Saturday, September 26, 2009

Westlake's only California winery

Today was crush for some very unique California cabernet as Cross Creek vineyards owner Richard Schwartz airlifted his Sonoma cab picked yesterday into Austin for crush today. Family and friends turned out for gourmet snacks, grape destemming and a fun sampling of vintages back to 1999. Here is Dave from The Grove taking his turn at the hand destemmer. Good times as the 2009 grapes look nicely ripened and prior vintages are tasting impressive. Standouts were the 2000 and 2004 and a 2007 barrel sample shows promise with some time for tannins to soften. There will soon be a way to try Richard's grapes in action as Spann Vineyards has done a 2007 Cross Creek Vineyard designated wine so watch for that. Maybe at The Grove?

Monday, September 07, 2009

wow - special occassion wine

Special occassions like, say, an anniversary, deserve something special to sip. Two ways to do that: pull something from the cellar or pick a special bottle from the shelf or wine list. Tonight we popped a bottle of 1994 Gran Reserva tempranillo from Torre de Oria. Not a true Rioja as it sits outside that region of Spain, this beauty sure had me fooled. Well worth the $40 price tag and 8 year wait. When is your next occasion for a special bottle?

Saturday, September 05, 2009

Takes a lot of beer to make wine?

Today we finished bottling 2008 pinot noirs and to keep the machinery humming we cracked open a few Texas brews. And it struck me that every step along the winemaking path seems to involve beer. Which begs the question, what do they drink at the brewery? Beer I guess.
Anyway, with bottling out of the way we are ready for harvest. First grapes should be in two or three weeks!