The ONX Odyssey

Vee-Own-Yay and Chilly Fruit

Harvest is slowly (really slowly) ticking along here at Briarwood Vineyards, as the weather has been warm but relatively mild overall, keeping the grapes ripening slowly and evenly. We picked our Viognier on Sunday night, beginning at about 3am (I guess that is Monday morning) and finishing around sunrise. As is typical of the nights in Paso Robles, temperatures we in the low 50's and by the time we got the fruit into the press at the winery, the juice came out a chilly 52F. The fruit was pressed and the beautiful pale straw colored juice was placed into a tank for chilling before it goes into barrel this afternoon and begins fermentation.

People often ask me why we pick our fruit at night, wondering if we do it simply because we like to torture ourselves and our vineyard workers, or if there is indeed some method to the madness. There are actually a number of reasons why picking at night is a preferred method, so I'll outline a few of them below:

1) Lower Microbial Risk - Picking at night brings the fruit into the winery cold, which means that any microbial or oxidation risk is vastly reduced. Think of what happens to fruit left on the counter vs. that left in the fridge. We are trying to preserve the full integrity of the fruit and its flavors, so cold fruit is critical.This is important for both red and white grapes, but especially important for whites. We try to avoid oxidation of the juice of white grapes, which can damage the delicate aromatic compounds.

2) Physical Integrity - The colder the fruit is, the less the skins break when going through the processing equipment (see the clusters on the sorting table above) We try to maintain whole berries during fermentations, and cold fruit makes this possible. When warm fruit comes into the winery, it often comes out of the equipment a juicy, sloppy mess. Not good.

3) Cold Soaking - Prior to the beginning of fermentation in red wines, we often like to allow our fruit to soak on the skins for a period of time before we inoculate with yeast. This improves color and the extraction of flavors. To do this, it's very important that the fruit is cold before it goes into the fermentors. If the fruit was warm, the native yeasts on the skins of the fruit would initiate fermentation right away and produce flavors we don't care for in our wines.

4) Weather - It's much nicer to be picking in the cool of the night than during the heat of the day! Spending hours on a tractor and doing tough manual labor is simply more pleasant when it's cool outside. In addition, it prevents bug activity (yellow jackets are a menace!) and minimizes dust.

So while we do value our sleep, we also know that during this time of year it's all about the wine and all about quality, so we will gladly sacrifice sleep to ensure we get our fruit off the vine in A+ condition.

Pourings, Pairings and Party's!!

In the midst of harvest I thought we would take a short break from reporting on how the grapes are progressing, how much fruit has been picked and when we think we will bring in all of the varietals (though you should look for this next week as we close in on the reds).  Nope instead I thought I would talk over some of the fun events we have had in the past few weeks and some that are coming up.

Two weeks ago I had the pleasure of pouring our 2008 Mad Crush and our 2008 Fiery Nights wines at DaVine Wine in Dana Point.  The owner, Steve is an incredibly down to earth gentleman and really knows his wines and cheeses.  He actually found us while he and his charming wife were out doing some wine tasting in Paso Robles.  Being a huge Paso wines fan, he routinely tries to travel up here and loves finding unique wines that are not well known to the public.  Once he tasted our 08 wines at our estate vineyard, Briarwood he was hooked and ordered them for his retail store.

 
We had the pleasure of pouring our wines for the grand opening of his tasting bar this past weekend and let me tell you it was fun.  He had superb cheese pairings, incredible wine of course and fun boutique items that every wine lover would enjoy. 

 
The next events on the horizon will be when the Cambria Wine Appreciation Group comes to the vineyard at the end of this month.  They also reached out to us as they wanted to pair up with an eclectic winery that would have a diverse portfolio of wines.  Well that is us, so the group is scheduled to tour the vineyards, meet with our Winemaker and taste some of our 08 wines. It should be fun!

Next month we welcome the Spaghettini group as they come by for a private tour and tasting.  Spags is a very well known restaurant and jazz club located in Seal Beach.  Their menu is insanely good, their wine selection is above the norm and their live jazz bands take the edge off of a tough work week.  We can't wait to host them at the vineyard and potentially have our wines represented at their restaurant as we know it will be a great fit.

That is it for now as we wanted to give you just a taste of some events and fun things on the horizon.  Look for more  tastings and parties to come as we ring in the New Year with some of our upcoming 2009 wines.

 

The Calm Before the Storm: Literally & Figuratively

ITS BEGUN!!!

Well, sort of. We harvested 1.8 tons of our estate Sauvignon Blanc in the middle of the night last Thursday and pressed the fruit later that day to much excitement. The fruit came in absolutely beautiful (you see any leaves in those bins? I didn't think so) and the resulting juice is aromatic, intense, balanced, and delicious. Flavors of passionfruit, pineapple, green apple skin, feijoa, and pear were apparent, with soft acidity and perfect ripeness. While Sauvignon Blanc is a relatively rare variety for Westside Paso Robles, we are convinced that the quality of the 2011 fruit will really blow peoples minds when it goes to bottle in early 2012 (in a blend of course).

With only 3 varieties of white grapes on our estate vineyard, it can be a bit of a tease once harvest begins. Our whites usually come off the vine several weeks earlier than our reds, so what always seems like the beginning of the 'exciting' time of year is usually followed by several weeks of down time until the reds beginning harvest. Thus the "calm before the storm" can occur twice - once before harvest actually begins, and again after the whites are in. With Sauvignon Blanc coming in last week and Viognier next week, we will then have another 2+ weeks until the reds really start coming in, likely beginning with Zinfandel and Tempranillo. Hence, we are in the 'calm' period so to speak (although it's always busy around here!).

In addition to the figurative "calm before the storm" is the literal meaning of the phrase, which is currently occurring as we speak here in the vineyard. A cool 67 degrees (about 15-20 degrees cooler than normal temperatures) and strong southwest winds are indicative of the coming weather, which is arriving earlier than normal this year. In 2009, we saw a large rain event arrive on October 15th. In 2010, we saw a series of very small rain events that began even earlier, on October 6th. This year, we have moved up another few days, and it seems our first rains will arrive tomorrow on October 4th.The northern areas of Napa and Sonoma will see far worse weather (which is typical), and we are expecting only mild rainfall, followed by warmer temperatures later in the week that will be much appreciated. Altogether, these last 3 years have brought rain about a month earlier than normal. Many weather analysts, wine writers, and winemakers are becoming baffled by the recent cooling trends in California, while in contrast Europe and Australia seem to be getting hotter. It's unknown how long the trend will last, either indefinitely or simply in the cyclical nature by which nature seems to operate.

The 2011 vintage so far has shown to be one of the coolest of the decade, up until now being only slightly warmer (almost insignificantly so) than the two other coolest vintages of 2010 and 1999. The major difference between this season a both '99 and '10 is the large Spring frost event that occurred. This frost set the vines back several weeks from normal, and coupled with a wet winter which delayed vine growth and a very cool summer we are seeing most likely the latest harvest in Paso's recent history. Syrah, for example comes off the vine earlier than most red grapes on the Westside, usually picking in mid-late September. But this year we are looking at not harvesting any Syrah for another 3+ weeks, into the end of October! While this is incredibly late, we are expecting the extra hangtime and the cool weather to produce wines with excellent acids and lots of cool-climate spice characters. Other varieties such as Grenache, Mourvedre, and Cabernet Sauvignon will struggle to reach full ripeness in this cool season, so we are ensuring that our vines are healthy and strong enough to get the fruit ripening late into the season. While panic and anxiety are beginning to ensue around the Paso Robles area, we are in fact thoroughly excited to be able to make wines from such a cool vintage, as it challenges us as winemakers and also opens our eyes to distinctively different flavors and structures in the wines. 2010 was a similarly cool vintage, and from it we produced some of the most interesting and delicious wines we've ever seen from Westside Paso Robles, so we are confident that 2011 holds great things in store for wine quality.

Being a winemaker is certainly a double-edged sword, as being at the mercy of nature can both give you interesting and diverse flavors or destroy a vintage entirely. We of course are hoping for the former result, and we feel confident that Mother Nature is listening!