Harvest week Sept 17-23, 2007

This was a very busy week for us, here at Lost Canyon winery. Tuesday we received UCD 18 clone from Las Brisas vineyard in Carneros. Once again, the weight was lighter than projected (we expected 1 ton), .78 tons and came in at 25 brix. These grapes came in around 1pm and we were done a couple of hours later sorting and crushing.
Wednesday, we pressed our clone 37 from Saralee's vinyeard and 115 from Las Brisas Carneros region. This was our first press of the year and we had to relearn how to operate our bladder press. Everything went pretty smooth. The color of the Pinot Noirs this year is a beautiful purple color, not like last year where we really struggled with color. After pressing, we pump the juice over into the tanks and we let the wine settle for a couple of days before putting them into the barrels. At this time the fermentation is complete, there is less than 1/2 % sugar left.









Friday, we had the remaining grapes from Saralee's Pinot Noir vineyard come in, along with the Viognier. Once again, we had anticipated 7 tons and got in 5 tons of the 115 clone Pinot Noir. The grapes looked great and came in around 9am. The Pinot Noir was at 25 brix and the Viognier was at 28 brix! We had volunteers to come in and help us out with the sorting, and we were done by noon, but still had to press the Viognier. We realized later that when pressing the Viognier it takes longer (for Pinot we run the program for 20 minutes and with Viognier we have to run it for 90 minutes) and we had to do the 2 tons in 2 batches, so we were here until 8pm. Next time, we will sort the Viognier first, press and then crush the rest of the Pinot Noir (Rick, our volunteer pointed this out to us, thanks!)!!!






Saturday, we started at 11am so we could sleep in a bit (my suggestion). We had to rack off the Viognier that we had settling in the tank after pressing it. We started the yeast in the Viognier after we moved the juice into 3 tanks. Then we put the 37 and the 115 clones into appropriate barrels (that we had pressed on Wednesday). It was a long week!

Harvest Week 3, Sept 10-Sept 16

Above is what a Pinot Noir cluster looks like. They are tight, pine cone shaped bunches.

On Tuesday, Sept. 11, we had slightly less than 2 tons of Las Brisas Pinot Noir, Swan clone. This year has been a strange year for us, in that all of the clones that are blended into the wine are ripening on different dates and are coming in at different times. The Swan clone is one of my favorites from the Las Brisas Vineyard. The clusters were cool, tasted great and we found no mold. The brix were at 26. Peter Brehm brought the grapes to us around 11am and we were finished at 2pm. We were starving and quickly darted off to Luka's taproom for a big lunch with some Belgian beer.

Wednesday was my 34th birthday so I was glad to not have grapes! Martha, our intern, took me out for lunch at Pappo in Alameda and made me a Princess cake (Swedish tradition).
Thursday, Sept. 13, we had anticipated 12 tons of grapes at noon from Morelli Lane vineyard. I emailed 15 of our volunteers to round up some help. The grapes ended up coming in at 10:30am and there were slightly less than 8 tons. The clones that make up this wine are: 113, 115, and pommard. We processed them all together and the average brix was 25.5.
We had about 5 volunteers show up to help sort through the Morelli Lane grapes. It was great to have the extra help, even though we got started earlier than expected and it was less grapes than we thought. We had the weekend off from grapes! We still are waiting for the remaining Saralee's Pinot Noir, remaining Las Brisas Pinot Noir and Viognier grapes should be ready soon too. Keep checking in, we aren't even half way through.

2nd week of Harvest

We thought this week was going to by busy with grape deliveries, but the weather cooled off and now the sugars in the grapes weren't skyrocketing like they were last week. Wednesday we had 2 tons of grapes (clone 115) delivered from Las Brisas vineyard in the Carneros region. We kept getting calls all day about when the grapes were to arrive and they ended up coming in at 5:30pm. I ran out to get us all dinner just before then so we were able to eat before we started crushing. The grapes were just picked that day and they were warm to the touch. We sorted through the grapes and they looked pretty good. The sugar in the grapes were high, 27 brix. We finished with everything around 8:30pm.
The next delivery of grapes was from Saralee Kunde.....it was set for 5:30am on Friday with 14tons, 2 clones of Pinot Noir. Randy and Jack accepted the delivery of the grapes at 5:30am and I showed up at 6am. When I came in the guys told me that they only delivered 7tons of grapes, only the 777 clone of Pinot Noir. Nonetheless, we got started and 6 volunteers arrived to assist in the process....it went smooth! These grapes were at 25 brix. We finished at about 10:30am. Then, we were able to enjoy some coffee and bagels (Martha, our lovely harvest intern provided.....thank you!!!!!). No grapes came in this weekend....it was nice to have some time off!! However, there are always punch downs to be done. Three times a day everyday the grapes need to be manually punched down until they are pressed. We have a schedule with all the Lost Canyon folks so none of us get too burnt out. At this point, we have received 11 tons...and 47 more to go. Keep checking in to see our progress.

First Crush, Saturday Septmeber 1, 2007

We thought we would be in the clear and have the Labor Day weekend off, but we found out Friday that 2 tons of grapes were being picked that evening and would be brought down Saturday morning at 8 a.m. This past week had been particularly busy at Lost Canyon. Wednesday and Thursday we filtered the four wines in preparation for bottling on Friday. We had an early start on Friday, 6:30 a.m., with the mobile bottling truck.




Thankfully, all went well and we finished at 2pm bottling 1700 cases (our biggest batch yet)!!!! This was done with the help of about 20 fabulous volunteers.


So, Saturday, we were slightly zombies, but the delivery of grapes was a small amount and was on time. These grapes were Pinot Noir, clone 37 from Saralee Kunde's vineyard and they were in great condition. This will be the first time for us working with this particular clone. At a tasting event hosted by Saralee Kunde's vineyard early in the year Jack and I noticed this clone really had a dark color for Pinot Noir and since the year before we had lots of light color for our Pinot Noirs we negotiated to include clone 37 in our Saralee Pinot Noir.


The engineers next to Lost Canyon Winery built us a custom dumper/sorter for the grapes. In previous years, this part of the crush had always always been back breaking. It would take about 5 people to sort through the grapes (picking out moldy clusters, leaves, stems and bugs) and to shovel the grapes from one container to the other. Now, the machine takes care of the lifting and pouring, allowing us to focus more closely on the important part: selecting the perfect grapes! We are still looking for a good name for the machine. I was thinking about Bertha.


We had to do extra cleaning on the crusher, since it was the first time we used it in a year. Our harvest intern, Martha Gustaffson, was quick at work in doing this job. The whole process went pretty smoothly and we were done by noon. The punchdowns have begun -- no rest for us winemakers. We do 3 manual punchdowns a day from here on out.

Today (Monday), I will do the afternoon punchdown and add the starter culture (Jack prepared this at the early punchdown) to the fermentation bins for the evening punchdown. Everyone helps out for the punchdown: Jack, Randy, Bob, Martha and myself. More grapes to come this week....please check back in for updates.