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Through the Grapevine

The CA Central Coast lifestyle -focused on wine, food ad travel.

"A CONCRETE SOLUTION TO WINEMAKING"

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

CONCRETE SOLUTION TO WINEMAKING ©

It has been several weeks since Micah Utter was gracious enough to spend some time with me. I should apologize for taking so long to getting this posted on "Vinewright" but I've been off the grid doing some travel. All I have to say about that is, if you plan to fly - pack a big lunch for all those delayed and cancelled flights.

I recently read about a revival of the use of concrete wine making vessels by some very toney Italian small lot producers. Well, it turns out they aren't the only makers of excellent wines who are riding this wave. Pun intended, since Micah is a surfer who also happens to know a lot about custom shaping of concrete. I heard about him and his Vino Vessel, Inc. (www.vinovessel.com) operation, located on the south side of Paso Robles, during the WiVi trade event that was described here a few articles back.

So, Through the Grapevine sent its intrepid reporter (moi) to get an exclusive on this cutting edge idea. Little did I know that several equally edgy and innovative winemakers have embraced the concept. Small batches of some very nice wines are sleeping peacefully here on the Central Coast and other growing areas, wrapped up like Jimmy Hoffa!

Currently, Vino Vessel has designed and produced forms for eleven various fermenting and storage tanks as an alternative to wood barrels. While not inexpensive (they require extensive design and engineering input), the better oak versions of barrels topped $1,000 each a few years back. Stainless steel storage vats, and certification for fabrication techniques also makes for a serious outlay of capital. You may know that many smaller producers actually rent tank space for storage for larger wineries with excess volume, rather than purchasing those high ticket items. It has been reported that wineries plan to put a large part of winery improvements into increasing that aspect of their facilities in 2013. There are even some tank farms that simply offer a place to keep the juice as a sideline of the wine industry.

Micah's available containers are sized from 70 gallons up to 1,305, coming in an interesting mix of shapes and concepts. The company has the ability to design custom enclosures for nearly any idea with which a winemaker might wish to experiment. But it is hard to imagine a shape or size that isn't available other than bigger versions for larger producers. Examples include a pyramid and the "hippo" model, one of two oval styles, which maximizes the surface area that comes in contact with the wine. Specifically, that relates to skin contact, the more juice surface that is exposed to the cap - primarily grape skins that form a layer when forced to the top of a tank by CO₂ during fermentation - the better the extraction of tannin and color. Ideally, if impractical, a large flat shallow pool would work very well.

The hippo idea was the first style built and beta tested by Peachy Canyon and Chronic Cellars in 2007. It required some special engineering, a special formula for the concrete mix and curing process and, inclusion of reinforcing mesh. The result led to new design ideas and sales that have grown to include local wineries such as Linne Calodo, Epoch and Stolpman.

The Vino Vessel allows micro-oxygenation, a neutral (no extraction) flavor component that helps in the expression of the fruit and are easy to clean and sanitize. "There is no food in concrete", Micah quotes one user. Thus, the tanks are not prone to aid unwanted critters making a home in them. Concrete also has excellent thermal retention, avoids hot spots found in some upright styles, offers a slow rise in temperatures and needs no temperature controls such as those on jacketed stainless tanks.

While not in widespread use, use of concrete as a winemaking option is on the rise and works well for small operations and those liking to try new concepts and experiments. If you have the opportunity, try a wine made in a Vino Vessel and see what you think. In Paso Robles one easily found example is the 2011 Viognier at the Peachy Canyon tasting room at W46 and Bethel Rd. You may also inquire at Chronic Cellars if they have a current sample done in a Vino Vessel.

Upgrading to concrete forces sale of used Trans Store Stainless Tanks

One of our customers is upgrading to concrete tanks and selling their used stainless tanks:

 

The Trans Store tank specs are the following:

 

Capacity: 2T destemmed, 1.5T whole-cluster

Glycol jacketed and plummed on 1 side

Side manway (door)

2'' Bottom and mid-tank ferrules

Pallet jack friendly

Stackable

Good shape. Normal signs of use. No rust or dents.

 

Asking $4800 and have 13 to sell, and are willing to offer a price break for the lot of them.

 

 

 

For more info regarding purchasing of these tanks, contact John Faulkner:

johnnyfaulkner@gmail.com

SO WHAT’S UP WITH CONCRETE?

 I know you are going to ask, so I might as well speak up. It makes me think of the movie “Back to the Future” where technology is awesome but relationships, family, and good characters prevail. Concrete is kind of like an old friend that you never realized was so cool, that is until they were gone for a while from your life. In no way is it a pure vessel, like stainless, but instead the concrete is like a cast iron skillet. Absorbing the flavors of everything that touches the surface and enhancing the flavors of the wines that will grace its walls. While winemaking became squeaky clean in the 80′s, 90′s and 00′s, we may have lost the essence of life. These tanks are alive, slowly maturing the wine. I will not say that they are without flaws, I myself am not perfect and I do not expect it of the wine I craft. I want the circumstances to tell a story and if wine is like a book, then each story should be different.

- Matt Trevisan, January 2013

                                                                                                                      Linne Calodo Winery

Vino Vessel's new YOUTUBE account

We are starting to provide our customers with help videos, see below!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GGDEDeC7YM

Winter Savings!

For the upcoming months there is savings to be had on Vino Vessel's innovative concrete wine tanks!

 

For the month of January we are offering a 5% discount on the tank of your choice

 

February the featured tank is the 348 gallon Cone - discounted $350.00

 

March the featured tank is our most versatile and popular tank the 270 gallon Hippo - discounted $325.00

 

Please contact our office for more information 805-238-2676 or visit www.vinovessel.com

or email vinovessel@hotmail.com

The world has gone crazy for Concrete! Blog from Stolpman Vineyards

Concrete Waffles – Not Eggs: Focus on Authentic, Natural wines

September 5, 2012 By Pete

The wine world has gone crazy for Concrete!
It seems modern winemaking has finally cycled through a complete rotation, and it only took forty years! Wineries went from rooms crammed with shining stainless steel tanks and stacks of pristine new barrels to building the same Concrete tanks that were used in Europe for a millennia.
To take advantage of the wonders of modern winemaking, every year Californian wineries bought New French Oak barrels and picked up the newest, fanciest filters and de-stemmers. This mentality drove the success of winery suppliers that encourage producers to buy more cool stuff to make “better” wines. Sounds a bit like modern healthcare or even the Military Industrial Complex, eh?
Stolpman has been backing off of New French Oak percentages for four vintages now and we’re more focused than ever on making authentic wines. We define authentic as pure, natural wine. Stolpman wines are left largely free and un-manipulated in the vineyard through organic dry farming, minimal green harvesting, and cultivation by hand. We natively ferment our wines, manually punching down the skin caps, relying on gravity to transfer wines to minimize the use of pumps, and we shun additives or filtration. This year, we won’t add sulfur to any of the fruit lots arriving at the winery!

This year also marks the first use of our 6 new Concrete Fermentors. We installed them last week complete with a catwalk on top so we can stand above to circulate the chambers by hand. The tanks are elevated by giant concrete legs and the floors are curved so that all of the skins will flow into a bin once we open the bottom hatch. The juice can drain directly into neutral oak barrels, and the bins of skins and seeds can be lifted by forklift for a gentle pressing.

While it will still be another month before we put Syrah into the new Concrete, we’ve already put some of Rajat Parr’s Sandhi Pinot Noir picked from Rita’s Crown vineyard into one of them.
Because Rajat Parr tastes more international wine than anyone else I know, I asked him to articulate the differences he tastes in wines fermented in Concrete versus Stainless Steel or Oak. On the white side, he says “The best thing is that Concrete adds an extra layer of minerality and freshness to the wine that is clean without woody flavors. It allows high acid wines to stay nervy.” For red wines, Rajat says that Concrete is beneficial because “it keeps fermentation at a naturally stable temperature where the ferment won’t get too hot or cold”.

Sashi was inspired to design these concrete tanks on a trip he took to Patagonia with Rajat. They traveled to Bodega Noemia and saw concrete tanks designed for the same type of natural, pump-free winemaking that Sashi practices. Winemaker Hans Vinding-Diers and his partner Countess Noemi Marone Cinzano both raved about the ease of use and the subsequent quality of their unfiltered old-vine Malbec.


While some of the best European Chateaus and the most Prestigious wineries in Northern California have dropped hundreds of thousands on concrete eggs, we decided to take a more conventional route, and make waffles. After all, we want to make the best wine possible while keeping our price-points below the stratosphere. Concrete eggs are much smaller, extremely expensive tanks rounded into an oval with a wider base and gentle nose to promote the flow of wine that is found in a natural egg. By creating a tank in this shape, one is “incubating” the wine. We like our waffle design because the open-top squares (like a Belgian waffle) allow us to regulate the oxygen to naturally reductive Syrah, and we can easily punch the cap down to make sure the juice absorbs all of the Syrah’s beautiful color and skin tannin.

Sashi worked with Micah Utter, CEO of Vino Vessel in Paso Robles to make sure the tanks were exactly what he wanted for Stolpman. We’re looking forward to the arrival of two more concrete fermentors before Syrah harvest begins.
As great as the vineyard looks right now and with Sashi’s focus on new tools, 2012 is shaping up to once again redefine how great our wines can be!

Get your 70 Gallon Concrete Eco-Barrel today!

For the rest of the month of July we are extending a special online special

featuring our 70 Gallon Concrete Eco-Barrel at a 10% discount!

Several available now!

We gladly accept mastercard/visa

www.vinovessel.com

805-238-2676