Second Leaf

Just had to share the following wine experience that cracked me up…

This evening my 5 and 8 year old daughters gave me a hand punching down the ‘07 Zinfandel. One of them asked what kind of wine was in the carboys on the bench next to the Zin. I replied in my best French accent, “why, it’s Mourvedre.”  If you’ve ever seen the movie Tommy Boy you may remember the scene where Chris Farley does his best James Earl Jones impersonation as he booms into an oscillating fan, “Luke, I’m your father”.

Well, hearing my daughters take turns saying, “moo-ved-ray” into the fan keeping our garage cool brought a huge smile to my face. I just love the fact that they’re interested enough in my winemaking obsession to lend me a hand and ask questions.

Absolutely priceless!

So it’s been six days since the ‘07 Zinfandel was harvested and crushed. It’s been cold soaking in three separate open top containers all week. Today it was time to inoculate the must with yeast to kick off the primary fermentation. However, as one of the containers was warming up to prepare for its new sugar-eating inhabitants, it decided to kick off, or start fermenting, on its own. Whenever you see a description of how a wine was made and it includes something about being fermented using wild yeast, this is exactly what they mean. The must is starting to ferment using the yeast brought in from the vineyard. This is a first for me.

I decided to stick to my original plan and combine two of the bins and keep the other on its own. I wanted to inoculate the two lots with different yeasts so I could blend the characteristics of both in the final wine. The larger bin got D254 and the smaller bin got D80. Both bins will get nutrients in the morning.

Hopefully the larger bin (the one that was starting on its own) will not encounter any of the difficulties, such as a stuck fermentation, which are common with wild yeasts. Perhaps the D254 will muscle its way in there and keep the wild child yeast in line? We shall see.

Has it really been a month since I was last a Bunco Bachelor? The calendar says, “no”, but Mrs. Second Leaf says, “*%#&@! yes!”  Tough… well, really not even an option… to argue with that!

Seeing as how I surely committed some sort of wine blogging faux pas last month by mentioning one winery but actually opening a wine from another, I was determined to make amends this time around. So the question at hand building up to this month’s dad vs. kids throw-down was how to get my hands on some of that “*%#&@!” Twisted Oak wine? Sure, I could have ordered directly from the winery but how much fun is that? Since El Jefe, the Grand Poobah of TOW (or maybe it’s the Sgt. Hulka of TOW?), slyly pointed out that WineQ was now featuring wines from Twisted Oak, I knew right where to go to get my *%#&@! fix.

WineQ is a new web 2.0 company trying to do for wine what Netflix has done for DVD rentals.  Setting up my Q on WineQ was a breeze and, before I knew it, the UPS man was handing me a box with a green WineQ sticker on it. A box of three Twisted wines: the 2005 *%#&@! red Rhône blend I tasted tonight, the 2005 %@#$! white Rhône blend, and the 2005 Viognier.

Now that I had the wine nailed down, I needed a menu to go with it. And not just any menu… a menu that would match the wine and be something my 3 daughters would actually eat. Let me tell you, the Iron Chefs never had it this difficult. My younger 2 daughters, 8 and 5 years old, are easy enough to cajole into trying new things but my 11 year old is convinced that anything other than chicken fingers must be straight out of the kitchens of Fear Factor. I needed a slam dunk.

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My final harvest for 2007 took place this last Sunday. Smokey Ridge Ranch is a family owned 100 acre ranch located in the Apple Hill area, just outside Placerville, in the heart of Gold Country. Purchased back in the 1920’s by their grandfather, Kirk and Wendy now run the place. Originally the ranch was planted mostly with pears and was one of the largest pear orchards in the area. Fortunately for me, they recently planted what looked like about 8 acres of grapes. With neighbors like Boeger Winery on one side and Lava Cap Wines on the other, Smokey Ridge is indeed in good company. 

Planted at Smokey Ridge is one block of Sangiovese, a couple blocks of Zinfandel, and another block of Syrah. The Zinfandel vines are 8 years old and the others looked to be just as old. The vineyard is planted on a gentle slope with a south/southwest exposure. Even more important, though, the vineyard’s 2,500 foot elevation brings welcome overnight relief from the scorching summer days of the Sierra Foothills. Ideal grape growing conditions.

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To clear the decks for tomorrow’s Primitivo/Zinfandel harvest, I pressed the Mourvedre this afternoon. This is the final component of my red Rhone blend for 2007. The other two varieties, Syrah and Grenache, have already completed both their primary and malolactic fermentations and are settling down for their winter slumber.

The color of the Mourvedre was beautiful and the flavor was outstanding. A few quick photos…

A typical press setup for a “garagiste”.

The poor little suckers were doing their best to escape the clutches of the basket press.

I just liked this shot looking around the side of the basket press.

 Next up: 250lbs. of Primitivo (or Zinfandel) tomorrow.

I’m jumping back into the swing of things with Wine Blogging Wednesday this month. The theme for this edition, though, was more challenging than usual. Ryan and Gabriella  from Catavino were the hosts this month so you just knew the theme would center around Iberian wines. Sure enough, our charge was to taste a table wine from Portugal, steering clear of Madeira, Vinho Verde, ports, and wines from the more well-known Duoro region.

What makes this theme difficult is simply that it’s hard to find a wide selection of Portuguese tables wines in my area. My first thought was a trip to The Spanish Table, a purveyor of fine Iberian food and wine products located in Berkeley. However, since a trip to the Bay Area wasn’t in the cards this month, I was forced to hit a big box wine retailer for my selection.

The wine I tasted comes from one Portugal’s largest, if not the largest, producer. The 2001 Sogrape Duque de Viseu Tinto from the Dão DOC is a blend of Touriga Nacional and Tinta Roriz and set me back $10 USD.

The color of this wine was a beautiful blood orange at the edges with medium depth. The nose was quite earthy with scents of leather, tar, chocolate, and black cherries. On the palate there was stewed cherries, black olives, and dusty-fine tannins. The finish was dry and lingering.

All in all this wine really surprised me. For the price I was not expecting so many flavors and nuances. This is an old-world style wine that comes from the earth and a wine that begs to be shared with food.

A few weeks back I got the opportunity to help out the folks at m2 Wines again. Back in April I joined a small crew at m2 bottling their late harvest Zinfandel and had a great time.

The task on this day was to crush nearly 6 tons of fruit for the 2007 vintage. Three tons of Old Vine Zinfandel came from the local Soucie vineyard in Lodi, planted in 1916, and another 3 tons of Cabernet Sauvignon from Pratt Vineyards in Fair Play (up the hill in El Dorado County).

The following photo is a closeup of the Old Vine Zinfandel. These berries were loaded with flavor and were very ripe (as the raisining shows). In fact, these flavor bombs would later become something of a challenge in the winery.

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