Winemaker’s Update – May, 2019

A very successful vintage despite the challenges

“We just bottled the remaining 2017 wine that we had in the barrel – a couple of single vineyard Pinot Noirs, the rest of our Grenache and Syrah, plus the 2017 Lotus & Om single barrel bottlings.”

“These 2017s have this amazingly good acidity and great freshness. The 2017 red wines, in particular, are really nice.  They all came in with higher acid level and we can tell that these wine are going to prove to be a very successful vintage despite the challenges of that year. As you may recall, we had several heatwaves in 2017 that presented a real challenge for us.  We really had to scramble to pick everything quickly, to make sure the fruit came in at optimal ripeness. Many of the other vineyards in the area, faced the same challenges of the unrelenting heat, but luckily, we managed the challenges well and the proof is in the pudding. These wines speak for themselves.”

Excited to have Colson Canyon in our lineup

“These 2017 wines are looking great. It’s SAMsARA’s first vintage making Colson Canyon Grenache and Syrah. Colson Canyon is a bit of an outlier for us because it’s not in Santa Rita Hills, but the fruit was awesome, came in with great acidity because of how cold it is out there at night. It’s very exciting to have Colson Canyon in our lineup and we believe it’s going to be a really solid vineyard for us for years to come.”

A lot of fast and vigorous green growth

“The vineyards are all looking really good this year. We haven’t had any flowering yet, but that should be happening sometime soon. The vineyards all had a little bit later than typical budbreak this year because the weather has still been a little bit “wintery” with sporadic rain showers. But due to all the heavy rain, there’s been a lot of fast growth and the vineyards look really happy which is nice to see. There’s a lot of fast and vigorous green growth. The cover crops have all done really well. It’ll be exciting to see how it all turns out as we hopefully move into more consistently sunny weather.”

“Despite the cooler than average temperatures, everybody is really optimistic about the 2019 vintage. It looks like another year where harvest timing is going to be in line with historical averages, which is nice! ”