Pruning

It's pruning time, my favorite time in the vineyards. They were already pruning in Burgundy last month, which was giving me the itch, but I like to wait for the winter solstice to pass before getting started. It might be a superstition, but I don't believe in pruning until the days are starting to lengthen--the vines have finished pulling all the nourishment from the canes to the roots, and, though slumbering, are starting to shift towards growing again.

Steve teaching sommeliers about pruning

Sunny days are the other prerequisite for pruning--there are many fungal spores that like to infect the pruning wounds in the rain, so we prune when it's clear out, and paint the fresh cuts with an organic paste made of flour, milk, and compost. This encourages beneficial organisms to grow on the fresh surfaces, creating an inhospitable environment for the wood-rotting fungi.

The frustrating thing is that it is impossible for me to prune the vineyards myself--there are just too many vines. All vineyard owners are forced to hire help to get all of the vines pruned--Columella wrote a treatise on agriculture in 50 AD Rome, and described in detail how many hired hands are necessary for each parcel of vines. So given this reality, my role as a viticulturist is really as a teacher: our pruning is only as good as I can describe and show to the people helping us.


Between our own vineyards and the many vineyards of my consulting clients I find myself discussing and demonstrating pruning almost every day. It's fun, but the high point is taking a day off on the weekend and pruning myself! Even though I live and breath it, I feel like a weekend warrior when I'm actually doing it--five minutes of showing someone doesn't cramp your hand the way a whole day does. It feels good though.

Steve showing the boys how to prune the persimmon tree

Before the Rains: the farm in Winter

There is great light at this time of year. And lots of sunshine. We're relieved that the rains are finally starting.

Harry got a new camera for his birthday, so lot's more pictures to share.

the last of the persimmons

freshly pruned vineyard

Koda

our barn

dried sage along the ditch

more dried flowers

The Pilgrimage to Burgundy

In the modern wine world Jill and I are an anachronism. We have managed to create a family business where a day of work for me might entail driving the tractor to plow between the rows, checking on the wine in barrel, and then driving to the airport to fly to Utah for a market visit to sell wine. A day for Jill could be to take the kids to school, then pay bills, reply to emails from customers, meet with our label designer, write a press release, then go to pick the kids up again. We are literally soup to nuts.

As the Napa Valley has prospered over the years the wineries have gotten bigger and the jobs are more specialized. Most of our peers do one or more of the above jobs, but almost none literally do it all, from farming their own land themselves to making the wine to figuring out how to sell it. Through a lot of luck, patience, and hard work we were able to buy our small vineyard, but it has been a herculean effort, and most people our age either haven't been as lucky or haven't chosen to make the sacrifices. That's not to say that they don't work incredibly hard, but it's just not as common these days for them to engage in the entire process: the farming, the winemaking, and the business. This makes it just a little bit lonely at times to make the struggle. There are plenty of exceptions, but it's not the norm.

I'm on Air France flight 84 right now on my way back from Burgundy--first trip--and I have to say, I am feeling incredibly renewed from the kinship I felt--the wine producing community there is composed of a whole lot of families just like ours. I met with incredibly hard working farmer/winemakers...vignerons...who deal with all of the challenges that we encounter, and who are driven by the same fanatical desire to control the entire process as us. Only they are the norm. Burgundy is a really magical place in that regard. Through some combination of geography, inheritance laws, family tradition and local culture, there remains to this day a true community of small family operations. They pool resources, understand each others problems, and enjoy the seasonal lifestyle that farming entails with a synchronicity that I envy. When it rained they were all in their cellars checking on the secondary fermentation. When the sun was back they were all out in the fields pruning. For someone like myself, who finds his meaning through his work, that was magical. It was like a homecoming. It inspired me to start the annual cycle back over again.

And the wine was pretty good too.

A Year of Praise

Over the years, our wines have received praise from wine experts and our faithful customers, and we are always grateful.  We keep thinking that the wine writers will tire of our wines, that we’ll no longer be the shiny new penny, and that our loyal customers will move on to new wines. I am thrilled to see you all coming back for more!

In his winemaking, Steve walks the fine line between artist and craftsman. In his constant pursuit for excellence, he is always making sure that the wines are carefully crafted, even flawless, while at the same time imprinting his singular, artistic vision. I think this is one of the secrets to our unique and outstanding wines year after year.

In addition to the 2010 MATTHIASSON White Wine being  included as one of the Top 100 Wines of 2011 by the San Francisco Chronicle, the SF Chronicle included our 2009 MATTHIASSON Cabernet Franc as one of the TOP 10 MOST MEMORABLE WINES OF 2011! (If you want to purchase some of that memorable Cabernet Franc, you can get it by joining our Wine Club.

 

Here are some more of the praises in print and in the blogosphere over the past year:

•  The 2010 White Wine was described as a Beguiling High-End Blend by the Wine Salon;
• The wine was a hit at the Sundance Film Festival, where it was described as “a gorgeous, mouthwatering marriage of stone fruit and minerality that rivals the best of Italy’s Collio Biancos,” in The Daily Meal;
• In an interview with The New York Times Wine Critic, AKA “….. The Most Famous Wine Writer In The World, Eric Asimov,” Mr. Asimov is asked “ If you had to describe your passion for wine, without words, by sharing three bottles with me, what would they be?” His answer ”……to bring it home, a white from California, from Napa Valley, no less, a wine that represents free-thinking individualism, that goes against everything that people assume about Napa. It’s the Napa White from Matthiasson, a family venture that epitomizes the do-it-yourself American ethos that we venerate so freely in mythology but so rarely in real life.”;
• The 2010 White Wine was the #1 choice for Turkey dinner: Thanksgiving week: Wine with Jesse Becker, MS;
•  And a fun interview with Steve in the online magazine Find.Eat.Drink.