This week we tasted the 2008 vintage wines. Most of the usual suspects were present on our little tasting panel – Dr. Phil Freese and Zelma Long, Kenneth and I, plus John Harley, our newly appointed assistant winemaker.

At first glance, everyone commented that the wines have great color. Phil suggested that I summarize the vintage and comment on the difficulties. Well, we had a little of everything – from frost, heat and drought to fire and smoke.

When the heat came in early September, we were still at fairly low sugar levels and we rode it out. As soon as temperatures dropped, the fruit relaxed and sugars dipped as well. A month of hang time ensued, with very slow (almost imperceptible) ripening, certainly not the normal curve. Something a little different occurred. We let our fruit hang into October until it was pretty clear it wasn’t likely to progress much further and needed to come in. You would have thought our sugars would be 27 or 28 degrees Brix, but in reality we finished from 24 to 25.

So we had our customary first tasting after completion of malolactic fermentation – a secondary bacterial fermentation that converts malic acid (think crisp apples) to the softer lactic acid (think milk). And speaking of acids, we felt that overall the 2008 wines are slightly more angular with brighter acidity than the 2007 vintage. As the 2008 vintage was slow to ripen in the vineyard, so it is a little slower developing in the cellar. These are not lean wines, just different. The flesh is there underneath, similar to our 2006 vintage Pinots which have evolved into very beautiful wines.

The 2007s seemed to spring forth fully formed and we had a clear picture of what would happen. The blends practically made themselves. With the 2008s, we’ll wait a little longer, working to familiarize ourselves with the wines until we have another panel tasting in April.

We began the tasting, by the way, with several lots of our Chardonnay clones and selections, all of which were very harmonious and showed beautifully. The classical music playing in the background was really a wonderful accompaniment. I recommend the pairing of violins with Chardonnays.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites