Cima Collina

Archive for the ‘Cima Collina’ Category

Cima Collina will be at the Pinot Days event in Chicago on November 14th-15th. If you want to attend this wonderful event, please go to their website and enter the code “Collina” to get a 10% discount on tickets! Please be advised that the number of discounts available is limited.

Winemaker’s Dinner

I will be present and pouring Cima Collina at Christopher’s on Lincoln, in Carmel-by-the-Sea this Friday at 7:00. Christopher’s is one of my favorite local restaurants (chef owned and operated), and Christopher himself is a James Beard award-winning chef. Great food, great atmosphere, great service. Tickets are available at: montereywines.org.

• Posted in Cima Collina, Food & Wine, News & Happenings
• Comments Off on Upcoming Events

Hello All — I’ve taken a little break here, at least somewhat. We hosted our annual harvest party at Hilltop Ranch this past Saturday. The weather was wonderful, the band — “The Furry Chaps” — a fun, local bluegrass band kept us all entertained; all in all, quite good fun. We brought in the last load of grapes on October 10 — a mix of Bordeaux varietals (Cabernet Franc, Petite Verdot, Malbec, Merlot) from Lockwood Oaks. I kept the Malbec separate for a possible small bottling next year, but all the others are a “field blend” in one of our bigger tanks and all of it is just now coming into the homestretch — in other words finishing primary fermentation. We have drained and pressed a few tanks of Pinot so far — as soon as I’m done with this entry, I will drain a tank — but will dedicate ourselves more to that task next week……

Winemaker’s Dinner: Friday, November 7 at 7pm.

Yes, We’ve made a Port (all of 25 cases). I’ve had so many people ask for one, and I have played around with different varietals (traditional port varietals are difficult to come by here in Monterey — as they should be) and came up with this. I got the brandy for the fortification part of it from Germain-Robin up in Redwood Valley. Personally I do not like or drink sweet wines, and admit I had a difficult time separating my personal and professional judgements on this one, so this is neither as sweet nor as alcoholic as a traditional port. I have poured it at a few events recently and people seem to really like it — even those like myself who don’t like sweet wines. So, I’m getting a label created for it and it will go on sale in our tasting room sometime mid-November.

• Posted in Cima Collina, Food & Wine, Harvest, News & Happenings, Winemaking, Wines
• Comments Off on Hiatus

It’s sweatin’ time here again. We brought in the rest of our Pinot Noir last week, and processed about 35 tons in 3 days. We got through that, certainly, but then the monster that rears it’s head as a result is a *@!#-load of punchdowns….needless to say, I’m not very popular around here at the moment.

Maybe we should go back to doing it the old-fashioned way as it seems like it might’ve been more fun than modern times….at least the old-timers could drink some wine and hike up their skirts while mixing-up their fermenting must!

• Posted in Cima Collina, Harvest, Winemaking
• Comments Off on What — more punchdowns?

Vern Fisher of the Monterey County Herald came by one day and photographed us as we processed Chardonnay and Pinot Noir on the same day. Click here to see and hear the slideshow he put together. By the way — I’d have to get my arm twisted to do both whites and reds simultaneously here, because, well, you’ll see why…..but sometimes I’m reminded that Mother Nature is stronger than me, hee hee. Anyway, I’ve long admired Vern’s photographs in the paper, and I think he was able to capture what we do here on a very busy day.

The slideshow starts out at Chula Vina….the first photo is Henry Carrasco, owner of Chula Vina…the crew is shown harvesting the Chardonnay and Pinot that we subsequently are shown processing. Chula Vina is in Chualar Canyon, BTW, and it is one of my favorite beautiful places. Enjoy…

• Posted in Cima Collina, Harvest, In the Vineyard, News & Happenings, Winemaking
• Comments Off on 15 Minutes? :)

We are pushing to get all of the Pinot in and destemmed. Chula Vina and Hilltop Ranch have been harvested. Palisades will be tomorrow. Holly, Hummux and I are working the night shift. There’s nothing like being sticky, tired, wet and cold after midnight….

• Posted in Cima Collina, Harvest, Winemaking
• Comments Off on After Midnight

We are pretty tired here. We brought in Chula Vina Chardonnay, some Chula Vina Pinot Noir, and the remaining Tondre Pinot Noir last week, so we’ve been doing punchdowns and dealing with Chardonnay barrels foaming over and making a mess. During this time, everything gets sticky and dirty. We work in a small, compact space, so we work hard during the off-time to get everything clean. It simply is easier to work when your feet aren’t sticking to the floor.
This week will be the last push for receiving fruit. I’ve decided to bring everything in that is still hanging as I just don’t see much benefit to letting grapes stay on the vine any longer. It has been a strange year — could’ve been a pretty good year — but we just didn’t get the weather in the end to push the tannins and flavors into ripening just a bit more. I’m not sure I’ve seen a harvest like this before when we’ve had weeks of beautiful weather that didn’t go much over 85 degrees in some areas, but really cold nights. As a result, sugars didn’t increase much, tannins didn’t “ripen”, everything stood still. Anyway, we will spend a few long, cold nights destemming Pinot…..our last load will come in Saturday night.

Living Legacy

These two characters are Fred Nason (on the left) and his son Tom Nason (on the right) (photo courtesy of hummux). Tom and his wife Cara manager Hilltop Ranch, but Tom also hauls our grapes for us every harvest season. The Nason family is well-known in this area as they are descendents of Esselen Indians and, well, have been here longer than anyone else. Tom hauls our grapes for us during harvest. We all get so busy during the year that it is nice to catch-up during harvest. Fred is always entertaining. He has so many interesting stories as he has done a lot of ranching in the area, and has led innumerable horseback riding trips into the Ventana wilderness. He’s in his 80’s and looks great and is going strong. It is a pleasure to know and work with the Nasons and learn about the history of the land from them and is one of the many benefits of my job.

******

I will do a winemaker’s dinner at P.F. Chang’s in Monterey tomorrow night. We will pour a variety of wines with an interesting menu, and I will even pour our newest product — our as-yet unreleased Port. Contact Dave at 831-375-0143 for reservations.

• Posted in Cima Collina, Harvest, Winemaking
• Comments Off on Moving Right Along

What do winemaker’s dream about? This one dreams about tropical islands and a nice swim in a beautifully clear, warm ocean……but I also dream of Sauvignon Blanc. This time of year, that’s what I’m doing as I’m getting ready to blend our 2007 Sauvignon Blanc. Sauvignon Blanc! I love Sauvignon Blanc, especially on a warm summer’s day. Unlike other wines, I can honestly say I love all styles of Sauvignon Blanc (just had a nice Grgich S.B. tonight with dinner). Anyway, when it comes to this part of the winemaking process — blending, finishing, bottling — it just gets the gears turning in my head (and just when i worry they might be getting rusty) and gets me going. It’s exciting, envisioning how I think the wine will taste and then discover how it really turns out.

So, pictures to come in the next entry so you can see what’s goin’ on……but right now, it’s in my head, in my laboratory, and in my dreams…..

Thanks!

Thanks to all those who nominated this blog once again for the American Wine Blog Awards, vintage 2008, “Best Winery Blog” category. Much appreciated. It’s always a delight when I realize that folks read what I write here. To nominate other great wine blogs out there, or just to check out the action go to: www.fermentation.typepad.com.

• Posted in Cima Collina, Winemaking
• Comments Off on Dreamin’ n Schemin’

A handful of patience is worth more than a bushel of brains….Dutch Proverb

If I have ever made any valuable discoveries, it has been owing more to patient attention, than to any other talent….Isaac Newton

So, you might think that a winemaker must have certain attributes in order to be a winemaker: highly developed sensory skills, commitment and attention to the details, blah, blah, blah… But, as I grow older in the wine business and, I hope, wiser [luckily for me there is no qualitative measurement for wisdom], and get through yet another year of the winemaking cycle, I can’t help but to reflect on what I have come to view as the most important attribute of all: PATIENCE. Yes, that stalwart resistance to time and ambition, hopes and dreams — patience. I wait for harvest to start, I wait for a wine that is tasting off in the barrel to work through it’s adolescence, I wait for the cold, cold winter in the wine cellar to end so that I can warm my bones in the springtime sun; I wait for the wine in the bottle to come around and taste great; I wait for fermentations to finish, for TTB to approve our labels — you get the idea. Yes, I can be busy, busy with the seasonal rush and other times of the year, but most of my job is spent waiting, and not trying to drive myself too crazy in the process — this time of year is that which demands the most patience for me as it is the least active time when I spend most of my day planning, thinking, working on spreadsheets, budgets, etc. and also remembering the mistakes I made or could’ve made last year. The only way not to get crazy, or fiddle with a wine that isn’t tasting the way I like, or worry if things will turn out alright, is to adopt patience as my child and attend to it and fret over it, watch it grow, and learn from it. What have I learned (so far)? Things usually turn out alright — the wines usually end up tasting great, or as good as I had hoped, and that patience is the most valuable asset in winemaking…..maybe even in life, too.

*******

Here are some Cima Collina events coming up that you’ll have to wait a little while for, but I can assure you it will be worth it!

January 30, Tarpy’s “Wine Down Wednesday” will feature Cima Collina wines. We had a lot of fun last year and are looking forward to this.

February 1 Our newest product available in our tasting room– Howlin’ Good Red — will be released February 1st. This wine is a blend of various red wines (mostly Merlot, Syrah & Petite Sirah) and all profits from the sales of this wine will benefit The SPCA of Monterey County! Most who have tasted it agree that it’s worthy of howling about and it supports a good cause — what could be better than that!

Also:

Our tasting room operating hours will change slightly for the next two weeks and will be open only on January 18-20, and then on January 25-27. We will resume normal hours (open Thursday-Monday, 11-6) starting January 31.

• Posted in Cima Collina, Winemaking
• 1 Comment

We’ve been busy finishing up and draining & pressing reds.  Here are some photos from the catwalk:

A red tank after draining & shoveling…..

A view from above of a press in action…..

Pretty messy, huh?….

A press pan….

Checking the tank.

• Posted in Cima Collina, Harvest, Winemaking, Winery
• Comments Off on Notes From the Catwalk

***Update: 11-9-07 It looks like Tanner will make it! Thanks to all for the calls and well-wishes! Annette

I’m not sure why I missed this one and I have to say this is disturbing and embarrasing for me given that I have been in the wine industry for awhile and own dogs — but I did not know that grapes are toxic to dogs. My dogs go with me everywhere and spend a lot of time in vineyards and in the winery. They have eaten grapes or grape skins here and there with no effect. But the other day, my little dog Tanner got into some grapes and is now experiencing kidney failure in a vet hospital in Capitola. The veterinarians tell me that this is not well understood — they don’t know what it is about grapes that is toxic to dogs and have no idea how it affects the kidneys, just that it does, and often does alarmingly quickly, but yet doesn’t affect all dogs. So, there you go. Tell your friends that have dogs: raisins, grapes, grape skins (and, I would venture to say wine as well) can be toxic to dogs. And maybe while you’re getting the word out, could you say a little prayer for Tanner, too?

• Posted in Cima Collina, In the Vineyard, Uncategorized, Winery
• 6 Comments

• Carmel Valley, CA 93924
• 831.620.0645