It's Spring Time!

 This is what it looks like in Napa this week.  It's spring and the flowers are starting to bloom in the vineyards.  However, it's still much colder than I am comfortable with.

By this time of the year the vines are pruned and tied down.  At this point we start counting the number of buds per vine to begin formulating an idea of how much fruit we could potentially get this season.

This is a nice juicy bud on a cane.  It's officially Budbreak in the vineyards.  Exciting stuff.

But what's even more exciting is that this past weekend Todd and I bottled our white wine.  Finally we have something to show for ourselves (besides a pile of receipts).  It didn't feel real until we held a corked bottle in our hands.  We still need to label and package the bottles, but at least they are bottled and available as proof.  I'll have to post that soon.

Happy Spring Everyone!

-L

Quixote

One of my resolutions this year was to go wine tasting two places a month, which to me is a whole lot of wine tasting. So last week I went to visit Quixote.

I know wine tasting is what a lot of people do for fun and on vacation but I really have to force myself to go out tasting because it usually feels like work.  I've worked in Napa since 2007 and have only visited a handful of wineries in the last 6 years.  It's a little embarrassing.

I chose Quixote this month because it's so whimsical and fun.  I knew nothing about the wine, but loved the building, I saw it in an architecture magazine a while ago.  It's hidden away in the Stag's Leap District in Napa, you can't see if from the road and it's appointment only so it's impossible to stumble upon.  If you are going here it is very much on purpose.

The winery was designed by the Austrian artist Hundertwasser, whose work I was unfamiliar with but reminded me of Guadi's mosaics in Spain.  Very colorful, no straight lines, no repetition. Unfortunately during this time of the year the vegetation is all cut back.

This is a picture I did not take but want to include because it shows how beautiful the building looks nestled into the hillside.

Excuse the glare.  I would not include this picture except for how much I enjoyed seeing the large printed canvas covering the tanks.  This is the eternal dilema of esthetics in a winery.  You can make the building and tasting room beautiful but the cellar has to be a functional cellar and those are much harder to make beautiful.

Decorating Tip #1: Cover the tanks with a canvas or stick a picture of Audrey Hepburn on there to beautify the tanks.

Decorating Tip #2: Paint barrel rings to add whimsy to any barrel room.  

Unfortunately the paint tends to chip easily and they only look amazing and fun for a short time.  Still, I'm a big fan.  In my dream winery all the barrels are painted like this.

This is the lab space.  It's a lot more sparse than my lab but it's one of the nicest I've seen at a winery.  You know, compared to the other 3 wineries I have visited in 6 years.

Actually, it almost looks like a kitchen that also happens to have instruments and glassware.

This is the tasting room where I tasted 7 Quixote wines.  Four were Cabs and three Petit Sirahs.  Due to the Stag's Leap appellation and the exclusivity of the winery, I was expecting the wines to be expensive.  They were not and they were delicious.  If the wines had been $90 to $150 I wouldn't have thought twice about it.  But that some were $40 or $60 was pretty amazing.

Also, all the wines were screw caps!  Two of the wines from the early 2000s, so they were early adopters of the method.  I am a big fan.  The winery was beautiful, the wines were very impressive and the packaging was innovative.  

I would like to bottle my wine with a screw top, but unfortunately the first vintage will have to be cork because it's being put together with a hodgepodge of materials.  I've been a fan of alternative closures for a while, but had not tasted much aged high-end red wine with a screw cap.  I am more convinced that this can be age-able without the drawback of cork (i.e TCA, high cost for good quality).  A good cork can cost over $1/cork.  A screw cap can be as low as $0.17/cap.

One down, one more winery to go this month.  Also, need to bottle the white wine in my garage this weekend.  

I've been putting that off for the last 3 weeks. . . . . 

-L

2013 Unified Symposium - Sacramento

January is cold and ultra busy with blending, but I also love it because I get to go to Unified.  Usually.  Last year was too busy, so I was extra pumped to go this year.  Unified gets all wine making things together under one roof and all winemaking people.  So you get to see all the new toys and products available and you run into everyone you know and haven't seen since the last Unified.

 The convention is 3 days long with seminars and a trade show going on simultaneously.  This year I only had 1 day available to spend in Sacramento so I only went to the trade show.  I took my intern Gilroy on Wednesday January 30th.  She took this picture of me with a ceramic wine bottle because I had never seen wine in a ceramic bottle.  When (most) everyone is worried about their carbon footprint and trying to reduce shipping weight (and cost) this winery chose to use an extra heavy bottle.  I think it is a bold choice.

 The trade show starts around 9am but in the early evening they start pouring wines from all over the US.  I saw at least 4 tables covered in glasses.  This puts my tastings to shame.

 I am super excited about this picture because it includes TB (far right), he was the co-creator of FPB blog back in 2010!  Without him, I doubt I would have come up with the idea to begin blogging and it was our mutual admiration of Radiohead that lead to the FPB name.  But I left that job 2 years ago and have barely since him since.  The only way my sweater could be more appropriate for this picture is if inside the heart were the words "I love CLV, but especially TB".  And them maybe an arrow pointing to the right.

 Ok, enough nostalgia, back to cool stuff.  I really liked this wooden wine carrier that turns into a wine rack.  So clever.

Close by there was another wood box maker.  Look at the tiny phone!  Or rather, look at the GIANT wine bottles that make that normal size phone look tiny.

Gilroy is standing by for a size comparison.  I think this wood box maker must also make coffins.

Then you turn a corner and there is a beautiful live owl hanging out.  I think this booth wanted to say something about using predator birds in the vineyard, I don't know, couldn't pay attention with that beautiful bird using his wise eyes to stare into my soul.

 But it turns out my intern Gilroy is a bigger fan of this nocturnal bird of prey than I am, and she had the earrings to prove it.

This system gasses the head space.  I find it hypnotic.

 We took a break for lunch and spotted this tall gentleman.  First I had to find someone taller than me to tap him on the shoulder so I could ask if he would take a picture with me.  He's 6'10!  Also, I'm wearing heels.

After lunch we wandered back to the closures section to look at corks and screw caps.

 I'm a fan of screw caps.

 I'm also a fan of this display.

 It took me way too long to realize that the trees around the convention center were painted blue.  I must have walked past them 4 or 5 times before it hit me.

 And it wasn't just a couple, all the trees surrounding the convention center were blue!

 After a long day of walking around, I got a chance to sit by a warm fire place.  It's hard to tell but I am affectionately clutching a dark and stormy.

The day started at 5am to get the dogs to "puppy day care" and have enough time to get to Sacramento by 8am.  Then a full day of walking and talking to people and then comes my new favorite tradition of Unified.  The sushi dinner with Scott Labs.  It's an intimate affair with some of my favorite people in the wine industry and all you can eat sushi.