Monday, August 2nd, 2010

That faint thud you just heard was my jaw hitting the terroir when I returned home from a quick vacation to find colour, yes colour, in my Pinot Gris and Pinot Noir.  It seems eerily too early.  The race is on, it’s veraison.

Veraison is the physiological stage of grape development where the hard, green berries finally soften and start to accumulate sugars and gradually turn colour.  That first flash of colour is always a “noose tightener” of sorts, in that so many jobs need to be squeezed in before the imminent harvest.  In early years such as this one, we are already fighting to keep the clusters exposed and canopy trimmed, but now it is even more important.  Recent studies out of Cornell University have shown that longer fruit exposure to sun can decrease methoxypyrazine levels (green, vegetal characters) in late ripening varieties like Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc.

Coloured berries also attract hungry birds, so our protective netting needs to be put up as soon as the hedging, leaf removal and cluster thinning is complete.  I honestly can’t decide if I’m excited or horrified at the prospect of working every day for the next three months.  I reassure myself that we go through the same song and dance every year, but that doesn’t seem to quell my uneasiness.  Amid the vineyard duties, we have to squeeze in a bottling run and get all tanks and crush equipment ready for the first fruit of the season.

Just as my anxiety peaks, the faint light at the end of the tunnel begins to emerge.  ”Push on lad!”, I tell myself.  Pluck a few more leaves, thin a few more bunches, finish one more row.  Visions of brilliant autumn colours and cozy fall clothes begin to warm my thoughts.  The thrill and challenge of ripening Shiraz emboldens me.  I can taste that luscious free run juice now!

Bring on veraison!

Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010

It dawned on me today,  as I  hurriedly thinned Pinot Gris in the midst of an earthquake, that I hadn’t given a thorough vineyard update in a while.  So here goes…

Mother nature is two weeks ahead.  I’m three weeks behind.  This good news / bad news situation is the familiar refrain I’ve heard in talking to many grape growers throughout the peninsula.  We’ve seen a boon of growth in all vines over the last couple of weeks, leaving us scrambling to keep up with the expedited hand labour chores.  Adequate rainfall, heat, and blistering sun are making my vines very happy, but leaving me a little worried.  Disease pressure has been low to this point (kiss of death) but the current humid conditions will challenge even the best of viticultural practices.

The accelerated growth creates the need to shoot-thin and shoot-position all vines before we are able to start hedging.  As always, vine vigour was particularly problematic in our Shiraz blocks, so I targeted them first.  After two weeks of what felt like hacking through a rainforest with a dull machete, I was happy to kiss the Shiraz good-bye and move on to the more manageable Cabernet  Sauvignon.  We are well through bloom in all varieties, and very close to berry touch stage in the Pinot Gris.  Air flow through the canopy is critical at this stage, as is fruit exposure for optimum fungicide penetration.

I’m happy to report that the young Pinot Noir vines we planted last season are doing very well, with less than 5% vine failure.  In the spirit of Father’s Day, I give my dad all the credit for these thriving vines.  It was he who ploughed the field ad nauseam to his own exacting specifications, he who sat vigil through many winter and spring evenings waiting to fire up the windmill, and he who artfully maneuvered the grape-hoe around each baby vine with the deft touch of a surgeon.  Judging by a couple of the catastrophic first year fields I’ve witnessed while out consulting this year (upwards of 60% vine death), I really believe that the use of the windmill combined with proper site selection and field preparation helped save our bacon.

PS:  I send a special thank-you and congratulations to Insite Design for designing an Ontario Wine Awards silver medal winning wine label that still makes me proud every time I slap one on a bottle!

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

What a pleasure it was to have a keen group of culinary/hospitality students from Assiniboine Community College (Manitoba) stop by our barn this morning.  Prior to their arrival, I worried that it may be tough to keep our guests entertained for the full two and a half hours they were scheduled for, but once I met them I knew it wouldn’t be a problem!

They were all ears as my mother and I took turns explaining the history of our farm and some of the viticultural practices we employ.  The rest of the time was filled with very well thought out questions and subsequent discussion.  We concluded the morning with a tasting of our wines, of which I received some great feedback.  It is a perk of my job to be able to meet such engaging and talented young people getting set to embark on their careers.  I wish them all the best of luck in their future endeavours, and thank them for bringing a sampling of Five Rows back home to Brandon, Manitoba.

A special thanks also goes to Barbara Leslie from Niagara College for hooking us up with our new friends.

Saturday, April 24th, 2010

Starting Saturday May 1st, the barn doors will be open once again.  I encourage all friends of Five Rows to stop in for a quick sip and chat.  We’d love to hear how your winter was and give you a sneak peek at our upcoming release schedule.  All the wines are drinking well right now and, consequently, their numbers are dwindling rapidly.

Make sure to bring your boots and take a leisurely stroll through the vineyard. It’s a great time of year to witness new buds popping right before your eyes.  I’d be happy to lead a tour for anyone interested.  Thanks to the wonderful spring weather that’s graced Niagara, we are a good 10-14 days ahead of a normal year.  As I envision what the 2010 vintage could potentially become, I hear the voice of my wise and battle-tested father reminding me not to count my chickens just yet.

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010

After a brief respite, work in the vineyard has begun again in earnest.  It’s time to evaluate just how many buds have made it through winter, then make an educated guess at how many to leave for the upcoming season.  We look at things like bud viability, cane density, internodal gap distance, and the long-range forecast before making our first cuts.

Generally, we prune our vines back to two trunks, each housing a cane of ten or so buds.  We’ve been lucky with a mild winter to this point and bud viability is relatively high compared to previous years.  However, one frigid night can quickly change this rosy outlook, so as an insurance measure we’ll leave a third cane on one of the trunks just in case March decides to go out like a lion.  This third cane is left untied early in the spring then either cut off or tied down at a later date based on how many total buds survive through the dreaded frost window.

The art of pruning may seem like a boring, monotonous chore to some, but I actually quite enjoy it.  I look at each vine as a blank canvas, ready to be fashioned into a viticultural masterpiece.  Laugh not, for the responsibility to empower a vine to produce stellar fruit should not be taken lightly.  This important task of renewal sets the tone for the year ahead and restarts the cycle of life.  With each successive snip of the pruners, it’s hard not to anticipate and envision the bounty this vine will bring us in the fall.

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

Our 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon took a road trip recently, and ended up finding a new home in our nation’s capital.  Beckta Dining & Wine, on Nepean Street in Ottawa, is the latest member of our extended Five Rows family.  I haven’t had the opportunity to dine there yet, but countless “foodie” acquaintances have assured me that our wine is in good hands.  The refreshing philosophy at Beckta is to “change involved and sometimes intimidating culinary experiences into the comfortable and remarkable”.  Sounds like my kind of place!

Closer to home, Five Rows was recently featured in an article by wine writer Rick VanSickle of the St. Catharines Standard.  You can read it here.

Sunday, January 3rd, 2010

At 8:03 AM on January 2nd, a new era began at Lowrey Vineyards.  As the sun peeked over the escarpment we welcomed the dawn of our very own “Ice Age”.   After an evening of perfect freezing conditions (-12 degrees Celsius) it was decided to harvest five rows of Cabernet Sauvignon, our first foray into the world of Icewine.  A beautiful morning unfolded before us, with a light snow gently filtering the weak rays of winter sun.  It soon became clear that picking the fruit and braving the cold are the easy part, and actually quite enjoyable.

To understand the travails of pressing frozen grapes to yield minute amounts of juice, I want you to imagine trying to squeeze a tray of ice cubes in an effort to produce water.  It takes equal amounts of pressure and patience I assure you!  Too much of the former and not enough of the latter can lead to problems…big problems.  Less than a minute into the second press load I cranked up the pressure and was horrified to hear the sickening hiss of a slow leak in the press bladder.  Luckily we had a back-up bladder on hand, but the subsequent dismantling of the press load and bladder re-assembly really set us back.  In the end, patience prevailed and the luscious Cab juice began to flow.  It was thick, sweet and full of super-concentrated flavours of ripe strawberry and raspberry.

At this stage the plan is to make a traditional Icewine, but I could be persuaded to ferment it a little longer for those seeking more of a drier, “late harvest” style.  Initial feedback tells me that Icewine is often perceived as being “too sweet” for some palates (including mine at times), but I challenge those people to try Cabernet  Sauvignon or Cabernet Franc Icewine with dark chocolate or strong cheeses.  Simply delectable!

Monday, November 30th, 2009

As the harvest of 2009 comes to a close I find myself in a nostalgic state of mind, reflective of the intense year that we’ve just experienced.  In this time we nervously launched a winery, opened our barn to visitors, sold out of our first vintage and managed to carve ourselves out a small niche in the local wine scene.

In a recent radio interview, I was asked to shed a little more light on this experience.   You can listen to it here.

Thursday, October 29th, 2009

When you get to a point where the line between work and life is so blurry that the majority of your day seems like filler between fixes of caffeine, and what little sleep you do get is haunted by images of Multi-coloured Asian Lady Beetles and under-ripe Cabernet Franc…it’s best to step back, focus, and re-consider exactly why you do what you do.

Thankfully, success breeds perseverance.  The following are two reasons why I still choose life as a winemaker:

2005 Cabernet Sauvignon

A severe winter led to an average of 50% bud damage in the Lowrey Vineyard.  This Cabernet Sauvignon was sourced from vines that were shouldering a much lighter load than they were used to, hence a greater opportunity for ripening was in the cards.  Thankfully, the growing season weather co-operated and the resultant fruit was as good as has ever been produced on our farm.  The St. David’s Bench microclimate really strutted its stuff, with even the later-ripening Cabernet Sauvignon reaching optimal sugar and TA levels.  Like our first “Five Rows” vintage in 2004, we took equal portions of Young and Old Cab Blocks to maximize clonal complexity.  Following traditional small batch punch downs, the wine was aged in a 50-50 blend of American and French Oak with an average age of 1.7 years per barrel.  A comparative barrel tasting took place on July 5, 2007 and as with previous years, the highest rated wines were housed in two-year old wood (a 2003 Barrel Associates & 2003 Berthomieu).  These two superior bottles were bottled on July 18, 2008.  This wine showcases the potential of minimally-cropped Cabernet Sauvignon from warm vintages in the Lowrey Vineyard.  Aromatic highlights include wild blueberry, ripe cherry and vanilla.  Very ripe and jammy on the palate with soft, mature tannins and excellent length.  Although hard to resist its youthful charm, this Cab is only entering its prime.

Barrels: 2       Cases: 45        Alcohol: 13.4%         Price: $50/Bottle

2008 Pinot Gris

In an effort to instill confidence, I tell my wines that it is never fair to compare themselves to their predecessors.   For that reason we won’t speak further of the effusive praise garnered by the 2007 Five Rows Pinot Gris.  Some shoes are just too big to fill.

Harvested on September 19, 2008, this Pinot Gris began its life fermenting slowly in stainless steel and older French Oak.  The oak component was added in an effort to further enhance mouthfeel and increase aromatic complexity.  A nice cool ferment, dotted with periodic lees stirring, was complete by mid-October.  The finished wine was blended, then fined with bentonite for protein stability.

Early tasting sessions showed strong notes of McIntosh apple and anise, while one panelist was sure he could smell “catbox” (depending, of course, on the type of litter you prefer).  The French Oak and lees stirring helped create rounder texture and seemed to lend tropical nuances such as star fruit.  The wine was left with just enough residual sugar to balance the acidity.  Lemon-lime citrus flavours are predominant.  Bottled September 14th, 2009.

Cases: 57             Alcohol: 13.3%       Price: $25/Bottle

Both wines are now available for purchase!

Saturday, September 26th, 2009

Without fail, every vintage brings forth an unforeseen challenge.  This year that head-scratcher is the acid levels in our grapes.  Sugar levels in vineyards across the peninsula are sky high, usually the indication that grapes are ready to harvest.  However, upon a quick taste and further  laboratory analysis, most growers and vineyard managers are finding that their fruit remains quite tart and not quite balanced as of yet.  It seems as if the warmer daytime weather has spiked the sugar content, but the cooler nights have stalled the acid conversion.

Those who choose to harvest their fruit primarily on high sugar levels will surely pay for it in unbalanced resultant wines.  One major problem within our industry is that grape growers are paid mainly on tonnage with a bonus structure for sugar levels (degrees brix).  Clearly, this does not tell the whole story when it comes to the quality of fruit that it takes to craft premium wines.  Titratable acidity, flavour production, seed and tannin ripeness, colour, berry size, nutrient levels and cleanliness are all key components that a winemaker must take into consideration when evaluating incoming fruit.

Consider the plight of a grower who thins his vineyard to lower tonnage, but their fruit is above average in all the other ripening components at the base sugar level.  They get paid the same per tonne as a grower who overcrops underripe fruit at the base sugar level, which is fairly easy to do.  I’m of the opinion that we need to better reward the grower in the first scenario.  If we could come up with some kind of “ripening coefficient” that takes all the important parameters into consideration, perhaps more growers would be inclined to crop at the lower levels needed to ensure premium wine quality.

Thankfully, while we wait for the acid levels to drop, the grapes keep accumulating sugar and flavours.  If we can keep them clean (and that is one nervously typed “If”) the fruit should round out nicely, giving us the ability to craft great wine in 2009.