Our Grape Harvest was unusual this year, but what else should we expect from 2020. It was the earliest and shortest since we began making wine in the Gorge in 2017: September 10-17.
We had planned to make Rose from our red varietals this year as an exercise in case we had a smoky harvest season in the future. There is a phenomenon called “smoke taint” - wine smells and tastes like an ashtray - in which the chemicals that we perceive as smoke are absorbed by the grape skins and bind to sugar residues. The smoke taint correlates with time on the skins. For Reds that time is days to weeks from crushing to pressing, whereas Whites are crushed and immediately pressed and our Roses have in the past soaked on the skins for 2 hours or 24 hours. If the smoke taint is really bad, then the odor of ashtray is there from the start. However, the smoke chemicals are released from their chemical bonds with the sugars over time, so a wine that is excellent at the outset can become undrinkable.
What started as an exercise in making Roses soon became a reality when heavy smoke filled the Gorge from September 11 beyond September 17. We only soaked the Roses on the skins for 1 hour: Primitivo (aka Zinfandel, but same grape by DNA sequence) on the 10th; Syrah on the 11th; and Merlot on the 12th. Our Viognier finished the harvest for us on the 17th.
We expect to see a lot of 2020 Rose from California, Oregon and Washington next spring.