vineyard
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Was reading a Curious George story from the late 1950s to our young son the other day. In one of the scenes is an image of a reporter carrying one of those old-time cameras, the boxy ones with the big flash on top, looked like she was looking down on it to take the picture instead of holding it to her eye. You know what I’m talking about? Anyway, I soon put our little guy to napping and came downstairs thinking of that camera, about how in many of my favorite children’s books I share with Sam there are a good many dated items like the telephone in the big green room, or this box camera, or horse-drawn wagons, etc; in essence, objects from the past that my son might never come to know because they are no longer relevant to our cultural landscape.
Alone with my cup of coffee, Scott across the table finishing up Hugh Johnson, A Life Uncorked (look for a book report soon – I’ll try to get Scott to expand on his thoughts for this one), I began to think about something I had read recently in the March WS, about an idea from the past that I wonder if more and more people might never come to know, or even worse, to dismiss: the farm-to-wine connection.
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Tags: A Life Uncorked, Burgundy, Curious George, Finger Lakes, Hugh Johnson, James Molesworth, single vineyard wine, vineyard, wine
While watching the Academy Awards the other night I started thinking (what an incredibly boring show, even with Alec and Steve, so what else to do?): How are films made? Besides the obvious of a great script and dialogue and scenery and costumes, lighting, etc., and of course the greatly talented actors and directors who bring it all to light, at the end, it all gets pieced together after numerous takes. Get the line wrong? Take 2. Get it wrong again? Take 3. And so on, and so on, take after take until it’s just right. Then, it’s edited down, soundtrack and whatever else applied, and there you go. Oh, if it could be so in the wine industry.
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Tags: Academy Awards, vineyard, wine, wine industry
You’d think it’d be the waiting. All this waiting. At first it was to find the right land. Then it was to do the dance so the wheat farmer (Old Wise All) would sell us it. Which did turn out shorter than expected, but a dance and wait game nonetheless. The wait to find water. How deep would we have to drill? How much would there be? Would we even find any? Then the waiting for the deer fence to be dug, the mainline to be set in, the 3-phase to be brought in, the plants to arrive.
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Tags: vines, vineyard, vineyard manager, weather
Reading a fairly recent WS blog by James Laube about winemakers with style reminded me of what Scott has been saying since ’45:
“I don’t make wine for anyone except me.”
“Wait. Woah. Hold on, Hoss,”
I’d say to him.
“How the hell are we supposed to sell wine you only make for yourself?!”
Even before planting the vineyard we had talked about not catering to the critic’s palate, and for sure not rushing after or trying to predict the wine flavour of the day. That wasn’t the point of any of this. But to hear Scott put it out there on the table so, well, matter-of-factly (or egoistically, depending on how one feels AT THE TIME), I was taken aback, made a little nervous.
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Tags: James Laube, palate, sea turtles, vineyard, wine, winemakers
Scott went off to the farm this past weekend, and as much as he loves farming, he hates leaving us to do it. We were supposed to be moved out there by now, to tend the vineyard from a 10-minute drive, and eventually, when we could afford to build on our ground, by stepping out our front door, not this 90 minute plus haul that happens each time something must be taken care of. And now that season has begun. The taking-care-of-the-farm time.
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Tags: Farming, Portland, vineyard, Wasco County
Looking at my daily dose of wine news yesterday, I came across the most beautiful picture of a medieval castle, its timeless quality framed by a pine forest behind and an enchanting vineyard out front. How it sat there, majestic in its quiet (Samuel had just gone down for a nap and “quiet” was my word of the moment). My first thought was “Oh, how I miss Italy,” where I imagined this castle was. “Wouldn’t a dose of sunshine—or limoncello— in that land of rustic comfort and fine leather hit the spot right about now?” (it was 10 AM, PST, the rain coming down on a grey January morn, as I sat with my own rustic Oregon comfort, coffee). Then I saw the story’s headline, Wine Tales of The Decade.
“Maybe another Italian scandal,” I thought, thinking of the Brunello troubles. “Or MAYBE,” and this is what I secretly hoped it was, “that old buck of a Prime Minister has a new 18-year old wine heiress-mistress?” and with that thought in mind I settled in to read the juicy news.
Well. I was had.
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Tags: Antiques Roadshow, authentic, Bavaria, Braveheart, Brunello, California wine country, castle, County Meath, Germany, gigantism, Ireland, James Conaway, limoncello, McMansion, medieval architecture, medieval castle, Napa Valley, Oregon, provenance, Vanishing America, vineyard, wine, wine news
There a few things I hope to accomplish in 2010:
- Work on that attitude of mine;
- Establish a horseshoe pit;
- Get our wine sold;
- Submit another story (or two, but one’s a start);
- Build some shelter on our hilltop.
Each one you’ll most likely hear something about here at The Uncultivated Life, but it is to the last, the shelter on our hilltop, that I now write because seriously, enough is enough.
Almost four years into this, we need something on our hilltop other than our camper. Just a small something where someone like you, dear Reader, can come out and kick back; to sit and survey, look out and see and enjoy the quiet and the expanse, like a small oasis from the rest of the busy world. And someplace where the dreamer inside can go free. (Not to mention, we also need a place to store our farming gear, get that cute little tractor out of the elements, and clean up the clutter that drives me NUTso). As much as we may have started this for ourselves, it’s always been our hope to share it with other individuals who get it: the inherent beauty of a Western landscape; the timeless, intrinsic connection shared between the earth, its bounty, and the people who work it; the idea of possibility and the determination to go for it; the appreciation of the simple and authentic.
Right now, the camper is probably too simple. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: authentic, California quail, horseshoe pit, Hungarian partridge, juniper, Laura Ingalls, lupine, meadow lark, Missoula Floods, native grass, Oregon Trail, pheasant, pole barn, rammed earth, robin, sage, scrub oak, sparrows, straw-bale, The Dalles, vineyard, wheat, wine
Last week we tasted our very first bottled wine we made from our vineyard. What follows are some particulars regarding it.
The goal for our Riesling is to make it bone dry. No residual sugar. We planted Riesling because that is Scott’s favorite white wine. We have 4 rows’ worth on the south side, and around 3 acres on the north, for around 3.5 acres in total. Since our budget has only allowed us to trellis the south side, it is from here, some of the steepest ground on our site, where we take our harvest to date.
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Tags: 2008 harvest, minerality, residual sugar, Riesling, sugar/acid balance, vineyard, white wine, wine
