Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Summary of events since my last posting


The Paso Robles Grenache and Amador Cabernet Sauvignon are in various carboys.  Their fermentation went well, I still need to send off some samples to get analyzed.

We got a couple of buckets of Sauvignon Blanc juice last fall as well.  I'm getting ready to rack those over to new containers.

The Regent vines planted last year didn't fair too well.  I am not sure if the problem was the quality of vine I purchased (I purchased it from vendor I don't normally buy through), or if it was the growing conditions on the slope they were on.  So, this spring, I replaced all the dead vines with some from Double A Vineyards (which seem to be doing better than the previous ones, even at this time of year), and moved the entire row further down the slope.  They are doing great so far, much more rapid growth than what I saw last year.

I've submitted four wines to the Winemaker magazine contest this year, and I hoping they do well, but I won't know until early June.  The wines I submitted are the best four I think I've made to date.  They are the 2009 Winsor Zinfandel (purchased through Brehm Vineyards as a frozen must), the 2008 NC Cabernet Franc, the 2010 Viognier, and the 2009 Columbia Gorge Pinot Grigio (also purchased from Brehm Vineyards).

In the next month or so there is a lot of wine to bottle.  There is about 5 gallons of Rancho Sarco Cabernet Sauvignon, 8 gallons of 2010 Lodi Barbera, 32 gallons of 2010 NC Syrah, and 32 gallons of 2010 Lodi Zinfandel.  May have to see if I can invite some people over for a bottling party, or just bottle the wine in stages.  I've already got all the corks I need (ordered 500 of them), and a new filter (coarse filtration on reds), I'll have to inventory the bottles I have available though, and maybe see if there is somewhere I can purchase bulk bottles cheaply.  I estimate that there will be at least 150 bottles each of the NC Syrah and Lodi Zin.

My wife and I also made a trip out to the Napa Valley in California this spring.  Though the details of that trip are going to be a post of its own coming up shortly.
Just a quick update, man it is has been a long time since I last posted anything.  For a while there, I got caught up in life, and the longer it went without me posting anything, the harder it was to even think about doing it.

I've had to change how the comments are handled, as some spammers started putting links to their sites in them.  Kind of rude if you ask me, but luckily Blogger as some tools to prevent this.  So from now on comments will be moderated.  As long as your comment isn't a spam message, it will get through.