Left Coast Cowboys

Our Grenache, Mourvedre and Cinsault have been happily sitting in steel tanks for their second fermentation (with a few rackings to clarify out dead yeasts). This weekend, it was their time for the destination of all good wines: oak barrels. We had the further ambitious plan to develop a few Southern Rhone style blends from our separate varietals. Or at least get as close as we could to a Southern Rhone style blend, given that we haven’t yet planted that key Rhone varietal, Syrah. And we don’t have half the dozen or so other grapes that go into a true Rhone wine. But, baby steps.

The first step was to pull samples of all our varietals from the steel tanks.

Then set up a blending station.

Yup. There’s no fancy blending at Two Terrier Vineyards. We just think of a possible mix and adjust and take notes until we think we have a combination we like. We started with a couple of classic Southern Rhone blends like Chateauneuf du Pape. Well, we got as close to Chateauneuf as we could given that we don’t have the thirteen or so grapes they use. But hey, their blends are mostly dominated by Grenache and Mourvedre with half a dozen other varietals at 1% of this and that, so we thought we could get close enough for amateurs. So we developed a Grenache dominant blend and a Mourvedre dominant blend.

Once you have the formula for your blend, it all becomes a matter of, not shutes and ladders, but hoses and pumps.

You need really long hoses. And lots of them.

See you have to pump the wine in the tanks...

into oak barrels in the wine cave. With a short stop in a carboy for measurement purposes.

This is a complicated and time-consuming process. So note to self: start early. Which we didn’t.

Instead we hot rodded down to Sonoma for lattes in the morning.

And took a hike around the property.

And activated Mole Patrol.

So by the time we were at the messy, wet clean-up stage, it was dark and cold.

But we did get to see this wonderful sunset.

Which was still amazing even while viewed cold and wet.

Usually farmers pray for rain. Especially in semi-arid places like California. Except when that rain comes at the end of the growing season and just before harvest. And if you are growing wine grapes. Typically, we shut off the irrigation water (which is only a drip at the best of times) about a month before harvest . That concentrates the flavors of the berry and creates a greater ratio of skin to pulp. Since the skins give all the flavor, color and tannins, that’s a good thing. So you can imagine the calamity when we get dumped on by several inches of rain toward the end of the ripening. Imagine that happening twice. That’s this season in a nutshell. We never got enough of the hot, 100 degree ripening days, then we’ve been pelted twice with early season rainstorms. In early and mid-October, yet, which is almost unheard of in our neck of the woods!

If you’ve been reading, you know we did a panic harvest of all the Grenache and Mourvedre (the Cinsault, as it did last year, ripened early and was already processed). The Grenache and Mourvedre weren’t quite to the degree of ripeness we would have liked. But the cooler weather is making the fermentation go slower, so we may end up having to leave it longer on the skins in primary fermentation, which could counterbalance things.

John the Baptist isn't taking this rain lightly. He and Louis have been shoring up the banks of our creek in the event of flooding.

By the way, I haven’t written much about the daily doings here at Two Terrier Vineyards — mainly because it’s been such a blur of activity — but also because it’s the same routine I wrote about last harvest. Every day. But for a refresher, here are some posts about the processing of the picked grapes into primary fermentation. (Here’s how we get grapes from picking to crush to primary fermentation vats and here and here are how we take them from primary to press to secondary. )And here’s the daily routine of a Wine Babysitter. Which would be moi.

So it’s been the daily round of punchdown, then take readings to test temp, pH, and specific gravity. In between cursing at the sky and staring in disbelief as even more rain clouds roll in.

Even our sunny days have looked threatening.

Did I mention that grapes aren’t the only crop threatened by this unseasonable rain? My tomatoes swelled, burst and had to be harvested immediately. Since you can’t really can bruised or burst tomatoes (the natural bacteria barrier — the skin — has been breached), I boiled this whole harvest down into spaghetti sauce.

You don't even want to know how many tomatoes were left on the vine because they were completely green.

All those tomatoes boiled down into about enough sauce for four.

Did I mention, before I added some sugar, the sauce was so acidic it made a temporary crown fall out?

You think I’m whining? Well, you’ll hear the same thing up and down Napa and Sonoma Valleys. I took my brother, who’s in town, to the Benziger Family Winery tour (take the Partner’s Tour. It’s the best tour in two counties!)

Their Cabernet is still on the vines. Look at the damage. They're hoping we get a week to dry out.

They usually sell their organic tomatoes to local restaurants. This swollen batch is ruined and headed for composting.

So everybody pray for rain to go to someone who needs it. Like the Sierras. That is if we can figure out a way to get the rain to sweep over Sonoma without falling on its way East. Otherwise, 2009 is not going to go down as a good year for Sonoma Cabernet.

Mark Twain said: “Everyone complains about the weather, but nobody does anything about it.” Good point. And I wish someone had taken action on this terrible season back in May when it just wouldn’t warm up and wouldn’t stop raining. With a few scattered periods of hot, hot weather, it’s been mostly cooler and wetter than a normal season in Sonoma. And that’s not good for the grapes. Now we have word that a huge storm is going to sweep in Monday, dropping so much rain, it will put an early end to fire season. Which is a good thing for the brush. But not necessarily a good thing for ripening grapes which might start sprouting mold. John the Baptist and Louis are already putting out straw bales to brace for what they are saying will be a big one.

Meanwhile crews have been lined up for 7:30 Sunday to bring in all our Mourvedre and Grenache — even though they haven’t reached the optimum Brix level. With the Cinsault already processed, that will leave only Cabernet out in the field. But our vineyard consultant says Cabernet can pretty much stand up to anything.

While a crew of professional Mexican grape pickers will have no problem bringing in our grapes in a few hours (our vineyard will be a “little earner” for them between “real” jobs), Andy and I have never tried to process this many grapes by ourselves before. I think we have more than two tons out there. And with our sophisticated processing system, that means I sit on the concrete wall above the crush pad and drop grapes bunch by bunch into the crusher/destemmer. So I, in effect, will be “repicking” two tons of grapes. Andy, of course, handles the complicated task of turning the machinery off and on. It’s going to be interesting. And may end with me developing Pop-Eye arms. Instead of Lucille Ball’s comic timing.

Various Unrelated Notes

Chuck the Buck is back in a big way. In fact, I think our wacky weather and the presence of a full moon has brought on an early mating season. Apparently, male deer, at that time, can be very aggressive and fearless. Little Oscar found this out when he went running up to bark at Chuck who has taken to hanging out very close to the barn. The big buck just lowered his horns menacingly. Little Oscar scampered down the hill. Oh, he’s very brave dragging a deer carcass around that the coyotes have killed. But he’s not about to tangle with this.

Chuck the Buck is back. His rack is as impressive as ever. And he's not taking sh*t from anyone. Especially small yappy terriers.

The coyotes are back! Wiley, Wilma and two or three young’uns. John the Baptist and Louis saw them frolicking around the barn a few days ago. Like Chuck the Buck, they showed no interest in running off. As do most of the critters around here, they’re pretty much convinced they own the place.

Our coyotes look like this. Not scrawny, but fat and sassy as German Shephards. This photo from this site: http://www.plumas-eureka.org/mammals.html

Even if my grapes aren’t ripening as fast as I’d like, my prickly pear cactus is. John the Baptist brought in one of the fruits and showed me how to peel one and eat the fruit.

Tastes surprisingly like...pomegranate.

The week goes on and so does the processing and tweaking of the Cinsault. We start our day with our first punchdown of the day and readings of the must. Oscar patrols the vineyards on our way up to the crush pad. Yup, lots of critters have been feasting on the shriveled grape bunches that we threw on the ground during picking. That is judging by the amounts of grape colored poo.

Yes, there is a lot of fermentation going on that has nothing to do with the crush pad.

Andy had me add some yeast a few days back and now things are really bubbling.

After punchdown, time to check pH, temperature and Specific Gravity (shown here). All progressing nicely.

Which brings us to the dilemma of California winemakers versus what the French face. We actually have many more sunny days than France (or our comparable regions: the Rhone or Provence). That longer growing period allows us to bring the fruit to a much greater degree of ripeness than the French can enjoy. You only have until the rainy season to get your grapes ripe. Once it starts to rain, you’ve got to harvest immediately or your harvest is ruined. For us that can be well into November. For the French it’s much earlier. So for us, longer ripening means more sugars, deeper flavors, but also reduced acids since grape acid naturally drops as the grapes ripen. Since acid is what gives the wine staying or aging power, you want to keep acids at the right level. In Northern California, that means adding Tartaric Acid. It’s kind of a dirty little secret. Premium winemakers don’t like to talk about it, but most of them do it. Not that there is anything wrong with Tartaric Acid. It’s the naturally occurring acid in grapes, bananas and tamarinds. It’s been isolated since Persian times with modern isolation practices helped along by Louis Pasteur. It’s just everyone wants the consumer to believe this process all happens naturally.

Not here, Baby. Here goes 300 grams of Tartaric Acid straight into the Cinsault.

With full disclosure out of the way, we head down to see how John the Baptist and Louis are doing with all that brush clearing.

They’d actually found a nice stand of California Honeysuckle or Lonicera hispidula. Like most California versions of plants, it doesn’t look like what you traditionally think of the type. The flowers were down and the vine had beautiful red berries on it. John says he’s going to try to plant more of it around the trail.

California Honeysuckle twining around an oak. Note the red berries.

I’m not sure about the aroma as Oscar found a rotted deer carcass and shook it up to get that smell all around.

If Sarah Palin wants to see Death Panels, she should visit Two Terrier Vineyards. Deer are dropping like flies.

Since Oscar had to be bathed at this point, I thought I might as well buy him a new collar and tag.

ZZ Top said it: Every girl crazy bout a sharp dressed dog!

The harvest has finally begun. And as it happened last year, the Cinsault was the first of our varietals to ripen. Which is a good thing since we’ve planted very little of it. It’s a gentle beginning before the tons of Mourvedre, Grenache and Cabernet get going. Further good news is that we kind of know what we’re doing by this point. Or, at the least, we have better equipment. So up at the crack of dawn Sunday for the harvest. Just us two. And some terriers for comic relief.

A bit of background: Cinsault (pronounced San-So) is a traditional Rhone blending grape. I have seen one or two single varietal Cinsaults around Sonoma, but mostly, since it’s pretty sweet, it’s used to give a little balance to a Rhone blend that is mostly Grenache, Mourvedre, Syrah and/or Merlot. The predominate nose is supposed to be strawberry. I can tell you that was NOT the dominant aroma of last year’s Cinsault. But hey, the vines weren’t mature yet and we didn’t really know what we were doing. We have higher hopes for this year’s harvest.

Unlike the tiny tanniny berries on Cabernet vines, Cinsault bunches are big, fat and sassy. With an almost sweet flavor right off the vine.

Andy cuts with the traditional mini-sythe grape cutter.

I have a different weapon of choice: kitchen shears. Yes, in the field, I can cut a bunch of grapes or bone a chicken. Julia Child would be proud.

Meanwhile, once at the crush pad:

Here's our entire Cinsault harvest. About 400 pounds. Which is chicken shit in grape harvesting terms.

So the bins are dropped off at the top of the crush pad. I sit on the concrete ledge here and drop the grapes, bunch by bunch, into the crusher/destemmer that you can just glimpse below. Andy then pours the crushed grapes into the big white primary fermentation vats, in the right of the picture.

So this whole dropping grapes thing. Well, it's like picking 400 lbs of grapes all over again.

400 lbs. of grapes is a lot. Especially twice in a morning.

Terriers are no help at all.

Once you have the crushed/destemmed grapes in a primary fermentation vat, it's called a "must". And you stir it. You'll keep stirring it up three times a day for about a week.

After this point, Dr. Frankenwine retreated to his lab to do very complex things like testing acidity and calculating how much yeast and tartaric acid to add to the whole mix. It’s all a little beyond me, so that bit will have to wait until I can get the Mad Scientist to sit down and explain everything. Meanwhile, I discovered something alarming: a mouse invasion (the crush pad is outdoors after all.) Recently the mice had built a nest on the engine of the crusher/destemmer and one poor guy had crawled into an empty vat and died. Yes, all of these things were cleaned and disinfected before the crush! Although I’m told the French would just shrug and say “Eet ees thee terroir.” But this is America. So Andy devised an elaborate plastic and duct tape mouse barrier to go underneath the vat cover.

Take that Trixie and Dixie, Stuart Little and Tom and Jerry. No meeses in our wine.

Time for clean up. This is where terriers come into their own. HOSE PATROL!

Oh, and all those stems that were separated from the grapes? Those go over the side of the hill for the deer. They love them!

Deer don't want no Cinsault. Just give them the stems!

More pictures of the Cinsault 2009 Harvest and Crush here.