Vermouth making has become an annual tradition for my friend Sam and me. Once we had harvested the grapes that he and his team spent all year growing, it was my responsibility to turn them into wine, vermouth’s base ingredient. The first step in making wine is wresting the juice from the grapes. Last year,…
Tag: Wine
Grape Harvest, August 2020
The vines ripened in the final days of August this year, and when the grapes call, I must go. Sam, my friend who grows wine grapes, graciously let me harvest over 100 pounds of chardonnay on the evening before his last night of harvest. I drove to his family’s farm in the delta near Sacramento…
Decisions, Decisions: Winemaking
Before I could make Z Line Vermouth, I needed wine (vermouth’s base ingredient). Though a total novice, I hoped to make the wine myself. My friend Sam is a fourth generation farmer who has started growing chardonnay grapes under contract in the last five years. Sam graciously allowed me to harvest 100 pounds of grapes…
Ariana Gunderson 