Harvest Update: Week #2

Well it’s been almost a week since my last update. This past week was the “Pinot” week of harvest. Pinot Noir is almost always the first red to come in the doors and usually marks the beginning of the extremely busy part of harvest. During the last few days we managed to pick all of the Stowe Vineyard Pinot Noir as well as the Kuna Butte Vineyard. Both came in looking amazing, ripe flavors, brown seeds, low brix (a measure of sugar) and great acid. Quality wise, I couldn’t wish for anything better than this years Pinot Noir. Unfortunately, just like the Muscat and Sauvignon Blanc, yield was extremely low ranging from 25-75% below average, depending on the clone. Although I don’t think there is any single reason for this years low yields, I do believe that winter damage and heat during bloom/fruit set are the major reasons.

 

With my science background, I’m always conducting experiments every harvest and Pinot Noir is by far my favorite to experiment with. This year we have 8 different fermentation bins going on, each roughly 2 barrels worth of wine. Each bin has something slightly different happening with it. There are some wild yeast fermentations, in which I did not add a commercial yeast but am relying on the “wild” yeasts floating around in the winery or coming in on the grape skins from the vineyard to conduct the sugar to alcohol conversion. I have a few “whole cluster” fermentations, where the grapes were not crushed or destemmed and allowed to ferment as “whole clusters”. I am also experimenting with cold soaks, in which we hold the must (crushed berries) at a low temperature for a while. We have always done what I call an “Idaho Cold Soak”, this is where the grapes come in cold, we add yeast and it takes about 3 days for the yeast to get going due to the low temperature of the grapes. This year I am bringing the temperature of the must down a little further (into the 40s) with dry ice and holding it there for about a week before allowing it to warm up and start fermentation. The idea is to extract more bright fruit character and less astringent tanning…we’ll see.

 

 

With a couple of much-needed catch up days over the weekend, we will be back at harvesting next week for what will probably be the biggest week of the vintage. Beginning Monday we will be processing about 3 tons of King Hill Vineyard Merlot as well as small amounts of Malbec, Petit Verdot and our first ever Primitivo! Tuesday and Wednesday we will likely be doing more Merlot from the Arena Valley Vineyard as well as the Wood River Vineyard Merlot later in the week. Over the weekend we will be bringing in some more Malbec from the Klahn Vineyard as well as the first ton or so of Cabernet Sauvignon. Viognier will likely come in sometime soon as well. On top of all this, some of the Pinot will be finished fermenting and will need to be pressed and racked to barrels. Busy times!

 

If you have any questions about this years harvest, the harvest process or anything else, please leave a comment and I’ll try to address it in the next weekly harvest update.

 

Cheers,

Mike