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This is, by the author's own admission, a rush job.
Harvest season, or in wine lingo, "Crush", has occupied the
greater part ot the last 3 weeks ot my life. Since September
30th 1 have had little lime to live anything approaching a
normal life, let alone the time to pen this column by
deadline Wine and the business of wine conjure powerful
images of romance, elegance and class in many peoples'
minds 1 thought I would take this time to touch on a few
points of the 1995 harvest and momentarily dispel any fancy
notions you might have about the process of making wine.
JXriZ«* «»—
WITOOC
Laurel’s
C an n on
B each
T h e Crush
Perhaps the most aptly applied slang word in existence.
The day the grapes start coming through the door is the
beginning of a relentless grind that does not end until weeks
later. According to many experienced sources this was the
most physically brutal crush in 10 years.
Why? Winemaking is essentially glorified farming. Bad
weather plays havoc with grapes. Grapes are moist little
suckers to begin with and the addition of copious amounts
of rain shortly before or during the harvest creates all sorts
of problems. Rot is the foremost of these problems. Other
problems arise from wet weather but I will confine my
ramblings to this aspect of things. The best way to avoid
rot is to get your crop out of the field. For us, at Torii
Mor, it meant bringing in the vast majority of our grapes,
about 60 tons or more, in the space of a few days. Wine
grapes and the resultant juice may weigh tons but they must
be treated as gently as possible. This requires moving them
about manually whenever possible rather than with a pump.
The 3 person crew of Torii Mor moved tons and tons ot
grapes and juice from one processing stage to another bucket
by bucket. Since time waits for no wine this often means
shifts of 18-24 hours for days on end. Back problems,
swollen hands and sore feet are common.
Rot also adds to the problem by creating more work.
Rotten grapes are not something you want to put into your
wine, so intense sorting must be done. This requires going
through every cluster of grapes and chucking out those
clusters overly infected with bunch rot. The type of sorting
required this year increased our workload in terms of hours
by a factor of around 10.
W h at's in you r wine?
If people only knew. Bees, yellow jackets, lady bugs,
ants and earwigs all make it into the mix at some point. Ot
course dirt is involved to some extent. For several straight
days I had to don a pair of (overly tight. I might note) hip
waders and get into a large tank of Pinot noir and push the
cap of grapes back into the juice. Needless to say some
sweat dripped in there.
c—i n-a.
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The M ed ia
Three quarters of the way through crush a little blurb
appeared in USA Today about how the 1995 vintage in
Oregon for Pinot noir and Chardonnay is going to be lousy.
Nothing like a little press to help you sell your wine. This
statement is so general as to be ludicrous. Sure, this is a
demanding vintage but there will be some excellent wines.
There will also probably be some lousy ones, but there
always are. Speaking from experience I can honestly say we
have some excellent tasting juice in our cellar right now.
The wines will probably not be big blockbusters, but they
have elegance and style.
(U öLK Soii
ANTHONY STOFFIELLO
= = = = = = = = = Architect
Winemaker extraordinaire Patty Green says, "It takes a lot
of cheap beer to make good wine." Truer words have rarely
been spoken. We've got quite a returnable pile at work. In
the time honored tradition of wine tasting we conducted a
blind tasting of cheap beer to see which would be the "Beer
of Choice" for Torii Mor. Included were Bud, Bud Light,
Rainier, Hamms. Busch, Olympia and Heidelberg. The
Good Reverend will be happy to know that Bud was the
hands down winner. Bud Light and Rainier were on the
second tier while everything else fell far short of being
potable.
Torii Mor 1994 Chardonnay: Again, another wine
where the character of the vineyard is allowed to express
itself. The grapes come from 10 and 20 year old vines. A
short malolactic fermentation and modest amounts ot oak
allow the depth and weight of the wine to come through.
This wine is still quite young and will gain complexity as
time goes by. $12-$ 15 will get you a superb white.
1992 F am ily V in e y a rd
Reserve Pinot
Noir: I've never tried this wine but it gets a nod lor the
name alone. All right, the name isn't exactly
"Peckingpaugh" but it is pretty damn close. Sam
Peckingpaugh was, of course, the director of the infamous
and ground-breaking film "The Wild Ones", as well as other
bizarre, odd and violent films. II nothing else, for $15 you
can get yourself quite a conversation piece.
Finally, a clipping from a recent Oregonian.
PAPEETE. Tahiti- A 1980 French army map of a South
Pacific island used for nuclear tests shows the atoll nas
filled with cracks long before the latest blast, a newspaper
reported Tuesday.
Some experts have warned that Mururoa Atoll, the site of a
20-kiloton nuclear test Sept. 5, could crack and release
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Recommended Wines for the Month: I haven't had a
lot of time to do much exploring but I have a couple ot
recommendations. November is one of the biggest wine
buying months of the year so stock up soon.
1992 Bethel Heights Pinot Noir Flat Block
Reserve: OK. this one will he a little tough to find bu, it
is worth the search. The Flat Block section of Bethel
Heights vineyard is legendary. The Casteels have let the
vineyard show its strength in this wine. The fruits are
supple, bold and exceptionally rich. The oak is present but
very light. This is simply one of the best Pinots you can
find in Oregon. It will run you $3O-$35, but sometimes
you simply pay for excellence.
. ..
L ufco m u S tyle ,
3 10 Lake S t • FOB 72, Ilwaco, WA 9 & 6 2 4 ( 2 0 6 ) 6 4 2 - 4 2 5 6
W h a t it takes
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radioactivity.
The Le Monde newspaper in France said the map, drawn
before about 100 more tests were conducted, showed that
"large cracks developed in the structure of the atoll's
volcano."
The sketched diagram that appeared with the article showed
several fissures several miles long, as deep as 28,000feet
and as wide as 11 1/2 feet. No information was given about
when or how quickly the cracks developed.
Last month I wrote about the insanity of these tests and
the swearing off of French wines. While I realize that the
good people of France and the wine producers in particular
have nothing to do with these tests and arc, by and large,
opposed to them I still believe that a message must be sent.
T T ie French recently signed a treaty with other nuclear-
capable nations outlawing tests in the South Pacific — once
the French have completed their current rounds of
(unnecessary) tests. This is, at best, a step sideways.
Chirac is a madman and since France operates in a semi-
Democratic manner the people of that country must be sent
the message that Chirac MUST go. My sympathies to the
the innocent wine producers of France, whose wines I miss
dearly, but France has essentially declared war on the entire
world.
jö / kät Point
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