2018 Grape Update and Photo Album

The grapes, with one exception, are coming along. Frontenac and Foch have started to bloom. Traminette and Chardonel are loaded. I'm removing all of the blooms from Chambourcin and Norton. The Norton doesn't show the vigor of the others but they were a little slow last year as well, so we'll just be patient and see how they progress.

The Vidal Blanc shows no further signs of recovery. We've started to look at replacements, and considering La Crescent, Brianna, Itasca, and Frontenac Blanc. Unlikely to get them replanted this year so we have time to look around.

There is a subreddit powerwashingporn which would be a good place to post pics from last weekend.

This weekend is rainy and cloudy so we got some wine work done. 2017 elderberry came out of the barrel and went back into the carboy. I barrel aged 1/2 of it, and it seemed to improve the wine, will consider doing the other half depending on what we have lined up for the barrel later. One half of the 2017 old vine Zinfandel went in next. I will likely give both halves 3 months each in the barrel before bottling.

Most country wine experiments end poorly but 2017 pawpaw wine might just be an exception. Aroma is very light but there is definitely banana and other tropical fruit there just at the beginning. I added a bit of glycerin to smooth it out and went ahead and bottled. We'll chill this and give it a try this week. Judging from the looks of the trees so far, I will have more pawpaws than I can use this summer.

We bottled the 2017 Sauvignon Blanc last weekend. I probably won't even bother with caps and labels, this wine is good enough that it won't last long. The surprise of the weekend however was the 2017 Vignoles. Early on this wine had a very nice passion fruit tropical aroma and somehow I've not managed to screw it up. Bottled just a portion to be sure we have the residual sugar right, and if so we'll bottle the balance in the next couple of weeks.

Pictures taken before the rain came...

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