Inside Winemaking - the art and science of growing grapes and crafting wine

This episode features Dr. David R Montgomery, professor from the University of Washington and author of three books that shine a light on the often-overlooked role of biology underground and the connections and influence these microbia have with plants. David is a professor of geomorphology at the UW and together with his wife, Anne Bicklé, has ventured beyond the inorganic confines of soil scienc...

This episode features Brett Weis, who is the Associate Winemaker for ElevenEleven Wines in Napa. Beyond making the full portfolio of wine for ElevenEleven Brett is managing the custom crush clients that have their wines produced at ElevenEleven. Our conversation covers his background, the ElevenEleven vineyards and wines, the ar throughout the winery, tips for working in as a custom crush client,...

The guest for this episode is one of the most industrious and deep-thinking winemakers for whom I've had the opportunity to sit down and explore their winemaking brain. Tim Milos is a winemaking consultant and through his various projects is all over California, Oregon, and has experience with more varietals than anyone on the podcast to date. Our conversation gets into the weeds on technical aspe...

The guest for this episode is Jenny Heinzen, who runs a real estate business in Paso Robles, California, focused on vineyard and winery sales. Jenny's real estate services span both residential and commercial properties. I wanted to talk with Jenny about issues buyers and sellers should be prepared for when buying or selling vineyards and/or wineries. Jenny works with her husband, Randy Heinzen fr...

This episode features Matt Iaconis of the husband and wife team that is Brick and Mortar Wines. Our conversation covers the development of Brick and Mortar, the winemaking decisions that accompany its stylistics goals, and then focuses on the process and equipment involved in packaging wine into aluminum cans. Matt is also a winemaker with Naked Wines. His description of working with Naked Wines i...

This podcast is the third installment where I answer winemaking and vineyard questions that have been submitted by email. If you would like to submit a question, please send them to jim@insidewinemaking.com. Sign-ups for Deep Winemaking are now open. If you are interested in coming to Napa to learn technical winemaking for three days in August, please check out further details here . These events...

This episode features Randy Heinzen, who is the owner and president of Vineyard Professional Services (VPS), which is a vineyard farming and consulting company based in Paso Robles, California. VPS currently manages over 2,400 acres in Monterey, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties and has designed and developed over fifty properties in the last twenty years. I met Randy years ago when we wo...

Every day I drive by Shafer Vineyards (twice) and never fail to slow down in order peer into that special sloping set of vineyards within the Stags Leap District where the hillsides graduate from difficult-to-grow-grapes to upright cliffs. In 2018 Doug and his team at Shafer began producing "The Taste with Doug Shafer" podcast and that presented the opportunity for me to connect with him and explo...

Molly is a good friend and has a tremendous wealth of viticultural knowledge from her years in commercial grape-growing both in California and Oregon. Now as the Vineyard Coordinator and Instructor, Molly is teaching the viticulture courses at Napa Valley College. This podcast covers the two topics I most wanted to discuss the with Molly. First: how to farm grapes in cooler, wetter climate that is...

Near the end of the 2018 harvest I recorded this episode with Ben and Cameron after they had a chance to work with me at Seavey. I have known both of these guys since they came on the Deep Winemaking trip in 2017. Making the leap from a comfortable career to starting from the beginning as a winery intern requires significant sacrifice. Working a harvest is what I recommend to anyone who finds them...

This episode features Dr. Dave Block from UCDavis. Dave is the Chair of the Dept. of Enology and Viticulture, teaches both enology and chemical engineering courses, and directs a research lab. I did my graduate research in Dave's lab and got to know him during our conversations about tinkering with Cabernet fermentor shapes and sizes. I went back to Davis in July, 2018 to record this podcast and f...

The folks who put on the City of Riesling invited me to their events this past June in Traverse City, Michigan.  I was able to record this podcast featuring Hunter Smith from Frankland Estate, situated in the Frankland River Region of Western Australia, and is known for their Rielsings.  Hunter does a great job of describing this remote site, 70 km from the coast, where they are farming and certif...

The folks who put on the City of Riesling invited me to their events this past June in Traverse City, Michigan.  I was able to record this podcast featuring Fred Merwarth, who is the owner and winemaker at Hermann J. Wiemer Vineyards in the Finger Lakes region of New York.  Our conversation covers Fred's introduction to winemaking, the challenges of growing grapes in the Finger Lakes, the grapevin...

The folks who put on the City of Riesling invited me to their events this past June in Traverse City, Michigan.  I was able to record this podcast featuring August Deimel, the winemaker for Keuka Spring Vineyards in the Finger Lakes.  August has a talent for storytelling and I was incredibly fortunate to connect with him on a whim.  Having attended Cornell's enology program, August provided a peek...

The folks who put on the City of Riesling invited me to their events this past June in Traverse City, Michigan.  I was able to record this podcast featuring the team behind Washington state's Eroica Riesling, produced by Ste Michelle Wine Estates.  Bob Bertheau is the head winemaker for Chateau Ste Michelle and Ernst Loosen is the proprietor of the Dr Loosen wines in Germany's Mosel Valley.  Since...

3 Michigan Winemakers - Sean O'Keefe, Bryan Ulbrich, and JayBriggss The folks who put on the City of Riesling invited me to their events this past June in Traverse City, Michigan.  I had a great time, was introduced to the many of the people who are at the helm of Michigan's viticulture, got to taste a lot more than just Riesling, and recorded six podcasts with winemakers from around the world.  T...

This episode features Josh Jacobsen, who I met when he signed up for the forthcoming Deep Winemaking immersion trip in Napa this coming August.  Formerly of Facebook, Josh agreed to help walk me through all the important aspects of creating ads in a manner that would be specific for wineries.  Josh provides an incredible insight into creating, tracking, and evaluating the messages and costs that a...

This episode features Michael Evans, who is the co-founder of the Vines of Mendoza in Argentina's Uco Valley.  After falling in love during a trip to Mendoza in 2004 Michael found a local partner and created a place for individual owners to build a wine starting right from vineyard plantings.  Under the guidance of full vineyard staff and consulting winemaker, Santiago Achaval, owners can choose t...

This episode features Frederic Panaiotis, Chef de Cave for the Champagne house, Ruinart, which was founded in 1729 and lays claim to being the oldest maison in Champagne.  Frederic was on a press tour in the US and I had a chance to record this podcast with him in San Francisco.  Chef de Cave translates to Chief Winemaker, which is the post that Frederic serves at Ruinart.   As both a holder of tr...

This episode features Gabrielle Shaffer, who is the viticulturist and winery relations manager for Stagecoach Vineyard.  AT 600 planted acres across 175 distinct parcels, Stagecoach is one of the largest and most important vineyards in the Napa Valley.  Gabrielle works with 90 different winemakers, who are purchasing grapes from Stagecoach.  Gabrielle also has her own brand, Gamling and McDuck, wh...

This episode features Thibaut Scholasch, founder and VP of Research and Development for Fruition Sciences.  Our conversation gets deep into the weeds of technical viticulture.  Fruition Sciences provides four technical vineyard services that track novel parameters within grapevines.  Thibaut discusses those services chronologically as they are pertinent during the growing season and describes how...

This episode features Rudy Zuidema, who is the winemaker at Shadybrook Estate in Napa, where we met to record this episode.  Rudy also makes wine for other clients and is known for his experience with organic and biodynamic farming.  Under his own brand, Zuidema Wine Co., Rudy produces a single vineyard Grenache from the McGah Vineyard in Rutherford.  The second half of this podcast is focused on...

This episode features Becky George, who is the winemaker for Kelly Fleming Wines in Napa.  Becky also produces her own wine under the Mojave Wines brand, which is a tribute to her childhood growing up in the Mojave Dessert.  Becky and I studied winemaking at UCDavis together 15 years ago, and used this podcast to catch up on all of Becky's work throughout the globe leading up to her current projec...

Pam Starr has been making the wines and building the Crocker and Starr brands since she first met with Charlie Crocker of the Crocker Estate in 1997.  This podcast covers the long story of how Pam built Crocker and Starr beginning from the handwritten business plan.  Associate Winemaker, Evyn Cameron discusses Crocker and Starr's portfolio, they ways how her and Pam evaluate Cabernet Franc ferment...

Dave is a long time friend and agreed to help create the recent Winemaking Chemistry Series - pH and TA episode.  I asked Dave to be a part of that project because of his background in organic chemistry and his ability to describe where in winemaking those principles are most critical.  We ended up going deep on several aspects beyond wine acidity and I made the decision to make this a stand-alone...