Winemaker Q&A

Ask the Winemaker
Your questions, answered!

Earlier this season, we opened the floor to our wine club members and loyal supporters to submit their most curious questions to our winemaker. Well, today we are excited to share our winemaker’s responses!

Q: At what point in the wine making process do you know that you have a wine that is exactly what you had hoped for?

A: There are a few moments in a wine's life that give you glimpses or hints at the direction it is heading to as it develops, but you sometimes don't have the final confirmation until you get to the blending table to assemble the blends before the wines get bottled. Wines are alive, so they can change a lot over the course of their lives or even once they are bottled. This has been proven to me a lot over the years when I revisit the same vintage over and over, and it is amazing how it can be super expressive and all of the elements we had set as the stylistic goal and at other times the wine can represent as shy. I am fortunate to be able to follow these wines from grape to bottle and we check on them regularly. I have been pleasantly surprised by wines that did not show super strong in our lineup right after harvest but that go on and develop into some of our favorite lots of a vintage. A mentor taught me never to judge the wines based on how they showed right after harvest and that has stuck with me.

Q: How do you choose how much to filter the wines? Do you think it is good or not good for the wines to throw noticeable sediment?

A: We make filtration choices on a wine-by-wine basis. If we think that there is too much background noise detracting from the purity of fruit or focus on a wine, coming from things like sediment or tartrates, we will filter that wine before bottling. We have still seen wines throw sediment even if they have been filtered. Some vintages tend to have more instability that will cause sedimentation to occur the longer they are aged in bottle. This can be due to a lot of reasons like the ripening conditions of a season or the amount of active management during barrel aging (racking off of gross lees, aerations, etc.). It can be challenging to enjoy a bottle that has thrown a lot of sediment if the wine has not been decanted as that hit of sediment can take you by surprise, but generally I see a small amount of sediment as a positive sign that the wine has aged and matured.

Q: Napa is, of course, rightly famous for its cabs. Occasionally, though, one encounters a cab that is too big, often high in alcohol and, frankly, overpowering in a blunt way. Perhaps this is just a bias of mine, but is that on your radar and how do you know when you're getting close to that line?

A: This is very much top of mind for us when we are making most of our decisions. One of our goals at James Cole Winery is to produce elegant wines. Finding the balance between power and elegance can be like walking a knife's edge and a challenge we relish. We put a lof of attention and hours into the blending portion of the winemaking process and we will obsess over the smallest details and changes to a wine with tweaks on the proportions of the lots we are using. Balance is always something that we strive for on our wines.

Q: I've heard some folks liken the 2021 vintage to that of 2015, which is one of my very favorite. Do you agree with this comparison? 

A: The 2021 vintage in Napa was one for the books, I do agree with the 2015 comparison. We saw drought-like conditions similar to 2015. Although we had a larger crop in 2021, compared to 2015, there was still a lot of depth and concentration to those wines. I am really looking forward to seeing how the 2021 vintage ages.

Q: Will there be a new Jaden coming some year soon?

A: Currently we do not have any plans to bringing back the Jaden as the source of these grapes changed hands making it a lot more complicated though I won't say it is completely off the table.

Q: How did you manage to create delicious red wines in the 2020 vintage when many Napa wineries passed on even trying due to the wildfires during August and September?

A: We were fortunate to have locations in the Valley with limited exposure to smoke. With other fire events happening around the state in other vintages we were able to take lessons of techniques for extraction, time on the skins, destemming, etc. that we were able to apply and one of these that proved very beneficial was the ancient Italian method of ripasso.

Q: To what extent does forecasted weather play in your decisions as to your care of the vines? Do you look 3-4 months out or more at macrotrends and then make decisions on fertilization/watering/pruning/harvest, or are these shorter-term decisions based on more immediate or recent conditions?

A: Winemakers obsess over weather, especially the closer we get to making that harvest call. We also watch bigger macro trends, there have been some great longer term models that we look at in the Springtime. While the precision on these models might not be great it can be good to establish a baseline for a given vintage. We also rely heavily on our past experience in Napa, and we know how much things can shift from a cooler season to an early one due to a hot summer. If it is shaping up to be a cooler season it means we need to be careful with the crop load to make sure we have ample time to ripen the fruit. If it is a warmer season we know there will be more sunhsine to ripen a larger crop. We also have different concerns during different stages of the vine's development. During the flowering stage we are concerned with having as little wind as possible, no heat waves, no rain, anything that will diminish or knock down the flowers on the vine and decrease the amount of fruit that sets. Our fertilization and watering are done on a more short term forecast, and we can also send some of the plant material in for testing to establish vine health. The closer we get to harvest the more we are worried about excessive heat or rain. We start trying to gauge the pace of ripening to make the best timing decision we can and get the most out of our vineyard blocks. The only insurance we can get is a federal crop insuarnce program. This helps us to get protection against adverse weather conditions that can negatively impact the amount or quality of fruit we harvest, though the parameters and instances where this can be claimed are very well defined and strict.

Q: Do you find it more difficult or Challenging to make a white wine or red wine

A: I find white and rosé wines more challenging to make. There are less steps in the process whereas red wine production is a lot more hands on and you can push things in different directions and influence the direction a wine is heading into.

Q: At what age did you realize winemaking was in your blood?

A: I was very fortunate to realize I wanted to be a winemaker at the age of 15.

Q: What was your very first wine you bottled?

A: The very first wine I bottled happened during my first year at College , we were given Chenin blanc grape juice that was frozen during harvest and then thawed for us to do our first fermentation management on (this class happened 6 months after the end of the harvest season in South Africa), as well as other winemaking tehcniques and trials, and then bottle and present them for tasting. I still have a bottle of this trial in my wine fridge.

Q: What's your absolute favorite of the JC wines?

A: This is a super tough question for me as I love all of the JC wines dearly and it all depends on my mood which one I reach for. A special one for me is Privado as I remember being there for the very first vintage when we were sitting around the blending table and this wine just jumped out of the glass. I love Cabernet Franc so playing around with it every year for this wine is really cool.

Q: I just joined James Cole and purchased a magnum of your 2019 Suede Cab. Do I need to decant this bottle?

A: Thank you for joining! I would gently decant his wine, since it only has 3 years of bottle age. This wine will age for 15 years or more but if you want to enjoy it now then the gentle decant will allow you to see the development of the wine over time.

Q: What unexpected pairing is your favorite?

A: I think our rosé has lots of depth and character and recently had it paired with a merguez sausage off the grill and the pairing was so good!

Q: What is your favorite James Cole vintage to open and enjoy at current?

A: I love revisiting the 2013 vintage, it was my second full season at the property and I think the wines are aging really well!

Q: Bertus! What part of the James Cole property is your favorite plot to make wine from?

A: Another tough question… There is a really special spot in Block 3 which is Clone 7 Cabernet, it is one of the main sources of the original Mud's Kitchen and a section that is a little more rocky leading to beautiful bold tannins.

We hope you've enjoyed our Winemaker Q&A! If you have any more questions and would like to connect with our team, send us an email at contact@jamescolewinery.com.