Why I Love My Job

by Kyle Anne Pallischeck, Tasting Room Manager

Community:

1.  A group of people living together in one place, esp. one practicing common ownership.

If you travel around to any of the numerous wineries in the Finger Lakes, you'll surely hear someone behind the tasting bar recommending a wine from a winery... other than the one they're working at.  Some people find this surprising, as the expectation seems to be that we are all competitors.  In reality I think it's a true representation of the community that has developed in the wine industry of the Finger Lakes Region.

What’s in the Bottle – Shards of Glass?

By Steven Hickman Ph.D., Staff Scientist, Harvard University and Fox Run Winery Intern emeritus

The story, as told by Peter Bell, goes as follows:  a woman calls the Fox Run tasting room one afternoon, in a state of some distress.  She had removed a bottle of Fox Run wine from her fridge, and as she was preparing to open and serve said bottle, noticed shards of glass suspended in the wine.  She was rather upset at the winery, accusing it of at best gross incompetence on the bottling line, and at worst an attempt on her life.  What had caused this strange circumstance?

What I Learn From My Customers

By Dan Mitchell, Regional Sales Manager

I have been known during my time here at Fox Run to collect and archive some of the unusual comments and questions that come from visitors to our winery. These can come fast and furious when the tasting bar is five people deep. My responses are often of little help.

What's in the Bottle: 2001 Cabernet Sauvignon

by Peter Bell, winemaker

After a whirlwind couple of weeks helping to wrap up the Tierce Riesling blend, serving with Scott and Tricia as a judge at the Finger Lakes International Wine Competition, and giving a couple of lectures at the Rochester Institute of Technology, I finally found time last night to open and enjoy a bottle of our 2001 Cabernet Sauvignon that I'd found in my cellar.

There's No Telling Who You're Going to Meet in New Jersey

by Lauren Brunhofer, PR intern 


In college, there are two words that are very sacred to the average student: “Spring Break”. This week-long vacation is more than just a few days off from classes and academic responsibility. It is an opportunity to regain a sense of sanity after the seemingly endless duration of midterms. While some of us were lucky enough to venture off to a tropical oasis, I spent my Spring Break at home in everyone’s favorite state… New Jersey. Although I was unable to sip fruity drinks while sinking my toes into the sand, the weather was steadily above 50 degrees, which was paradise in comparison to the tundra of Geneva, NY.  

Understanding Wine in One Quick Lesson

by Peter Bell, Winemaker

Yesterday I drove over to Ithaca, New York, to teach a class at Cornell University. The lecture I gave, titled Balance in Wine, has been a regular of mine in that class for 17 years now. I often begin by telling the students (most of whom are not planning to become wine makers) that understanding this concept is probably the single most powerful tool for understanding wine.

Ramblings in the Sunshine State

by Peter Bell, winemaker

If you’re in the wine business, you can’t really escape wine, even while on vacation.  I wouldn't even want to really, but I’m often reluctant to tell strangers what I do for fear of what almost inevitably comes next: some variation on “Let me tell you about my experiences with wine…” 

No More Mr. Nice Guy

- by Tricia Renshaw, assistant winemaker


I can’t believe we’ve let Kelby leave again.  Last year, he was off to Marlborough, New Zealand.  This time, he’s gone to Tasmania, the island state of Australia.  We wish we could keep him here, but he has to follow the whisperings of Calliope:  voyage, see, learn.

 

A Mental Vacation From Winter

We live in such a visually beautiful area...so much to be exploited by photos! I've been planning for the arrival of Spring and Summer of 2011 here at the winery, which made me go back and organize some photos from a shoot earlier this year.  This first photo is an absolute magazine cover taken by Glen Sanders, a photographer who has done lots of work for Wine Spectator. 

Winter in the Finger Lakes!

If only! How nice to remember the vineyards from only a few short (warm) months ago.

It was quite a chore leading the photographer around for 4 or 5 hours, but in the end we think it was worth every penny for these photos - especially in helping us escape the winter for a moment!  Take a look for yourself: 

Peter Bell and Tricia Renshaw

I had to make sure and “style” my subjects, although this one is pretty natural!

Winemaker and Assistant Winemaker

The last time we did this Peter and Tricia wore BRIGHT blue and
BRIGHT red t-shirts.  This works much better in our natural surroundings

Scott Osborn, President

Scott also makes a great subject (we styled him too).

What is this about?

Here, Scott is explaining how turkeys cling to the trellis and flap their wings
so that the grapes fall.  Before you know it two or three rows are stripped. 

Here Comes the Sun

What more could he ask for...

Ruth Osborn, Comptroller

...other than his beautiful wife, Ruth!

 John Kaiser, Vineyard Manager Extraordinaire

Our vineyard manager, however, was not entirely helpful…
he just does not want his picture taken.

 Peter Howe, Winery/Vineyard Wunderkind

Pete Howe is always moving so you have to get him on the fly.

Winemaker, or wine glass holder?

Peter, frankly, would be the first to admit he can be a difficult subject.

 Taking a sample in the Winery

Glen, however, did an amazing job capturing what
I think are some totally natural expressions from Peter.

 10,000 Watt Smile

And then there is always lovely Tricia...

 Tasting in the Winery

...never a bad photo of our Assistant Winemaker!

Finger Lakes or French Countryside?

All in all…a good day.

Of course there are the traditional vineyard photos – but what’s not to love? This property is stunning and certainly makes for a great subject.


By: Leslie Kroeger, Marketing Manager

New Year's Wishes

It’s 8:43 on New Year’s Eve, and the last of the fifteen-year-olds has arrived.  My twelve-year-old gratefully accepted an invitation to her friend’s home tonight, so it’s me, Elizabeth and a few of her friends here tonight.  We’ll toast midnight’s arrival with a choice of sparkling apple or grape juice.  

Don’t worry; I treated myself to some delicious wine earlier tonight.  For dinner, I roasted a chicken which was sublime in its simplicity.  It was crispy and golden brown from the butter and smashed garlic I rubbed under its skin before roasting.  In the oven, melted butter and rendered fat bathed tender little yellow potatoes I had tucked under the bird along with some sprigs of fresh thyme.  Salt and pepper completed the works.  While the house filled with intoxicating aromas, I sipped our 2007 Pinot noir and happily hummed snippets of a tune I can’t place.  

Kelby said he thought he and his family would be having beef tenderloin tonight, as that has become something of a Russell family tradition.  If we’re lucky, Kelby will post a blog explaining how he cooks the beef and what he serves with it—both in terms of side dishes and wine choices.  

Peter and I admire Kelby’s perpetual calmness, especially while he’s cooking.  On several occasions, we’ve watched him whip up a feast—hors d’oeuvres through dessert—with nary a crack in his peaceful demeanor.  It’s as though he has never contemplated the possibility that his main dish might finish cooking too far ahead of his multiple vegetable preparations, and of course, it doesn’t.  He’s as quietly passionate about marvelous food as he is about wine, and he is very generous with his cooking talents.  I’ll try to persuade him to give us his New Year’s Eve feast details.

Peter most likely had something very fresh and low on the food chain.  He’s extraordinarily adept at listening to what his body wants to eat, eating that, and nothing more.  Eating with Peter is a joyful exploration of how grains and vegetables with herbs, oils and vinegars can be simple and exotic at the same time, and how satisfying those foods can be.   

He’ll probably go to sleep before midnight.  Years ago, Peter told me that was his habit, and that he is usually the first one up on New Year’s Day.  That sounded, well, odd at first, but really nice upon reflection.  Imagine the first day of a new year, unencumbered by headaches from overindulgence in food and wine and keeping late hours.  Imagine waking up fresh and ready to tackle whatever the new day brings.  A rather great idea, don’t you think?  

I had a chance to try it for myself a few years ago.  The girls were small, and under my power then.  We toasted the new year at 8:30 and they were asleep by 9:00.  I wasn’t far behind them.  We woke up early, and went for a walk as the sun came up.  It had snowed hard during the night and the morning was muffled and still.  Unbroken snow lay all around the city; the only marks were from our boots and the sled I dragged behind me.  The girls, laughing and rosy-cheeked, took turns being pulled in the sled.  As promised, we were the only ones awake (as far as we could tell) and it felt like the whole world belonged to us.  It seemed we could feel our unseen neighbors—cozy and warm in their somnolence, they exuded a collective sleepiness that lay heavy over their houses like a woolen blanket.   It was seductive, that sleepiness, but the day belonged to my bright-eyed girls, and we were reveling in it.  

That New Year’s memory is one of my favorites.  We haven’t had another like it, though, because my girls discovered that they like to stay up late.  Veeeeerrrrry late.  

This year, we’re celebrating youth and exuberance.  Theirs, not mine.  We just went on a madcap dash to find Pop Rocks—somebody had a craving, and they were too excited to turn down.  I try to say, “Why not?” when I can.  Most stores were closed, naturally, and those that were open did not have any Pop Rocks.  The kids consoled themselves by building a fort in my living room, and playing a movie really loudly.  In a few years, this silliness will give way to sophisticated dinner parties, and we’ll celebrate that too, in its time.  

These teenagers remind me tonight of people I haven’t seen, or in some cases thought of, in over twenty years.  I wonder how they are doing, and hope their lives have turned out to be as fulfilling as mine.  

By the time you read this, December 31^st will have slipped away, and January 1^st will have quietly dawned.  

Kelby will have decorously held aloft a midnight glass of sparkling wine, and offered a toast as an ambrosial conclusion to their traditional rite.  

Peter will have slept well and risen, and greeted the day, full of renewed energy.  Perhaps he has already taken his morning walk, maybe with Max to liven up the quiet morning and to bark at all those silly people still a-bed on this first day.  

My girls and I will be among those still snoozing late into the morning.  We’ll sleep as long as the puppies will let us, and then we’ll pick up bits of fallen streamers, and wayward potato chips.  Some other New Year’s Eve, I’ll remember when my older daughter was fifteen, and she had her first New Year’s Eve party, and how they laughed all night long.  

I hope that as I’m writing this, where ever you are, and whatever form your New Year’s Eve takes, that you are surrounded by people you love, and that you are happy.  

Bonne année, meilleurs souhaits,

Tricia

Music of the Day:

• Jean Redpath, a true treasure of a performer and interpreter of traditional Scottish songs, performing live on Late Night with David Letterman (Letterman being as instantly captivated by her voice as we were):

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What to be Thankful For

Yesterday, Thanksgiving, my family and I discovered and thoroughly investigated what I consider to be the greatest piece of software ever invented...Pandora. As I understand it, if you have a wireless internet connection you can set it up. We have wireless speakers and a little thing that looks and feels like a PDA and you can basically go around your house and choose and play any music, any radio station (that is streamed), any song that is downloaded into your computer. Or maybe play a CD in one room and other music in another room with one fingertip touch. My life is changed. It is unbelievable. Your favorite music all the time.

So last night we sat at the table after a delicious meal (except for my sweet potato biscuits - those were a flop - note to self: don't try new recipes on Thankgiving) and created playlists from the artists that my Mother used to make us listen to when we were growing up. The favorite of the night...Shirley Bassey radio!!! Santana, The Fifth Dimension, Jackson 5. What a riot. Each time you choose an artist Pandora will save that "station" and it will choose songs similar to that artist. It is magical.

What if there was a Pandora for wine?? If you loved, for instance, a flowery, mango-ish, perfectly balanced semi-dry riesling from Fox Run Vineyards a little voice would pop up and say, "well if you loved that wine, then you will love........" what a great viral selling tool for Finger Lakes wines. And the little voice would only suggest Finger Lakes rieslings because this is the only place that such wine is available. We are so lucky to be living and working here in this beautiful place.

What if there was a Pandora for winemaking teams?? That would be a complete failure. I can tell you for sure that there is no other team like the 3 amigos up there. Peter Bell is my hero. First of all, a man who speaks six languages makes me swoon. I am consistently amazed at the quality of every wine that shows up in the tasting room. One of the first times I met Peter he came down to the Cafe for a wine & food pairing and as we were tasting the 2006 Gewurztraminer I blurted out that he was a genius and he gave me a big hug. The talented Ms. Tricia Renshaw is quite a find with her uncanny olfactory memory and fantastic descriptors. When I first came to Fox Run I spent most of the night at an event with Tricia and the next day called up to the winery to announce to Peter that I was madly in love with her. Then there is Kelby J. Russell who started as an intern. He sent letters to lots of Finger Lakes wineries and I think Peter was one of only two people to respond...we are so lucky he did. Kelby graduated from Harvard, and basically has been traveling around the world in order to execute what I think is a very calculating strategy to find the perfect life. A brilliant, cool, winemaker-marketing expert-tech head-music fan-foodie. He is mainly responsible for this blog and keeping it alive.

As I sit here finishing this post I am listening to Nina Simone radio on Pandora which leads us to Charlie Spivak, Etta James, Ella Fitzgerald, Big Mama Thorton, Rosemary Clooney, Diana Krall, Nat King Cole, etc!!!!! I am so thankful.

Here is my shameless Fox Run plug...sorry Kelby J. Russell: Today only!! Come to the winery and buy our delicious 2007 Meritage and get a bottle of our even more delicious 2007 Pinot noir FREE.

By: Leslie Kroeger, Marketing & Jack-of-all-trades


Music of the Day:

• Stanton Moore - Take It To The Street; "Who Took The Happiness Out?"
• Ed. Note: Leslie wins the award for being the first person to select a song I couldn't find a video for on Youtube to plug.  The selection is fantastic, however, and can be heard for free via the Amazon link above.  Check it out!

Support Artists, buy the music you like!

Where Have All The Fruit Flavors Gone?

With the fun and work of vintage behind us, now is the time that we have to have courage in our convictions at the winery.  By this point in the year (i.e. three weeks after the completion of vintage) when we are asked a question regarding the 2010 vintage we almost resemble a high school debate team; ask about the Finger Lakes 2010 Harvest and we can tear off an answer from rote in record time.  Ironically, it is precisely this time of year that we also happen to lose our ability to really track how our wines are doing.

This is not to say that our thoughts on Vintage 2010 are glib.  Based on the available information, which we feel is only useful after all the grapes are in, we are happy to provide our estimation of how everything will look as these wines are released and opened.  Nevertheless, in the winery we are now faced with an annual twist in winemaking that keeps us humble: the Thanksgiving slumber.

In her post on Gewürztraminer, Tricia briefly mentioned that one of the many times that leaves us doubtful in gewürztraminer’s development actually occurs after the harvest.  The wine seems to go into a quiet funk, losing much of the lychee, rose, and fruit precociousness that made it so endearing mere weeks ago.  What does it smell like it instead?  Well, nothing, to be frank.

While we have seen this happen to our gewürztraminer already, it is a phenomenon that occurs with all of our aromatic white wines.  Just as many of us will be doing after a large turkey dinner in a few days time, the rieslings, pinot gris, and gewürztraminer have all decided to take a snooze.  These wines will not wake up from their nap for quite some time, however, and in the meantime will send us into fits in the winery wondering whether everything is all right.

This is where the courage part comes into the equation.  During the fermentations of these wines we are constantly tasting everything and noting the beautiful aromas present in them at that stage.  While this process is enjoyable, the primary purpose is to evaluate how the fermentation is progressing and ensuring nothing is compromising the wine.  The other purpose of this tasting, however, is just as important; to get an early feel for what style of wine each block of grapes in each tank is best suited for.  

Particularly as our rieslings are fermenting, when we taste we are taking note of the flavors in the wine and how they match up with its structure - especially the acid profile.  With a softer and rounder riesling proto-wine, we start to think of our semi dry program and the slightly more tropical and tree fruit flavors we find complement that level of sugar.  With a riesling that is lean and electric in its acidity, we lean more towards our dry program and the citrus driven flavors we appreciate with a lower level of sugar. 

Based on this tasting we eventually decide when to end the fermentation of our individual blocks of grapes and thus how much sugar will be left in each.  It is at this point that we then lose the guiding light of those beautiful flavors.  By chilling the wine down to 28 degrees fahrenheit for a week and then adding sulfur, we arrest the fermentation and then kill the yeast.  Trying to taste the wine at this point to find the flavors we hoped to lock into it is fruitless (your call whether it is the loss of fruit flavors or that terrible pun that is most unfortunate).  To me, the wine smells and tastes flat even though the structure remains.  Maybe there are hints of banana, but this aroma reminds me more of the suspended-solids character of a nice hefeweizen rather than the wine we wanted.

And with that we enter the winter, having to trust our decisions and our noses back when we decided to stop the fermentation.  This trust gnaws away at us in the coming weeks as the continuing lack of fruit flavors begin to worry us, even though we know and expect this to happen.  How was vintage 2010?  It was fantastic, but right now we would appreciate it if some of those wines decided to agree.

By:  Kelby Russell, Winemaking Team

Music of the Day:

• The Beatles - The Beatles ("The White Album" [Disc 2]); Good Night:

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Autumn Repose

I hear it may snow tonight.  I’m not really surprised—despite last week’s balmy weather, we are in the middle of November.  We’ve lost our yellows and reds; the trees are skeletal, and everything is green or brown.  The lake and sky are steely, and it is so still.  It feels like snow.  

At the winery, we’ve moved inside, and are tending to those homey things that get put off during the frenzy of vintage.  

Kelby spent the morning scrubbing tanks.  It turns out that Mr. Clean Magic Erasers are wonderful for shining stainless steel.  Peter did some laboratory analysis, started a filtration, and answered e-mails.  I vacuumed the warehouse- and winery-floors.   None of it’s glamorous, but it’s essential.  

Kelby’s roommate from his Harvard days, Dave, came to the winery today.  He’s very friendly and has an easy smile.  He fit right in here, and kept busy at the computer while Kelby finished his work.  We all waited for a visit from our friends from Anthony Road.  

Around 11:00, Johannes Reinhardt (winemaker) and Peter Becraft (assistant winemaker) came to review our wines with us.  We gathered samples of all of our Rieslings, as well as our Pinot gris and Gewurztraminer.  

We tasted and talked.  We compared harvest figures (°Brix, pH, and titratable acidity) with those from Anthony Road.  We made predictions about how our wines might develop: How will this Riesling taste when it’s reached dryness?  Will the acid profile be just right when we blend these two Rieslings?  After we filter this Riesling, will it show the clarity we’re after?  Should Riesling 6 be released as a Reserve?  We discussed flavors, and textures, and palate-weight.  Johannes gave us his highest praise.  “Elegant,” he quietly declared, as he sipped and nodded.

When we tasted our low-alcohol style Riesling, Johannes excused himself to fetch some samples from his winery, which is just down the road.  

He returned with two fascinating bottles: one contained their low-alcohol Riesling.  The other held a Riesling that they had allowed to spontaneously ferment (that’s to say, they did not add any yeast).  They were made last year, and will not be released for a few years yet.  These styles need time to develop into the beautiful and complex wines they will surely become.  

Our small laboratory seemed a bright and cheery island in nature’s gray.  It was warm, not only from all the bodies in our little space, but from the outpouring of enthusiasm and friendship.  

It’s one o’clock, now.  Johannes and Peter Becraft just slid away to attend to other tasks.  Kelby and Dave packed into Kelby’s car; they’re off to visit old haunts in Boston.  Peter is finishing up his filtration, and I, of course, am writing to you.  

It occurs to me how the winery at this time of year is so much like many of our homes in late autumn.  There is a lot of cleaning to be done, but it’s not all drudgery.  The dreary days are often brightened by visits from friends we haven’t seen in a while.  And it’s always nice to be puttering inside when it’s blustery outside.  

Ask me in February how I feel about being indoors while gales are blowing, but for today, as geese are silhouetted against arctic clouds in a chrome sky, as pale-gold barren cornstalks wave about, as friends enjoy with us the bounty of our harvest, I am extraordinarily happy.  

By: Tricia Renshaw, Assistant Winemaker

Music of the Day:

• Pink Martini - Sympathique;  Sympathique:

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Rackin' in the Free World

Mid November, and the winery crew is able to make it home for dinner, no sweat, every night, and take a bit of a break on weekends to boot. If I look back at the careful cellar records we keep for each wine we make, nicely done up in a binder specific to that year, I see that this has not always been so. Just a few years ago we were still pressing out a few bins of Cab franc in the week leading up to Thanksgiving, and yes, the snow was flying at the time.

The fruit flies I’ve written so fondly about in previous posts (did you know that fruit flies and people share 60% of their genes?) are doing their Custer’s Last Stand thing right now. Their redoubt in this case is not a bleak spot in the hills of Montana, but the winery lab; and they seem to know the game is up. 


This week is a big one for racking. I should probably define that term here, and perhaps the best way to do that is to scroll through the Wiktionary entries on the verb ‘to rack’. We have:

1. To Place in or hang on a rack
• Well, we do place our jackets on a rack most mornings, but that's not the definition we're after.
2. (billiards, snooker, pool) To put the balls into the triangular rack and set them in place on the table.
• Sometimes we joke about getting a pool table up here, but that has yet to happen.  Nope.
3. (slang) To strike a male in the groin with the knee.
• Not gonna go there.  I have been 'racked' once or twice in my life, but I didn't enjoy it enough to learn that there was actually a term for it.
4. To stretch the joints of a person.
• I racked my brains trying to make this definition fit anything wine-related, and came up empty.
5. To fly, as vapor or broken clouds.
• Obscure!  Maybe someone had kneed the clouds in the groin.  Fly away, little broken clouds!
6. (brewing) To clarify, and thereby deter further fermentation of, beer, wine or cider by draining or siphoning it from the dregs.

At last! Here’s the definition we’re looking for, though in miserable sixth place, dictionary-wise. Our collective ego is bruised: Is what we do really less important than broken clouds? And what’s with calling lees ‘dregs’? 


Anyway, picture a shiny tank of wine. Riesling inside. It has finished fermentation, and the yeasts – those beautiful microbes that do our bidding every fall (know what? we share a bunch of genes with them, too) are either still in suspension or sitting in a thick layer at the bottom of the tank. 


It’s the ones at the bottom, the so-called heavy lees, that it’s time to say adios to. Here they are, in a picture taken moments before they were unceremoniously sluiced down the drain:

The sediment in a tank of wine at this time of year is composed mostly of dead or dying yeast cells.

Their brethren and sistern, the light lees that are still in suspension, are not just pesky non-team-players in the wine clarification game. In fact, we want them there for a few more months, yea though they make the wine cloudy and gross looking. Some winemakers employ these dead and dying yeast cells to gradually add a little mouthfeel to their wines, in a process called autolysis. Others take advantage of their ability to scavenge oxygen from the wine, a really very useful talent if you think of a wine’s aging trajectory as being progressively more oxygen-averse.

By: Peter Bell, Winemaker

Music of the Day:

• Pearl Jam, covering Neil Young's Rockin' In The Free World at Pink Pop 92:

Support Artists, buy the music you like!

Wine and Thanksgiving

My wine recommendations for Thanksgiving Dinner appear at the end.  I know this topic would be more timely next week, but I hope it is more useful this week with time and a weekend yet to make plans and purchases.

It is one of my favorite times of the year.  No, not the completion of vintage and the ecstasy, expectation, and sense of relief that follow it. (Had you asked me two weeks ago the third variable in that series would have been ennui, but as nice as that alliterative flourish would be, I don't roll that way.)  Instead, I am talking about the imminent arrival of Thanksgiving.

For me this brings back memories of the fantastic five-day weekend we received from public school, watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, great food, the beginning of the Christmas season, and a trip the weekend before to watch my Harvard Crimson crush the bullies from the inferior institution located somewhere unpleasant in Connecticut.  But for the past few years, and now more than ever before, this time of year is a favorite of mine due to the arrival of the annual "What Wine to Have with Thanksgiving Dinner" articles in publications across this fine nation.

Why does this amuse me so?  It all boils down to a little secret that all of us in the wine industry, especially wine writers, know: there is hardly a wine in this world that does not pair with turkey and Thanksgiving Dinner.  There are two considerations that factor into this reality:

• Turkey pairs well with nearly any light to medium bodied wine.  This isn't a beef or fish situation that clearly calls out for a certain wine to stand-up and/or not overwhelm the food; roast turkey is a flavorful dish that pairs with nearly all interesting white, red, or rosé wines.  With the notable exception of very heavy, jammy, alcoholic, or extracted red wines, you will enjoy nearly any wine you like with turkey.
• Thanksgiving Dinner is too large, too varied, and too complex a meal to ever find the "perfect" wine for.  What goes nicely with the green bean casserole is not likely to match the cranberry sauce.  What pairs with the mashed potatoes will likely be a miss with the sweet potatoes.  

1. One option would be to have a large variety of individual bottles for the evening, but this is onerous and expensive.
2. A second, equally unpalatable, option would be to select wines and then pair them with each dish in the meal.  This would not only be expensive, but is a pot shot at best.  We can have a hard time pairing when we have access to tasting every wine in our tasting room, let alone guessing in the dark.

What's my suggestion?  Pick a wine or two (one white/rosé, one red) that you enjoy and you cannot go wrong!  Preferably these wines would be light to medium bodied (not too heavy or alcoholic) so you do not tire of it or have it tire you out over the course of a long meal, but this is the only other guideline I would offer to "drink what you enjoy."

Despite the fact that wine with Thanksgiving Dinner should not be complicated or intimidating, the way it is usually treated always results in the wine articles I love so much.  It is no offense to the wine writers, who are asked and compelled to provide insight on the issue, that this is the easiest feature they have to write every year.  They know they can pick most any wine and be successful, they just need to put some words on paper and they have earned a handy pay check.

Some wine writers, such as Eric Asimov at the New York Times, go above and beyond and preface their yearly article with this reality; nearly anything will work and their recommendations are more suggestions and insight into their pairing philosophy.  Others continue to print the idea that one should only serve zinfandel from the US because it is an American grape, from a California producer, for American Thanksgiving.  With all due respect; the grape is not American, there are many places other than California that produce wine in America, and high-octane zinfandels are actually in that small group of wines that pair terribly with Thanksgiving Dinner.

With all that being said, and our advice that you pick the wines you enjoy most for your Thanksgiving Dinner, here is what will be on my table:

• '09 Riesling (Semi-Dry):  Beautiful tropical and tree fruit aromas and flavors, with a refreshing combination of sugar and enough acidity to keep you coming back for another sip and more food. Complements rich foods by keeping them from getting cloying, while the slight sugar and fruit flavors provide a nice counterpoint to turkey and vegetables.
• '07 Pinot Noir:  A medium-light bodied Pinot Noir that has developed the earthy and cherry aromas and flavors that we find so enticing.  Refreshing to drink and those flavors are dynamite with Thanksgiving staples, but this wine still has enough grip to keep you interested.

Happy Feasting!

By: Kelby Russell, Winemaking Team

Music of the Day:

• In memoriam of an inspired composer with one of the most transcendent pieces of the 20th century.  
• Henryk Górecki; Symphony No. 3, Op. 36 - Symphony of Sorrowful Songs (as performed by Dawn Upshaw and the London Sinfonietta):

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The Barrel: Wine Container Ne Plus Ultra

Barrels are such an integral part of winemaking that it’s hard to visit a winery anywhere and not see at least a few of these beautiful oaken containers on display. In fact, the standard, cliché photo of a winemaker shows him or her either posed in front of a stack of barrels or taking a sample of wine out of one for evaluation.

The barrel as we know it is a remarkably old invention, having been developed by the Celts about 700 years ago. Yes! In addition to having brought us Enya, Lucky Charms and the phrase “Top o’ the mornin’ to ya!”, the Celts, who populated a great swath of Europe in their heyday, also developed the technology to bend staves of wood and hold them tight with iron hoops. I guess they had to have some way of keeping the vermin out of their breakfast cereal.

Primarily a transport container in its original iteration, the barrel came to be associated with directly improving wine quality only much more recently. Nowadays it’s almost obligatory to put fine red wines in barrels for a year or so, and many of the finest Chardonnays camp out there too (Riesling, Nein danke).

As it happens, Chardonnay likes to be introduced to oak well before it is actually a finished wine, via a process called barrel fermentation. Now commonplace, this practice was new and cutting-edge to New World winemakers about 30 years ago, though in reality it had been practiced by Burgundian winemakers for eons (add your own definition of an eon here).

The story goes that either a Californian or an Australian practitioner went to Burgundy and asked, “Why do you ferment your Chardonnay in barrels?” The answer, no doubt accompanied by a Gallic shrug, was along the lines of  “Because that’s the only container I have.”

The other story, this one actually verifiable, is that Fox Run owner Scott Osborn is here in the Finger Lakes because of barrel fermented Chardonnay. He had spent some time immersed in the California wine industry in the 1980s, but decided to set up shop locally after tasting an early example from the pioneers of that style here, Wagner Vineyards.

Putting Chardonnay juice in barrels, and then commencing to look after what has just become a large number of individual fermentations rather than just one, certainly ramps up the work load during vintage. But the returns in terms of wine quality are enormous. Thanks to our understanding of microbiology and biochemistry, we now know that yeast cell enzymes act in concert with the soluble components of oak to produce aroma compounds that would otherwise not make their way into the wine.

Thus a barrel-fermented Chardonnay, even one from new oak, can show as not especially oaky. The integration of oak into the fruit can be so subtle that we even ferment that most delicate of wine styles, our Blanc de Blancs sparkling wine, in oak, albeit oak that was “pre-owned” by several previous vintages of Chardonnay. By contrast, a Chardonnay introduced to a new barrel after fermenting to dryness would smell more like a lumberyard than a wine. (Those of us who tasted the early, clumsy examples of oak-aged California Chard in the late 1970s remember that very sensation. Eeew.)

Our barrel-fermented Chardonnay, destined for the bottling we designate Reserve, is just coasting to dryness as I write this. Next step: coaxing all 33 barrels through malolactic fermentation. More on that, including the winemaker-specific pseudo-malady known as Red Ear, in a future post.

-By Peter Bell, Winemaker

Music of the Day:

• Patrick Hadley; Jazz Improvisation on a 5 Octave Array Mbira (Youtube Only):

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Socratic Dialogue Yields Quick Results

Last year, a good friend of ours, Evan Dawson, challenged the Finger Lakes wine community with a question: Why don’t we make a low-alcohol style Riesling like Germany does?

Our responding question at the time seemed straightforward and air-tight: given that our Rieslings are beautifully balanced at around 11-12% alcohol; given that our cool climate blesses us with Rieslings which are nuanced and crisp; given their vibrant flavors that range from lime zest to mango purée to pineapple to tangerine; given that sometimes there are notes of fennel or bay leaf, and always some alluring river rock (who else can boast of river rocks?)…

Why would we want to copy a wine style from another part of the world, when our own Rieslings are so beguiling?

Fast-forward to last July, and you’d find Peter, Kelby and me at the Riesling Rendezvous in Seattle, Washington, a winemaker-heavy think tank devoted to this most singular grape variety. We, along with several other winemakers from the Finger Lakes, had the opportunity to taste hundreds of Rieslings from around the world.  Over the course of three days, we participated in a slew of blind tastings and seminars, and came to some interesting conclusions.  

First of all, you’ll be proud to know how well our local Rieslings showed among those from long-established Rock Star producers.  Without knowing what they were tasting, the crowd -- comprised of Riesling producers from Alsace, Germany, Austria, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the US (both coasts as well as Michigan) -- extolled the enchanting flavors, beautiful acidity, purity and length of the Finger Lakes examples. 

We weren’t at all surprised to rediscover how delicious our Rieslings are, but it was certainly nice to have our firmly-held beliefs reaffirmed in an international forum. 

We were also not the least bit surprised to find some delicious, and different, expressions of Riesling being made around the world.

You might be surprised to learn that one of those styles was, yes, a low-alcohol sweet Riesling from Germany.  What we admired in those examples was the balance achieved in a wine which should, by rights, taste like sugary juice.  These wines had a lot, and I mean a lot, of sugar: around 60 to 70 grams per liter (or 6-7 percent, if that’s a more comfortable measurement for you).  Their alcohol content ranged from 8-10 percent, and they achieved some delicacy, despite their fruit intensity.  We were inspired.

We never want to stop making Rieslings in the styles Peter Bell has helped make internationally famous—very dry to semi-dry, with luscious flavors and clarity; perfectly balanced and with a moderate alcohol content (11-11.5 %).  These wines are exquisitely poised as they go into the bottle in their youth, and they have consistently proven that they become even more delicious as they age.  However, that doesn’t mean we don’t want to play with our boundaries.

At that conference, we surmised that our Finger Lakes fruit, given the right growing conditions, could produce a stunning wine in the low-alcohol style.  As if by design, this summer provided what had to be ideal conditions.  Lots of heat and sunlight produced grapes with a range of intense flavors—loads of lime and tangerine.  We also had a good quantity of Botrytis, which presented as Noble Rot, concentrating the sugars and producing lovely marmalade aromas.  We had high sugar accumulation, which meant we could ferment until we reached around 8% alcohol while still retaining quite a large quantity of sugar. 

Of course, we had to take the plunge, albeit on a very small scale. 

This past Friday, we stopped the fermentation on a few hundred gallons of low-alcohol Riesling by lowering its temperature below the comfort zone of yeasts.  Boy, is it tasty!  How it manages to taste like wine, despite having so little alcohol, is confounding but thrilling.  It’s at once rich and delicate.  It’s a Cool River of orange-fleshed aromas—papaya and mango and clementine -- with a lovely lashing of lime, which keeps the wine lively.  Wait until you try it.

It won’t be a dead-ringer for German Riesling, but that’s a good thing.  We always want our Rieslings to express their Finger Lakes character.  The industry here is long past the point where we need to think of copying another region: our Rieslings have a sui generis standing that is acknowledged world-wide.

A few other wineries in the Finger Lakes are tinkering with this particular manifestation of old-world style winemaking, as well.  Watch for these lower-alcohol wines, and let us know if you try any of them.  We’d love to hear from you.

By: Tricia, Assistant Winemaker


Music of the Day:

• Kate and Anna McGarrigle - The McGarrigle Hour; Cool River (also featuring Lily Lanken and Martha Wainwright):

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Aftermath: “And How Does That Make You Feel?”

Long ago I used to volunteer at a large annual music event in Toronto called the Mariposa Folk Festival. For folk music lovers – there seemed to be so many more of them back then – it was the highlight of the year, and attracted the likes of Bob Dylan, Gordon Lightfoot, Taj Mahal and Steve Goodman, along with performers in newly-rediscovered old genres like Zydeco, Old-Timey and even Clogging.

My tiny part in the planning and execution of this event involved making sure that performers got from the airport to their hotel and thence to the performance venue, and a few days later doing it all in reverse.

As soon as the last performer had been packed off to the airport late on Sunday afternoon, the festival was abruptly over for me. I was always struck with a “now what?” ennui for a few days afterward, a feeling that something really big and all-consuming had come and gone and now there was nothing to fill the void.

Not so with the phenomenon we have been blogging about so much lately, Vintage. Yes, vintage is over, but this is when the work begins. Work, that is, that feels more like normal winemaking and less like a concerted, giddy frenzy.

Here are some of the post-vintage tasks that are keeping us busy and engaged:

• Giving the crusher, must pump and press a final, thorough cleaning, and hanging up Son of Bertha, our trusty 4” must hose

• Inoculating about 80 barrels and tanks with the bacteria that will conduct the malolactic fermentation in the wines

 Fourth Floor Walkup

Tricia adds freeze dried bacteria to a barrel of Chardonnay

• Beginning the task of deciding which tanks of Riesling will play well with others, and introducing them to each other in a larger tank

• Vacuuming up the approximately 4 quadrillion fruit fly carcasses littering the lab

• Pumping last year’s red wines out of barrels and filling the barrels with this year’s reds

• Figuring out how we’re going to come up with the 400 cases of 2010 Arctic Fox wine that our marketing department needs in less than a month

• Trying to convince a defiant tank of Chardonnay to hurry up and ferment to dryness

• Tasting, spitting, tasting, spitting…

Overall it’s a thrilling time of year. No ennui to be found here.

By: Peter, Winemaker

Music of the Day:

• Iggy Pop - Brick by Brick; "Candy" (featuring Katy Pierson):

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Vintage 2010 - Fin.

Today, Friday October 29, we end what we began almost exactly 2 months ago:  our 2010 vintage has come to a close.  

It’s easy to determine when vintage starts.  This year it began on August 30^th as our euphoric little band stood on the crushpad and hand-loaded Chardonnay grapes into the press while watching the sun rise over steel-blue Seneca Lake.  It was a fabulous morning; we were filled with anticipation and a sense of urgency.  We were not sure what challenges lay ahead, but we could not wait to meet them.

In the ensuing weeks, we crushed and pressed over 255 tons of fruit.  We analyzed all the incoming juices for ºBrix, titratable acidity and pH. We racked thousands of gallons of juices, inoculated 47 fermentations, monitored fermentation status via assay and taste, controlled fermentation temperatures, punched down red ferments, fed yeast their required nutrients, and pressed the reds to tanks.  We’re emptying barrels of last year’s reds in order to wash and refill the barrels with 2010 reds.  We’re evaluating the 09 reds as we’re wrapping up this year’s vintage.  

Phew.  We did a lot, and mainly, it was done without sleep.  Peter Bell did not miss a single day of vintage—in fact, he has worked every day since mid-August.  Kelby might have stayed home one of the days, and Peter Howe was here for all but an occasional Saturday.    Those days usually ranged from 12-16 hours in length—what a marathon.  I’m a Mom—I had a later start and, quite often, an earlier quitting time than the fellas.   These guys always understood my need to spend some time at with my girls and tend at least a little bit to our home—no matter how tired Peter, Kelby and Peter were, they never minded my leaving when I had to go—what a great crew to work with!!!  Fatigue could not erode their passion or their vision or their good humor.  

There is still a lot of work to do.  There is a monumental amount of clean-up which has to happen next week.  We have fermentations still ticking along in tanks.  We have loads of barrel work left to do.  We have to inoculate about half of our reds and all of our Chardonnay barrels with malolactic bacteria.  We have critical decisions to make regarding the residual sweetness we desire in our aromatic white varieties.  We have to push our Rieslings into various styles, and make those blends. 

So, with all this left to do, how can I say that vintage is over? 

We pressed our last red fermentations into tanks today.  The crusher-destemmer and must pump have been cleaned, and so has the press.  We will not be getting any more fruit this year.  All of the grapes which we picked have been processed, i.e., they  have been crushed and pressed and are now wine.  The yeast haven’t finished all of their work yet, but we do not have any juice left in the winery.  

There is no formal or industry-wide end to vintage, though we’re not alone in choosing this end of pressing to signify the end of this season.  The phone starts ringing around the end of October as winemakers re-emerge from vintage.  Everyone wants to know if we are done pressing, if we like what we are seeing, and most important, if we are all safe after this long period of hard, and potentially accident-causing, phase of winemaking.  

Here’s hoping that all of our comrades are safe and well, and that, as our friend Johannes Reinhardt of Anthony Road says, all the babies (new wines) are happy.

-Tricia

Music of the Day:

• Billie Holiday; "I'll Get By (As Long As I Have You)":

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