Today Eric Asimov posted to his blog about Ridge Vineyards winemaker Paul Draper, “A Non-Action Approach To Winemaking.” Ridge is celebrating its 50th anniversary; Paul has been winemaker there for 40 of those years. I have met Mr. Draper a couple of times, but we are not acquainted and have never discussed winemaking method or [...]
Archive for the ‘Winemaking’ Category
Your Taste, My Taste
The perennial question of objectivity in wine evaluation has been rehashed lately in the trade media. While the main focus has been calls for “objectivity,” in the sense of “freedom from undue commercial influence” (a standard to which wine writers apparently must adhere, while our political leaders — among others — are given a pass) [...]
Tasting With Our Vineyard Manager
Yesterday I got together with Jean-Marie Martin, our contract vineyard manager, to taste the wines we have made from our Annadel Estate grapes. It was highly instructive. We finally have a sufficient track record with the vineyard — tasting individual lots through four vintages (2005-2008) we were able to debrief and plan a bit better.
2008 – The Year In Review
We had a pleasant (if a little lean) Christmas here chez Kelly and hope yours was one of hope, cheer and good health. As the year draws to a close it’s time for me to look back over the highs and lows for Westwood in 2008, and forward to 2009.
Harvest 2008 Debrief – The Winery
I was originally going to do the vineyard and winery in one LOOOONG post. What a snore that would have been. In this post, lessons learned in the winery in 2008:
Feeling Thankful, And A Bit Smug
It is raining here today. A lot. This is the first big rainstorm of the season after two weak shots that dropped half an inch each Thursday and Friday. I’m thankful we got the last of our grapes in on Wednesday — and to be honest, just a bit smug and self-satisfied. Nobody’s perfect.
Treading Syrah
In my last post I said that I was planning on doing some of the Syrah this year on stems.
Into The Syrah
Friday we picked Syrah for client wineries. Yields were down about 10% from my estimate – a little better than I did with the Pinot estimate where the fruit came in 20% shy. It was some of the best-looking Syrah I have grown yet – flavors, seeds and skins are fully developed, and the sugar [...]
Hands-On Winemaking
(Note: this article is abstracted from a post on my WinePod blog.) My friend Greg Snell recently posted to his blog about “non-interventionist” winemaking and the WinePod. I will take this opportunity to weigh in on the subject. What on earth does “non-interventionist winemaking” really mean?
2005 Blends And Bottling Plans
I am seeing an emergent pattern here from vintage to vintage. Our even-numbered years have been giving us wines that are beautiful, scrumptious and forward. Our odd-numbered vintages are slow-to-develop, closed, brooding and a bit massive. I’m learning to deal with it.
