From Vineyard to Glass: The Story Behind Our First Rosé

It began before sunrise. Jeff and the vineyard crew - Riley and Jose - arrived at work at 5:00 am, with David rolling in not long after (he’ll admit mornings aren’t his specialty). Buckets lined the rows, pruners in hand, and the estate Syrah fruit looked perfect for picking in beautiful Lake Chelan.

The plan was straightforward: start the pick, Jeff and David would slip away mid-morning to prep the tanks and crush equipment. But that plan was about to get rewritten.

The harvest moved quickly, even with a fair amount of fruit set aside for our Syrah red wine. Calculating how many five-gallon buckets would be needed and how many rows to pick kept their minds busy. A couple of wine club members, Marc and Lorrie - Marc celebrating his first week of retirement - joined the crew, bringing energy and good humor to the day. By about 1:30 pm, the picking was done. Lunch was served, as it always is for our picking teams, and spirits were high.

Since it was their first time doing things on their own, Jeff and David had spent a day the week prior testing to make sure all the equipment was good to go. So after lunch, it was time to crush. Or so they thought.

We headed up to the production area, plugged in our Italian grape press… and the screen lit up in what looked like computer hieroglyphics. Not Italian. Not English. Just a mess of characters that told us one thing: the machine wasn’t working.

What followed was nearly three hours of troubleshooting. They checked the product manuals, searched online for answers, unplugged and replugged, and — yes — gave the side of the press a few “love taps.” Rob Mellison, our friend, neighbor, and wine mentor from Mellisoni, came over to help, along with another neighbor, Zach.

Zach, a former Army engineer, decided after about 2.5 hours to pull the panel apart and remove the chip beneath the screen. Nothing appeared damaged, so he reassembled it. We plugged it back in, and to our relief, the display was back in English. That’s when Rob, with a grin, looked at us and said, “Alright, kids - so what tank are we putting it in?”

Jeff and David hadn’t managed to sneak away earlier that morning, in their attempt to calculate number of clusters to tonnage. The tanks and fittings still needed sanitizing, which added another 45 minutes before the first load of Syrah grapes finally went into the press - at about 7:00 pm.

When it comes to their rosé, they use a light press to capture the fruit, yet avoid extracting tannins from seeds and stems. The first press cycle ran for about an hour and fifteen minutes, producing some beautiful juice. There was still more juice to be had, so they stopped the cycle and restarted it rather than increasing the pressure.That decision kept the flavor clean but doubled the press time.

They had three loads to process that night, each followed by clearing out the grape must and reloading the press. By the time the last grapes were fully squeezed, cleanup was all that remained before they could finally head home at about 3:45 am - sticky, tired, but deeply satisfied.

Nearly 23 hours from start to finish. Every pour brings back the memory of our first wine — the turmoil, the teamwork that carried us through, and the special satisfaction of creating a wine of this quality.

And that’s why we call it the Longest Day Rosé.

Cheers,