Wine, Pleasure, Beauty

Interview with a local Boulder winemaker (part 1)

For this week’s look into a local wine community (namely, my own here in northern Colorado) I interviewed a local winemaker from Boulder. Blake Eliasson left engineering to pursue winemaking a few years ago, and I was impressed by the wines of his that I first tasted last year. So I emailed him a few questions. His answers were lengthy and thoughtful, and I believe they provide insight into both local community and wine philosophy. I am going to let Blake speak for himself, so rather than trying to fit this into paragraph/narrative form I’m just going to share his answers here in interview for. For the sake of making this manageable to my average reader, since this is a very lengthy interview, I’m splitting the questions and answers up according to two themes: local wine, and personal philosophy/issues of the craft. With that, I present to you Blake of Settembre Cellars.

First off: Why Settembre?

The first part of this answer is that I’m an Italian wine fanatic.  It was the 1997 Chianti Classico’s that truly turned me from an occasional wine drinker to a wine lover.  Secondly, Tracy and I were married in September.  The meld of the two, during construction of our personal cellar, resulted in the name Settembre Cellars (September in Italian).

What is the state of grape growing in Colorado?

Overall we’re a very young industry.  We don’t have the benefit of generations of winegrowers who have identified the most suitable cultivars and vineyard sites.  Many of the vineyards are very new.  However, our arid high altitude continental climate with warm days and cool nights provides outstanding growing conditions.  An ever growing number of winegrowers are increasing their viticulture knowledge and striving to produce premium winemaking fruit (as opposed to simply a cash crop) which requires understanding not only which cultivar to plant, where to plant it, but also mastering the details of growing it in such a manner that high quality grapes result.

What varietals do you think have the potential to stand out in Colorado?

This is a topic of great discussion in the industry.  A fair number of folks are proponents of Cabernet Franc.  That variety hasn’t captivated my attention and I have yet to find a 100% Cab Franc from any region that particularly suits my taste.  As far as varieties that I think do extremely well in Colorado we have a lot of Merlot planted, and it really does appear to have the potential to produce some unique wines here.  Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon are the reds I produce which really do well and I’m happy with the wine style.  I’m curious to see what Tempranillo, Malbec, and Dolcetto do in the coming years; there isn’t a lot planted but they thrive in climates which possess some similarities.  For whites: Riesling and Chardonnay.  Riesling has a reputation in the states as being a sweet wine, but it’s one of the few wines that stretches the entire range: bone-dry to syrupy sweet.  There are challenges associated with growing Riesling for a dry styled wine, but the potential for that wine style in Colorado is huge.  Chardonnay also does very well in Colorado, however, one needs a to reconsider style for it to be a Colorado standout by tending towards a crisp dry white (as opposed to a cream/oak/butter style for which California excels).  The biggest issue, to drive these wines to stand-out is to focus on growing a premium fruit through, in part, careful management of irrigation and canopy.

Why do you only make wine with Colorado grapes? Do you ever make wine with grapes from other wine regions?

We use 100% Colorado grapes.  With the exception of our tiny “80304” production from our Boulder vines, most of our fruit comes from the Palisade area.  I believe Colorado has conditions conducive to produce fantastic wine grapes.  When the option exists local food is often fresher and as a result substantially tastier and healthier than that from distant corporate farms.    Just as I prefer to buy arugula from my local farm because it tastes better, this mentality extends to the production of premium wine.  Similarly, I don’t believe premium winemaking begins by placing freshly harvested grapes in a cooled rail-car for several days while it makes its way to the winery.

What is the local wine culture in Boulder like?

In terms of ‘local wine’: local food is huge – most new restaurants like to tout their use of local ingredients whenever possible.  Awareness of local wine is growing and a natural follow on.  Colorado wines are beginning to show up more frequently on Boulder restaurants wine lists.  There are several wineries in Boulder which are producing very nice wines and give the opportunity for learning and tasting local wines.

Considering local ‘wine culture’ it is relatively easy to find unique world-class wines from local shops and restaurants.  Quite frequently there are ‘meet the winemaker’, or, focused flights at local restaurants.  The Blending Cellar, a wine bar on Pearl Street, regularly has Wine 101 events and other opportunities to learn about specific producers, regions, or varietals.

You make wine from local grapes and sell it locally, on bicycles. Do you see yourself as being part of the Slow Foods movement? Do you think more people should learn to drink locally made wines wherever they are for environmental reasons?

First and foremost: I believe Colorado has potential to produce premium wines.  Within that realm, I use 100% Colorado grapes and I am experimenting with growing winegrapes right here in Boulder (our “80304” wine).  I’m also concerned about my environmental impact, this coupled with my love of bicycling (often doing my own wine shopping using my bicycle trailer) this delivery option seemed natural.  Grape pomace is also a fantastic source of nitrogen, and as such we have several local farms who love receiving our grape skins for compost. Although I’ve never personally considered, or thought of, the winery as an influential member of the Slow Food movement - this philosophy is in many ways inline with our wineries actions.  We’ve been a member of Slow Food ever since learning about the organization when talking to a winemaker of Dolcetto di Dogliani.  After that conversation, Tracy & I began noticing the little snail logo throughout Piemonte and joined the organization as soon as we returned home to Boulder. 

I recently attended a winemakers round-table in Boulder (we have over 20 wineries on the front range!) and blindly tasted our wines intermixed with ones that are highly regarded from other regions.  There are some fantastic wines being produced in Colorado in a variety of different styles.  That being said, I would certainly encourage folks to support their local farms and business and drink locally produced wine made from Colorado grapes.  There is a synergy that can exist between local food & wine and it can certainly be more environmentally friendly as well.  If you haven’t tried Colorado wines in some time, I urge you to give some a try, you will likely find some that do not suit your palate (this is true for any wine region), but I would be surprised if you don’t find several that do.  If you’ve tried several, feel free to ask me, if my style doesn’t fit your taste, I’d be happy to point you to one that may.  Drinking locally is also interesting, whenever I travel I always seek out wines that are grown/produced locally.  But this isn’t to say one should restrict oneself to a single wine, winery, region, or style.  I still drink my fair share of Italian Wines and Oregon Pinot noir, but local wines make up a substantial percentage of my personal cellar.

[This question refers to conversations we’ve had previously with a fellow wine lover on the future of Colorado wine.] What do you think of how Sandy compares Colorado to Austria, grounding his belief that Gruner would do well here? Do you think the fact that Lemberger (another Austrian grape) does well here supports his theory?

Grüner Veltliner, from my limited understanding, has a cold hardiness similar to Chardonnay (which excels in a crisp white style), but requires a longer growing season and is more sensitive to spring frosts.  The spring frost, is one of the major reasons Vinifera are expected to be less reliably grown near Boulder.  There are some experimental plantings of Grüner Veltliner on the Western Slope, but I haven’t inquired on that cultivar’s performance.

What are your favorite restaurants for wine in Boulder? Which wine shops to you visit when buying wine for yourself?

This is an interesting question.  I usually don’t decide where to eat based on a restaurants wine list – though I certainly do choose not to eat some places (or at least do take-out) because of a wine list or wine which is poorly stored.  A few Boulder Restaurants I do enjoy include: Bacaro, Laudisio, Leaf, Radda, The Black Cat, The Kitchen, The Med, and Trattoria on Pearl.

And, as winemaker’s often say: “It takes a lot of good beer to make great wine” and as such the Mountain Sun Pub serves as my home away from home.

To purchase wine in Boulder, more often than not I shop at Liquor Mart, they have an extensive Italian selection.  I’d also recommend The Wine Merchant which has a nice selection and integration of Colorado Wines.

What’s so great about Boulder?

My wife Tracy was born here.

For me personally the attributes of Boulder that I like best include it’s a very bicycle friendly: I can bike from my home downtown or nearly anywhere in town via the bicycle paths or bike lanes with ease and often in less time than it would have taken me by car – I can even hit a mountain bike trail in the foothills without getting in a car.  There are a number of fantastic restaurants in Boulder, of which most are vegetarian friendly.  The live music scene is vibrant.  It’s an educated and environmentally conscience city and I love the open space surrounding.

Interview with a local Boulder winemaker (part 2)

Can you give me an exact, unambiguous, uncontroversial definition for terroir? Just kidding. Not really.

Let’s just say I believe.

As a winemaker, what is your philosophy? Do you have one? Does every winemaker need one?

A quote, or perhaps passionate shout, that followed the shattering of chalk across the blackboard after my high school Latin teacher affixed a forgot macron: “attention to detail!”.  My winemaking philosophy is attention to detail through carefully monitoring of the winemaking process using my science and engineering background to understand the progression of a wine and enable minimal intervention and timing of otherwise very traditional winemaking techniques.  My wines are truly hand-crafted: manual punch downs during fermentation, traditional aging in French Oak barrels, and whenever possible leaving the wines unfined and unfiltered to preserve the delicate aromatics, and then finally hand sealed with a top grade cork closure.  I’m forever trying to pay attention to every caveat of the process in order to help the grapes produce something exquisite.


Which do you like better, sangiovese or barbera, and why?

My experience with Barbera is predominantly in two styles: it’s the everyday wine in the Piemonte region of Italia, and while there we often had it for lunches.  Most of the wines paired fantastic with the local cuisine, but were not overly complex.  Since that trip a majority of the Barbera’s I’ve purchased here in the states tend towards that heavily oaked fruit forward style; which doesn’t suit my palate.  As mentioned Chianti Classico is one of the earlier wines that captured my attention.  The premium ones can have great acidity to pair well with food and often an ‘earthy’ layer of complexity that I just love.  One of my favorite wines is 100% Sangiovese.  Its interesting that, like Pinot noir (another varietal that I love), Sangiovese has only the 5 basic anthocyanins in the skin, rather than the full 20 that can exist (a full set can result in a darker colored wine).  Sangiovese can produce a beautiful light-colored wine, even with full red-wine processing.  It is a fun wine with complexity that often surprises, and would be fun to serve in a black glass for those who think a wine needs to be inky black to be complex.


How long did it take you to learn winemaking at UC Davis, and what’s the story behind your decision to pursue this passion as your vocation rather than avocationally?

The distance program from UC Davis is 5 quarters/courses.  The UC Davis distance program is fantastic, particularly for someone who already has some background in chemistry and science.  I feel perhaps more than ‘learn winemaking’ from UC Davis I had my understanding of winemaking polished.  Having a Ph.D. in electrical engineering (at the basic quantum physics level) I read all levels of enology work, including the research papers, without intimidation.  I also read a lot of texts on wine appreciation and began forming my preferences and philosophy with regard to winemaking approaches early.  Whenever traveling I always made the attempt to stop at the local wineries and learn whatever I could.  I feel what UC Davis did was provide a structure to my learning and help solidify my understanding and more formally unite all the pieces of scientific understanding and winemaking philosophy.  Whenever possible my research reports for UC Davis focused on understanding the scientific justification, benefits or risks, associated with my traditional winemaking approaches.  I suspect my winemaking style, would be very different if I were to have fully learned winemaking from UC Davis, as opposed to being deeply passionate about creating exquisite, age-worthy, old-world styled wines in a traditional manner and then evaluating and fine-tuning my approach while studying at UC Davis.

I began my winemaking, as many folks who didn’t grow up in a wine family, first by appreciation of wine in a glass, then a drive to understand more often due to some transcendental wine experience, and eventually the desire to try producing a wine of my own.  I have a mentality, if it’s worth doing it’s worth doing right, and as such started by purchasing a 100L variable capacity stainless tank and enough ‘kits’ with Sangiovese juice from Italy to fill it.  I made several ‘kit’ wines before deciding starting with a purple juice was too late in the process to produce a wine with the level of complexity and control of style that I desired.  With the help of a fellow winemaker I purchased a quarter ton of Colorado Syrah and absolutely loved the whole process (and folks loved the wine being produced!).  I wanted to produce more varieties and based on the amount of heat generated during fermentation and the aspect ratio of the stainless tanks I ferment in wanted to work with larger quantities of grapes.  The tons of grapes I desired pushed us well beyond the ‘hobby’ level: it was time to make a business plan and turn the winery commercial.  From that moment, perhaps due to lack of a spare moment ever since, I’ve never looked back.
 
What does the work schedule of a winemaker look like? What kind of a lifestyle is it?

Winemaking has an intimate connection with the seasons: we get one shot a year (maybe two if we swap hemispheres).  During the fall once the harvest is called, the schedule is dictated by the grapes.  Long hours and for my winemaking style lots of manual work.  We do a very careful hand-sort of our fruit, quite literally every bunch is inspected  before it heads into the winery (thanks to the help of our amazing Crush Crew Volunteers).  Once fermentation begins I punch down several times a day/night, the timing of which is again dictated by the grapes and wine style desired.  It’s really not until the wine is in barrel that the pace of life in the winery becomes more moderate and then its time to begin filing the plethora of paperwork surrounding wine production and getting previous vintages ready to bottle.  For a winery our size, it’s a lot busier than one might imagine, our fall trips to Italy for the porcini mushroom season are now out of the question and honestly any trip is dictated by the wines schedule.  In between vintages, I spend a lot of time analyzing data from previous vintages, evaluating how wines evolved and how they can be improved, and reading/learning as much as I can.  The potential of a grape is fascinating, the science, tradition, and art understood vast, and yet the variables responsible for the finished glass of wine staggeringly beyond our present understanding.  The people in the wine industry generally make one feel truly blessed to have the opportunity to be a part of.  Here in Colorado it’s a small but growing industry and most winemakers and winegrowers are open, friendly, helpful, and happy to be a part of a craft we all love.

Could someone without great passion make a great wine, if they had all the technical skills down?

This begs the question, what is a great wine.  Is my opinion of a great wine the same as yours?  Furthermore, one’s opinion of a great evolves with experience.  That being said, winemaking has a lot of science behind it.  One could be very good at making wine, and potentially part of making a great (or at least quite quaffable wine) with technical skills alone.  However, wine is as much art as it is science.  There are so many variables that even with my best efforts to tell a fellow winemaker exactly how I make my wine, and they tried to replicate, the finished wines would probably be different.  Not that one would be better or worse, simply they would be different.  From here, a passionate winemaker is going to be driven to understand these differences and strive for something greater (at least to their palates understanding of great).  A passionate winemaker is most likely also a winelover and therefore looking for and driven by subtleties of wine.  For a small boutique winery that is focused on making truly exquisite wine, I doubt without passion, one could succeed by technical skill alone much less endure.