Some wines from Orin Swift

For a majority of the time I've been at Merryvale Starmont, we've been bottling for a winery called Orin Swift in St. Helena. They only produce 5 wines: one Sauvignon Blanc, one Cabernet Sauvignon, one Zinfandel, and 2 high-end red wine blends. We've been bottling 4 of the 5 wines and in addition to being great wines, they're stylistically some of the cooler bottles I've seen. They're all pretty different, but fit together well as a cohesive piece of art much like a collection of clothes on a runway. The information below is taken directly from the Orin Swift website, and the only thing I have to add to their own descriptions is to watch out! This maybe be no surprise, but these California reds are heavy-hitters in the alcohol department. Great to sit down with before dinner, but they haven't really complimented any meals I've had with them.

Mercury Head

2006 Cabernet Sauvignon

Mercury Head Cabernet Sauvignon is named for the silver mercury head dimes that adorn our bottles. This wine is a blend of our two best Cabernet vineyards. We are blessed to buy Cabernet from a handful of great people who are also great farmers who farm great vineyards. We've learned a lot from these guys, and we're proud to count them as friends; Gary Morisoli (Morisoli Vineyard, Rutherford) and Doug Wight (Taplin/Lewelling Vineyard, Saint Helena). The 2006 Mercury Head is 100% Cabernet Sauvignon, entirely from these two vineyard sites and is true to its varietal characteristics.

Tasting Notes

The color is deep dark garnet. It has aromas of wild ripe field berries, figs, dust, earth, cranberry, black cherry, spice, dark coffee, chocolate, leather, violets, and currants. The palate is also dominated by dark brooding fruit, pomegranate, plus a little root beer and licorice. It is solid with a firm chewy mid-palate. The finish is long with smooth, w

ell integrated tannins.

The 2006 Mercury Head was aged in French oak barrels (forty per

cent new) for sixteen months. This wine is very drinkable now but will benefit from cellaring in the short term and could rest for up to ten years.

Bottom line is we're extremely pleased with the wine and think you will enjoy it too.

Suggested retail price - $75

2006 Papillon Napa Valley Red Wine

Orin Swift Cellars second release of the Papillon.

The artwork for the label is a photo taken by world renowned photographer and wine lover, Greg Gorman. See more information on Greg Gorman and his photography.

Tasting Notes

Ruby red with notes of campfire, toast and sweet vanilla. On the palate - wild strawberry, rhubarb, and sassafras. And the finish - 30 plus seconds with an impression of cherry pie.

65% Cabernet Sauvignon
27% Merlot
4% Petite Verdot
2% Malbec
2% Cabernet Franc

Suggested retail price - $55

Saldo

2007 California Zinfandel - Inaugural Release

Gaining experience and contacts in the Northern California Zinfandel growing community through the success of his Prisoner label, Orin Swift Cellars owner/winemaker Dave Phinney has gained access to some of the best Zinfandel vineyards in California. Dave recently decided he wanted to make a high quality Zinfandel and what he created did not fit the constraints of a single AVA.

The term "saldo" has many different meanings in Spanish, Italian and Portuguese. In Spanish it mainly refers to "balance on hand", and sometimes it can mean "from here and there". This wine represents the best of the best lots made by Dave from vineyards all across Northern California.

There are grapes from Sonoma, Napa, Amador, Mendocino, and Contra Costa counties. Some of these great vineyards include Monte Rosso, Eagle Point, Rockpile, Bismark, Beatty, Page Nord, Duarte, Solari, Evangehlo, Battuelo's, Tofanelli, Korte, Mable Tiedemann, Frediani, Lewers, Alta Vista, and Bald Mountain just to name a few. Dave is so committed to this concept he is now developing his own Zinfandel vineyard in Sonoma specifically for this project as well.

Winemaker Notes

The 2007 Saldo has a deep dark ruby color. It has aromas of red raspberry, ribena, campfire, toast and sweet vanilla. On the palate there is wild strawberry, rhubarb, and sassafras. The wine is expansive with a 30 plus second finish. There is an impression of cherry pie on the end. Drink now and enjoy over the next five years.

Blend 85% Zinfandel 10% Syrah 5% Petite Syrah

California Appellation 54% Sonoma 16% Napa 15% Mendocino 9% Amador 6% Contra Costa

Suggested retail price - $28

The Prisoner

2007 Red Wine

The 2007 blends the lush berry flavors of Zinfandel, the power and concentration of Cabernet Sauvignon, the dark black fruit of Syrah, the intensity and structure of Petite Sirah, the flesh of Charbono, and a hint of Grenache - all combined for a decadent wine with great complexity.

50% Zinfandel
24% Cabernet Sauvignon
14% Syrah
9% Petite Sirah
2% Charbono
1% Grenache

We continue to receive an overwhelming amount of inquiries about "The Prisoner". Not just the wine, but the image on the label. The image is inspired by an original etching depicting a prisoner in chains Dave Phinney received as a gift from his mother and father (Orin and Swift).

Suggested retail price - $35

Follow me on Twitter!

So Harvest 2009 has officially begun, so I don't know how much time I will have to write formal blogs. However, I do wind up having a lot of wine thoughts during the day at work, so I tend to tweet a few times a day. Follow me @emschwig for wine and not-so-wine related tweets!

Rosenblum Open House

So now it's September and I'm still catching up from my July adventures. Thankfully, there was only one wine-related event before August rolled around.

On Sunday, July 26th, I took my friend Michelle with me to the harvest open house at Rosenblum Cellars in Alameda. Having worked at Rosenblum last harvest, I was able to attend the holiday open house last November. The two events were pretty much identical, except this time around I didn't embarrass myself by dropping my glass on the floor.

Rosenblum offers very few white wines, so I sampled a Marsanne (or Roussanne?) while Michelle chose the Viogner. After our brief tryst with the whites, we moved on to the main event: Zinfandels! My plan of action was to taste only Zinfandels this time around, because that is what Rosenblum is known for and because I wanted to get a better idea of how they actually tasted as a varietal. I'd like to say it helped, but I still have a lot to work on in the realm of tasting.

Michelle receiving a pour of Snows Lake Zinfandel

About halfway through our Zinfandel journey, we stopped for some Zinfandel ice cream. Tucker's in Alameda makes this amazing ice cream using actual Rosenblum Zinfandel. This delicious ice cream is speckled with dark chocolate chips and is unique but not weird. It's a perfectly balanced ice cream and I would highly suggest it if you're lucky enough to stop by Tucker's on a day that they have it.

Michelle skipped the rest of the Zinfandels and moved on to a handful of Syrahs and Petite Syrahs which she thought she would like better. She wound up surprising herself by preferring the Zinfandels over the Syrahs. Rosenblum has a convert! Michelle left with a bottle of Snows Lake Zinfandel and Kathy's Cuvee Viogner. I still had a bottle of Lyon's Reserve Zinfandel in my collection, so I decided against a purchase this particular day.

It was a lovely July day in the Bay Area, and I thank Michelle for accompanying me to this open house at my wine "Alma Mater." Check out Rosenblum Cellars at 2900 Main Street, Alameda, CA. Their tasting room is open daily from 11-6 and all tastings are free!

Ridge Vineyards

The weekend before I started at Merryvale, Marc and I headed down to Ridge in Cupertino. It was one of the last wineries in the Santa Cruz mountains area that I wanted to get to before I moved up to Napa. It was also the last of the 3 R's known for their Zinfandels, accompanying Rosenblum and Ravenswood.

The Santa Cruz mountains are beautiful, but the wineries up there feel like they take forever to get to due to all those steep hair-pin turns. It was a lazy day, so by the time we got down there, the tasting room was only open for another hour or so. The view was beautiful, but the tasting experience was lackluster. Either our pourer was not too knowledgeable about the wines or she was just anxious to get out of there. She was a lot less talkative than most tasting room employees I've encountered. However, she did waive the $5 tasting fee for us. I wasn't impressed with Ridge so much as to buy a whole bottle, and it didn't look like I was getting a discount, but we settled on a 375 ml bottle of 2004 Lytton Spring Zinfandel (79% with 18% Petite Syrah and 3% Carignane). It's still in the bottle, in my overflowing wine rack. A review will come whenever the cork gets popped.

Grapes on the vine

View of the South Bay


Marc enjoying the view


Picnic benches outside of the Ridge tasting room

Gene Simmons Wine Moment

So I'm watching Gene Simmons Family Jewels and he sends Shannon Tweed and her sister to a winery to represent him because they're going to make a wine for him. They're trying to brainstorm names for the wine and Shannon's sister suggests "Genie In A Bottle," but my favorite suggestion was by his son Nick: Gene Simmons Balls Wine. Classic.

No word as to when this wine will come out or what it will be called, but I will let you all know when I find out.

Speaking of musicians with their own wine labels, a little while back I ordered a bottle of Claypool Cellars (yes, that's Les Claypool of Primus fame) Purple Pachyderm, a 2007 Russian River Valley Pinot Noir. It is now in my possession and I am waiting for the perfect opportunity to open it up. It's in the queue with about 8 other wines.


The very cute Purple Pachyderm logo


Les Claypool and his winemaker Jay Meyer

I am so behind!

So I just got my internet set up here in Napa, so I am behind on my posts. I still owe you Ridge and Rosenblum Open House entries.

In more recent news, we're currently bottling Merryvale's premium Profile. I've had many days of being able to taste this wine, and, without quite knowing exactly how to articulate it, this is a damn good wine. It will be stellar if you can hold onto it for a few years. The 2004 vintage is comprised of 79% Cabernet Sauvignon, 12% Petit Verdot, 7% Merlot, and 2% Cabernet Franc. I think the 2007 make-up is slightly different, but not exactly sure how. You think I'd know these things, but I get all of my sample bottles without labels. Retail price: a cool $75.

My new Merryvale adventure

During my several months of unemployment, I was debating whether to stay in wine or branch out to the "green" jobs becoming so prevalent in this area. My head was telling me to do something that would be transferable to other parts of the country in case Marc and I moved. But my heart (and my mouth) told me wiiiiiiine. Even after trying to network at green events, going to green job fairs, and going to green information sessions, the only interviews I got were in the wine industry. I interviewed at a company in which I'd be a technical rep, talking with clients and feeling out their needs. It would be a departure from what I was used to, but they seemed to like me and would pave the way to becoming a wine consultant.

After that first interview, Merryvale called to offer me an interview for their Starmont facility. I went up to Napa and met with the assistant winemaker and the cellar master. We seemed to really hit it off and they showed me around the gorgeous facility. This particular job really appealed to me because Merryvale's Starmont facility is a green facility, complete with solar panels, water recycling, energy efficient lighting, efficient insulation, etc. The best of both worlds! Also, it is absolutely gorgeous. I get to drive through the grape wines on the way down Stanly Lane, lavender and white roses surround the winery, and Napa actually feels like summer.

View of some of the grape vines from the parking lot

Some grapes on the side of the building

My favorite lavender!

Right now we're doing bottling, so I'm just doing a lot of QC lab work for that. Behold, my lab! So big. So new. So pretty.

White wine production for dummies (and lab techs). Hey...

All and all, a good start to a good job. I'm currently working Mon-Thurs, 7AM-5:30PM. I have to be up at 5 to get to Napa from San Mateo, but I'll only be doing that for 4 more work days then I'm moving up closer to Napa. Once September rolls around, I'll be there up to 6 days a week for up to 12 hours a day. Much more hardcore than Rosenblum. Let the harvest begin!