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Gelfand Vineyards
Summer 2008
This summer hit with a vengeance! It was actually hard to differentiate between spring and summer, in that the last few weeks of spring brought with it temperatures close to 110 degrees. It will be long remembered by those of you who attended this year's wine festival in the town square, where it hit 108 degrees, one of the hottest days on record. Needless to say, drinking the big red wines from the Paso area was definitely NOT number one on anyone's minds. Although summer started only a few weeks ago, we have already had more 100+ degrees days than entire summers over the last few years.
So what effect will this have on the grapes? At this point, all we can tell you is that they are looking better than we have ever seen...big, tight clusters. Below is a photo of our Petite Sirah - notice that there is nothing Petite about it!!! But this is just the start. They are still young and immature. They will start ripening in about another month, at which point we will start dropping about half our fruit, and from that point until harvest, Mother Nature will determine their quality. But we are off to a great start.
Our first Wine-Maker dinner was a huge success. It was a sold out affair, and Gaetano and his staff did an incredible job to make it so memorable. Thanks to each of you who once again supported us and had the attended our inaugural event. And just like our annual Blending Event, we promise to make this an annual event exclusively for our wine club members to remember. In fact, we are already starting to plan next year's event which will be in a very intimate, backyard setting (wonder where that might be?).
We have received some feedback on our last wine club shipment that went out the first part of May. Due to the unusually warm (hot) spring weather, some of you found corks that had pushed up or have leaked. Heat will do that to wine...the heat causes the liquid to expand, and the only place for it to go is up. This by itself will not cause the wine to spoil - unless it keeps leaking which means that the cork did not reseal itself. But, if any of you open bottles that have 'turned', just let us know and we will replace them for you. We have also received some questions about our Rose becoming cloudy. As you may remember, we do not fine or filter our wines, and you will see this very clearly (sorry for the pun) in this wine. Also, if the wine is chilled, it causes the tartaric acid in wine to precipitate out into a colloidal solution (see, Len really does have a degree in Biology). Again, this can be removed by filtration, but that's something we just don't want to do. Look pretty or taste great? We opt for the taste. You may also see the tartaric acid on the bottom of a cork in some of our red wines - this is when you see the cork red and crystallized. Again, this does not mean that there is anything wrong with the wine; in fact, it means that the cork is out and we hope you soon discover that everything is great with the wine!
Since we are always curious as to how our wines stack up to others, we submitted a few of the 2006s to the Orange County Fair Wine Competition, the largest gathering of California
For those that might be interested in helping out with this year's harvest (which normally starts mid-September), please stay in touch by either email or phone. We can then let you know the exact dates we will be picking, crushing and fermenting, as well as bottling some of the 2007 vintage. We won't know the exact dates until one or two days ahead of time, so if you want to get those hands dirty (actually purple), we would love to have you come out and participate in the fun.
And a final reminder about our Blending Event which will be held on Saturday, September 27th. Once again, it will be your chance to come up with that perfect blend for our 2007 Menage a Bunch and SFR. If you haven't been to this great event, then you should make sure not to miss one of our best events of the year. And of course the party wouldn't be the same without those of you who join us every year to help blend. While we haven't set a maximum number of people for this event yet, we will need to limit it to make sure we have enough food and space for all of you to enjoy yourselves. So please RSVP soon and with the limited hotel space in Paso Robles, you should definitely book lodging as soon as possible.
Have a great summer and hope to see you in September!
Len & Jan Gelfand
Gelfand Vineyards
Summer 2008
This summer hit with a vengeance! It was actually hard to differentiate between spring and summer, in that the last few weeks of spring brought with it temperatures close to 110 degrees. It will be long remembered by those of you who attended this year's wine festival in the town square, where it hit 108 degrees, one of the hottest days on record. Needless to say, drinking the big red wines from the Paso area was definitely NOT number one on anyone's minds. Although summer started only a few weeks ago, we have already had more 100+ degrees days than entire summers over the last few years.
So what effect will this have on the grapes? At this point, all we can tell you is that they are looking better than we have ever seen...big, tight clusters. Below is a photo of our Petite Sirah - notice that there is nothing Petite about it!!! But this is just the start. They are still young and immature. They will start ripening in about another month, at which point we will start dropping about half our fruit, and from that point until harvest, Mother Nature will determine their quality. But we are off to a great start.
Our first Wine-Maker dinner was a huge success. It was a sold out affair, and Gaetano and his staff did an incredible job to make it so memorable. Thanks to each of you who once again supported us and had the attended our inaugural event. And just like our annual Blending Event, we promise to make this an annual event exclusively for our wine club members to remember. In fact, we are already starting to plan next year's event which will be in a very intimate, backyard setting (wonder where that might be?).
We have received some feedback on our last wine club shipment that went out the first part of May. Due to the unusually warm (hot) spring weather, some of you found corks that had pushed up or have leaked. Heat will do that to wine...the heat causes the liquid to expand, and the only place for it to go is up. This by itself will not cause the wine to spoil - unless it keeps leaking which means that the cork did not reseal itself. But, if any of you open bottles that have 'turned', just let us know and we will replace them for you. We have also received some questions about our Rose becoming cloudy. As you may remember, we do not fine or filter our wines, and you will see this very clearly (sorry for the pun) in this wine. Also, if the wine is chilled, it causes the tartaric acid in wine to precipitate out into a colloidal solution (see, Len really does have a degree in Biology). Again, this can be removed by filtration, but that's something we just don't want to do. Look pretty or taste great? We opt for the taste. You may also see the tartaric acid on the bottom of a cork in some of our red wines - this is when you see the cork red and crystallized. Again, this does not mean that there is anything wrong with the wine; in fact, it means that the cork is out and we hope you soon discover that everything is great with the wine!
Since we are always curious as to how our wines stack up to others, we submitted a few of the 2006s to the
For those that might be interested in helping out with this year's harvest (which normally starts mid-September), please stay in touch by either email or phone. We can then let you know the exact dates we will be picking, crushing and fermenting, as well as bottling some of the 2007 vintage. We won't know the exact dates until one or two days ahead of time, so if you want to get those hands dirty (actually purple), we would love to have you come out and participate in the fun.
And a final reminder about our Blending Event which will be held on Saturday, September 27th. Once again, it will be your chance to come up with that perfect blend for our 2007 Menage a Bunch and SFR. If you haven't been to this great event, then you should make sure not to miss one of our best events of the year. And of course the party wouldn't be the same without those of you who join us every year to help blend. While we haven't set a maximum number of people for this event yet, we will need to limit it to make sure we have enough food and space for all of you to enjoy yourselves. So please RSVP soon and with the limited hotel space in Paso Robles, you should definitely book lodging as soon as possible.
Len & Jan Gelfand