Zepaltas Wines

I feel like I will never truly master making Chardonnay, but I feel like I have come a long way since 2005. I think when I first started, I worried about what I needed to do, and now I am more concerned with what I don’t need to do. In short, when you find a site like Keefer Ranch, most of the hard work is done in the vineyard, and the winemaker’s job is to not screw things up.

We did a have a bit of a scare in the vineyard during 2010. As mentioned before, the summer was ultra-cool, but we experienced one really extreme heat spike in late August. The heat wave ruined a lot of fruit in the vineyard. In Sonoma County, many growers pulled more leaves in the fruit zone in effort to help push ripening ahead, because the vines were so behind schedule. When the heat spike hit, it was devastating. Hot, Piercing sun began to burn clusters and they basically turned to mush. At Keefer, we lost about half of the crop in our rows due to this heat (on the afternoon sun side of the vines.) Luckily, what remained on the morning side of the vines was safe, and in the end, produced the amazing fruit that we have come to expect.

As you can probably guess, the 2010 Babushka Chardonnay is 100% Keefer Ranch Vineyard. On the nose we get the usual hints of lemon zest, wet stones and tonic. On the palate there are flavors of citrus, flan, and as it opens up, hints of toasted brioche. The wine was aged for 14 months in 100% French oak bbls (25% new.) This wine is more brisk than the 2009 bottling, so it is going to need some cellar time to round out. Though, if you like your Chardonnay racy, this wine is good to go right now.

98 cases made

I feel that our La Cruz often gets overlooked within our roster of wines, because of its shy and elegant nature early in its life. It doesn’t show much early on, and as one customer told me it is kind of a “fastball down the middle.” I do agree, but as retrospective tastings have shown, the wine seems to “run on all cylinders” after about two years in bottle. Right now, the 2008 is showing lots of layers, and has gained intensity in its fruit character (which seems backwards to me.) The 2010 could possibly be our best version of La Cruz (I think I said that last year too.)
Because of its location in the Petaluma Gap along the Lakeville Highway, bud break tends to be about 10-14 days earlier than in our other vineyards. I think that the head start it gets was advantageous in 2010. We got full fruit maturity in the 3 different blocks, and had good acid levels and great flavors at low sugar levels.

The final blend is 75% clone 115, and 25% Pommard selection, both planted on hillside slopes. The 115 provides the brightness, and the Pommard adds the depth, and layers. On the nose we get hints of raspberry, currant and wet stones. There are under layers of mushroom and forest floor that show after a bit of air. The vibrant acidity gives the wine tension and a refreshing feel. The tannins are light to medium grit, and give the wine a nice presence on the finish. I recommend holding this wine for about one year in the cellar before popping it for your best return on investment.

This is the 5th vintage of our friendly-priced Sonoma Coast Pinot noir, and no doubt our best. It has the intensity & brightness of the 2007 and the depth and complexity of our 2005. It is a blend of the Suacci and La Cruz Vineyards, and this wine is a killer reflection of the Sonoma Coast Appellation. It is more elegant than its big brother, the Russian River Valley Pinot Noir, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have intensity. We achieved great flavor development at lower sugars in the vineyard thus producing a powerful wine at a lower alcohol level, and that is something that we have set out to do when we first started making wine.
This wine shows classic flavors of the Sonoma Coast: ripe raspberry, currant, cranberry along with layers of earthiness, underbrush and hints of exotic, Asian spices. 2009 will be a great year for aging Pinot Noir, but this wine is quite generous at the moment. Pair this up with Pinot-friendly classics such as a dry-rubbed pork tenderloin or a thinly-sliced, grilled flank steak.

In the spring of 2009 I got a call from Hanzell Vineyard’s winemaker, Michael McNeill. He had called to ask me if I would be interested in working with some fruit from their iconic vineyard. Excited but confused, I told him that I would look at my budget and get back to him.
Well, I never really looked at my budget; I just decided that my answer was “yes.” I was honored to be offered fruit from this legendary site, but I thought that there had to be a catch. Was it going to be some lesser block of young vines, or some old diseased rows?
Hardly. I was offered grapes from the de Brye block that was planted in 1977 to old Wente Clone Chardonnay. Needless to say, we got the contract signed and in early Sept we harvested 2 tons of Hanzell Chardonnay.
The harvested fruit had me buzzing with excitement: small berries loaded with dense, but delicate flavors. The juice was pressed off and put through primary fermentation in stainless steel. After primary, we transferred the wine into French oak barrels where it remained on the lees for 14 months. We stirred the wine heavily throughout malolactic fermentation, and then let the wine rest until it was time for bottling.
On the nose there are hints of stone fruit, minerals and quinine. On the palate there is subtle hints of lemon curd, lychee and a touch of creaminess. The wine has a really crispy framework reminiscent of Chablis. The 2009 Hanzell Chardonnay will benefit from time in the cellar to let it develop secondary flavors, and fill itself out. Feel free to drink it now with dinner, but I believe that the rewards will be greater with a couple years in the cellar.

This is the 3rd vintage of our top barrel selection Chardonnay blend. 2009 was a no brainer year in the Russian River Valley. It was easy to decide when to pick the fruit no matter what style a winemaker was going for. We had really dense flavors early on in the vineyards on Chardonnays as the fruits started to ripen.
Now that we are working with more Chardonnay vineyards, we are able to have more options (and some fun) at the blending sessions. We based the blend off of barrels from the famed Keefer Ranch Vineyard near Graton and then tasted the wines with some other barrels blended in. In the end, we found that a touch of Chardonnay from the Sapphire Hill Vineyard added an exotic touch to the blend.
The 2009 Babushka is clean, crisp but with a rich mouthfeel. On the nose there are hints of pear, honey fig and wet stones and it is all held together by the crisp acidity and slightly chalky mouthfeel. If you were a fan of the
previous vintages of this bottling, you will not be disappointed. The staple meal in the Zepaltas household with a chardonnay like this is a simple roasted chicken with side of roasted root vegetables. Enjoy now or let this wine age for a couple years to add some extra layers of flavor.

This is our second vintage working with the Springer Vineyard in Lake County, just north of Sonoma County. The Lake County appellation is in a mountainous region and sits at 1,400 ft. above sea level. The air is dry, the days are warm and the nights are cool. Vineyard is just over 20 years old and is producing amazing, organically farmed fruit.
This vineyard delivers Sauvignon Blanc that is energetic, crisp, with stone fruit and tropical flavors. In 2010 we tried to make a wine that was a bit lower in alcohol that the 2009, but still loaded with flavor. After a long, extremely cool summer the vineyard finally became ready to harvest in late September. We brought in 6 tons of fruit and whole cluster pressed the juice out from the skins. We fermented and aged the wine in stainless steel (80%) and neutral oak barrels (20%). We left the wine on its lees and stirred during fermentation to help with keeping the wine safe from oxygen, and to enhance flavors.
After 4 months of aging we filtered the wine and bottled it. This wine is meant to be a summertime food wine that is complex, of great value and a pleasure to drink amongst friends. We recommend serving this Sauvignon Blanc with shellfish, tempura, rich cheeses and oysters.

This is our first go Sauvignon Blanc and we are very excited about what we have done. We had the
opportunity to get some amazing juice in 2009 and we jumped on it because we wanted to make a
new white wine. Our goal was to make a wine that is of great value, but still very high in quality.
We believe that we have found it at the organically farmed Springer Vineyard. The vines are over
20 years old so they are well established and producing complex and just plain tasty fruit. We could
not pass it up!

The wine has spent its whole life in stainless steel and we bottled it this summer- super simple,
strait forward winemaking from incredible source material. This Sauvignon Blanc seems like the
perfect cross between a New Zealand, a Californian and a Pouilly-Fumé. The wine is just a bit
grassy, along with wild tropical fruit flavors. It is rich and lush, but still very racy. This wine is great
for all seasons and an excellent pairing with oysters, cream sauced pasta and fish dishes. We made
just a tiny bit this year, just two barrels.

Each year, we release a Chardonnay blend right before summer hits so that we have something
affordable, fun and food friendly for the summer months. You could call this our village level
Chardonnay. It is meant to be serious like our other wines, but not too expensive to be a special a
occasion wine. In all honesty it is a blend of the leftover barrels from the Babushka Chardonnay
blending sessions. This “massive” two-barrel blend is comprised of one barrel from Keefer Ranch
and one barrel from Sapphire Hill Vineyard. We aged the lots separately on the lees for 16 months
and made the final barrel selections prior to bottling. This wine is a crisp, refreshing Chardonnay
that shows just a bit of richness. It is styled like a California Chardonnay with and old world twist.

On the nose you are greeted with scents of apricot, wet stones and a touch of mint. Just like its
sister blend, the Babushka, the flavor profile is more exotic than the 2007. It sometimes reminds
me of a Muscadet. The finish is chalky, crisp and mouth watering.

I say pop this wine to go with some rich Gouda cheese prior to dinner, and then go into a crispy
greens and goat cheese salad, and if you still have some left when it is time for the main course
pair it with some thin crusted pizzas topped with Teleme cheese, pears and caramelized onions