Winemaker Journal: February 2012

Jeff Herinckx

What’s happening at the winery
A few of us from Oak Knoll spent some time in California last month. First, we visited some smaller, family-owned wineries in Sonoma County. I thought it was a lot of fun to talk to people who work in, and run, wineries that are close in size to our own. I also really enjoyed the fact that we had a chance to taste some of the bigger wines, like Petite Sirah, Cabernet Sauvignon and Zinfandel, that we don’t make. Plus, the weather there was much nicer than it is in Oregon this time of year!

From Sonoma, we went to Sacramento for the Unified Grape Symposium. This is a huge show that travels around California and the northwest, but the Sacramento location is the best one at which to see equipment. This year, we didn’t see as much equipment there as we have in past years, but it was still worthwhile to go. We were looking for new crush equipment – a sorting table and a destemmer – which are both pieces of equipment that are custom-built at the winery, because everyone’s set-ups vary so much.

We ran out of some wine while we were in California – Niagara, Frambrosia, and Marion Berree. Fortunately, we anticipated a need for those wines; before we left, we moved some of that wine to the room that we use to warm wine before we bottle it. Most of our wine is stored between 43 and 45 degrees. Before we bottle it, we move it into a room that we heat to 55-60 degrees so that it can come up to that temperature before bottling.

Pinot Report
We plan to bottle our 2009 Arcachon Pinot Noir in February, which will then be available through our distributor only in Oregon.

We still have some of our 2009 Pinot Gris available for sale. We are planning to bottle a 2011 vintage, and it’s in progress now. Once the Riesling and Niagara are cold-stabilized, we’ll cold-stabilize the Pinot Gris and Chardonnay.

What’s going on in February

There’s a Valentine’s Day event at the winery on Saturday, February 11, which involves tasting six of our red wines that have been paired with petit fours. We’re expecting to be very busy that day!

Besides bottling the Niagara, Frambrosia, and Marion Berree, we also plan to bottle our 2008 Barbera this month. Those grapes came from Washington State, and the wine has mostly aged in neutral barrels. Through tasting trials, we decided that the wine needed more oak, so we added some oak chips in order to enhance the oak flavor in the wine. We’re only bottling about 200 cases of it, and I’m anticipating that it will be pretty popular.

Our first wine festival of the year will happen early in February. It’s hard to believe the festival season is already upon us! We look forward to getting out and spending time with our fans.

That's it for now...talk to you next month.

Jeff Herinckx
Winemaker

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• January, 2012
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