Chambourcin Galore!

So today we are going to focus on the Chambourcin. When I went to talk to the boys about what they were working on today the answer was the Chambourcin! Frankly, I have never had a straight varietal Chambourcin, only blended into wines. The Chambourcin is in both our 2008 Norton and our 2008 Touriga, and I love the flavor it gives to those wines.

So I decided to learn a bit about the Chambourcin and I found out that the grape was not even available until the 60s! It grows really well in the region because it is able to withstand fairly cold winters and the grapes sit far apart from one another which makes them less prone to fruit rot. The one thing I found interesting is that I typically describe our wines with Chambourcin in them as spicy, not like spicy hot spicy, but more along the vain of dried spices. I found a description of Chambourcin and one of the words they used was herbaceous... which is a much better descriptor then my "spicy".

We pressed down the cap of the 2009 Chambourcin grapes which I found out does a few more things then just ward off rot. It also oxygenates the wine as well as homogenizes the temperature of the wine. Apparently, it creates a better environment for the yeast when all of the wine is at the same temperature. This insures even fermentation and a fantastic wine at the end of it all!

All of this hard work pays off in the end and I'll let you know how things turn out!

Fall Colors

As I was driving to work today I had a sudden realization that the fall colors were in swing. I also did not realize the leaves on the vines would change so radically! Coming into work was a blur of yellows and orange... It looks like my first official fall is going to be a beautiful one!

In Focus: Cabernet Sauvignon & Franc

So I just wanted to say I'm sorry for not posting in quite some time! I have been rather busy and I worked both days this weekend, which left me little time to catch up! Luckily, we had some exciting things happen today...


First, I came in this morning to a new facebook video and poll up online, which is always exciting. This time we are voting on which type of oak barrels we should put the Facebook Franc in. Apparently it is amazing right now, I have not had the pleasure of trying it, but I'll take Stephen's word on it! So good work thus far on making an amazing wine and keep up the voting!


We also racked off the Rosé today. This means it is going into barrel and it will be aging there for some time. It turns out it is 75% Cabernet Franc and 25% Merlot, both of which only sat on the skins for a limited amount of time to get a nice pale tint to the wine. I'm still unsure if Stephen has chosen to do a sweet or dry Rosé, but I am excited none the less. This is going to be the first time we are making a Rosé since 2006.

The Cabernet Sauvignon being pressed down and pink carbon dioxide bubbles forming over the cap

The other thing we did this afternoon was pressing off the Cabernet Sauvignon, which is amazing. According to Stephen it is going to be even better then the 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon, which won us the Governors Cup this year. I tasted the wine and it was great. It was very smooth which was unexpected to me because it is so young! I personally got a lot of pomegranate flavor from the wine, which I loved... So I am hoping that doesn't fall completely by the wayside as it ages. I think aging the wine in oak is going to give it much more depth so I am thrilled to see how this is going to turn out! 


cap - the layer of skins that sit on top of a wine (typically red) as it ferments. These caps need to be pressed down every few hours to keep the skins wet, so rot does not occur.

Harvest Complete!

Today the boys finished with harvest! ... Well sort of... They finished picking yesterday and today they finished processing the Norton and the Chambourcin. This included more de-stemming and putting the fruit into stainless steel tanks. Another good bit of news is that Stephen got his heater back! This means no more 87 degrees on the second floor of the barrel room (which was our temporary solution to heating the wines). This heater will now be connected to the last of the red wines to keep their temperature higher to make sure that the yeast is active and turning the sugars in the wines to alcohol.

Now the focus is going to be making and tending to the wines... I'll keep you updated on what happens with the wines as they change and develop!

Looks Can be Deceiving

Take a good look at this picture of our tasting room. At first glance nothing seems out of the ordinary, just a typical day at Keswick Vineyards... right? WRONG! Check out this huge wasps nest we found in the tree today... This thing must be bigger then a basketball, which kind of freaks me out... Oh the power of nature!

The End is in Sight

Yesterday and today are our last days picking for the season! The Chambourcin and the Norton are on their way into the barrel room and getting ready to be processed. I came in this morning and the boys were already hard at work, but they had a bit of extra spring in their step... They know that all of their hard work is paying off. But dont think this is the end of their work, they still need to process and tend to the wines to keep them in tip-top shape.

Norton on the vine... but not for long!

The Merlot and the Petite Verdot were put into barrels, so now the only wines left to deal with are both of the Cabernets (Franc & Sauvignon) and the Chambourcin and Norton. One little note about the Chambourcin grapes. I snagged a bunch when they boys werent looking yesterday and tasted them and I thought they were wonderful! It was later explained to me that the seeds were very "ripe". Apparently seeds can give seed tannins to a wine, which can sometimes leave the wine a bit bitter.. but the seeds in the Chambourcin will not do that because they are so ripe. If you look at them they are more of a chocolate color then the other seeds I've seen which are more like an oatmeal color.

Its a beautiful day at the vineyard, and today will (sadly) be my last day of serving freshly picked grapes in the tasting room until next harvest... so come keep me company today!

Grape Stomp & Cabernet Franc

Yesterday we had our first ever grape stomp and it was a lot of fun! In the morning the boys picked some of the grapes we still have on the vines and quickly de-stemmed them into three different bins. Once the event started we had some brave soles jump in and start stomping even though it was rather chilly outside...  Luckily we had some delicious tomato basil soup to warm people up after they got out of the bins of grapes. 

The Rock River Gypsies played some music to accompany the stomping and they were fantastic! They played for our Reds, Whites, and Bluegrass 4th of July event, but I was not working at Keswick Vineyards yet, so I had never seen them! They were amazing, so bravo to them! 

If I could do it all over again, I think I would try and plan the event when it was a little warmer, because the grapes ended up being so chilly! It is crazy how quickly the weather changed out here, just two weeks ago, it was nice and sunny and now it is getting cold... October in San Diego typically is still in the 70s so hanging out in 40 degree weather is a new thing for me!

Thanks to everyone who participated on Saturday! All of the pictures are on the computer at Keswick, so I'll try and post a few once I get back to work on Tuesday.

Oh and I almost forgot! We sold out of the Les Vents de'Anges on Saturday, so our 2008 Cabernet Franc was released today! It is fantastic, smooth with a nice lengthly finish... So come visit us in the tasting room soon to try it out!