Come visit us and get your Big Table Farm Wines!!

Join us November 25-27, 2011 for the 29th annual Wine Country Thanksgiving event.

11am - 5pm If you are in the area the Thanksgiving weekend, come out and visit Big Table Farm!

We are excited to introduce you to our newly released wines. Clare will be showing new paintings as well. Please use our web site for directions to the farm.



Seems like this fall everything has happened just in its right time, from the weather during harvest to fermentations and finding mushrooms.

In keeping with that the Riesling and resonance have come together just in time for the big Thanksgiving Wine Weekend . We held these two wines back from our fall release as they were just not quite ready. They have come together beautifully and are ready to enjoy, of course, if you cellar these wines they will mature even more. We are excited to share this year's Resonance; it's quite elegant and the Riesling is beautiful with great acidity like last year. 2010 was a cooler year producing elegant, lower alcohol wines.


The 2010 Pinot Noir Resonance Vineyard was fermented with native yeasts, 75% whole clusters, and aged sur lie in 30% new French oak for 10 months. The aromatics display brambles, cola and red fruit with vanilla and oak. The mid palate is sweet with licorice, spice and brown sugar. This wine has balanced acidity that carries the wine through to a long finish. The label on this wine is a grown up version of last year's new-born calf illustration.

The 2010 Riesling Brooks Estate Vineyard features a drawing of a chanterelle gathered last year from our woods. This wine is barrel-fermented in neutral oak, fermented completely dry, and aged sur lie with batonage for 10 months before bottling without fining or filtration. Aromas of white flowers, hints of caramel, toasted almonds and lemon greet you, and transitions into a mid palate of lemon along with a rich coating mouth feel. The smooth-texture is nicely balanced with a bright acidity and spice. This wine was not cold stabilized which means, if you leave it in the fridge too long, tartrates (a harmless sediment) will form creating 'wine diamonds' -please take note.

Despite some initial fears about the 2011 harvest, the fruit came in perfectly ripe from our beautifully farmed vineyards. The Resonance vineyard has proven itself yet again this year as a stellar site with the fruit coming into the winery at 24.5 brix; not too shabby for a 'lean year'.
This harvest was punctuated by a wonderful harvest meal here at the farm.



It was a small 'thank you' to our amazing cellar crew and volunteers who helped this harvest season go beautifully. The meal featured the bounty of our farm along with porcini mushrooms, fresh picked just an hour before from our woods - look for these porcini on next year's Riesling label.

Finally, right on time just as the last ferments got rolling, Robert Parker's "The Wine Advocate" scores for our '09's came out giving us a nice little boost as we went into the final week of winery work. We are grateful for the scores we received:

Riesling 91pts 

Cattrall Brothers Pinot Noir 93pts

Resonance Pinot Noir 92pts

Willamette Valley Pinot Noir 92pts

Thanks for all the interest in the 2009's; yes, they are sold out but this is your chance to get the 2010 wines. That way when they hopefully start to get attention you can know yours are tucked safely in your cellar..

you can click here to order wine if you can't make it for the big weekend!

another day of grapes!

We processed 10 tons yesterday and another 10 or so today! whew... I'm tired just typing that : ) -- we've been sooo lucky with amazing people coming out to help see my friends Kathleen's blog for yesterdays photos and here are some photos from today -- Big Thanks to everyone that has come out so far!!!

Laura, Kathleen, Gina, Tera, Alex and Alacia -- and of course the core crew Mila, Lester, and Katie... and thanks to Tom Boyer for the grape hauling!!



The Wertz Vineyard - Coury Clone planted in the 70's - Brian found this diamond in the rough cvinyeard back in 2007 it's our second year getting this fruit and it's a great site he found!! We Get Pinot Noir and our Pinot Gris from this site : )









The Cattrall fruit came in on the famous truck - featured on the '09 Cattrall -- ! Thanks Tom and Bill BTW the 2010 truck is pretty fine too ; )







Thanks to all from Big Table Farm!! here's to 2011!!

Full swing!!!

Well harvest has started - we brought our first grapes in last week and will be bringing in all the rest by Friday!! Every thing looks amazing we are very excited this year!! we've had amazing help so far !! - thanks to all who have come out!

















Other than the grape harvest Mila has helped me bring in and press 15 gallons of apples juice which is now all caned and ready for winter!! Big Thanks to Chris and Amy of Square Peg Farm for the use of there beautiful press!!















Then of course it's not fall with out the pumpkin patch plow!! thank you Duane and his beautiful Shires!!











The cows on there new pasture : )




and the lovely Mila relaxing post carving! Happy fall

A kitchen sink post..

The final bins of grapes have been sorted - fermented and pressed into barrel - Both Brian and I are running on empty at this point and READY for our long winter's nap!! but it was a great harvest and so many friends came out the help. The grapes looked beautiful! and the wine looks like it will be another great year! Especially for Pinot! Big Thanks for all the love and support this year during harvest!










Back at the farm - I've been holding down the fort best I can with out the man around ... It's another year of not doing as much as I'd hoped in terms of canning and doing all the fall things that need doing .. but well at the end of the day there is just me and that has to be good enough... I did take an hour or so to take a walk up the big hill to remember as my friend Maia said ' to enjoy this life we are working so hard to build' ... took some shots of the boys in the beautiful fall light and the canyon and the woods which I haven't walked in in quite a while!











I also finally spotted the heard of elk - they seem later this year although I've been so busy I could have easily not seen them - as I was often doing chores in the dark on both ends of the day this harvest.





I did take time last Sunday to work with the boys!!
Laura come out and we had some fun hooking the boys to the cart!! This is the farm cart that will now be pulling things around the farm like a manure spreader (as soon as I find a nice used one for the right price - that is).. this team has been such a great adventure it's pretty darn exciting to have a working farm team that I'm training from the ground up - with lots of help of course!





And last but not least in wine news.. more big facy press as if the Parker scores weren't enough we got some nice lovin' up by wine and spirits magazine!! NICE!!

I feel like things are really taking hold this fall - like this whole crazy plan of ours .... the farm, a winery, and our new life in Oregon might just work... I'm feeling tired but pretty darn hopeful

on a personal note... Brian and I have worked together as a team this year like never before I feel like we have grown so much in our partnership and with just a little bit more time we might just see some returns on paper fingers crossed... but in the mean time I feel like we have worked our asses off and laid a really solid foundation for our farm our buisneess and our relationship... and just hope that the finishing work just get's more fun from here!!! so here's to you Brian! and here's to enjoying life, improving our world and making art ...

so here's the press ... that combined with last week Parker scores is clearly helping me feel all happy about things...



Wine and Spirits names Big Table Farm in the top 9 (yup that's right NINE) wineries to watch for 2010 again internationally!!!



Wine and Spirits names it's picks for top 100 wines internationally for 2010 -- yup Big Table Farm Pinot Noir !! not bad company .... Williams Selyem, Flowers, Evening Land...

on that note I'm going to go down stairs and pour my self a glass of Riesling.. : )