Back on the Horse

So let’s review the lessons I’ve learned during the last year and a half of winemaking without a mentor.  You can, and will, lose your grapes to black rot, birds and bees, so get comfortable with it.  The wrong kind of oak will make your wine taste like a tree.  Bottling too early will make your wine too cloudy.  Exposing your wine to oxygen will allow bacteria to turn it into vinegar.  And the wrong acidity will make your wine taste flat out bad. 

Each of those lessons have been learned the hard way, and I can pour you the wine/vinegar to prove it.  It’s with that backdrop in mind that I recently laid down $300 for 180 pounds of grapes from Russian River Valley.  It’s the largest production I’ve attempted on my own at once, and, of the 80 or so grape varietals available for purchase, literally the most expensive choice.  I’m a glutton for punishment, I realize, but if all goes absolutely perfectly, I could end up with three plus cases of pinot noir from arguably the best producing AVA (American Viticultural Area) in the country at an average cost of less than $10 per bottle (not including my equipment costs, of course).  I had to at least give it a try.

Macy on the hand crank with Jeff.

With assists from Jeff and Macy, the grapes were crushed in the driveway without issue with my fancy new crusher/destemmer.  After 11 days fermenting in the dining room in my new 45 gallon tub, Drew and I pressed the must in the garage, producing just under nine gallons of newly minted wine.  Malolactic fermentation is now well under way, as the wine ages in the basement beside my other three varietals in progress.  I now have a record 23 gallons of wine in production, a total of over 10 cases.  Surely, somehow, somewhere in that collection, is a glass I can be proud of, and validation of the greatest lesson of all:  practice makes perfect.

Inside the crusher.



180 pounds of must.

From left to right: 2010 Pinot Noir,

2011 Chardonnay, 2011 Corot Noir,
2011 Pinot Noir.



Drew on the press.