I used to buy Burgundian oak barrels from a variety of different coopers, made from different forests at different toast levels. Those sorts of combinations can multiply rapidly. Through the years, I’ve undergone a honing-in process in barrel selection. I’ve found that, depending on the individual wine, usually a particular barrel (one forest, one drying regime and one toast level) from each cooper works best.

I simply ask myself, which barrel enhances the wine best? If you try to use several different barrels to build a wine – this one enhances the entry, this one builds up the middle palate, that one fills in the finish – it can be too much, producing a wine that is technically correct but lacks personality.

From each cooper, whether the forest is Allier or Tronçais, or it’s two- or three-year air-dried oak, there is a particular barrel that either supports the fruit personality of the wine or lends some personality of its own to move the fruit subtly in a good direction. It’s not overly aggressive, but it just works. Then I can mix two different barrels to compound the results.

For example, from François Frères, I tend toward Allier wood to build the mid-palate. From Billon, I prefer a three-year air-dried Vosges medium toast barrel that subtly enhances minerality while showing sweet fruit. And those two barrels do work very well together.

For Chardonnay, I go very subtle because any white wine shows the wood so much more. I like the quality of oak, not toast, in Chardonnay. So I choose lighter toast coopers and tight-grained wood that slows aging and leaves the wine tight and compact.

Right now we’re working on blending the 2008 vintage wines. We’re starting to look at some new programs like a heritage selection blend. It’s preliminary, but right now this blend seems to be dominated by Old Martini and Calera selections. We’re just at the stage of picking the best barrels, and it’s really fun.

We’re even considering a small amount of stand-alone Martini in a combination of Billon and Sirugue cooperage. This would be a high acid, intense, red fruit dominant Pinot Noir.

Crop-wise, 2008 was a short vintage, but as I’ve mentioned previously, everything in barrel is very solid. There are no dogs in this vintage. The crop yields were almost a joke, in some cases 60% less than what we would have thought they should be. But the resulting excellent fruit intensity, nice structure and amazing color make it a very good vintage.

In our Russian River Valley vineyard, where yields were a third of normal due to frost damage, the sugars in our Dijon (early ripening) Pinot Noir clones were at a sensitive stage when the heat hit over Labor Day weekend. The heat was compounded by single digit humidity. We decided to push through the hot weather and ignore the Brix (approximate percentage of sugar) readings. We felt we didn’t have quite the concentration of flavors we wanted and that the tannins and skins were still a little green. To compromise matters further, we had some variability in ripening because of the frost. We picked in the second week of September.

We made only a very small quantity of wine and we experienced a little difficulty getting a few fermentations to completion. I’ve heard there were a number of stuck fermentations this year, probably because heat can interfere with micronutrients needed to finish. But I’m happy to report that we have very concentrated and ripe wine that should be spectacular. I found it hard to sleep for a few nights wondering if we had made the wrong decision, but had we picked earlier, I’m convinced the wines would have been a little lean and green.

The situation in Carneros was also a little weird, but good. We went into the heat there with lower sugars, probably due to a combination of clones and selections, older vines and some virus. Then we saw the numbers spike. Anne took it all in. Normally, she pours over the numbers, but last fall she decided not to look at them. She had great intuition and her decision was helpful to the rest of us. We waited.

Moderate weather came on September 7th and soon the numbers plummeted, with Brix readings dropping as much as four points. I’ve never seen that before. The sugars remained fairly low throughout a month of hang time. We completed harvest on the October 3rd.

The wines are thoroughly ripe with fresh, concentrated fruit and great color. They have behaved like cooler vintage wines in the cellar, slower to develop and unfold as they ultimately were slow to develop in the vineyard. They are very solid, beautiful wines. There are no dogs in the winery.

My big fear is having bad wine in the cellar that I have to try to fix. But in the vineyard, I would rather push the limits and make the best decision to pick on the right day. Our interns were going nuts standing around waiting for us to pull the trigger. They looked at the numbers we were getting and scratched their heads, but the development we wanted just wasn’t there.  In the end,

I will taste all of the components at least twice, and I’ll taste them blind; that is, I will know that I’m tasting various lots of our 2007 Pinot Noir, for example, but I won’t know which lot is which. It’s just a way of eliminating any prejudices and expectations, conscious or not, I may have about a given lot of wine. During this period, I’ll do the most tasting that I do all year.

I’m walking into a system with which I’m already familiar, having made the wines over the previous few months. So I go into the cellar with some general ideas and I give myself plenty of time. I put on music and I work with all my components, tasting and taking notes, putting together little blends. I may take a thief and splash a little bit of one lot into another to test my ideas. Slowly, a plan begins to take form.

Eventually, I’ll look at a main component and then experiment with a spectrum of other wines blended in increments, a range of percentages. As I identify what I like, I begin to tighten up, going from broader to narrower percentages – say from roughly 2/3 and 1/3 down to 72% and 28%. Finally, I will select the three or four best case but different scenarios.

Then it’s time to sit down with Anne and test my ideas. By the time we are tasting together, things are pretty tight and we start tweaking. Again, we’ll taste blind, and I may even put just the raw component in again and see how it fares.
We keep at it until we agree consistently.

We go through this whole process so that we have systematically covered all the bases and can put the final blend in the bottle with confidence.

This summer we’re blending the 2007 vintage, the seventh Donum vintage, and for the first time ever we’re planning to produce that other major Burgundian varietal, a Chardonnay.  We’re only going to make about a hundred cases, but we want ultimate Chardonnay. So we have to consider the same kinds of stylistic questions as we do with Pinot Noir.

A few days ago we tasted six Chardonnay lots – the finalists. Two of the wines were old Wente selections from separate blocks. Two more wines were blends of those old Wente selections. And we had one Weimer selection and one Dijon clone.  All of the wines were fermented and aged in one-year-old French oak barrels, and all of them went through partial malolactic fermentation (in which the more tart malic acid, found in apples, is converted to the softer lactic acid, found in milk). Partial malolactic adds some richness and texture to the wine, but also retains some of the wonderful crisp acidity found in Carneros Chardonnay.

I’m happy to report that we liked all of the wines. At first I asked my colleagues to rate the wines from 1, their favorite, through 6, their least favorite. But they found that difficult, so I asked them just to pick their personal favorite. The aromas ranged from pineapple, Gravenstein apple, pear and honeysuckle to lemon oil, tropical fruit, citrus and floral characteristics.

In general, oak vanillin and toast played a quiet supporting role and did not take center stage, in keeping with our philosophy. As with Pinot Noir, we look for wonderful varietal fruit, fully ripe but not over-ripe, and a delicate balance between power and elegance.

As we discussed the wines, it became clear that we all wanted richness and ripeness, but in a refreshing wine. And we all agreed on the sixth wine. It was one of the old Wente selection wines, with a classic nose full of ripe apple, fresh pear and lemon blossom aromas, rich yet vibrant on the palate. Anne commented on its minerality and viscosity, noting how beautifully it finished with a clean, pure expression of fruit in the aftertaste.

Initially, our selection may not be quite as showy as some of the other wines, but we reveled in its subtleties. I was pleased that we all agreed and, once again, I’ll be very happy to be bottling a wine that I really want to drink. Now it’s back to Pinot Noir!

That beer sparked a discussion of wine styles. My friend had recently tasted a 1987 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon from a prominent producer. The wine had aged quite nicely. Upon opening, it displayed considerable green pepper and green olive aromas as well as a slight herbal character in the flavors, but he said those components gradually diminished to mere hints as the wine revealed more currant and cassis. The label showed the alcohol at 12.5% (a popular level for its era), and while he recalled 1987 as a big, warm vintage, he found nothing in the wine to dispute that figure. The wine was very pleasant but subtle, he said, with no big “wow” factor.

My friend has been an avid wine consumer for three decades, so he recognized those “green’ aromas and flavors as appropriate for Cabernet Sauvignon. Yet he was surprised to encounter them. We have shifted our paradigm in California, away from pyrazine, that “green” compound in red grapes.

If we consider the range from obscenely green to slightly vegetal to perfectly ripe to over-the-top, as an industry we’d rather be over-the-top than green (not to be confused with environmentally conscious). In 1987, I suspect the focus was on who was getting the ripest fruit. Now that everyone strives for and most achieve ripeness, if not over-ripeness, I consider the best producers those who can attain a perfectly balanced ripeness.

My friend asked me how many producers do that consistently, and I had to say maybe half a dozen produce the style that I prefer. He persisted, wondering if they were smaller producers, and most of them are. Then he wanted to know if my wines were among those I chose.

Good question. A winemaker’s style is a combination of variables coming together to produce a recognizable signature. Most of the time, you know that’s your wine, even if sometimes you’re not exactly sure why or how. For me, experiencing my own wine is like being unable to see the forest because you’re so familiar with each of the trees.

Even if I’ve just nailed the wine, it’s not as easy to love as someone else’s wine. There’s a joy of discovery in finding a wine somebody else nailed. How did she do that? Speculating on the reasons for another winemaker’s success is the best part. Learning – solving the puzzle – is fun. I suppose thinking about my own wine is like looking at a crossword puzzle that I’ve already filled in.

My friend tasted my beer and agreed with me. He said it was “too” smooth, slightly cloying. He loves Pinot Noirs – he’s had the iron fist in the velvet glove experience – so he asked about texture.

I told him I think texture is all about farming and then not abusing the fruit in the cellar. It’s a function of a mature vineyard in balance with a proper canopy and crop load that produces depth of fruit. You bring it in at the proper moment and you treat it gently. It’s amazing how much you can and should beat Cabernet Sauvignon to death and how fragile Pinot Noir is.

Extended contact with the lees is huge. I’m sensitive to texture when making the wine. I taste it frequently, and if it’s getting a little rough around the edges, I pull back, ease off on the extraction. If it’s not enough, I move forward.

As he pushed my beer back to me, my friend asked if I thought high-end Pinot producers sometimes had residual sugar in their wines. I think there’s probably a little r.s. in quite a few. I don’t consider that cheating. I’m a big believer in the juice, and if the wine didn’t finish quite dry, who cares as long as it isn’t problematic. If it’s not cloying, is it good? Does the end result give the most pleasure?

As new consumers and new winemakers, we often get hung up on picking out a flaw. Someone once pointed out that a great vintage of Haut Brion had some Brettanomyces, volatile acidity and residual sugar. Yet the sum of the parts was extraordinary.

I know with my own wines, I have stopped looking at numbers. I do look at them when the fruit comes in for any possible adjustments, but after that I taste the wine. I really don’t care what the final numbers are. It all comes down to that moment of anticipation when you raise the glass to your lips. Is it in the glass? And, yes, it does take at least some good beer to make good wine.

During harvest, everything stacks up. Business and personal bills go unpaid and there are piles of unopened mail. But by Thanksgiving, there is time to re-cap the vintage and evaluate aspects of it while they are still fresh in my mind. I think about changes we can make, equipment we should purchase.

I try not to taste the wine until it completes malolactic. Sometimes I do, but less and less. It’s not good, because the wines are typically in an awkward state with high acids, and they can be awkward now and show beautifully later. So what’s the point?

This is a time to reflect, to catch up and plan. It takes until January to get back in the groove. There are definitely post-harvest blues. You are so pumped up for weeks on end, making all these decisions on the run. Everything is thrown at you and you just deal with it.

Suddenly it all stops cold. You go from what has to be done to what needs to be done. And there’s an emotional and intellectual transition. You’re not used to any free time, so you don’t quite know what to do. You have been so focused that you sort of lose contact with the rest of the world.

Most years, you are in crisis mode. This year was a luxury, not nearly as bad. We had ample time and true fruit maturity. That allowed me to capitalize on available tank space for longer macerations (steeping juice or wine with skins for greater extraction of color, flavors) and more cap (layer of skins that float to the top of the tank) manipulation, perhaps four punchdowns rather than three. We had the time to do it and the fruit called for it.

We put in ten- to 12-hour days, not 14 or 16. We had more time to dot each “i” and cross every “t.” In some vintages, you leave something hanging because you’re just too tired to handle it. This year everything was done every day.

We’re scheduled to bottle the 2006 Donum Pinot in February. It’s sitting topped in barrel now. I need to re-evaluate that wine. If it’s ready to bottle, I need to move it from barrel into tank and hold for bottling. In December, it would be nice to do some comparative tastings before gearing up for next year.

Looking back, 2007 in Carneros and Russian River Valley was pretty ideal. The only bad thing is that there wasn’t more of it. Yields were light, but we had perfect weather and great fruit, and the Pinots are stunning. Everything was aligned to give us tremendous flavors, lower alcohols and great acids.

I make a small amount of wine from Oregon, where 2007 was a nail-biting vintage. It was a bad weather harvest. I brought two lots in early to avoid rain and left one lot out on the vine through three inches of rain. I was skeptical, but they all came out really solid. In 2006, Oregon wines were lush, juicy and really flashy. This year will be a classic from good producers, with good tannins, structure and fruit, wines with depth but not flashy.

In California, the 2007 Russian River Pinots will be very pretty, hedonistic and fruit forward, and Carneros Pinots will be very complex and concentrated.

There’s no rush at the winery to get lots out of tanks. There’s plenty of time to do the work, so we’re crossing t’s and dotting i’s. For normally high alcohol producers, this year will be considerably lower. Our alcohols aren’t normally that high so they won’t be down very dramatically. Acids are not high, but certainly not low. Nothing tastes over-ripe. It’s all concentrated but fresh with great softening in the skins. I’m not sure of what’s happening south of us, but everything I’ve tasted this year from the North Coast – Carneros, Russian River Valley, Sonoma Coast and Mendocino – is stunning.

This is the kind of hang time I like. In the past I have heard about hang time in 95-degree weather and that makes me really uncomfortable. This year we’re coasting along at 75 degrees. Unless the fruit just screams to be picked, there’s no reason to rush. Sometimes you do walk into the vineyard and there’s great intensity of flavors, ripe skins and seeds, perfect acidity and softening berries and it all tells you – pick it! We’ve seen some of that and should see a lot more soon.

The small amount of rain we received had no effect. The fruit is still sound and will be ok out there until next week. A little more rain could even help break down skins and give us better extraction in the cellar.

My take on the 2007 vintage at this point is that it’s terribly promising and should give us pretty rich wines with nice acids. I usually make that judgment in the vineyard and then wait until after malolactic fermentation (bacterial conversion of appley malic acid to buttery lactic acid) to re-evaluate the character of the wines. Fermentations are all standard and going well, but wines are difficult to judge at this stage. Right now we are bulletproof. The vintage is finished in terms of quality and it is excellent. This is an enviable position to be in.

You can create wines from one place that seem like they are from any place.
Usually in warm vintages, very ripe grapes are the biggest culprit. For example, the 2003 Burgundies all taste very much the same.

To capture terroir, that has to be your goal. Often, at 26 degrees Brix and above, you will lose it. By cranking up the sugars and ripeness, you can negate the effects both of vintage and terroir.

Yes, I think soil is the major contributor to terroir (although terrain and climate play large roles as well), but I don’t think anyone knows exactly what the soil provides.

Are northern Burgundies mineral laden? Yes. But is it because of the limestone or the high acid and low pH? Do earthy, mushroom characters come from the soil? Certainly different characters come from different soils, but we don’t really know why.

Some say heavier clay soils make bigger Pinots. Others argue that lighter soils make bigger Pinots because they create less canopy, exposing fruit to sunlight.. Most winemakers would agree that soil is very important. But often when we see a vineyard before tasting wines made from it, we are surprised by those wines.

Other times you have just a sense, a memory triggered. You can’t define it, but you know it. Even when I’m right, I’m not sure why. I do taste more black fruit and structure from the clay soils of Nuit St. Georges, and red fruit, mineral and austerity in wines from limestone vineyards. But why remains a mystery.

While great Burgundies may come from the middle of the hillside, producers like Claude Dugat treats all his vineyards like grand cru sites. And he makes stunning village wines. I think he demonstrates that with excellent vineyard management, you can move sites up a quality notch, say from a B- to an A-.
But probably no more than that.

You could look at terroir as potential, and at vineyard management as the ability to extract what nature gives you. How many absolutes are there in life, anyway? Pi?

After a heat wave in July, flavors started to show in the high ‘teens of degrees Brix (scale of sugar content). Then, rather mysteriously, the flavors flat-lined and almost disappeared. The vintage became a game of “let it hang.”

I think the heat slowed the canopy in its work, making us wait for flavors. Usually we harvest between 24.5 and 25.0 degrees Brix. This year we were closer to 26.0.

Normally we harvest all of our vineyards within a week. This year our picks were a month apart. As a result, we have an array of different wines and styles in the cellar. In general, the acids seem a little higher, as you would expect with malic acid levels up in a cooler season. We’ll have to finish malolactic fermentation to fully evaluate.

The wines are elegant, not as opulent as the 2005s, but with laser-like fruit characters, very focused and wonderfully perfumed.

The botrytis (gray mold) issue could have been huge in this drawn-out, cool year. But we also had more time to deal with it. First we thinned fruit in the vineyard, then we sorted as we picked, and finally, we sorted at the winery. We got 90 to 95% of it out, and we don’t mind a little. In cooler areas, botrytis can add to or enhance fruit aromas.

We did eliminate a lot of fruit and sold a lot of barrels because we had no wine to fill them. Usually we average about 155 gallons of juice per ton of grapes; this year we got 137. That’s close to a 12 percent loss. This year berries were larger than usual, so saignées (drawing off lightly-colored juice) to get color and tannins also lowered yields.

Early in the vintage, I was more conservative with length of maceration (“steeping” skins with wine). As we progressed and I encountered no problems with botrytis, I went to a more typical maceration time. Extraction took a while. Color, tannins and richness didn’t come until toward the end of fermentation, whereas in some years we see it at the end of cold soak (“steeping” skins with cold juice), just before we ferment.

I did very little different in the cellar. I might do a little lees stirring to add some mid-palate richness. The vintage presented some problems, but we dealt with them. It was a little nerve-wracking, but by mid-November, we have very solid, lovely wines, better than I had hoped for.

Burgundy, by the way, had the same year – a hot July and lots of botrytis. Oregon had a warm, but not hot, growing season that gave growers, who often cut yields dramatically, confidence in their crops. Then it cooled and rained in little patches, and people got nervous. A little Indian summer arrived, flavors came on, sugars shot up and they had an excellent vintage – just at the edge of maturity without raisiny characters.

On the bright side, we did get good flavors in many blocks, and we got the majority of our harvest in before the rain. It’s the fruit in blocks that we usually pick at the end anyway that is still out there. We brought in what needed picking, like some Martini selection Pinot Noir that is thin-skinned and might have fallen apart after enduring the rain.

The occurrence of botrytis this year has necessitated a lot of thinning. Actually, we have a three-step process. First, we drop affected fruit in the vineyard. Then we sort as we pick. Finally, we sort again on tables, pulling out any affected clusters. So, with this added effort and expense, the fruit we get at the winemaking end is clean. Fortunately, we had an abundant vintage, so we aren’t getting shorted badly on quantity.

At my end, fermentations are proceeding nicely, although that cool first week of October affected them. Ambient temperatures were so cool that we had to warm the tanks to get them going. Native yeast fermentations, for whatever reason, have been more difficult. Anne suggests it could be due to botrytis.

This has been a bizarre year for fruit maturity. You may walk a block and ask, “Where are the flavors?” And one day they are there, but maybe not in the next block. This is especially annoying because earlier in the vintage, the flavors were really evident at lower sugars, and we said, “Wow!” We had very high hopes, then flavors diminished, and it’s been a long wait for sugars. As late as we have gone, we will still be picking Pinot Noir next week.

The fruit is not at all tired, however. The Roederer Pinot Noir clone from block 490 that goes into Donum is par for the course with its thick, ripe skin.
Everything is completely ripe, seeds as well, and we could leave that in the tank as long as we wish. It’s just odd to have some wine already in barrel, some still juice and some fruit still hanging out there for another week.