun to taste from now until November. Most of the fruit now is not ripe, most of the fruit down deep on the North side is very tart

I will use this vine to guess when the Harvest for Zinfandel will be ready........but Catarino is the guy who is out there everyday so he and I will decide when the first Zinfandel will be harvested..........one to two weeks?

Brad and I are still experimenting with pizza every Sunday. Maybe out there somewhere like us. So we have tried everything. I will have more to say tomorrow is another day..........

Tennis

Wednesday September 4, 2019

Our sugar tests came in low but we suspect as usual we may have some more Harvest ready next week...........

Thursday September 5, 2019

So tennis is one of my passions. Nadal I think is what I would be if I was a tennis player. He always is intense. Tonight is women's so i will have to wait for Nadal tomorrow

I will let you know about Tesla Power Wall, eventually..........They are coming in here at 7am tomorrow..........and we may not have power for 6 hours. I have my Kindle Ready.........

Now Brad. He is my best friend now, he is intense.........................

When I'm at the winery, Dave and I make pizza. Other times we exchange what we're cooking. Many of the things we make at home are new to us (we experiement a lot) so it can be exciting. So Dave asked me to relate what we've had for dinner and maybe a recipe from time to time. Full scale explanations are for another time and another place, but we hope you'll be interested and maybe try some of the things we've made as presented in "Dinner Last Night".

The setup for the posts is evolving but we thought we'd start you off with last night, our family take on Lox and Bagels.