A Harvest Reflection
By Jamie Rubin (Harvest Intern 2020)
We continue to share with you the story of our harvest 2020 intern Jamie Rubin. This story first appeared as a post for Sommation_live, an IG channel offering a venue for wine education through shared experiences. Please enjoy!
Part III: November 8
The fruit is mostly in!
Last week was positively exhausting. We brought in huge lots of Riesling and were working around the clock to get it crushed, briefly cold soaked and pressed. The pace was much higher than it has been as seems like the year-round crew were simply waiting for this.
The tasting room crew cooked us some wonderful dinners which really kept us going. It was a kindness that I really wasn’t expecting but reflects the attitude of the collaboration and teamwork that exists not just at Red Newt, but in the region as a whole. Now we begin to shepherd the juice through fermentations. I’m learning about additions like bentonite and acid. Early on, I was very confused by the usage of the word “Lees.” As a somm, my understanding has always been that lees are dead yeast cells. It turns out it is used as a catch all term for solids. Glad to be caught up on what feels like a very basic thing I missed out on.
There’s a tiny bit of fruit left to come in, but largely the job over the next few weeks will be to rack tanks, filter lees, make small chemistry tweaks here and there, and make sure that we’re getting out of the way as fermentation begins.