Waiting For Ripening

Waiting is the hardest part. Especially when it is raining. The Sauvignon Blanc grapes are very close to full maturity. But to make a balanced, terroir driven wine, close isn’t good enough. If we did decide to pick before last night’s rain, the wine would have been lean and bracingly tart. Three or four more days on the vines would calm the grape’s acidity and build some mid-palate. By the end of the week we could start harvest, but waiting until next week would be even better.

However, Sauvignon Blanc has tight clusters and thin skins which makes it susceptible to rot under wet conditions. The forecast is somewhat undecided on what happens next. It looks like our first day of harvest will also be undecided for now.

Our first picking decision will be a hard call. So we decided that the best thing we could do in this situation was to taste wine. We tasted the last five vintages of Hardscrabble Sauvignon Blanc. On hand were records on each of those vintages. They included harvest dates, sugar content, pH, and acidity. The tasting helped confirm that it was best to wait. Our favorite wines were harvested later. It gave us the confidence to do nothing.

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Linden Vineyards / Learn More / Latest at Linden | Journal: September 6, 2022