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By “Trade Show” I mean we had a table at Rock N Roll wine www.rnrwine.com at the Green Valley Ranch in Henderson. What an awesome venue, what an awesome party.

Initially we talked about what we were going to do with the leftover wine…since neither of us really wanted to pack it up and check it on the flight home. Hah! The event was scheduled for 3 hours, from 7-10pm, and we ran out of wine just after 9. Four cases in two hours, and since the cups were small we were giving little pours, ~2 ounces or less. (I’ll admit giving smaller pours to anyone on a cellphone jabbing their glass in my general direction).

Speaking of the “stemware”, we did a taste test at the end of the night.

We got down to our last bottle, and put our table sign face down with people still lined up for more wine. We apologized for running out and someone pointed to the bottle in Pauls hand. Sorry guys, this is for us…and we headed to a quiet spot by the pool.

My plastic “stem” sprung a leak, as many others had thru the night, and Paul fetched me a replacement – a clear plastic water cup, no stem. Hm.

One thing I noticed with the goblet was that it didn’t matter how much you tried to swirl and sniff, there was no aroma present, the goblet was so wide and flat on the bottom that it killed whatever nose you would expect. Then I poured the remaining wine from the leaker into the water glass and was pleasantly surprised, the nose returned! Ok, it was still a plastic cup, but at least I could smell the wine in it.

For those of you thinking you might like to hit an event like this, the VIP section of the party included a Riedel “O” glass, which I would say is well worth the price of admission based on our experience of leaking plastic goblets.

We poured the 2006 Haut Tubee (a cab. blend $20 retail) and the 2006 Eaglepoint Ranch Syrah ($35 retail).

I’ve been enjoying the Syrah a lot but worried that it’s so different from the average Syrah. It’s bright and crisp, and has a palate cleansing acidity that lends it self well to spicy foods and solid cheeses. The nose is very floral (in the right glass) and clean.

Last night for dinner, Paul braised lamb shanks and simmered them with rough chopped carrots, celery, and potato. I made goat cheddar and herb muffins to dunk in the stew.

He opened a 2001 Cote-Rotie and poured a glass while he cooked. I wasn’t ready for wine yet, but sipped from his glass and asked if we could open one more bottle for comparison. Since he almost never tells me “no”, he asked what it was that I wanted.

For a side-by-side comparison I had him open the 2006 Stefania Syrah. The nose on our syrah was prettier, the CR was smoky and saltier. Both were crisp, both were savory with the stew, and both opened up over the course of the meal getting denser and fuller. We went back and forth between bites and sips and ended up finishing with the Stefania wine.

At least the wine finished better than the Sharks, what a disappointment that was….

Cheers,
Stefania

40th Floor Condo Overlooking River : The view, the view, the view!!!
Deep Dish Pizza : Something I look forward to each trip
Fox & Obel Market : Most expensive dinner “at home”
Blue Man Group : A Must See, great venue
The Bean : Because it’s cool
Chicago Art Institute : Winslow Homer & Edward Hopper exhibits
Tulips : Prettiest sign of spring in the city
Museum of Contemporary Art : Inspiring
Lightning Storm as seen from the 40th Floor : OMG Fantastically Awesome!!!
Dinner with Friends : Good Wine, Good Food, Good Party, Great Friends

Best part about coming home :

The Rose Garden & Haut Tubee Vines :

Here’s the latest on shipping.

Orders from states listed on our ‘ship to states’ section on the allocation letters have all been released to the fulfilment center. Those orders that came in before 4/21 went out last week and tracking emails have been sent. Orders after 4/21 went out yesterday and tracking emails should go out today or tomorrow.

If you did not receive a tracking email yet it is because of one of two reasons.

First: a number of states require ‘label registration’. This means the state government must approve the label for shipment. Yes, even though the federal government has already approved it, each individual state has a right to approve it also. Currently the following states have registration pending: NY, NJ, FL, MA, NC (I’ve given up on NC, they still have not approved the 05 labels after over a year). In addition VA has approved the Syrah label but not the Haut Tubee label. All those approvals (except NC) should be done no later than 6/1. As soon as the label clears, the shipment will release.

Second: States not listed on our allocation letter have to be shipped directly using our Bonded Winery Permit / Type 2. Those go out directly from the winery and have to be picked up by UPS with us present or delivered to a UPS office by us. We will begin shipping those states next week.

I’ll begin sending updates directly to individuals next week who are going to have delays beyond 5/15 to let them know the status.

Write your state legislator or visit www.freethegrapes.org, to see what you can do to make this situation easier for all of us wine lovers!

I originally posted this on the Wine Spectator site, but I liked it so much, I’m reposting here.

Monday turned into a long day. Visited the new vineyard site from 8-10am. Whacked one gopher. You know what winegrowers talk about when they get together? Killing gophers. We all keep a count, it’s like kill marks on a fighter plane. “How many did you get?.” “I got 14 so far this year.” “That’s good, I’ve only got 7.”

Everyone keeps an up to date count, plus a vintage history. “I got 11 this year, but nothing like 05 I got 104 that year.” I heard someone actually say that on Saturday. I know winegrowers who can’t remember exactly what the weather was like 5 years ago, but they can remember how many gophers they killed. Monday was my first kill of the vintage. Millie’s comment. “11 more and your even with me.”

Glamour of the wine life.

I meet with our Bay Area sales reps for lunch and did barrel samples for them. Good kids. They seem so young.

The crew had a spat and I had to go back on site after lunch. Daniel was filling the post holes with too much water and Millie was mad about working in mud. Turned out it was a Spanish translation problem. Last week I had a simliar problem. I backed the forklift around the truck to unload it, and Jerry had said he’d turn the truck around. My Spanish isn’t good enough to tell the difference between “go around the truck” and “turn around the truck”.

Monday the problem was Daniel’s English wasn’t good enough to tell the difference between ‘put water in the holes’ and ‘fill the holes with water’. Everyone made up though and they have 5 of the 34 rows complete.

Total wine stuff 10 hours.
Total miles:104.
Rows installed :5
Sales Reps met: 3
Dead Gophers: 1

Hey folks!

I didn’t get an opportunity to take very many photos during the process as all available hands were on the line working, but follow the link below to see a handful of pictures from our April 1st bottling.

http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/349947

I was grateful that this bottling was small since it was our first time managing the process from start to finish. Inconveniences with suppliers were many, mistakes to be corrected happened, but overall the logistics came together and even the rain stayed away for just one more day.

Once the truck finally settled in (after much ado about the driveway and tree limb) and was sterilized, we hooked the hoses up, got the people in their work positions and hit the big green “Go” button!

Earplugs were passed around, thankfully, and for the most part the operation went very smoothly. There was some fine tuning needed with the fill level of the bottles, the depth of the corks, and the position of the new labels. Once we got started though, we all found or rhythm and hustled through two hours of hands-on assembly line work.

Loading empty bottles onto the line was Millie, getting empty boxes to the end of the line was Kathy – both of them short enough to fit under the overhead racks. The bottle fill station, cork station and label station were all monitored by the bottling crew, then Daniel and I were at the tail end putting the full bottles back into the cases.

We struggled at first, but with coaching from the bottling crew we found a great rhythm and hustled through the two hours.

Paul told me later that he and Jerry were sweating keeping up with us – they had to stop loading the finished cases on pallets when there was an empties pallet change. He thinks next time we bottle we’ll need one or two more bodies to keep the flow moving better.

I thought we did just fine, but that’s because I had my head down and focused on my bottle count the entire time – and the earplugs kept me from getting too distracted.

An enormous THANK YOU to our crew, Jerry Anderson “Winemaker Emeritus” for coaching us, the folks at Top It Off Bottling, and CWT for taking such good care of us.

After 9 very frustrating months of dealing with the Santa Cruz Mountains Winegrowers Association, I’ve decided to give up. I notified them yesterday that we are pulling our membership application and asked that they return our membership check. I also let them know we will be withdrawing Chaine d’Or from the SCMWA next year.

Going forward we will not be participating in any events that the organization sponsors. I’ve also removed the link to the organization here.

It was sad and difficult to deal with the organization from the very start and with as little time as Stefania and I have we could not continue to dedicate time to the organization. It appears to me that the organization is headed in a direction to promote the small 50-75 case backyard vanity projects that exist in the mountains rather than real commercial wineries, and we are headed in a different direction.

I encourage people who are looking for information on the Santa Cruz Mountains AVA to go to:

http://scmwine.wikispaces.com

Dave Tong’s wiki is accurate, extensive and has information on all the wineries in the area, including those like Varner, Ryhs, Clos la Tech and ourselves who do not belong to the SCMWA.

My brother called the other night. He and my mom were just in Chile, he had to be there for work, she tagged along to see friends and neighbors of ours from when we lived there. Of the various photos they have sent me in email to look at, it’s clear much has changed since we were there (30 years ago!).

One thing in particular they both noted was the amount of air pollution, though I figure the dense metropolitan area is much like here, some months are worse than others. I’m sure that once you leave the big city and head toward the coast that the air is much improved.

Because my brother was there for work related business, they didn’t get a whole lot of time to venture outside of the city and see the wineries or vineyards. We talked of planning a trip there together, perhaps in a couple of years when our schedules are more free and our vacation/PTO accounts have the reserves for an extended vacation.

I’m excited to think I’ll be able to travel back to my childhood home and see the country and vineyards with new eyes. I remember fondly the trips to “Tio Tolo’s” vineyard and winery where my best friend and I got to glue labels on the bottles and play in the winery. I also remember the smells of the wine and the oak barrels and of riding horses through the cork orchard. It wasn’t until very recently that I made the connection between the cork trees and wine corks.

My dad once told me that his fantasy plan for retirement from the Army was to own his own vineyard and winery in Chile and not come back to the States. I toss that information around in my brain from time to time and wonder if maybe I inherited that passion to be a farmer and winemaker from him. It’s a fun fantasy to bat around because I’m certain that the hootch my dad would have made would be just that, “vino tinto” whose sole purpose is for daily drinking and in large quantities.

I can still see pictures of him swilling wine from a basketwoven covered green jug of wine hoisted over his shoulder, his neck twisted around so his lips could drink right from the bottle. No doubt he was showing off and being silly. He loved to wear hats and act the part to correspond with the style. Sometimes he would don a FuManchu mustache that was made from real hair.

I could reminisce all afternoon and tell you all the crazy antics I pulled as a kid in Chile. I’m glad my brother called and put all those crazy memories in my head, and glad to have the time to just sit and enjoy memories of my dad and living his dream.

A toast to my dad, he would have said my wine was too fancy, but I can picture him drinking it right from the bottle just the same to antagonize me!

Cheers,
Stefania

If you’re having trouble getting your order form to go through on the e-fax, hang on another day or send it by mail. No telling for sure why we’re getting a “busy” signal, but we figure it may be due to the start of March Madness and the live streaming video of the games hogging the ‘net.

We tested the efax number yesterday with no problems, but have gotten feedback today that some of you are sending faxes that are not going through.

Thanks,
Paul & Stefania

We will have the first set of offer letters out next week, maybe as soon as Monday. In the newsletter I said there would be two waves, but there are likely to be as many as four different mailings going out.

The first set will go to the 1000 pointer’s. Those customers with more than 1000 points. There are about 70 of those people. They signed up early, and have bought a lot of wine! They will get an offer of two six packs of 2006 Eaglepoint Ranch Syrah at $200 a six pack, and one three pack of Haut Tubee at $60. Yeah $60, $20 a bottle 🙂 Since this group usually buys a lot of wine I’m going to judge how to get the next set of letters out.

I’ve broken the remainder of people on the list into three groups:

700-999 points will be offered one six pack of Syrah and one three pack of Haut Tubee
400-699 points will be offered one six pack of Syrah
100-399 points will be offered one three pack of Syrah at $105

Right now there are about 60 people with under 100 points who have signed up in the last couple of months. If I have wine left after the first few waves of mailings, I’ll get a three pack offer out to them, but I suspect I’ll just be able to offer them an apology that we’re out of wine and hope they hold out until the Fall release.

Our list has grown about 250% since the release last Spring. This release will be a big clue about what the future looks like for us. For the next few years we really won’t have much more wine to sell than 125-150 cases of each wine. I have to judge how ordering goes this time to figure out future allocations pretty closely. I don’t want to get into a situation where it takes people years on a waiting list, but I’m afraid for people signing up in the near future, it might be a long wait to get wine.