Summer Time Update

As with everyone else in the Snake River Valley, we have been busy trying to beat the heat. Vineyard growth is slowing down, the grapes are about to begin changing color, and most the vineyard work is more or less finished for the summer. This means we have been turning our attention to the cool, air conditioned winery and getting ready to bottle. Over the past week Tammy and I have been tasting through the wines, coming up with blends, tweaking the blends, and finally creating the blends. The blends I am talking about are the 2007 Bordeaux varietals: Malbec, Merlot, Cabernet and Star Garnet.

Although we label the wine each year as “Merlot” or “Malbec”, often times we blend a small amount of another wine to achieve a more complex and complete wine. For instance, the 2007 Merlot will have a small amount (5%) Petit Verdot. In this case we found that the Petit Verdot smoothed out the tannins in the Merlot while building the body, darkened the color slightly, and opened the aromas. This is a very common thing to do, especially with Petit Verdot. I always tell people when they ask about Petit Verdot that everyone has had it but no one knows that they have. This is because it is many winemakers secretly blend a small amount into their Merlot or Cabernet.

After we decided the blends for the Cab, Merlot and Malbec, we shifted our attention to the Reserve Star Garnet. This will be the first vintage of our Reserve Star and we are very excited about it. The blend is roughly 70% Cabernet, 20% Merlot, 5% Malbec and 5% Petit Verdot. Although we are bottling the Merlot, Malbec, Cab and Star Garnet next week, we do not plan on bottling the Reserve until sometime this winter, it just needs a little more time in the barrel.

Finally, keep an eye out for the new and improved 2007 labels. Tammy did some magic with them this year and they are definately a little different then our current labels, I think a major improvement. We will have a sneak peak of them next week so stay tuned.