Quick Cork Question...

This month I've been dealing with the cork companies.  Mostly getting samples, discussing price, and most importantly, asking what they are doing to reduce cork taint.  

They all have their methods and technologies and they all claim to be the company that done the most to eliminate TCA.  I've seen the numbers, and the graphs, and the presentations.

What I really want to know is :  What is the incidence of corked bottles in the market today?  

Gary Vaynerchu(c)k says its 1 in 2500.  I strongly disagree. Please leave a comment on your corked wine experience.  I figure 1 in 60 for me.

( I know, I know...let's leave the screwcaps out of the equation) 

 

Fire and Ice

Well, actually that should be ice and fire.  It was really cold in Napa last week.  I believe there were five days in a row of freezing temperatures.  Now it is pushing 94 and really hot.  

The last post showed a Cab Franc bud coming to life.  Now look at him : (top photo 4/16/09)

The tissues in the plant freeze causing the cells to explode.  It sort of looks burned and wilted.

Here he is today (pic on the bottom) after a couple of really nice sunny days:

Not nearly as much damage as I expected.  A few little dead leaves but I think he'll be alright.

Vines come to life

It started about three weeks ago. The twisted stumps that appeared all but dead sprung back to life.

It is really amazing what's in each little bud that starts swelling when the weather warms in March.

All compacted in that bud is the entire year's growth. All the shoots, leaves, grape clusters, tendrils, everything. Even stranger, the following year's buds are there too. Its quite the complex structure really.

Here is Mr. Cabernet Franc with a pic taken every three days to show how these microscopic plants appear and start to telescope out just like clockwork, year in and year out.

Label Options

So we are gearing up to bottle our newest addition to the Prime Family...Chardonnay (only about 100 cases, due out in Summer 2009!). We were playing around with color schemes and these are the finalists. The yellow color will be more of a gold to match the foil if we can pull it off. The chardonnay bottle will be about the same color as the one we used for Prime Cabernet. Let us know if you have a preference to one label over the other, we are interested to know.

Option 1


Option 2

2008 Crush Report

The yearly grape crush report is in my hand and is not good news (in my opinion).  District 4 (Napa) Cabernet Sauvignon is up to an average price of $4688.76 a ton.  Up from $4143.14 last year.  Since this is how grape growers price their fruit, we are going to be paying more $$$ for our spectacular Coombsville fruit this year.

As usual, I like to see what I would be paying if we were using Cabernet from Fresno (District 13)-  $344.08.   Quite a bargain but don't expect to see PRIME District 13 Cabernet Sauvignon anytime soon. 

Topping

Caught with my finger in the bung hole again. I'm checking the barrels to see how low the level of the wine is. If its too low, its time for topping.

I was reading a post from the Goosecross Cellars winery blog and it got me thinking. Topping barrels probably takes up more time and costs more money that any other activity in the winery.

Barrels that are full of wine don't stay full on their own. We have to add wine to each barrel every few weeks to avoid fill the void in the barrel caused by evaporation. The void contains air and that is the enemy of wine at the ageing stage (vinegar anyone?).

Evaporation takes about 5% of your wine away every year. Prime is in barrel for about two years. So for my production of about 700 gallons of Cabernet I can expect to lose about 70 gallons of wine. That's 348 bottles of wine never to be seen again.

The Show and Prime 2007

Part One-The annual Unified Wine and Grape Symposium "the Show" is wrapping up tomorrow and this year was a huge success.  The entire show was packed with thousands of people.  Vintners were shopping for tons of high priced toys.  The state of the industry lecture pieced together lots of data that pretty much reads that aside from heath care the wine industry is doing better than most in this crappy economy. 

Part Two- I just tasted through the PRIME 2007 Cabernet lots and this is hands down the best yet from our young winery.  Some of the best Cab I have had period.  Very exciting stuff.  Here's a shot of the barrels just recently racked and topped up.