Issue link: http://winesandvines.uberflip.com/i/131907
winemaking Out with the jacks and stems Monticelli's crew fills two large garbage bins with jacks, stems and defective fruit to compost each day during harvest. "Imagine how it would affect the wine if we used that," he says. The careful sorting eliminates overripe flavors, vegetal flavors from leaves, bitter tannins from stems and musty, moldy tastes. He collects the saignée juice, which is used elsewhere. He uses a Kiesel 7100 Heilbron progressive-cavity pump to transfer the must to tanks. The destemmer is a floor above the tanks, but not just above them. Monticelli adds 50 ppm of SO2 to the must for red wines and inoculates with yeast. (For whites, he only inoculates half the juice.) The bin washer was fabricated internally at a Trinchero shop to ensure that newly picked grapes aren't contaminated by bacteria and mold. On the 22-acre site, the family built its signature winery, tearing down and replacing the old facility, renovating the old house on the property into a tasting room and building a firstclass hospitality center with an elegant event space, professional kitchen and even a bocce court. The family also recently restored and expanded existing caves, which they'll use for both aging wine and entertaining. Torres' knowledge of both architecture and wine production is reflected throughout the winery, starting with a refrigerated room to hold grapes and chill them as they come in. "It drops their temperature to 45ºF," says Monticelli. "Then everything can be calm. There's no need to rush. The grapes aren't sitting in heat." Trinchero uses 35-pound bins for picking and transport to the winery, rather than standard half-ton bins, to prevent grapes on the bottom being crushed prematurely by the weight of the grapes above. This was one of Monticelli's requests. A bin washer fabricated in-house at Trinchero reduces labor and water usage while assuring clean bins so grapes aren't contaminated. While many wineries sort grapes, Monticelli sorts them three times, using workers for cluster sorting, a P&L shaker table after destemming, then manual sorting. This eliminates raisins, moldy berries and stems that could compromise the quality of the grapes. "As long as you're doing it, you may as well do it right," he says. Mario Monticelli (left) serves as winemaker, while vice president of operations Bob Torres (right) trained as an architect. Monticelli sorts grapes three times: as clusters, with a shaker table and then manually. His Delta E2 crusher-destemmer was manufactured by Bucher Vaslin and its sorting table and conveyor by P&L Specialties. Win es & Vi n es JU NE 20 13 35