Sauvignon Blanc flew off the vines this morning alongside roadwork on the bottlenecked highway 101, a vineyard the boys often refer to as El Walmart, due to its close proximity to falling prices. This was our first pick off the season and a classic case of now you see me, now you don't. After more than eight month's of meticulous care and nurturing it's hard to imagine that a plant can be denuded in a little under thirty seconds.
The pros like Macha and El Burro are a buzzcutting blur, adeptly cutting off tight lime green clusters, heaving them into yellow lugs and pushing their boxes along to the next vine with their feet. Older workers such as Don Ramiro slowly pick away at a constant pace insisting "I pick clean clusters for quality and not speed."
For the most part I steered clear of the pickers, collecting samples for historic yield counts, collecting stragler bunches like a mother hen and deleafing ahead of the crew. "Somos hojeros ahoro Tommy!" boomed Mario as we deleafed at warp speed while the tractor looped around the the drop spot. I have a long list of job titles but it had never occured to me that one day "dealeafer" would be one of them.
Deleafing, especially with Sauv Blanc, is of utmost importance. Leaves mixed in with the fermentation can easily give off green and vegetal characters a vinter would be opposed to seeing in their finished wine. And while Sauv. Blanc seems to incorporate these flavors on it's own it sure doesn't need anything that might compound them.
Overall, the grapes were in good shape and tasting quite 'savvy'. Dave commented that Sauv Blanc might be one of the few varieties where you can taste the same flavors in the berry as you can in the wine. Of course this could probably be said about a few other whites, Gewurztramier and Muscat Blanc quickly coming to mind. Nibbling on berries as I went there was plenty of melon, peach, citrus and yeah maybe a bit of capsicum. It might not measure up to Marlborough(hey I'm biased!) but how can you really go wrong with this varietal.
Beto the team leader cheered the boys on as he rumbled up and down the long, and I mean seemingly endless, rows in the Kubota with a macro bin in tow. "Let's move it muchachos because we got six long rows to go and I'm not gonna be here all day."
However this was to be a slow day, maybe 10 tons picked max. Even though the bossman had
mentioned early in the morning that there was no reason to pick "stupid fast," the boys didn't seem to hear him; they are ready to make some dought. The smell of harvest was in the air, and much like the sauv blanc, everyone could already start to taste the green.
