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TECHNICAL SPOTLIGHT WINEMAKING June 2015 WINES&VINES 43 TTB LABEL APPROVALS Low per-label costs Gov't. Liaison Negotiations or Footwork Reasonable Hourly Rates TRADEMARK SEARCHES As Low as $185 Your trade names or designs are searched at the U.S. Patent Office to help establish valuable ownership or avoid costly legal liability. Over 100 years' total staff experience handling every government liaison need for industry. Phone or write for details. 200 N. Glebe Rd., Suite 321 Arlington, Virginia 22203 Phone: (703) 524-8200 Fax: 525-8451 TOLL-FREE 1-800-642-6564 Major Credit Cards Accepted www.trademarkinfo.com Since 1957 GovtLiaison_Dir08 11/29/07 2:00 PM Pag done both in the past, and we thought about getting a sorting table here," he said. "I found with the shorter sorting tables, if you don't have multiple people on there—you know, at least half a dozen—you're actually pulling people away from doing extra pump overs or doing other work in the cellar." All of the processing equipment at Odette is from Carlsen & Associates in Healdsburg, Calif., and includes a hopper with a corkscrew auger that feeds to a crusher-destemmer. Pro- cessed grapes, of which about half are crushed, are then sent by a Waukesha must pump via a 3-inch must line to the fermentation tanks. "It's actually pretty clean," Owens said. "There's not a lot of jacks that are coming out, and there's nothing extra coming from the vineyard be- cause those guys know how to pick.…Once you get it dialed in and moving, it's pretty much just on autopilot." The winery is equipped with 28 tanks that include 18 stainless steel tanks from Santa Rosa Stainless Steel, two concrete tanks by French supplier Nomblot and eight 500-gallon Tran- Store fermentors from Custom Metalcraft in Springfield, Mo. Owens said in 2014 he split one block of Cabernet Sauvignon and fermented one half in steel and the other in concrete. He said the wine that fermented in steel is more focused with fruit upfront and exhibits a bit more en- ergy and precision, while the wine from con- crete has a bigger mouthfeel, is silkier and also has a bit of chalkiness and minerality. "I like them both independently, (and) I think we'll be able to use them both for the blends." The smaller tanks enable Owens to ferment small lots of estate grapes to ensure the fruit is at optimal ripeness when picked. "I did a lot of separation in the vineyard for '12, '13 and '14, making as many as 28 different separations of picks, just walking through and saying, 'We want this tiny little micro block here.' And, 'For these 25 rows go 15 vines in, picking them separately.' And, 'We'll go into the next part block, we only want this,'" he said. "The whole philosophy on that is, if you can taste the difference in the vineyard, then obviously you can taste the dif- ference in the wine. The more detailed we can get, the more we can keep it separate, and the more options we have for blending." That also means if Owens can harvest 1.5 tons from one block and 2 tons from another, he'll combine the two into a small tank. "It's a lot of moving parts around the vineyard to make the tank space work," he said. Yet every year he said there have been blocks that he kept separate that have ulti- mately gone into the winery's reserve blend. Had Owens not made the call to pick and vinify the lot separately, it would have just gone into the estate program. All of the reds are inoculated because Owens said fermentations at Odette are typi- cally warmer and faster. "Commercial yeast provides a safer and more consistent result," he said. The Chardonnay, however, is left to ferment spontaneously after pressing. "This way we gain some of the nuances and complexity from the native yeast with a slower, longer fermenta- tion," Owens said. The grapes are whole-clus- ter pressed and left to ferment and age sur lie for 14 months in about 80% new barrels by Tonnellerie Francois Frères. "Once it goes down in the barrel, everything stays in the barrel." Quick and warm fermentations All of the red fermentations are managed with pump overs, and Owens said he tastes the wine during each pump over to see how it's progressing and when it's time to press. "The way we do it here is we bring the fruit in and start it off with a cold soak of 24 to 36 hours, and then we crank up the heat. And so we're going to be pushing the fermentation tem- peratures into the 90°s, and we're a little more aggressive up front," he said. "We like to do three-plus pump overs for the first couple of days, and then we start to trail off. (It) just kind of depends on how much color and tannin we're seeing early. How much body we've been able to extract so far will dictate