I Shook The Baby!

I did, I shook the baby, the little bastard.  It was the turbidity that made me do it. My numbers were high, my resources are low and I have a school of fish a floppin' that need to be fried. What am I talking about? Good friggin' question. I am not saying that I have bitten off more than I can chew but I am definitely talking with my mouth full.

Last week I pushed my precious Garnier Merlot through a two penny rental filter and now I am feeling guilty.  I swear I could almost hear baby Baccus cry as I basically disassembled the wine that had a year and a half of pampered barrel life. Then I throw it into a tub and expect it to find itself again. In an ideal world, I add no sulfur, I use no pumps and I let gravity assist the wine as it flows through unhindered lines from the vine to the toilet. Unfortunately, in the words of the venerable Ice T, "shit ain't like that."

Life throws you curve balls and what you have to do is adjust your swing. I would still consider this wine a base hit. Don't discount the Texas leaguer. If it weren't for mediocrity, greatness and lowliness would share a thin wall and I am not a proponent of that.  Some things are actually better than other things and if I have to fill the space in between, I'll do it. There is a lot more room to play between the end points. Besides, extremes get too much attention.

I should get my own turbidity tested.

tur·bid

   [tur-bid]  Show IPA

–adjective

1.

not clear or transparent because of stirred-up sediment orthe like; clouded; opaque; obscured: the turbid waters nearthe waterfall.

2.

thick or dense, as smoke or clouds.

3.

confused; muddled; disturbed.

Wine Update

My goal is to put Merlot back on the map. I know, that is a bold statement coming from a guy who drools at pop tarts but the movie Sideways wrecked Merlot for a lot of people and I'm not going to stand by and let this unwarranted alienation of a perfectly good varietal continue, uncontested. I'm going to do something about it. Especially after tasting a '98 Petrus Pomerol last Fall. I really just dripped a drop out of an empty bottle onto my palm and licked it. It tasted like hand with notes of things I had been doing and I will never forget it.

The Nectar Vats

Here is the Merlot I am making with my pal Joe and a highly qualified peanut gallery of real winemakers. It is working while I sleep. Every day in the barrel it is getting a rounder, fuller mouthfeel and a buttery cherry flavor as it muscles through malolactic fermentation, allegedly. I need to stick some toasty oak in the barrels because the ones I used are neutral (aka: old and cheap, like... super cheap). I actually just stripped the barrels off the soapbox car and epoxied the holes. The addition of some good oak will make the wine a little more dynamic. It will taste like it was aged in a nice barrel. Fake the oak.

This is the results of a chromatography test. I like the way it looks.

My plan is to ask a few of my ultra talented pals to design labels for the wine in return for some of the wine. Maybe I will send them a bottle and they can drink it, name it and make a label for it. That way I will feel like I have a bunch of different wines in my cellar because they will all have different labels. But really it will just be a giant stock of minky Merlot that I can give away, bring around and barter with. Black market fun tickets. Tax That!

These are the Merlot grapes that will set things straight.