New at Sierra Vista

Estate grown wild blackberry/Syrah Jam  Black berrys picked by winemaker John.  What should I do with the few bottles I have.  Let me know.

New Label:  go to http://www.sierravistawinery.com/pages/our_wines.php     to see some of them.

Let me know what you would like to know about Sierra Vista at

syrah@sierravistawinery.com

Two fortified wines/winter irrigation

This photo shows all three of our desert wines, Our Viognier Doux and two new fortified wines similar to the wines of Banyuls in South western France.

Fortified wine from Syrah and Grenache

In 2010 Sierra Vista made its first fortified wine from Grenache and Syrah. The process was patterned after the wines of Banyuls, a town in the south west of France. The wine made there is a Grenache-based fortified wine that has been made since the thirteenth century. Banyuls, what the wine is called, is allowed to ferment until it has about six percent alcohol, then spirit is added, raising the alcohol level to about fifteen percent.

Sierra Vista Tawnie Grenache was allowed to ferment down to about 7% alcohol and 190 % spirits made from wine was added which brought the alcohol up to about 16%. The Rubie Syrah was made in the same style but came to 15.8% alcohol.

What this yields is a sweet wine that is a classic companion to semi-sweet or dark chocolate as well as other full bodied deserts. While rich and full-bodied, it is less sweet and syrupy than a typical dessert wine. It possesses a lovely garnet color and a good balanced acidity that makes it come off as more delicate than vintage port.

The names Rubie and Tawnie came about because when tasting the two barrels it was felt that the Syrah was more like a ruby port while the Grenache was more like a tawny port. The two are distinctly different. Come see and taste them at their grand debut at the Valentines desert celebration.

New topic/ Winter irrigation

On the 14th, Jan, we started watering the vineyard. The attached photos show where the dripline leaks are. They are quite easy to spot when it is so cold.


This shows a vine cane with two drops of water under a bud. The water is not blue but is reflecting the blue of the sky.
















This one shows an emitter completely gone from the drip line. Don't know how that happens but it is cold to try to replace it withod turning of the water.

This dish was called "seafood Ravioli" but it had a lot of lobster in it. If you use wine varietal labeling, 75% of the varietal as a guide the ravioli should have been called Lobster Ravioli. Whatever, it was the best ravioli I have ever had and would be in place at the best restaurants. Our caterer did herself proud.




Something else that was shown at the event was a proof copy of a cook book presently being published. The recipes are from the Barbara MacCready kitchen. Some of them have been included in the wine club shipments and some are new. The recipes are all for dishes that are delicious. The book will go to our wine club and will be on sale at the winery.



Three happy tasters









Mr. Bean was the hit of the party







Mr Bean keep these two guys in their place all afternoon










Two volunteers, Jackie on the right and Lynzee on the left, Lynzee is scheduled to start helping Barbara at the winery on November 29th. She will be doing a lot of everything including wine club, tasting room, event planning and organizing and even helping me with facebook and blogs.

Chardonnay development 9-27-11

Here are two shots of Chardonnay, one of Cabernet and the flower garden in front of the winery. The Chardonnay is about a week of good weather away from harvest while the cab is a week and a half of good weather away, maybe two. However one block of Grenache the estate Rayas vineyard is almost there. Zin old clone is ready as far as the sugar goes but it is high acid. We may pick 2 or 3 blocks the end of this week or the beginning of next. What fun.


I am starting to name my blocks of grapes. We have the Rayas vineyard as Grenache block 1
the Castel vineyard is Grenache block 2, The Reeves Zinfandel is the first Zin we planted while the next zin is the old clone vineyard. We have an old clone Cab. I need some more names.

Chardonnay development 9-20-11

Yes I know this is a day late but we received our Sauvignon Blanc Grapes yesterday so we crushed, repaired the press and had a very late day which we always do when we are not picking our own grapes. The reason is it takes a while to pick the grapes and then they have to trucked here so we don't get started when the first bins are picked as we do with ours.We also had a press malfunction so I had to repair that while our new celler person ran almost all the grapes by himself. That means he loaded each bin in the bin dumper, sorted the grapes by hand because there were a few very sour grapes in each bin, just enough to hurt the quality and pump the grapes into the press while I was repairing the press. The press was repaired just as he was finishing the last two bins.

This shot shows the Chardonnay out in the sun developing that nice yellow color one sees in our unoaked chardonnay. Barrel fermented Chardonnay wine picks up color from the oak as well as the grape.


The following photo shows some grapes not exposed to the sun directly and they are much greener but both may be about the same sweetness.











Several week ago I showed you some Mourvedre. The following photo shows the same grapes but very little green showing now compared to then.












This next shot shows some cab developing nicely. It looks like a good year if we can beat the rain. Cross your fingers for us.

Chardonnay on the 12th

Now days the progress is in the taste not the looks. I can tell it is sweeter than last week. Roses ad the wildflower aromas to the wine. Believe me? Last night we had a very localized thunderstorm with rain and lightening and wind. 0.4 inches should not do any damage and may even be good for the vines.

We sampled the Sauvignon blanc today in Amador county and it is about ready to pick. Just that the acid was too high. Maybe next Monday.

Following Chardonnay

Notice how the bunches in the sun are becoming golden while the ones in the shade. I am tasting more sweetness in the berries than last week which is a good sign. Maybe we will have a harvest after all. This warm, not hot, weather we have been having here is really helping the ripening. We get up to near 90 during the day which is 8-10 degrees less than the hottr parts of El Dorado county and the Central Valley.


Don't they look good enough to eat?







Below is a photo of the flower gardens in the fore ground then the picnic area and the Viognier vineyard in the back ground.

Chardonnay development 8-29-11 3rd week of verasion

Here are a couple clusters of Chardonnay. Notice that they are taking on a slight yellow hew. These grapes
give our unoaked wine the yellow tint in the bottle. If the grapes are exposed to sun as these are and the temperature does not get too high, which it seldom does here at 2800 ft, we get good color and not sunburn that comes with hotter temperatures.





In the photo below the grapes are still quite green although both these and the ones above have about the same sugar. These grapes are in the shade 100% of the time so will not change color much. They are beautiful looking grapes.





The grapes in this photo are Cabernet Sauvignon. You can see that some of the grapes are still green while some have started to turn purple. Still not half way through verasion which is when the grapes start turning from green to purple and the sugar starts increasing from none to some and eventually to 23 to 26% whatever the winemaker wants.

This is the third week of verasion