The column, essentially, demands that producers “Tell us the truth”.   Mr. Kramer first calls into question a wine labels ability to deliver accurate information about what is in a bottle of wine.  He provides a brief explanation of labeling laws as they relate to alcohol levels.  In short; for wines over 14%, stated alcohol levels must be within 1% of actual levels and for wines under 14% this interval increases to 1.5%.  He goes on to say “If NASA used these standards for the moon shot, they would have called it a success if the rocket merely sailed past its intended target, never mind actually landing on it.”

He then goes on to say “…alcohol levels” are “merely symptomatic” and that “The real issue is how ripe the grapes are before the wine is made.”  He then goes about listing all the things that winemakers have to do as a result of picking grapes that are too ripe.  The take home story is that we winemakers go on to lie about how we make our wine, that we are somehow “ashamed” of the things we do, that we’re “fiddling with their wines precisely to make them appear to be something they’re not”.  He then goes on to demand that producers “Tell us the truth”.

Like many other so called wine “journalists” Mr. Kramer fails to provide any definition of ripeness and resorts to using the analogy of high brix.  What Mr Kramer fails to realize, as do so many others, is that most of us winemakers have gotten away from picking grapes at a specific brix.  Most of us have gotten away from the recipe approach to winemaking, we rely less and less on laboratory tests to tell us when we should pick and rely more and more on how the grapes taste.  There is a lot more to a balanced wine than alcohol levels and these are the variables we winemakers must consider, not one but many.  I am tired of people in offices tasting finished wines going on about what ripeness is.  Mr Kramer is not in the business of understanding ripeness, he is in the business of tasting and commenting on finished wine.  I AM in the business of ripeness, I walk countless miles through vineyards putting grapes into my mouth, tasting them, chewing on the skins and seeds, trying to get my head around when is it time to pick.  Mr Kramer, I wish it were as easy as picking grapes at a specific brix. 

I also disagree with Mr Kramer when he says we are “fiddling with their wines precisely to make them appear to be something they’re not”.  When I and I think most of my peers would agree, “fiddle” with a wine I am doing so so that it can be all that it can be.  I don’t like 15% alcohol Pinot’s nor do I like overly green characters, so what am I to do?  I have to look at the grape and ask myself; which of the factors involved with balance can I control?   The truth of the matter is that I can increase or decrease alcohol and acidity with relative ease.  Flavors and tannin quality are things that I am far less capable of altering, so why not pick based on the things I have the least control over?   The simple truth is that when a winemaker makes a manipulation he does so with the consumer’s best interest in mind, not in an attempt to pull something over on them.

The impression that I get is that Mr Kramer thinks winemakers should rely on the numbers of laboratory tests instead of our instincts in making picking decisions and that we should apply NASA like precision in using those numbers.  The truth is that there are already large ‘wine factories’ doing just that and they are producing wines by the millions of cases.  To paraphrase one of my favorite musicians, David Lowery of Cracker, “there are a lot more professional wineries out there.  And they’re all fucking boring”.   I for one want the human element in my wine.  I want a product made by people who reflect on what they produce.  I want a wine that is the result of someone practicing a craft and not a chemist.  Based on other things Mr Kramer has written I was under the impression that he did too. It appears as if Mr Kramer wants to both eat and have his cake.

Where I DO AGREE with Mr Kramer is that WE SHOULD TELL THE TRUTH.  Winemakers should be more open about what they do to wines and more importantly why.  What Mr Kramer doesn’t realize is that until writers like himself, and the consumers he claims to serve,  view our craft with an open mind we will continue to be selective with the truth.  Until writers and consumers realize that the ideology they expect us live by is based on the lies we supposedly tell, producers aren’t likely to come clean anytime soon.  I think the first step in becoming a more open and honest wine culture is for consumers and writers to leave the winemaking to the winemakers.  Instead of telling us how you think wine should be made, try listening to how and why we do the things we do.  The second step will be the dissolution of the ego of wine writers and their understanding that the craft of winemaking cannot be learned in a book sitting in an office; it is learned in the cellar and vineyard.

Sugars are trending towards higher levels but my commitment to flavors has got me hanging fruit out longer than even I had expected.  We have harvested about 20% of our fruit so far.  Only one fermentation has taken off thus far so my impressions of the harvest are still buried in the haze filling my head, the result of a 23 hour work day followed by the usual 14 hour-a-day monotony.  I suspect any day now I will wake up to either find that everything is in barrel or that it was all a dream and my fruit is still hanging on the vines.

Talk around the valley centers on high brix, botrytis, and desiccation.  Though I have seen each of these none have been extreme or beyond our ability to deal with.  I mentioned in earlier posts that this entire season has had me baffled, and though my confusion continues I am now just to the point of trusting the vineyard.   Sometimes a wine grower just has to believe that the vines themselves want to make good wine and that they should be given the chance to do so.

As far as crop load goes I decided to go with my gut and assume that the vintage would turn cool and potentially wet.  I thinned most of the vineyard to a single cluster per shoot.  In some blocks this is still more than 2.5 tons to the acre.

Low and behold weather has cooled and the last three days have seen showers.  Let me emphasize SHOWERS.  Not down pours, not three days of consistent rain but a typical, slow Oregon drizzle that lasts 15 minutes and are followed by wind and sun.  I have to be clear about the nature of rainfall here or all of the wine writers, which never really visit here during vintage, will misconstrue the events and hastily damn the vintage before grapes are even picked.

Nights have cooled considerably as have days and it is really the diurnal variation that makes Oregon, in general, and Patton Valley Vineyard, specifically, such an interesting place to work with.  As the temperature extremes widen from day to night, ripening slows down.  It is my belief that it is this slow ripening that produces Pinot Noir with the finest structure, complexity, concentration and intensity of fruit.

It is still to early to, at this point, make any declarations about the vintage (or else I run the risk of being like those wine writers).  However, from my point of view I would say optimism is growing with each cool and relatively dry day.

    Programs such as The Simpsons and The Family Guy, among others, have demonstrated that the Cartoon can elevate simple observations and commentary, brutally clear language, to hilarious heights.  Something about animation allows it to soften a truth or at least dull its edge.  Wine related humor often lacks the tickling sarcasm that cartoons effectively deliver.  Until Now.  A friend forwarded this link to a U-tube cartoon that I think is exactly the sort of thing the wine biz needs right now; something to laugh at and an opportunity to hear something true that it might not want said.

This spring we had ideal weather during bloom, too ideal perhaps. It seems every flower set a berry resulting is very dense, closed clusters that are simply HUGE. If I were growing tomatoes, corn, wheat etc, I would appreciate the large crop that nature has given us. I have no problem with dropping fruit and have already done one ‘green harvest’ to reduce crop load.

Typically I would never drop below one cluster per shoot, it intuitively seems to me, that doing so brings the vine out of balance . This year however, with these enormous clusters, I am projecting unreasonably large yields even with just one cluster per shoot. I am finding myself on challenging ground intellectually; do I follow my one cluster per shoot inclination or do I respect tons per acre?

Further complicating things has been the extreme heat we have been experiencing here in the Willamette Valley. We have been through one record breaking heat spell and are now entering another. The peril this presents is this: If I carry too low of a crop and the vintage stays hot my sugars will develop faster than my flavors; the wines will be high in alcohol and potentially hollow and uninteresting. If I carry the currently heavy crop load and the weather turns cool, always a possibility here in Oregon, then I will have huge amounts of under ripe, poor quality fruit. I want my crop load to be like the bed and porridge of the baby bear, Just Right.

And “Just Right” is the tricky part. To get things Just Right I have to be able to see into the crystal ball and know what the weather is going to do a month from now. Really now, if I could do that I wouldn’t be here doing this! To be honest, like my friend, I don’t know what to do. All I can do is guess and hedge my bets and try to balance the extremes of risk. Despite what most people think about winemaking and winegrowing; there are rarely clear answers as to how to proceed. There is no class at Davis, no website or book or consultant that can tell you what the right thing to do is. When it comes down to it, more so in extremely hot or cool years , all a vintner has is that feeling in their gut. In my opinion the Best are those that follow it.

As a winemaker I have never considered myself an artist but a craftsman. The distinction for me is that my approach to winemaking is one of bringing out the beauty in my materials, the grape. Think of a furniture maker that is simply presenting a piece of wood in a way that best expresses its inherent beauty. Think of a mason working with stone to build a wall that best presents the nature of the stone. I see art as something more deliberate, something with a more clearly defined end point, something with a higher degree of intent. In the above examples an artist would build furniture more about the building and less about the wood, the wall more about design and technique and less about the stone itself. I’ve just never sought to so exactly determine the nature of my final product that I would consider it art; it isn’t about me it’s about my material.

As I begin blending my 2008 Lorna-Marie and block designated wines I am taken by the degree of Detail the wines show. The wines have very clearly defined borders, prominent but rounded corners and transition smoothly and efficiently between them. The surfaces range from velour and silk to polished glass and metal. The wines are well structured frames wrapped with elegant and exquisite fabrics. Think of them as the muscular arm of a woman not covered by the black dress.

This is allowing me, to an extent I have never before experienced, to more precisely shape a wine in the physical sense; its structure and texture. I feel that by carefully selecting the ‘pieces’ (specific barrels of wine) I can deliberately build the wine. I liken it to sculpture.

However I still cannot claim I am an artist. Each barrel is a very specific expression of Patton Valley Vineyard. They are all indicative of place but each tells there own version of the story. Though I may deliberately and with intent blend a wine, it is still more about the material than it is about me. Even though I am able to control, to a greater degree than ever before, the shape of the final product they are still just the presentation that I believe best shows off Patton Valley Vineyard. Though proud, I am still just a craftsman. I will leave the Art to the Artists.

Bloom this year came about 2 weeks earlier than the last couple of vintages putting the potential picking window somewhere in late September to early October; if we respect the old burgundian rule of picking 100 days post bloom. The more experience I get the more I believe the rule. 100 days seems to be the minimum amount of time it takes to get fruit to the point of physiologically mature and tasting great.

The advantage to a late September pick is that it greatly increases the chances of getting fruit off before the inevitable autumn rains arrive. I also think there is a possible disadvantage, though I am sure many of my peers would disagree. The style of Pinot I most enjoy is the result of slow ripening, developing concentration and intensity on a lighter and more elegant frame (at moderate alcohol levels). To this end I believe that the last three weeks of ripening are the most crucial and the weather at this time can have a tremendous impact on wine style. In the later half of October I can be almost certain that we will enjoy moderate temperatures with very cool nights. Late September can still be quite warm and the nights less cool, rapidly advancing ripening.

In Oregon we must balance two opposing desires; the desire to pull our fruit from the vineyards dry and without the dilution caused by rains and the desire to have grapes ripen slowly, evenly and completely. I for one will take the risk of rain head on and prefer to have grapes ripen slowly during the cool, short days of October instead of potentially warmer days and nights of September. I know other growers feel very differently, we all have our own ideas about what constitutes the perfect vintage.

One unique thing about bloom this year is that, at Patton Valley Vineyard at least, it took nearly two weeks to finish. That means that on a given cluster there could be up to a two week difference in age from one berry to another. This could lead to some very uneven ripening. Good vineyard management, early leaf pulling and meticulous fruit thinning, can minimize some of this risk. Regardless, it will require winemakers to be very careful in their picking decisions. In winemaking knowledge is power and knowing now that some of these issues might arise allows me to make better decisions in the vineyard. My potential success as a winemaker is dependent upon my being a successful vineyard manager first.

Already the 2009 vintage is looking as if it is going to have its own unique set of challenges. I revel in the opportunity to overcome them; god I love this job!

That mindset is very important to the style of Rosé I produce. I have been told by many winemakers, consumers and sommelier’s that my Rosé is among the best in Oregon (some say the United States) and, not to be arrogant, I have to agree. Again, it is the mindset.

First of all I see Rosé as a confused wine. It doesn’t know if it is supposed to be red or white, it sort of suffers from issues similar to those described as “transgender”. This is especially so of Rosés of Pinot Noir. In my opinion Pinot Noir, more specifically its phenolic and color profile, is poorly suited to Rosé production. The key to good Rosé, in my opinion, is minimizing bitter phenolic compounds. The problem with Pinot Noir is that if you want color you must extract it and when you do you get bitter phenolics. Most Rosé of Pinot Noir is made by red winemakers whose job is to maximized phenolics; minimizing phenolics just isn’t part of their skill set. In addition the vast majority of Rosé is a byproduct of red wine production, the result of Saignée or the bleeding off of juice from red wine fermentations to increase their concentration. And let’s not forget the tendency to bottle Rosé with significant amounts of residual sugar. Rosé therefore is like the red headed step child of the wine world (Disclaimer, I AM a redheaded step child).

The way I approach Rosé, my mindset, is to focus on what the final wine should be and work backwards. At Patton Valley most of the Rosé we produce is not from Saignée, it is not a byproduct. I designate certain blocks of the vineyard to be made into Rosé and farm them accordingly. I also strive to minimize phenolic compounds. I do this by keeping skin contact to a minimum; instead crushing the grapes and pressing them immediately. Though this sacrifices some color, it creates a wine of purity, a more than fair trade off in my opinion. The wine is then settled until clear and fermented until dry, bone dry. I think another thing that sets my Rosé apart isn’t what I do but what I don’t do. I employ no malolactic fermentation and never stir the lees; this maintains fruit intensity and acidity as tight as a piano string. Once fermentation is complete I sulfite the wine and let it rest on the lees for 3-4 months; this keeps the wine fresh and creates some weight and roundness. The result is a pure and crisp wine that drinks well cool, goes great with foods and better with friends. What I am going for is the perfect sipper for spring and summer.

Interested? Stay tuned to the website of Patton Valley Vineyard for the Rosé release!

To me this confirms a suspicion I have had for years:  French coopers are saving the best wood for french winemakers.  In a few cases Domains are aging there own wood and having barrels custom made.  I just can't believe, after tasting, that we new world winemakers are on equal footing with our old world counterparts in terms of the quality of the wood we receive. 

I cannot say that I am surprised by this.  Burgundian winemakers have the coopers in their own back yards, literally.  Some of the producers I have spoken with have indicated that not only are they good friends with the cooper but so where their fathers and their fathers before that.  Producers here have the opportunity to work closely with coopers to customize the toasting process to better fit their style and sites.  Whereas we in the new world only have the coopers general style to select from to create wines specific to our desired styles.  Our approach is therefore much more ham-fisted than that of the Burundians.

In addition to being surprised at the level of new wood producers are using I am also surprised at the relative lack of microbial flaws in the wines, all of the wines I have tasted on visits I would describe as clean.  This suggests that like myself, Burgundian producers consider the scars left by Brett and other spoilage organisms to be a more dreadful violation of "terrior" than New Oak. 

I have to point out that I am not crying foul play here.  Though I wish I had the opportunities to work closely with coopers to perfect the match between barrel and wine, and also wish that I could gain access to the same quality of wood as Burgundian producers, I also realize there is something else at work here.  Tradition.  It isn't just the knowledge of a vineyards character that is gained through 1500 years of wine growing.  Relationships are, I believe, just as an important tradition for Burgundian producers as the knowledge of "terrior".  

The best I can hope for then is that my great, great, grandchildren will bennefit from the first steps I take to developing relationships with coopers here in Europe.  Tradition doesn't happen in a single lifetime.

Though I have yet to visit a cellar or walk the rows of sacred vineyard ground, I do believe that I should of been born here instead of the USA.  I have often dreamed of a culture that valued food produced by craftsmen.  In Beaune there seems to be not just a bakery but also a charcuterie shop on every block and apparently it is just fine to have a beer at 10am.  I wish I could make McMinnville a little bit more like Beaune.

I will, hopefully, be posting my impressions and experiences in the restaurants and cellars of Burgundy while I am here so please stay tuned!