Vine Views

Barn Painting & Other Improvements

Last weekend we finally completed painting the barn, and we're really happy with the results.  Painting always takes longer than I think it will, and this time was no exception.  I thought we could do this in two days or less and it took more than four.  Part of the problem was that the wood was so dry, it sucked up gallons of paint faster than I could buy them from the Home Depot!

As part of this project, we also added some lattice fencing to hide the HVAC unit and outdoor electrical feeds.  We're going to plant some clematis and/or rose vines on this fence to soften it up and really complete the look, but we'll see when we can get to that.  I also cleaned up the unkempt grass and weeds around the barn, replacing most of this with gravel instead.  Next will be the complete fence to separate the vineyard from the barn and the stone walkway for out guests.

Here's a before and after of the barn entrance to compare the difference:

BEFORE

AFTER

Toast of the Town NYC

As I finish up my final few MBA classes, my posts have been sparse.  But, at the same time, the spring season is upon us and I will have a lot to do in the vineyard.  And, thus, a lot to post about.  Starting with the wonder that is bud break on our vines that will soon be the young age of ONE!

With the wonderful milestone of my MBA commencement only three weeks away, I'm now in a celebratory mood.  And, frankly, nothing says celebration like wine; even more so in a fun, friendly event format.  There is just such an event for you all to attend this month as Wine Enthusiast brings us their Toast of the Town 2008.

Held at Lincoln Center, this is a great consumer-friendly event for food and wine enthusiasts.  It is a walk around format and can be enjoyed solely for the food and the wine, or you can engage with any number of folks in the industry to bone up on your wine and food knowledge.  It's really your choice how to best take in this event, among the largest each year, and that's the fun of it.

I encourage you to attend if you are looking for a celebration of spring in the form of food and wine.  And if you do plan to attend, buy your tickets online to take advantage of our discount on this great event ($10 off the Grand Tasting or $20 off the VIP Tasting) - just enter CLUB08 to get your discount.

Cheers!

Sampling the Wine in Progress

Nick and Mark joined me yesterday for the first complete round of post-fermentation sampling.  While there is certainly some work to be done, and not everything is rosy, the overall results are very positive.  Here are some notes on each of the wine batches and how they are progressing.

Cabernet Franc
This was the best fruit to start with and has not let us down.  We each took home a bottle of this wine now to enjoy with others and consider how it might evolve.
Appearance: There is a super deep violet color on this batch.  Additional racking and clarification time is certainly needed, but the wine is otherwise clear. 
On the Nose: It is earthy, spicy with some green pepper and black cherry; plus there is still a slight note of raisin that should continue to dissipate.   
On the palate: The wine is full bodied and quite chewy - more tannic than I'd expect from the Franc, but this should give it a nice structure as it ages.  There are flavors now of liquorice, mushroom, cherry and spice. 
Rating: 8 out of 10.   (There are several carboys of this wine, each slightly different.  We took notes on each of the eight vessels separately, but I will consider them one batch for purposes of this blog.  At least until we reach blending time.)
Recommendation: Another month in glass, second racking, consider oak.

Cabernet Sauvignon (5-gal Carboy Batch)
While not quite as perfect as the Cabernet Franc, this fruit was close to perfection.  It was about as ripe as one can hope for on Long Island and the bunches were tight, but free of any rot.
Appearance: Deep violet, but a little less opaque than the Franc.  Additional racking and clarification time is certainly needed, but the wine is otherwise clear.   
On the Nose: Clean nose, but giving only subtle hints of flavor.  Plum and blackberry are the primary aromas.   
On the palate: Very ripe, almost sweet from full fruit flavors of plum and blackberry.  The body is medium plus.  Quite tannic.
Rating: 6.5 out of 10. 
Recommendation: Another month in glass, second racking, would use oak but may be a problem due to the small volume.

Cabernet Sauvignon (Steel Tank Batch)
This is the tank that had serious mold at the first racking.   The batch seemed a lost cause, but has actually improved dramatically since racked off the sediment and mold.  Definitely the worst of all the batches, but potentially drinkable with some effort.
Appearance: Medium red and not as dark as the previous two batches.  Slightly cloudy.  No new mold was evident, but an oily film was removed from the top of the tank. 
On the Nose: Pretty flat, with prune and raisin aromas that are not entirely unpleasant, but not what we'd hope for either.   
On the palate: Flat.  Little of note beyond raisin.
Rating: 3 out of 10. 
Recommendation: Another month or two in glass, rack and retaste.  May need some effort to save this.

Merlot
This fruit was over-ripe to start and beginning to show signs of rot.  Handling the fruit was difficult as it was soft and prone to split or crush.  The hope was simply to get some flavor from this that can be blended back with the others.
Appearance: Dark purple.  Hazy, in need of additional clarification. 
On the Nose: Strong berry and raisin aromas.  Almost like a glass of pure grape juice.   
On the palate: Grapey, one-dimensional and hot.  Prickly sensation of post-fermentation and/or alcohol out of balance.  "Tastes like Coca-Cola and grain alcohol."
Rating: 5 out of 10. 
Recommendation: As bad as these notes sound, they are an improvement from the first racking.  We racked this from the tank into glass carboys and deliberately pumped with a heavy hand to aerate the wine.  Will rack, aerate and retaste in 1-2 months.  Could be saved and, blended with the "flatter" Cabernet Sauvignon, plus some oak, could be a decent table wine.  Assuming the over-ripe fruit flavor and burn mellow.

Framing the Wine Cellar

It's been a long time coming, but last weekend, I finally started to build the wine cellar.  A couple of friends came for the weekend and the ladies went shopping and relaxed a bit while John and I took to the heavy lifting.  Literally. 

By way of recap, we had discovered a 10' x 10' x 10' concrete lined "cellar" next to the barn during the initial property inspection.  The Catapano's used it to age cheese and odds are that it was a root cellar years ago.  We put a new, stable roof over it and added a staircase directly from the barn and tasting classroom.  But until now, it's remained nothing more than a storage space.

As seen above, John did much of the layout for the wood studs.  We together shared a Tim Allen moment when using using the Ramset Hammer Gun for the first time.  This is not a nail gun like you see on home improvement shows.  It is, quite honestly, a gun.  It takes a special nail for concrete and then you add a 0.22 caliber gunshot and literally shoot the nail through the wood stud and into the concrete wall.  Eye and ear protection are a definite with this tool.

Being that this cellar is truly underground and surrounded on all four sides with earth, I opted for minimal insulation on the walls.  Sheets of 2" Dow Board provide about an R-value of 19, but are really just a precaution against a hard freeze.  The floor, well below the freeze line, will be tiled directly over the existing concrete slab.  The only real insulation issues are going to be where the top of the cellar is covered creating the staircase and entry into the barn.  For the first year I won't keep anything valuable here and I'll monitor the climate variance to determine any additional needs.  I will also put an attic fan in the top section to vent out the heat in the summer.

Here is a section next to the stairs where we've framed out what will become the floor of a storage section when everything else is done.  The span is 10', but a few solid cedar 4x4's will do the trick in making this surface very sturdy.

Once the walls were completely installed below, we added the floor (or ceiling from below) to either side of the staircase.  The above photo shows the framing to the right and this photo the completed surface to the left.  I had no trouble walking and bouncing on this (except for the low ceiling) so clearly it will be strong enough to hold classroom supplies.

In the coming weeks I will tile the floor, add electrical and lighting downstairs and complete the ceiling insulation before starting to build the actual wine racks.

Accuvin Wine Analysis Tests

After last week's observations, I purchased several new glass carboys and Nick dropped by to help rack the Cabernet Franc into them.  We decided that we're just not as confident in the steel tanks, so into carboy we went.

Along with the carboys, I purchased a sample kit of Accuvin wine analysis tests.  I'd been told that it's unlikely these are terribly accurate, but I thought that they might be adequate for my home winemaking situation.  After all, some data is better than no data, right?

Well, I'm not so sure about that.  Overall, I'd have to say that the verdict is out on these tests.  We took five readings and one seems very accurate, three could be close or not (we don't have any benchmarks to work from) and the last was downright incorrect (or, at least, inconclusive.) 

The kit I purchased had five tests: Residual Sugar, pH, Titratable Acid, Malic Acid and Lactic Acid.  Four of the five tests are simple "strip tests" - measure a sample, put on strip, wait and match to a color chart.  Here are the results we came up with for the Cabernet Franc:

1. Residual Sugar = 750 mg/L
2. pH = inconclusive
3. Titratable Acid = 8.5
4. Malic Acid = 110 mg/L
5. Lactic Acid = 100 mg/L

The pH is the most surprising - we did the test twice and neither time did the result come even close to any of the yellow-green colors on the strip test.  While there is certainly a chance that the wine is out of range, I cannot believe for a moment that it was over 5.0 - the high end of the scale.  And seeing as how we all probably used litmus paper in high school chemistry to test pH, I thought this would be the most reliable of them all.

The only test that we could say with any certainty seems correct was the residual sugar.  The result of 750 mg/L puts it in range for dry, but not bone dry.  And we did this one test on the Merlot as well.  As it was the ripest of our batches, the resulting 1000 mg/L seemed in line with expectations.

I'll see if we can get one of the wine samples to Macari's lab for a full analysis and then comapre the results with the Accuvin.  I just doubt I'll find the time to get over there.  (Which is sad considering that they are, quite literally, next door.)

Some Details on First Year Pruning

These may not be the world's best photos, but I did want to show some of the details involved in winter pruning.  This is a closeup of a single growth bud on the cane of the vine.  To the right is the vine and to the left is the bamboo cane used to keep it upright in this first year of growth.  Right in the center of the photo the vine has a joint and "zigs" to the right.  On the left side of that joint is a white nub that is the growth bud.  This section is to become the trunk for this vine over the years, so there should be no growth spurs from this section.  Therefore, this bud will be removed.

Here is the same photo after the bud has been removed.  I simply nipped the bud out of the vine with my thumbnail.  It's a rather simple process, but leaves your finger feeling raw and tired after doing a lot of these.  The average vine needed about a dozen buds removed.  I bought some simple gardening gloves and then cut off the tip of the forefinger and thumb.  These work nicely in the vines - protecting my hands in general but leaving the two finger tips I need for de-budding and for tying up the vines.  But after doing all 99 of my vines in a single session (about 5-6 hours) my exposed fingers were definitely raw.  And while it was a mild 52 degrees, the day before had pounding rain, so I was walking and kneeling in lots of cold mud.  I had a nice mat to kneel on, but "raw" seemed to be the word of the day for sure.

Now for the matter of pruning...  Here is a typical vine after the first year of growth.  In this case it's Cabernet Franc and has topped out around 9-feet tall.  It has a few shoots, but most of the growth went into the central cane that will now be pruned, de-budded and trained to grow as the trunk for this vine.  You can see the original planted vine at the very bottom and the gnarled "top" of that original where this cane originated.  The goal is to save as much of this cane as possible and leave buds near the top for the new growth that will eventually be the fruiting canes.  But not all of this growth will survive the winter and the rule of thumb in this region is to cut back anything thinner than a pencil.

So here is that same vine after pruning.  It now stands about 3-1/2' tall and has six growth buds on the top section of the cane.  Below that, all the buds have been removed and growth in that section will be to lengthen, thicken and mature the trunk.  Each of the remaining buds may or may not grow, but six allows plenty of backup to be sure I get at least two good canes.  As growth begins in the spring, I will leave the two healthiest shoots and cut back the others, forcing the vine to focus on the best possible growth opportunities.  Of course, these fruiting canes will still not bear fruit this year, but they will be the start of the growth that will in year three.  This year (number two) some fruit may grow, but all of it will be immediately "dropped" to allow the vine to focus its growth on maturing and stabilizing the central vine system.  It wasn't a terrible winter here, but without a strong and mature central system, these vines could suffer winter kill and die off in a harsh winter season.

First Racking

I'm hoping the other "two guys" in the "Three Guys Wine" venture won't be upset with me, but I had to make an executive decision.  See, due to very reasonable but unforeseeable circumstances, we haven't been able to coordinate a good time for the first racking.  And when it was looking like middle or end of March was going to be our first chance, I got worried that we were waiting too long.  So this weekend, I bought a pump, and I did the first racking myself.  Given the choice, we wouldn't have used a pump, but this was the only way I could pull this off on my own.  I used very gentle pressure and had lots of patience waiting for the pump to move these volumes, so I don't think doing without would have been much more gentle.

Shown here is the 5-gallon carboy of Cabernet Sauvignon being racking into another carboy.  Due to constraints of space and available vessels, this needed to be racked into a 6-gallon carboy, the original one cleaned, and then racked back into the 5-gallon carboy.  One of the nice things about the pump was its large mesh pre-filter; meaning that I could suck up more liquid and the pre-filter would catch the sediment, leaving my racked wine relatively clear and wasting the least about of wine.

It's not all that easy to see clearly through a glass carboy, and taking a photo is even harder.  But here is the leftover sediment after the first racking.  The sediment is primarily made up of the "lees" or dead yeast from fermentation.  But throughout the aging process, more solids will form and "fall out of solution" as the process continues.  Based on the very little racking experience that I've had, the pump really helped get more of the wine out of the vessel.  If you look closely to the right, you can see the wine on top of the sediment.  That becomes waste, but when I racked a Chardonnay by manual siphon last year, I had a heck of a lot more waste.

One the 5-gallon batch of Cabernet was racked back onto it's carboy, there was about 1.5L of headroom that needed to be filled.  This is essentially the difference in volume between the liquid and the solids, but also includes the wasted wine that can't easily be siphoned off.  Generally, a wine maker keeps some extra must or varietal wines around to fill the headroom in any vessel like this.  Or you can rack into smaller containers.  Either way, some calculation and effort are needed.  No problem here, I've got another 60L+ in the next steel tank, so I'll use that to top this one off.

Uh oh!  Houston, we have a problem!  Once I removed the "sealed" lid from the steel tank, it was obvious that this batch had gone bad.  The air-filled rubber seals on these tanks are, shall we say, finicky.  Getting them in place and sealed nicely is nothing short of a miracle and definitely more art than science.  Never mind the fact that they are very difficult to clean and it only takes one grape skin getting moldy on the seal to cause all sorts of trouble in the tank.  After pulling my hair a little, scratching my head, and contemplating next moves, I decided on the following course of action.

I looked through my wine making books and did a few Internet searches.  Based on a few random and very unscientific observations, I guessed that this was mold and not a bacteria.  Without getting into details and without being absolutely certain, this was based on there still being a reasonable alcohol level.  I could be totally wrong, but I had limited time, drew a conclusion and acted on that information.  I racked this wine off into a new vessel and left more waste wine to avoid carrying the surface mold into the fresh tank.  Samples from below the surface showed no obvious signs of mold.  This photo is the tank after the "usable" wine was racked.

Truth be told, this whole batch may be a complete loss.  I did suck it up and taste the "clean" wine.  It wasn't awful and I didn't keel over and die instantly, but I'm just not sure there is anything there to make an interesting drink from later.  That said, there's no harm in keeping it to see if it can be saved.  I blasted this batch with a decent potassium metabisulfite solution in the hopes of killing off the culprit.

This is getting long winded, but there was a lot that went on during this process.  Next was the Cabernet Franc and I was SOOOOOOO happy to see nothing offensive on the surface when I removed the lid.  In fact, after racking and tasting, I was very pleased with what we've got there.  I'm sorry we only have about 100L of this, but we'll make the most of it.  Seeing as how the tank aged C.S. may be dead, I instead used the Cabernet Franc to top off the first carboy of C.S.

Finally, I racked the Merlot, leaving about 40L of clean wine.  Nothing terribly wrong with this batch, but hard to say if it will improve or not.  Time will tell.  We'll always have Franc. 

Pruning - The Winter Task

Pruning is basically the only key task that needs to be done during the winter.  Well, along with vine training.  Don't get me wrong, there is always something to be done!  But this is the only task that really relies on the calendar.  And, therefore, it's really the only time of year that vineyard managers and farmers can take time away from the vines.

Yesterday I took to the task of pruning our 99-vines, figuring (accurately, as it turns out) that this was about a single, full-day activity.  The weather was mild for February - nearing 50 degrees.  But there was over two inches of rain on Friday and the weekend remained damp, so it was a little more biting cold than I expected.  Especially anytime I made contact with the very, very damp ground.

There are essentially two tasks in pruning - removing buds and actually pruning the vine.  After that, the rest is training.  But since I don't yet have training lines, and at the end of Year One there is really no training decision to be made, all I did was nip and prune.  In the first photo I am holding the pruned off top of the first vine.  Perhaps we'll have that clipping bronzed <g>.  Here I am beginning the process of nipping the buds from the lower part of the trunk.  The objective here is to remove what would later become new growth.  This allows the vine to focus its energy further up the vine and on the canes that I will later select to be "fruiting canes."

The buds are all nipped off (yes, this is where the expression "nipped in the bud" comes from) using your fingernail until the proper height for the training wire is reached.  Based on my conditions, I selected 24" for this height.  (I will elaborate on that choice when I place the line in a few weeks.)  This part of the vine will eventually become the trunk and no new canes will be allowed to sprout from this section.

Above the training line height, I decided to leave six buds.  There are varying thoughts on this, like anything else in the vineyard.  Odds are that I will only allow three of these to grow in Year Two, but this gives me options in case a bud is damaged and doesn't sprout.  After the sixth bud - SNIP - as seen here.

Once the vine is pruned and the buds are nipped, it's time to tie the vine to a growth stake.  I still have my six foot bamboo canes in place, so I tied to these canes to keep the vine from being stressed or snapped by the winter winds.  Unfortunately, I found a few of the weaker vines had already snapped.  Luckily, there were buds remaining for a fresh start on those vines in Year Two.

This post is a brief narrative of my effort in the vineyard this weekend.  I will post shortly on some of the technical details - and the decisions that I made.  It was a rather long day and my biggest lesson learned is that I need one of those gardening carts that holds all the tools but also doubles as a seat.  Bending down on my knees over and over was the hardest part and today my sore legs are a keen reminder of this.  The actual effort on the vines wasn't that bad.  And it's a very relaxing, engaging exercise.  I guess it's a little like training a Bonsai tree - you get to know your plants and have to make decisions that will impact their overall well-being.

Tracy and the Guru of Luxury

Lorre White, The Guru of Luxury, has partnered with Tracy on a monthly series of Podcasts for 2008.  The first one has been posted and is available for your viewing pleasure.  You can view the five minute episode, Affordable Wines, on Podango.

Thanks to Lorre White for working with us and the Four Seasons Restaurant for their willingness to allow our use of some space in the restaurant during lunch for filming.

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