Left Coast Cowboys

First you set up a complicated Rube Goldbergian system of pumps and hoses to get the grapes from the primary vats to the press and from the press to the secondary fermentation tanks.

Then you pump out the fermented grapes from those white bins to the press.

When the hose and pump can't handle any more, you resort to the shovel, brute force and ignorance.

Meanwhile, a large bladder inside the press is separating the juice from the skins and seeds and forcing it out of the press.

There it comes, gallons o'Grenache.

At various points, you have to taste. And it's all tasting very good.

Now comes the hard part: getting the pressed out skins out of the press.

Then trucking them up to the top of the hill for composting.

And by the way, terriers are no help at any stage of this process.

And speaking of terriers, a very large coyote has been spotted lurking about. Terriers would rather snuggle under the covers where it's safe than hang out on an exposed crush pad.

It starts here with grape varietals resting in individual primary fermentation vats out on the crushpad.

Then we stick a huge tube into the slurry. That tube is connected to a large portable pump.

The slurry is pumped through another hose that spews it into the "bladder press" (partial view shown here). First step is to fill this press up to the top with grape juice and skins.

Now Andy turns the bladder press water pressure pump up to ELEVEN. Water is pumped into a huge balloon (think heavy guage airplane tire) that presses the skins into the sides of this perforated metal "skin" and allows the juice to run out into the try in the previous picture.

Now the skins and seeds are trapped inside the bladder press and only the juice is running out into that wheeled tray. Notice the smaller hose leading from that small tray to the foreground.

Now that smaller hose full of juice snakes across the entire length of the crushpad and into the Secondary Fermentation Shed and to a steel fermentation tank.

Now this is where that woodworking class Andy took in Sixth Grade really pays off, because he built this wood and clamp thingy that frees us from the need to have a third person holding the hose steady as gallons of young wine course through.

Since 3/4 ton of grapes have to be processed in batches. So at some point, we have to empty the water out of the bladder, depressing it so we can scrape out the pressed skins. That's where a terrier comes in handy.

So now we pull out the pressed skins which are almost the consistency of a ten year old Christmas fruitcake.

We're still trying to get this guy worked into the process. Not sure how, but Rube Goldberg would have found a way!

We haven't yet worked an alternate terrier into this part of the workflow. Especially since grapes can be toxic to some dogs. But apparently not ours, although Lucy is no Grenache fan.

In fact, one terrier's opinion: "This crap SUCKS!"

Although Andy has a different opinion. He's very excited by the bold fruit flavors in all three varietals, even though they aren't through secondary fermentation and are still a bit "yeasty".