Les Blog

Courtesy of the good folks at ETS Labs, we’ve now got some scientified digits to noodle on the Syrah and Merlot.

The top line, I suppose, is the acidity this year: it’s excellent. I don’t think we’ve ever gotten Washington fruit that didn’t need some pH adjustment to bring into safe territory. But this year, Washington’s weather mirrored Oregon’s, only a little warmer and with a lot less rain. That cool summer kept acidity lower than usual (heat and in particular warm nights tend to evaporate acidity), the result being lively wines right out of the chute.

That doesn’t mean these wines won’t require a few “Jesus units” (“water into wine,” as one wine pundit quipped), but we’re within striking range of well-balanced wines — again, especially because of those acid numbers. A good harbinger of a great vintage, I’d say…

Actual numbers after the jump.
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Somewhere around 6am, I pulled out of the Safeway parking lot with snacks and a 4-pack of Red Bull, and pointed the truck east into the sunrise. Ten hours and an enological sacrifice later, I was backing up the driveway with a combined 1200 lbs of merlot and syrah. Like slipping into an old pair of jeans: the 350-mile harvest road trip to fetch the good stuff!

I’ll post our numbers later, but the grapes tasted pretty good, and in fact, surprisingly racy for Washington fruit. I think we could have pulled the merlot a day or two earlier, but picking it when we picked the syrah saved us a trip — and besides, of the two, the blend-destined merlot quite usable a little less than perfect.

But yeah, the syrah: great acidity but also great flavor; clean berries, crunchy seeds. This one’s going to be fantastic if we don’t F it up — something I made sure of by stopping at Stonehenge on the way back for our ritual sacrifice (see picture above).

More pics below the fold…
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It was long day, but the magnificent 2009 Peugeot blend (one discerning wine critic’s opinion of which is pictured above) is now officially concocted and resting calmly. We’ll let it reflect on its nature through the winter and bottle it next April, but in the meantime, everything that didn’t go into that blend got socked away under lock and cork.

Well, almost everything. Cabernet Franc (which we goosed with a wee dram of Syrah – 5%), Merlot, Syrah, and Cabernet Sauvignon got stowed, but we ran out of time to bottle our 09 Pinot Noir and extended maceration (or “Ex Machina”) Cabernet Sauvignon. Those laggards will reach their final resting place this weekend, just hours before our first fruit of 2010 hurtles down the chute.

But as exhausting as it was, we got a lot done and the wines will more than make up for our labors, I think. Not to put too fine a point on it, but they’re friggin’ fantastic — made so in great measure by excellent fruit sources. Of course, the lovely lamb stew waiting for us after bottling didn’t hurt, either…

More pics after the jump…
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Here’s a cautionary tale: what happens when a magazine of impossibly high standards lets down its guard, for even a moment? It pains me to even say it: Les Garagistes.

It’s true. Like a wine stain on a pristine tablecloth, we’re on the back page of Fine Cooking (Sept/Oct 2010) in a quick Q&A about what we do and why. Luckily, the interview is artfully compiled by Kelly Alexander, a former editor of Saveur and now a freelance food maven, so I’m optimistic that the magazine will survive this indiscretion.

Seriously, though, we’re honored to be featured in such a legendary mag, so if you have a chance to pick up the issue, please do!

For readers new to the winemaking experience, one thing I should point out in advance about the article’s illustration — aside from the fact that in real life, we all still have chins. The friendly cartoon character stomping grapes in a barrel is more about the spirit than the fact of how wine is made. Virtually no one stomps grapes with their feet any more (except as a publicity stunt), and certainly not teetering in a barrel. But our cartoon winemaker certainly captures the giddiness we all feel when the grapes are in, crushed, and safely on their way to (ultimately) a glass near us. Jig-dancin’ and wine drinkin’? Yeah, that’s about right.

As you might imagine, Kelly was given only so much space to expound our epic tale. Luckily, most of what she cut from our hour-long conversation were animal noises and me shouting “holy coulis!” over and over again, but there’s one exchange I’d like to expand back out: what my wife thinks of it all.

FC: How does your wife feel about [wine being made in your basement]?

Giraud: She’s not really into the whole winemaking thing, but she loves all the hubbub and, luckily, the wine that comes out the other end. Plus, for about a month and a half our house is filled with this yeasty, fruity, ambrosial fragrance. But in deference to her, I rearranged our basement so splattering wine doesn’t rain down on our laundry.

There. Now I don’t have to sleep in a fermenter any more.

Thanks again to Kelly, and to the incomparable Susan Davis of North Carolina Public Radio, who pointed Kelly our way. Grab a copy today, and better yet, subscribe!

Outside of Georges DuBoeuf’s Beaujolais Nouveau marketing scam, it’s unheard of: releasing a wine in its vintage year. But here in our basement lair, we’re always hearing the unheard (dear Santa: tinfoil hat patch kit, please), so we thought we’d try it, too. The result: last Thursday night, a small group of us got together to bottle the first expression of the 2009 vintage — a “second wine” (or “piquette”) of Cabernet Sauvignon — which we’ve pithily christened “Peugeot Nouveau.”

A second wine is kind of like “small beer”: you take the leftovers from the first round of winemaking (in this case, the cake left over after pressing), and reconstitute it with water, sugar, and sometimes tartaric acid. Since the yeast still lurk within, nursing hangovers from their first binge, the party starts again within a few hours.

Unfortunately for them, there’s a catch: the good times may be rolling again, but the bar’s now only pouring well drinks. Because the vast majority of a red wine’s flavor comes from, essentially, an infusion of juice with grape skins, the first press has carried away the bulk of the good stuff — or so you hope. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t some oomph left in the skins, especially in our case, since our press isn’t pro enough to squeeze the daylights out of them. So for us, a second wine is aptly named: a second chance to capture all the flavor packed into the grapes we bring in.

Still, what you get isn’t exactly a Robert Parker, stand-a-spoon-in-it wine (“I had to use a knife and spread it on pain grillé — 100 points!”), so we decided to embrace its essential, uncomplicated nature. Like Beaujolais Nouveau, it’s fruity and easy drinkin’, but with enough verve and flavor to brighten a dark winter night.

We’ll be “releasing” it New Year’s Eve, just under the wire to taste 2009 in 2009. Happy new year, everyone!

Foul fest’ring cake that rules the night,
Removes the grape skins from our site,
It stinks so bad it might ignite,
So we decide that it is shite.
And the vintage’s conclusion?

[ apologies to the Moody Blues ]

Somehow amidst the frenzy of crush, we managed to bottle last year’s Syrah and Port. Actually, “managed” isn’t quite the right word; “had to or else” is closer to the truth. I’d been thinking we’d try aging both wines for another few months, but we simply needed to free up some space for the 2009s heading pell mell toward the end of fermentation all around us.

Luckily, we had enough people to make it go smoothly, and for our trouble, walked away with a surprisingly luscious Syrah — pure and rich but rewardingly complex. I’d think this one will unclench from its traumatic journey into bottle sometime around the new year, but that said, I won’t do any significant dipping into my stash until late spring at the earliest.

More pics and a bit on the port after the jump…
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