Posts Tagged ‘Shun Ishikubo’

Pagani Ranch arrives: The Alicante cometh …

October 20, 2011

I was fortunate enough to be on hand when the Alicante Bouschet arrived at the Monte Bello Winery from the Pagani Ranch.  In fact, I rode the fruit in!

Here’s me on the back of the grape truck (photo by Kim Korupp)…

Ahhh, kid in a candy store. That’s me when I’m at the winery …

Anyhow, and needless to say, the production team was ready to spring into action …

The pitchfork awaits ...

As does Paul Draper ...

 Alicante Bouschet is an amazing grape, and it was quite magical watching it come splashing onto the conveyor belt in all it’s crimson noir glory…

Paul Draper observes the fruit coming in off the gondola ...

 

... and Eric Baugher and Shun Ishikubo dig in and start tasting ...

Despite all the challenges of the vintage (rain, rain, rain, cold weather, rain, cold weather, fog, rain, cold weather, rain, rain, rain …), we’ve actually been quite happy with the character and quality of the grapes we’ve received, and think it will be a notable vintage for its elegance, its sophistication, and its concentration. Plus, we’ll be seeing low alcohol levels across the board, and a heightened focus on balance and harmony.

There is of course a fine line between elegance and austerity, but we feel strongly we’re on the right side of this line in 2011.

Tags:, , , , ,
Posted in Events & Photographs, Monte Bello, Paul Draper, Varietals & Blends, Video, Vineyards and Oenology, Winemaking | 1 Comment »

#Harvest2011: The Grape Path To Glory -or- The Sleeping Beast, About To Awaken

September 17, 2011

It’s Saturday, and the first delivery of fruit to Monte Bello is due in a matter of hours. Put another way, The Sleeping Beast Is About To Awaken.

And what, you might ask, will happen to said grapes upon arrival? Ok, I’ll show you …

From wherever is their vineyard place of origin, the grapes arrive at “The Crush Pad” …

They come to us in bins that look like this …

Delivered by a truck like this …

That lines up under a hook apparatus like this …

Which is utilized to tip over the bins, such that the fruit is gently dispersed onto a custom-built conveyor belt like this …

At this point, sorting will begin, and while it will get quite a bit more intense a few more steps down the line, there will most certainly be a gang of folks watching the fruit come in, and keeping an eye out for, for example, green and/or damaged fruit, as well as miscellaneous stems, leaves, and other organic matter.

The belt will deliver the fruit to a sort of gondola-meets-merry-go-round-esque conveyor like this …

Which will in turn deliver the fruit to what is called the “De-Stemmer” …

The De-Stemmer is a pretty self-explanatory machine; essentially, whole clusters (meaning grapes that are still attached to their stems) go into the de-stemmer, and they come out free of their stems; i.e. de-stemmed. This is achieved by a sort of spiky augur mechanism like this …

As these spikes rotate, the grapes are separated from their stems, and then consequently fall through a sort of mesh grid …

Which then disperses the fruit to its next destination via a series of rollers. If you’re a zinfandel grape, you’ll go through the rollers into what’s called a “Must Pump” …

Now, before we continue, a quick “summary pic” here is the view from by the must pump, looking up towards the belt and conveyor …

What you’re ideally seeing here is a bit of the first conveyor belt, the gondola conveyor, the de-stemmer, and the must pump.

It is at this point that methodologies diverge, as regards how the fruit proceeds. As noted above, if you’re a zinfandel grape, you’re ready to be pumped into the winery itself. But if you’re a cabernet sauvignon grape (or another of the Bordeaux varietals grown on our mountain), you’ve still got a bit more sorting to go through.

Why the difference? Well, the goal is to get the fruit to tank fully intact, and the more you move the fruit around, the more you run the risk of the skins breaking, and given that zinfandel is supremely thin-skinned, and likely to break anyway, it’s just better to get it into the tank asap. However, for the Bordeaux varietals, given that they’re sturdier, we’re able to take them through a few more tiers of sorting; this is one of the reasons why our Monte Bello so consistently maintains its high standard of quality; rigor of sortings. So, after these grapes have come through the de-stemmer, they’ve still got a few more steps to go through before they make the tank …

Like vibrating sorting tables, for example …

With grooves …

And blowers …

And after all that, there is still a final sorting table. And this one is the big one; this table is manned by as many as 8 very skilled and knowledgeable people, who will do their very best to pick out every single green berry, every bird-pecked berry, every shriveled berry, every single berry that isn’t, for whatever reason, perfect. This is a very important table …

Whatever grape you may be, eventually, it will be your turn to enter the winery itself, and you’ll do so via a complicated architecture of pumps and hoses. Your point of entry looks like this …

And that’s how you’ll depart the crush pad.

As for myself, descending from the crush pad, led by the very gracious, frighteningly knowledgeable, humbly benevolent, excellently hard-working Shun Ishikubo (Assistant Winemaker at Monte Bello) …

… I just had to stop for just one last pic; a last look at the hoses that will very, very soon be conveying the 2011 harvest to the Monte Bello winery. The hoses looked beautiful. Sinuous, strong, elegant, and focused. They looked ready.

Then, the winery.

Our beloved hoses, once inside the winery, begin the process of allocating out fruit to the appropriate fermentation tanks. If you’re a zinfandel grape, it’s quite likely you might go into a special kind of tank with a screen inside that can be used to submerge the “cap” (the mass of solid matter that forms during the fermentation process) …

Whereas if you’re a cabernet sauvignon grape, you might go to a smaller tank …

Delivered, of course, by the same mystically arterial intricacy of hoses previously noted …

These are fermentation tanks, and it is — unsurprisingly — inside these tanks that fermentation will take place.

Once fermentation reaches its conclusion, the “free run” juice (juice that has “naturally” separated from the skins, as opposed to juice that is “pressed” (i.e. squeezed) from the skins) is migrated to another set of tanks …

Within which temperature can me modulated, mitigated, and controlled via cooling lines that run behind the wall of tanks …

With that juice remaindered to those said tanks, there is still quite a mass of skins and such that can potentially be exploited for additional juice via “the press”; a mechanism that essentially “wrings” out, via the application of varying degrees of pressure, the juice that still remains in the skins. “Press Juice,” as it’s called, may or may not be called into use, depending on the character of the free run juice. By definition, press juice is more intensely extracted, and its relevance to a final assemblage is dependent on a multitude of factors. Ridge Vineyards is somewhat unique as regards its transportational methodology; our tanks are moveable via pallet jacks, and they are transported to the press thusly, to then be lifted by crane and hook, and consequently upended such that the skin mass can be delivered into the bowels of the press. Seen from a bit of a distance, the press area looks like this …

In the picture above, the apparatus is actually upside down, because it is still draining its water post-cleaning, in expectation of its pending use. Here’s what it looks like from below …

And from the side …

Ridge Vineyards traditionally drills down its management of press juice to a notably segmented level, by applying varying degrees of pressure (press “fractions”), and then segregating out those different press fractions of juice for possible later use. This is achieved by sending the differently realized juice lots to different destinations. Meaning, coming off the press, four different press fractions will be sent to four different tanks …

There to remain until the winemakers decide whether or not any or all of the lots can be utilized in an enhancitive role as regards the free run juice that will form the core of any given bottling.

Once the remaining skins have been pressed, there’s not a lot left to them; they sort of resemble cracklins at this point, but still, their use is not exhausted. Via an augur …

And a pair of belts …

this last remaining organic matter is dumped into a truck, and composted, until it’s ready to be recycled back into the landscape from whence it came …

And that’s the journey, from load-in to landscape. If you’re a grape, you’ve come a long way, baby.

Tags:,
Posted in Bordeaux varietals, Cabernet Sauvignon, Monte Bello, Varietals & Blends, Vineyards and Oenology, Winemaking, Zinfandel | 6 Comments »

A Look Back at the Fall Release Event at Monte Bello (i.e. Event pics!)

September 9, 2011

With all the excitement of harvest looming on the horizon, and all the forward looking this involves, it does indeed seem as if a proper “look back” at the Monte Bello Fall Release Event is in order; even though it was only last weekend!

Anyhow …

On behalf of all of us here at Ridge, and most especially the team here at Monte Bello, I wish to thank everyone who attended this extraordinary happening; I don’t know who was happier, our guests, or us!

I drove up that morning nervous, exhausted, stressed, and unhealthily focused. A huge event afoot, and all responsibilities on my shoulders. I was deranged.

What paused me, and fully recalibrated my psyche, was this:

That’s what I was looking at as I was unlocking the driveway gate. I was instantly unwound.

Once inside the Old Winery Barn, it was down to my office. That’s when things started to heat up again. So much to do, so little time. Staff began to arrive, the catering team arrived, the parking team arrived. So many people. I was beginning the routine that would be mine the rest of the day; running laps around the property. I was frenzied.

But pause was soon again given. It was tasting time.

You probably know by know just how good these new vintages are showing. I was happily rediscovering. Point scores are nice, and we’re happy to receive good ones, but at the end of the day, the wines have to perform when it matters most; when YOU’RE tasting them. I mean, sure the new issue of Wine Advocate had just simply showered down praises on these wines (97 points for the 2008 Monte Bello, and 95 points each for the 2009 Lytton Springs and the 2008 Monte Bello Chardonnay!) …

… but what were YOU going to think?

After tasting the line-up, I felt very good. Very, very good. And I felt that you, too, were going to feel very, very good.

Which was good, given that the first arrivals were starting to arrive, and as expected, the event had drawn out a hearty crop of serious Ridge-o-Philes. And believe you me, these weren’t the only two seriously vintage Ridge shirts I would see, though these are certainl two classic and excellent examples:

So it was go time, and we were ready. We had a great team on hand, the wines were showing beautifully, and some very key members of the winemaking team were in the house:

Paul Draper & Eric Baugher talking Monte Bello winemaking ...

Shun Ishikubo pouring 1992 Monte Bello out of magnum ...

Tara pouring below the ghosts of founders past ...

 

Zani expertly enacts the art of wine tasting merriment ...

 

Pete pours cool as a cucumber in the face of hot demand ...

No discussion of the Fall Release Event at Monte Bello is complete without acknowledging the presence of Pizza Politana. Not only did they manage to actually drive a wood-fired pizza oven up our mountain, but they then proceeded to serve some of the most delicious (and PERFECTLY paired) offerings we’ve ever had the pleasure of placing alongside our wines.
 
 
But a great idea (wood-fired pizza oven truck!), great ingredients (local, sustainable, organic, NorCal farmer’s market fare), and great pairing do not a great event make. It takes great staff, and the folks from Pizza Politana were tops.
 
 
 Things were definitely getting intense. You know when you’re starting to golf-cart the guests in that the event is really starting to happen.
 
 
Then suddenly this …
 
 
 … becomes this!
 
 
Fortunately, there was this to adjourn to (once the collective tummy was full up on pizza and wine!) …
 
 
Yeah, that’ll do …
 
 
 What a day, what a day …
 
When I began assembling the components of what have become this post, I was looking for one image, something that could somehow capture the magic of it all; I found this, and figured I had it …
 
 
Pizza and Monte Bello. Perfect.
 
But in looking through all the images I’d shot over the day, there was another idea that I just couldn’t shake, and in the end, it’s what I’ve decided to go with; the bookend.
 
After all was said and done, and I was coming down the mountain …
 
 
… I knew, finally and for certain, that all was well.
 

Tags:, , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Bordeaux varietals, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Events & Photographs, Food & Wine Pairing, Lytton Springs, Monte Bello, Paul Draper, Ridge Memorabilia, RIDGE Staff, Special Offerings, Tasting Flights, Tasting Rooms, Varietals & Blends, Zinfandel | 2 Comments »

Monte Bello Assemblage Tasting In Pictures – 4.17.10

April 19, 2010

It was a beautiful Saturday, and nearly 500 people came up the mountain to enjoy the view, the weather, and the wine! It was our second Monte Bello Assemblage tasting (out of three total for the year), and we had Paul Draper, David Gates, Shun Ishikubo, and the whole Monte Bello Tasting Room Staff on hand to host as we poured 2006 Monte Bello Chardonnay, our Monte Bello Half-Bottle Showcase vertical featuring 375ml bottles of 1990, 1992, and 1994 Monte Bello, and the current assemblage of the 2009 Monte Bello. But why listen to me, when you can see for yourself! Enjoy the slideshow! And remember, there is still one more Monte Bello Collector Event, the weekend of 5.22.10-5.23.10 …

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in Events & Photographs, Monte Bello, Paul Draper, RIDGE Staff, Tasting Rooms, Viticultural Salmagundi, Wine Clubs | 1 Comment »

The Monte Bello Collector Component Tasting In Pictures!

March 8, 2010

Well, I have to say, it was just a tremendous weekend up here at Monte Bello. We hosted members of our Monte Bello Collector Program for the 2009 Component Tasting, and this is absolutely one of my favorite events of the year. It’s such a rare and educational opportunity to experience the Monte Bello in this fashion; tasting all the components separately, prior to the beginning of assemblage. Not only is it a unique insight into the mystical mojo mad scientist magic of the winemaker’s art, but it’s a great opportunity to begin to learn the wine that will eventually be yours; a deep enhancement to the experiential hoodoo of drinking wine.

But enough of words, let’s experience the visuals; if you were here, this should be a nice opportunity to relive the joys of the weekend, and if you weren’t able to be with us, then hopefully these snapshots will act an inducement of a kind to encourage a future visit. Please join us! It’s magical …

Did you see yourself in there? I certainly hope so. And by the way, a special thank you to the members of our Production Team who participated in the event. I think the opportunity to speak with them is one of the truly excellent perks of the whole experience. In the pictures above, you can see the following members of said team:

Paul Draper

Eric Baugher – Vice President, Winemaking

David Gates – Vice President, Vineyard Operations

Shun Ishikubo – Assistant Production Manager

Caleb Mosley – Viticulturist

Karen Schmidt – Director of Quality Control / Chemist

And this post wouldn’t be complete without a HUGE hearty thank you to the Monte Bello Tasting Room Staff (& participating members of the Ridge Retail Staff!), who time and time again raise the bar with their formidable displays of knowledge, hospitality, and plain old hard work. Cheers to (in no particular order) Sam Howles-Banerji, Amy Monroe, Michael Riese, Sonja Seaberg, Karen Cai, Cecilia Aguilar, Chris Seguin, Zani Nesvacil, Karen Cai, Peter Yaninek, Samantha McMillan, Barry Campbell, Darren Gardner, Tara Einis, Howard Hickok, Jay Jensky, and Jane Occhialini!

Tags:, , , , , , ,
Posted in Bordeaux varietals, Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Events & Photographs, Merlot, Monte Bello, Paul Draper, Petit Verdot, RIDGE Staff, Tasting Flights, Tasting Rooms, Varietals & Blends, Viticultural Salmagundi, Wine Clubs, Wine Tales | Leave a Comment »

Tasting Notes: 15-Vintage Monte Bello Vertical! (Milestone and Milestones!)

February 19, 2010

Well, this is a bit of a milestone post for what is still quite a young blog; it’s the 200th post! Accordingly, I want to do something a little special to mark the occasion, and this is what I have to offer:

I very recently had the astonishingly great pleasure of sitting at table with Paul Draper, Eric Baugher, David Gates, David Amadia, Nicole Buttitta, Karen Schmidt, and Shun Ishikubo of Ridge, and Guillaume Bienaime and John Sanders of the very fine restaurant Marché in Menlo Park, to taste through 15 vintages of Monte Bello! Needless to say, it was one of the more extraordinary tasting experiences of my life. My only regret is that we didn’t have all day to sip and savor! But this was work …

So, given the rigor and intensity of the tasting, combined with the unavoidable time constraint of a morning tasting on a workday, we had to move pretty seriously and rapidly through the offerings, and accordingly my notes are somewhat brief and a bit riffy, but I hope they give you at least a reasonably in-focus picture of what an utterly astonishing palate experience this was … sprinkled throughout are some observations from Eric Baugher as well, who very kindly gave me a copy of his notes as a resource.

We tasted the wines in groups, the first of which was a foursome comprised of the 2000, the 2002, the 2004, and the 2005 Monte Bellos. First though, for a proverbial wetting of the whistle, we sampled the 1999 Monte Bello Chardonnay. Mon Dieu! What a delicious wine!

1999 Monte Bello Chardonnay

Warm and nutty on the nose, with hints of caramel, butterscotch and vanilla, and a rich and complex tropicality. Mouthfilling and pleasantly viscous without being at all cloying. Mid-palate weight is intensified by strong minerality and a hint of bread-y yeastiness. The finish is long and woody, yet shows lots of bright acidity. Starting to develop secondary and tertiary maturation characteristics, but still delightfully youthful …

Ok, back to our inaugural foursome: 00, 02, 04, and 05 …

2000 Monte Bello

Elegant and playful, yet deeply concentrated, exhibiting bright notes of pomegranate and cranberry layered over a compellingly dark sub-strata redolent of cocoa, leather, fennel, and cigar-box; notable for the juxtaposition of weight and beauty, deep coloration and vibrant concentration …

2002 Monte Bello

Muscular, viscous, and tannin-forward, with rich notes of tar and earth coating a core of crisp bright red fruits and spicy dried fruits; cherry on the red side, black currant on the dried side … definitely youthful and fragrant, but notable for depth of both strength and length …

2004 Monte Bello

Minty and eucalyptal, with strong hints of cherry and menthol; very vibrant and herbaceous, with deep layers of cassis, leather, and tobacco … very elegant and complex, resolving nicely, and showing classic Monte Bello minerality …

2005 Monte Bello

Big, fruit-forward, and intensely structured, with a vast and complex array of fruit profiles brimming away in the bouquet and infusing the body … loads of mountain fruit character, led by a rich blueberry layer and followed by a delightful violet-laden florality … hints of cassis and blackberry, with a saturated peppering of clove and cardamom over nicely chalky tannins …

Not a bad way to lead off a flight, not by any stretch of the imagination! From there, we proceeded to our next foursome, this time a close look at some key vintages from the nineties: 1991, 1992, 1995, and 1997.

 

1991 Monte Bello

I’ve waxed rhapsodic about this vintage many times before, sometimes to almost embarrassing effect (dig this post!), and this tasting did nothing to dissuade me from the very firm conviction that my affections are most decidedly not misplaced. It’s just wonderful, a fully completed circle, every component perfectly placed, a ballet of integration, reconciliation, and harmony; ripe but tempered, complex yet approachable, dark but fruitful, buoyant yet earthy. A treat to taste …

1992 Monte Bello

Astonishingly complex aromatics, very expressive, with a rich perfume. Elegant but well-structured, with very juicy, concentrated fruit. Nicely compressed juxtapositions of licorice and violet, and cigar and pine. Very present acidity and lively fruits transition from a dense middle through to a long and enticing finish …

1995 Monte Bello

Very firmly structured, and defiantly structure-forward. A nice touch of earthiness, and big fruits paving the way for controlled and subtle acidity. Nice blend of forest floor and wet stone co-mingling with hints of cola and black licorice, making for an overall powerful and complex offering …

1997 Monte Bello

Showing remarkably youthful still, and still opening up accordingly. Fully structure-forward, and still flexing its impending complexities … Starting to develop deep mountain fruit characteristics amongst the already present Monte Bello minerality, and clearly heading for a deep and seductive mid-palate around a nicely earthy core …

This foursome was followed by what I think we all collectively agreed was the surprise grouping of the bunch, a five-wine vertical of 80′s era Monte Bello: 1981, 1984, 1985, 1988, ands 1989. I say surprise because this decade as a whole has suffered some disparagement in the past, but to our collective palates, this was easily the most difficult group to pull favorites from; they all showed magnificently!

 

1981 Monte Bello

Deep, deep notes of fudge, chocolate, and cocoa, below an nearly-as-dark-layer of tar and chipotle, sewed together with a decadent chord of umami notes. Loads of black fruits, firm tannins, and still-lively acidity, and showing secondary and tertiary characteristics redolent of balsamic and molasses …

1984 Monte Bello

A very pleasant mintiness on the nose, with lots of red fruits and a hint of menthol and eucalyptus. A near feral intensity to the fruit layers, dominated by an almost sweet cherry character. Intense, pungent, and powerful, with great structure and length …

1985 Monte Bello

Woodsy, and very complexly so, with hints of caramel, vanilla, and cream blending with a slight citricity to almost evoke a caramel apple, wooden stick and all … Tremendously bright and youthful acidity, very fresh and young, with a subdued yet complex bouquet followed by a creamy blue-fruit laden middle and an herb-and-spice laden finish …

1988 Monte Bello

Archetypal “old-world” aromatics showing a concentrated mosaic of black cherry, cola, cedar, leather, and earth, with a concentrated mid-palate blending wild mountain fruit and exotic spice; perfectly resolved and structured, with still-youthful acidity and tannin …

1989 Monte Bello

Lots of fascinating structural components on offer, including dried currant, olive, and tobacco on the nose, and cedar, clove, and anise at entry. Complex without being weighty, with multiple layers of mineral, spice, and sweeter fruits mid-palate, closing with a firm and structure-forward finish …

The final grouping was a two-wine group, and this was really the treat of the bunch, both for the rarity, and the caliber! We first tasted the 1978 Monte Bello, and then the 1968! Unbelievable …

 

1978 Monte Bello

Decadent hints of stew, blood, and iodine simmering in the aromatics, meaning meaty, but not in an umami way, more Wellington-esque … Wonderful second and third tier characteristics on display, including clove, sandalwood, tobacco, and cedar, modulating sweet and concentrated fruits into an earthy and complex body, finishing very lively and vigorous …

1968 Monte Bello

Just astonishing, a 42-year-old wine, and yet still showing so much power, complexity, and concentration. Lots of classic mountain minerality, dried fruits, and sweet sauce notes (plum and balsamic), with a structurally enticing duskiness foreshadowing a rustic mid-palate, and closing with a completed-circle reappearance of marrow-like notes couched in a wrap of sandalwood and cigar …

And that was it for the tasting. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. And while I recognize that the purchase of an older-vintage Monte Bello is not an every day investment, I heartily encourage you all to find a way to sample some of the these older vintages, whether through purchases, or via one of the special tastings that we host in our tasting rooms., It’s an experience that will not leave you for a long, long time …

And thank you to the powers that be for letting me be a part of such an extraordinary tasting!

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Bordeaux varietals, Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Food & Wine Pairing, History, Merlot, Monte Bello, Paul Draper, Petit Verdot, Tasting Flights, Tasting Notes, Varietals & Blends, Viticultural Salmagundi, Wine Tales, Winemaking | 2 Comments »

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 66 other followers