Tassel Ridge Winery

Tassel Ridge Winery–September 2006

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Our Hours

We are open for tours, tasting, wine, and gift shop sales as follows:

We have added to our tasting room staff and by mid-September, we will also be open on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Tassel Ridge Winery is easy to find. It is just south of State Highway 163 on 220th Street in Leighton. From Ottumwa and Oskaloosa, drive northwest on 163 to 220th Street and turn left towards Leighton. From Des Moines and Pella, turn right at 220th Street. Drive west on 220th about 0.7 miles from the Highway and right into the Tassel Ridge Winery parking lot.

Here is a map showing how to get to the Winery.

Our New Wines

Candleglow White: Our new dry, food pairing white wine offers green apple and citrus notes with just a hint of oak. It is made entirely from Chardonnay grapes grown in the Central Valley of California. Candleglow White is ideal served chilled with fish, chicken, or pork dishes and it pairs nicely with salad containing avocado. $13.00 per bottle plus tax.

Overture: Overture is a semi-sweet white wine with distinctive citrus character. It is made from Mahaska County La Crosse blended with Muscat and Chardonnay grapes grown in the Central Valley of California. Overture is ideal as a sipping wine served chilled before dinner or just by itself. $13.00 per bottle plus tax.

 

What’s New in Our Vineyards?

Vineyard maintenance and harvest: The first 2-4 weeks of August were devoted to last minute weeding and mowing that was made more urgent by regular rains that fueled the growth of just about everything. The hot dry weather in July gave way to regular rain storms in late July and early August. High temperatures helped the vines develop nice sugar levels in the grapes through early August but as the rains continued, the vines absorbed the water and diluted the sugars. We began harvest on Monday, August 21 with our Edelweiss and followed with harvest of Sabrevois, St. Croix, and Foch. These grapes were all in our Tassel Ridge and Meadowcreek Vineyards. We were surprised that grapes in our Newport Lane Vineyard are ripening 7-10 days later than the same varieties in our other vineyards. Our Edelweiss harvest was better than expected at about six tons. This is enough fruit to make about 1000 gallons of wine. The Edelweiss will be used to make a semi-sweet white wine that has lots of spicy character and is perfect when chilled and consumed as an aperitif before dinner or anytime as a sipping wine. We will use some of our Foch and St. Croix to make our 2006 Nouveau. This will be a very fruity red wine that is frequently served lightly chilled. It is traditionally the first wine of the season and it is used to celebrate the harvest in November. Watch for announcements of our first Nouveau festival in November. Harvest will continue for several weeks.

How do we decide that grapes are ready to harvest:  Our first criteria is sweetness or sugar content. In theory, we could make this determination by carefully calibrating our taste buds and then simply tasting a grape or two from each block of vines. However, it is more accurate to squeeze a little juice onto a refractometer. In the photo below, our wine maker Brett Hay is getting ready to make a reading.

The refractometer is then held up to the light and the viewer looks for a shadow on a calibrated scale as Brett demonstrates below left. This process is repeated several times in random locations in each vineyard block and the data is recorded.

But sugar is not the only characteristic that determines when grapes are ready to harvest. We are also very concerned about the pH or acidity of the juice and the total amount of acid in grams per liter of the juice. These measurements are made in the lab.

Finally, grapes that we can grow in Iowa are usually hybrids of native American grape varieties and European grape varieties, also known as Vitis Vinifera. Some native American varieties develop particularly objectionable characteristics when they are allowed to fully ripen so these types are harvested early and at generally lower sugar levels. We then add sugar prior to fermentation to get the alcohol level to a level that will aid in the preservation of the wine. We observe this practice of early harvest with Edelweiss, Sabrevois, and St. Croix.  

New vineyard construction: As soon as we get caught up with our harvest, we will start pounding the posts for the vineyard at Meadowcreek West and South where we will plant Marquette next May. We are excited about Marquette’s potential because it could help us make an outstanding dry red wine. Marquette is a brand new variety that was developed at the University of Minnesota. It has Vitis Riperia and Pinot Noir in its parentage so the possibilities are intriguing. We will plant 5500 plants. We expect our first harvest of this variety in 2009.

What’s Happening in the Cellar?

In early August, we finished up bottling our semi-sweet Tickled Pink and in late August bottled the rest of our sweet Red, White, and Blue. We have finally managed to get our entire bottling line and the attached labeler working at the same time so this bottling went smoothly. Sometime in September, we will bottle our blackberry and raspberry wines.

Once we start harvesting, we crush grapes destined to become both red and white wine, and also press grapes for use in making white and rosé wine. This requires a major focus in the cellar because all of the equipment is carefully cleaned both before and after it is used. Depending on how much fruit is available, we will crush for anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours with a crew of three. The must, in the case of red wine, and the juice for whites and rosés are pumped into stainless tanks that range in capacity from 75 to 2000 gallons for fermentation.

We wait until the juice reaches about 70ºF and then inoculate it with a yeast and yeast nutrient that has been carefully mixed in hot water. Red wine typically takes about one week to ferment and white wine takes about two weeks. Fermentation naturally produces heat so we have connected our tanks to a chiller system that uses water and propylene glycol (to keep the water from freezing) in the outer jackets of the tanks to keep them cool. The temperatures are controlled by a computer based  central controller that is connected to all of our larger tanks.

In next months edition, I will talk about what happens next in the wine making process.

Decanters

The Tassel Ridge Winery Gift Shop offers two different decanters that are particularly attractive as gifts. They are used in decanting big red wines that really need to breathe before they are consumed. I associate the need for decanters with big French and Spanish wines, particularly when they have not been filtered. The reason is that they need exposure to air in order for them to “open up.”  Otherwise, their tannins are harsh. Finally, unfiltered wines will usually leave significant sediment in the bottom of the last glass poured. This sediment is rarely very tasty so the wine is decanted, frequently by pouring it through a rough strainer. Decanters offer an attractive way of serving big red wines. Read on!

Wine Decanter

Our simple wine decanter is attractively shaped and it provides a stylish way of serving wine. It is also effective for helping wine breathe. This decanter is attractively priced at $40.00.

Wine Decanter Kit

The Tassel Ridge Winery Decanter Kit offers all of the features of our simple wine decanter but in addition, it is attractively packaged and it includes a small strainer and a drying rack. Don’t underestimate the importance of this simple drying rack. Getting a decanter dry without this rack is challenging. The Wine Decanter Kit makes a terrific gift. It is priced at $80.00.

Wine and Food Pairing Suggestion

Pair our Tickled Pink with spicy foods. Tickled Pink is a semi-sweet blush or rosé with relatively high acid and prominent citrus notes. I recently served with Enchiladas that were fairly spicy because I had used lots of canned enchilada sauce. The combination was sensational!

See Tassel Ridge Winery at:

Friday, September 8, 2006: The Movable Feast, 5:30 – 8:30 p.m., Des Moines East Village, Des Moines, IA

Previous Issues:

August 2006: www.interpower.com/trwinery/newsletter8-06.htm
July 2006: www.interpower.com/trwinery/newsletter7-06.htm