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WINEMAKER INTERVIEW November 2015 WINES&VINES 95 White wines do not show as many sensory differences, although kegged white wines are guaranteed to always be at a consistent tem- perature because the kegs are stored in refrig- erators with temperature controls. We have not found any noticeable changes in chemistry between kegged wines and bottled wines. Q Jamieson Ranch used to have its own bottling line, but now you've switched to mobile bottling. Why? How do you make sure that everything is done to your specifications? Verdina: Our goal at the winery is to put all of our attention into the winemaking, blends and cellar operations. For this reason, we believe that hiring a service for mobile bottling ensures that we do not lose focus of the wines and al- lows us to maintain quality control during bottling rather than shifting our focus to op- erational maintenance. AT Mobile Bottling in Napa has a top-quality staff and standards that are consistently met with each bottling. We have been using this service for about one year and three bottling runs, all of which have gone very smoothly. During bottling onsite, we have a quality-control team that monitors all param- eters such as dissolved oxygen, bottle vacuum, fill height, packaging consistency and overall quality. Every 20-30 minutes, someone from the JRV quality-control team will enter the truck and make sure all parameters are being met. In addition, we have QC forms that are filled out during each check and are logged in the system and approved by the winemaker. Q Research has shown that the same wine bottled on the same bottling line can have big variations in total package oxygen (TPO). What procedures do you have in place to minimize this? Verdina: Our procedure to offset these varia- tions starts in the bottling tank. Once the blend is completed and all adjustments are made, we adjust dissolved oxygen well below our bottling parameter so that once the wine enters the bowl it will remain within our limits even with a slight increase. Our parameters for DO (dis- solved oxygen) are always between 0.75 and 0.95 ppm for all wines. During bottling, we routinely pull a random bottle off the line and check DO. If it exceeds our parameters, we immediately shut the line down and readjust to below our parameters. Q Most of your wines are under cork, but you do use screwcaps in some cases. Have you adjusted your sulfur levels or other bottling parameters? Verdina: Knowing that a screwcap minimizes oxygen exchange, we do actually adjust our free SO 2 levels to be lower than normal. With a cork, there is more oxygen exchange, so we bump the FSO 2 levels slightly to make sure that even with slight oxygen exposure, the wine is still protected against micro-oxygenation that can cause browning and shorten the aging potential. In general, we set our parameters for cork-finished wines at 35-40 ppm FSO 2 and screwcap at 28-33 ppm FSO 2 . We are currently using Stelvin screwcaps with a Saranex liner, and we have found this product respects the aging process and delivers uncompromised flavors and aromas to the finished product— not to mention it is guaranteed TCA-free and with no leakage. We primarily use screwcaps for white wines where micro-oxygenation is detrimental, but we continue to use natural cork on our red wines, where a minimal amount of micro-ox- ygenation is required for bottle aging. We use both Ganau natural corks and Lafitte natural corks. We have found that having two suppliers is beneficial because it allows us the opportu- nity for flexibility when making orders (for example, meeting a short deadline). Screwcaps are perfect for wines that are not meant to age more than two to three years, including reds. Q While you were at Hahn in Monterey County, you worked with Rex Goliath and Cycles Gladiator, two brands that ex- perienced tremendous growth. What chal- lenges did you face in working with brands that grew so quickly? Verdina: The biggest challenge was to maintain the quality and style of the blends year to year or blend to blend. We were bottling 6,500 gal- lons per day, five days per week, so the wine- making team was constantly bottling, blending, adjusting and looking for wines on the market. Keeping up with the pace of these accelerated brands was challenging, because we had to constantly adapt to what the market was asking for and what the market was providing. One time we had all of the wines ready for bottling, and suddenly the bottling line shut down; the filler bowl was clogged. So we had to troubleshoot on site and try to finish the bottling that day in order to fulfill our orders. Our entire crew had to stay overtime until the problem was solved, and we finally finished the run by 10 p.m. This type of problem is more serious for a growing brand because the orders are not flexible, and you risk losing shelf place- ment if you cannot provide the product on time. Now, at Jamieson Ranch, I have the knowl- edge to keep up with growing brands but also have the luxury of time to be able to create higher quality wines with more attention to detail from grapes to bottle. Working with these brands gave me the experience and tools to be prepared for the expected growth of JRV brands in the near future. A resident of the Santa Cruz Mountains, Laurie Daniel has been a journalist for more than 35 years. She has been writing about wine for publications for more than 21 years and has been a Wines & Vines contributor since 2000. EARLY EXPERIENCE WITH FLASH EXTRACTION W hile he was working at Hahn Estate in Monterey County, Calif., winemaker Juan Jose Verdina gained experience with a number of new technologies, including Flash Detente. The first commercial flash unit in the United States was installed in 2009 at Monterey Wine Co. in King City, Calif. Because all of the Hahn brands were growing, Verdina says, the company decided to purchase a second flash unit in 2010 "as a way of creating high-quality wines at an affordable price." The unit was installed about three hours northeast, in Lodi, Calif. "I was introduced to all of the versatile ways the machine can be applied in winemaking," Verdina says. "With Hahn, the machine is applied more to larger production wines. You can process several hundred tons through the machine and create large-scale blends." When Verdina moved to Jamieson Ranch, he learned how to apply the technology to small-production wines. "The machine allows us to create different tools for our blending toolbox; we have the ability to use different fermentation styles to create unique components." For example, Verdina sometimes co-ferments red grapes with the must from flashed red grapes and thinks the process improves structure and color. These days he uses the small Flash Detente unit at Carneros Vintners in Sonoma, Calif. "We are able at JRV to use flash to create blends as small as 300 cases," Verdina says. Juan Jose Verdina uses flash extraction to create large-scale wine blends.