Comparatively Speaking

Working for a winery is tough business.

Stop laughing. I mean it. Ok, it's only tough part of the time; we DO get to do some fun things now and then.

Like yesterday, when Rawley, Clarissa, and I met for our quarterly comparative blind wine tasting. Four times a year, the four of us get together to taste wines from all over the world blindly. Usually, I slip a Riverbench wine into the mix to see if we can identify it without knowing. We focus on Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, but this year we plan to include Riesling, Rose, and maybe even sparkling wines into the mix.

For evaluation, we use an adaptation of the fabulous Mr. Olken from The Connoisseur's Guide's tasting sheet to look at color, body, aroma, and flavors. Then we rate the wines in order of our preferences. The great thing about wine is that you can never be wrong; it's more about practicing using our palates and identifying flavors along the way. It's a super fun and challenging exercise.

Yesterday's tasting was unusually difficult. We tasted four California Chardonnays, and they were all very different. We left with a few interesting takeaways:
- It IS possible to identify wines made from one vineyard. I have gotten better and better at this for Riverbench, having tasted and contributed to our wines for almost 7 years now. I think if you spend that amount of time examining wine, you can definitely learn to do this. The trick is doing that for every vineyard in the world, which is virtually impossible.
- Once again, Riverbench wines make me happy. Seriously. The Chardonnay that turned out to be Riverbench had comments like "fruit jumps out at you" and "happy nose!" I remind you, we were tasting blindly.
- Finally, Riverbench wines are well priced. Our Chardonnay came in first in the lineup (our retail price: $26) among wines priced $30 to $40 a bottle Wowza! A perfect illustration of our wines being approachable.

Now, I better get back to the tough parts of my job.

Thankful

Sometimes, especially when harvest ends, I get a little down. It's rare, but it does happen, and as a naturally positive person I despise feeling sad.

So, in times like that, I like to think about the things I'm super thankful for.

The best dog in the world. Ever. Seriously, ever.

A sweet mom, smart dad, kewl sisters, and other loving family members.

Wine, specifically Champagne. Chocolate. Uliveto's Tre Funghi pasta. A chance to travel. A lifetime of happy memories. A rockin' job and kind owners. A fun loving and outstanding group of co-workers. Taco Fridays. A good cry. Bubble baths. Les Marchands (do NOT laugh, I seriously have been dying for a wine shop like this to exist in my area for YEARS). My health (and my admission that I'll just never be skinny). Truffles. Foie gras. Really good smelling dirt (I shouldn't admit this, but I've tasted Riverbench dirt, too, and it's rather...nice). Copper pots. Indian food. Friends, who support me no matter how stupid I am sometimes. Indoor plumbing. Croissants. Really good coffee. Oysters. Sunsets. Love, even if it's unrequited. The fact that my MBA program is over. (Ha!)

So many things to be thankful for. And that puts a smile back on my face.

SIP-ping the Good Life

Our annual SIP audit reminded me that I haven't done a blog post in a while about this wonderful program. It's time.

Three years ago, Riverbench Vineyard became SIP (Sustainability in Practice) certified by the Central Coast Vineyard Team. The process was lengthy, involving a full record inspection, questionnaire, and paperwork audit.

We at Riverbench chose this program over other certifications because it supports many great things. It limits our use of harmful pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides. It makes us pay attention to natural resource use and conservation. And, importantly, it considers our reputation in the community and the safety and attention we pay to our employees. People matter at Riverbench, as much as our vineyard, so the program was a perfect fit for us.

We're proud to have our vineyard and wines certified by the program. It does so much, more than I could ever describe, so for more information, check out www.sipthegoodlife.org.

In talking to Jim about the audit this year, he said he was asked lots of questions to make sure we are keeping up with our commitments.

"Like what," I urged, always bugging him for more information.

"Like...owl boxes," he said.

Wait, we have owl boxes?! How have I worked here six years and not known that we have fifteen...count 'em!...fifteen...owl boxes! How cool is that? I've known owls were great for rodent control (you know, mice and gophers) but never considered they were so vital that SIP would include questions about them in our audit. Very cool!

Photo credit: Stolli, taken early one morning before he had coffee.

New World Meets Old World: Wine Girl Goes to France

I was born a francophile. My mother instilled in me a love of anything French, and my father made a career of selling French wines. So my recent trip to France was a special treat, as I absolutely love spending time in that country. The food, the language, and oh-my-gosh the wines just all make me so happy.

This trip, we concentrated on an area I hadn't visited before: the Dordogne River valley and Bordeaux. To start we spent a few days in Paris indulging in the gorgeousness that is the city of lights. When in northern France, I always try to order wines from the Loire region which is nearby and focuses on pretty whites made of Chenin Blanc and lighter, more acidic reds primarily made with Cabernet Franc. These wines tend to pair so very, very well with food, making our experiences at each place even more magical. Additionally, Champagne is always allowed, anywhere, anytime. In fact, I personally find it a necessity as an aperatif at each meal. In Bordeaux, I have found that the younger wines tend to be a little rougher for my tastes, so they need some bottle age. Or maybe I'm just weird like that since my birth year is 1982 and that's the most amazing vintage there on record. You be the judge!

I found myself thinking a lot about wine and food each and every day. I've made it my mission in life to study the two, and their relationship to each other. The perfect meal doesn't have to be fancy or planned; all you need is a great bottle of enjoyable wine that doesn't overwhelm the senses and lets you enjoy what you're eating along with it. Food and wine should work together to create the ultimate sensory experience. And when they do...oh my, that's what makes life worth living.

Show Some "Spirit!"

Being a part of the Anacapa Project in Santa Barbara has been eye opening. We have delicious beer thanks to Figueroa Mountain Brewery, amazing wines (especially imports-yay!) thanks to Les Marchands Wine Merchants, outstanding food a la Lucky Penny and The Lark, and artisan spirits made right on site by Ian Cutler.

It's been a pleasure getting to know all of the people involved with these various entities, but Ian of Cutler's Artisan Spirits struck a chord with me and the Riverbench owners for different reasons. My family is from moonshine country, so distilling has always fascinated me, and one of my owners loves (loves loves loves) grappa. We have been making a small amount of honey infused grappa through Riverbench for the past year or so.

Last Thursday, Ian granted me the extreme privilege of allowing me to shadow him for a few hours to watch him in action. His chemistry know-how is mind blowing, and it was pretty cool to see the commonalities and differences between making spirits and making wine. Ian's place is like a mad scientist's lab, except he's methodical, organized, and deliberate (aka, not a mad scientist). Not to mention he's super talented and making truly remarkable spirits. (Try his Apple Pie. Seriously. Try it.)

The main takeaway was that making spirits requires the distiller to taste and smell to find the best balance through the distillation process. The first distillation is reputedly foul (Ian uses it to clean his car parts!), but as a liquid is distilled more and more, it becomes more refined and pure, with more concentrated flavors. The art is knowing how to find the balance, which is a sensory judgment. I loved that the three stages of distilling are called heads, hearts, and tails. How cool is that? Overall, it was a really interesting explanation of mashing, fermenting, and distilling that just made me want to learn more.

This harvest, Ian has agreed to experiment with grappa. Having never done it before, we'll supply him with various types of pommace to see what he can do, as we'd love to make our grappa locally. Do we have the best neighbors ever or what?

Taste Testing

I always love it when Clarissa lets me tag along on her frequent grape tasting expeditions during harvest. She's got such an amazing palate and it's absolutely fascinating to hear her talk about certain flavors in ripe grapes and not-so-ripe ones. She likes to walk a whole row at a time, tasting grapes every 10 to 15 steps. She says she carefully but randomly grabs them off each cluster, but I end up choosing the prettiest one each time because I like pretty. (Which is probably why I should never be a winemaker. That and the whole "gotta be patient" thing. Ugh.)

We tasted the blocks she uses for Rosé. She noted that color seems lighter than normal this year, so she might have to soak the juice with the skins a little longer to make sure our rosé is pink. The grapes weren't quite ready: they were still rather simple tasting and lacking that "hint of rose petal" Clarissa looks for in riper Pinot Noir.

Next, we headed to the Tributary block, where we get rows 12-16. She noted the drying leaves around the fruit zone, which is a sign that the grapes are ripening. She anticipates picking these grapes early next week, so she has already asked Jim to cut off the water so that they don't get diluted. The flavors here were lovely: That rose petal and some red cherry. She pointed out the slightly dimpled berries, and a few areas of botrytis, which seems to be more common this year than most. That means she's planning to sort the grapes not only in the vineyard but also on a table once they get to the winery. Extra work, but it's worth it to get all of that botrytis out.

We checked out the Riesling and some Chardonnay, too, neither of which was quite ready. She did mention that the Chardonnay tends to be ripening right there along with the Pinot Noir, which is rather unusual considering we typically have about two weeks between the two varietals. 2013 is shaping up to be a different harvest from years past, which is always what keeps us on our toes. :)

My favorite vineyard block, where our Clone 115 grows. Love that view!

And here is me as an excellent gate opener for your viewing pleasure:

Harvest 2013 Begins!

Warning: I pulled an all nighter by accident; too excited about harvest beginning! So this blog post might seem rather...delirious.

I dragged myself out of bed at 4:30 after finally falling asleep around 4:27 to meet Jim in the vineyard. He had been there since 1 AM, so I really couldn't complain. First pick: our Mesa Pinot Noir for our sparkling Blanc de Noirs. Since this is my favorite wine, it's a thrill to see it get started every year. The fruit looked really gorgeous - tiny berries, tight clusters. There is apparently a little more botrytis this year due to these tight clusters (if a berry breaks, this can cause botrytis to rock and roll), so the pickers have been more careful than usual looking for this.

Clarissa likes the bins to be super clean, so two guys oversee the clusters being put into the big bins and pick out anything that doesn't make the cut, plus leaves and stuff. The thing that always amazes me about picking crews is how fast they go. Literally, they're a blur! I get in the field and cut about 3 clusters, and they've already filled up a cajone.

This morning was cool and the fog strangely didn't roll in until around 5 AM. How gorgeous does this fruit look? Lucky harvest 2013...will this be some of our best wine yet? Time will tell!

Happy Harvest, everyone!