Laundry Stairs

Here are some photos of the project I have been working on for a few days - the back stair from the kitchen to the laundry room & garage. While I did not use particularly sustainable materials for this project, I did want something that will be easily cleaned and that will last for a long time. The stair treads and risers are a thick, industrial grade vinyl (I think that the package nearly broke our UPS driver's back when he dropped it off at the winery!) The flooring tiles are the cheap but durable industrial vinyl tiles that you might recognize from schools, hospitals, etc... I finished trimming everything out today, and it all fits snugly and feels good underfoot. I did my first baseboards in conjunction with the project - it is going to be a bit of a learning curve! I wasted about 3 pieces of baseboard making the cuts, but I think I have it figured out now. The 'chop saw' that I bought is going to come in very handy over the next months!

I particularly like how the magnetic door stop works - thanks to Amy for helping me pick it out! It can hold the door open, for when you are carrying in groceries or other tasks, and protects the wall from the doorknob at the same time. (This is important - we have already had to have Jason, the drywall guy, repair that spot a couple times, when appliances were delivered, or when just in the course of the day the door knob gets slammed into the wall.)

Recessed lighting

I started to replace some of the old recessed lighting with new fixtures, complete with more energy efficient halogen bulbs. In the photos above, I replaced a 100w incandescent bulb with a new housing and 50w halogen, which gives off a similar amount of light.

All of the new fixtures that we have put into the rest of the house use compact florescent bulbs, which are the most efficient option - they convert about 11% of the energy used into light, versus 7-8% for a halogen bulb and only 1.5% for a conventional incandescent bulb! (Much of the remaining energy is lost as heat.) However, the spectrum of light given off by a florescent is not always the best for every task, and they take a fraction of a second to turn on, and do not reach their full brightness for almost a minute.

Halogens give off a spectrum that is nearer to natural light, and thus are good for lighting artwork, task lighting and reading. We are using them in the kitchen, will probably put some in the bathrooms eventually, and in the main entry foyer. Florescent bulbs are good for basic use in the bedrooms, etc... but seem more yellow & blue in spectrum.

Concrete flooring

Above are some photos of the progress on the concrete floors. I will describe (as accurately as I can,) the process that Brian, from Los Osos Concrete has been using to prepare the floors for staining. First, they sanded and ground down the slab to remove left over adhesive, tile grout, and other blemishes on the surface of the slab. Next, they went around and ground out all the cracks, and filled them with epoxy and concrete. They did a similar process to fill all the nail holes, where the carpet tack strips had been all around the walls. Then they sanded and thoroughly cleaned the entire slab with a soy gel, removing all the dust and debris. Several new, ultra-thin layers of concrete were added over the top of the slab, progressively with finer and finer grit, until the final layer will be micro-thin and very smooth.

You can see from the photos that the effect is already dramatic. By early this week, they will be adding the acid etching and staining process, followed by a few coats of sealer, and a final layer of protective wax. What a difference already!! We now have to stay off the floor for several days, so not too much additional work can happen, except for in the garage and laundry room.

Carpeting

Carpeting went in yesterday. Kristin chose a natural wool-blend carpet from Green Goods, backed with natural jute backing. The pad is made of recycled materials.

There were a lot of carpet options to choose from. The first one that we were thinking about using was made from recycled PET soda bottles, but we decided to go for a more natural feel. For the pads, you can even get old school jute underlayments, but they tend to be very firm, difficult to work with, and sometimes of uneven thickness.

We think it looks and feels good! It is a major step forward to see this completed.

The concrete guys are starting working today - by the weekend we should be pretty close to complete on paint, electrical, and flooring.

Stairway Project

Dad helped me with the stairway project, building the facing boards that we need in place so that the carpet guy could do his installation. We are going with the basic design that I drew up, I am excited, I think it will make for a really stunning entry feature when it is done. The newell posts, handrails, and cap boards are made from Bamboo, which will simply be sanded smooth and oiled lightly to show off their natural beauty. The infill will be stainless steel cables, which should make for a clean, modern feel; industrial but still delicate.


The bamboo lumber arrived yesterday. It is beautiful; the posts are glued up from smaller pieces, and the end grain has such an intricate checkerboard pattern that it would be a shame to router it out. I think I will likewise leave it fairly square, and just oil it lightly. I don't think that the light was very good when I took these pics, but you might get a sense of it anyway.

The company that the bamboo posts came from was 4 Winds Bamboo, in Boulder Colorado. Jason Liu, the owner, was very helpful and quick to ship. I am very satisfied on this end. http://www.4windsbamboo.com/

Painting Kitchen Cabinets

Kristin and I finished up painting the cabinets last night. Dad and I had sanded and started painting, and I tried to use a powered paint system, with a foam pad. It put the paint on really thick, but streaked it at the same time. I had much better luck going back over everything with a roller - I may need just one more coat on some things, and then it should be good. We are thinking about painting the doors red - but we will see. I am covered in paint now!

La Palapa

La Palapa
3820 Broad St., San Luis Obispo
805-541-2700

I love Mexican food. San Luis Obispo has decent (but still far from excellent,) taco shops (and even better taco trucks, at the Sunday morning swap meet!) For Sopes or Mole enchiladas, Chile Peppers is the place to go. For Lengua tacos, definitely Tacos de Acapulco. Mariscos frescos, other seafood and occasionally goat tacos at the little stand on Santa Rosa street, near the corner with Foothill.

There is a new addition near the winery that bears mention. La Palapa opened recently in Marigold Center, and is a convienient place to eat. The service is cheerful, but inexpert. You need to be a bit assertive here if you are in a hurry - they almost never drop the check on your table until you physically flag them down and request it. I have taken to going up to the register at the exit, and standing there with my wallet open. That seems to expedite things.

Try the Sopa de Pozole. It is served complete with an array of spicy sauces, dry peppers, herbs, onions, lime and cilantro, so you can bring it up to the flavor that you prefer. The Chile Verde is the best that I have had around here, bright, tangy, and flavorful - they include lots of tomatillas and sliced Nopales (cactus paddles) in the recipe, which I have not seen elsewhere locally.

This is really good food, especially for a warm up on a cold, rainy winter day!

Tracking expenses

We are trying to keep track of where we are spending what. This is a little checkpoint for us as of today:

Kristin's Toilet!

Dad and I put in this toilet last night. Now I know how to swap out a toilet, something that I guess every guy should know eventually. Not as bad as I thought it might be.

I'm posting here, so that Kristin can see, as she has been in Napa for a couple days (staying at Meadowood Resort with our friend Elaine. Those poor girls really know how to go camping!)

Dad comes to help out!

Dad offerred to come for a visit and lend a hand with things around here. We obviously took him up on the offer. (I suppose that after all the child labor he squeezed out of Benjamin and I, it is only fair, but it is really nice to have him here. It has been a long time since I have been able to work on any kind of project with my Dad, and it will be really satisfying to look at things around me every day and think that Dad and I did that together!)

I have been keeping him busy, as I had to work yesterday. He did some electrical wiring, started building the stair railing, and we ripped out one toilet yesterday before I went to work. Also, dad has been ripping out the tiles in the downstairs bathroom, so that the flooring guys can prep it for staining the concrete next week.

I met with the concrete guys, one of them stains floors, and the other builds countertops. We are thinking about using concrete for the countertops in the downstairs bathroom, as well as the kitchen - we will see how it all goes, I don't know what the quote is going to look like yet.

Some progress photos

We have been busy still - finally all the carpeting has been hauled out to the landfill, painting continues to progress. The painters should be done by the end of today, or tomorrow at the latest, they have only been at it for about ten days, but everything is done, except for a few touch ups and some trim that will need to complete a little later.

You can see that the laundry room is completely functional now, which is very exciting. We have taken to doing our laundry up here while we are working. We are going to have the dryer stacked on the washer when the appliance installers come back with the kitchen stuff, that way we will have a bit more room freed up for storage in the utility / laundry room.

President's Day Weekend - Saturday

Let's just say that Kristin and I are both pretty tired. We arrived at the house (the 'project?') at 8am, and we just arrived home about 20 minutes ago. We made some serious headway today, though!

So much happened, in fact, that it is hard to remember it all, and in fact, we forgot to take photos of every part of it.

Loaded the truck with all the baseboard trim and some of the carpet that we ripped off the stairs the day before, as well as the ceiling fans, (the Habitat for Humanity RE-Store didn't want any more ceiling fans, and we don't need them...) and went to the landfill. There is no carpet recycling place in Atascadero apparently - though the carpet installers we were referred to by Green Goods added "carpet recycling" on his estimate. Someone correct me if I am wrong?

The landfill is pretty cool, it is out in the countryside, among some almond orchards, and we saw our friend Kathleen, whom we know from The Park Restaurant in SLO, she used to manage events for Maegan & Jeff there. She is a professionally trained chef in her own right, and I think that she is a director, or at least a very active part of the local Slow Food Convivium. Anyway, the landfill uses longhorn cattle to graze the hillsides and keep the fire hazard to a minimum, it is really scenic, and we could just about see our house on the drive back, from the banks of the Salinas River, which is actually above ground right now, which is a rare occurance.

We also went to pretty much all of the hardware and lighting stores in town, getting the lay of the land. Kristin really liked Miner's Hardware, and said "I'm never going back to Home Depot again!" We will see how that plays out, but we found some good tools and supplies that we needed, and got a sense of what is available.

Then we went back, pruned some rose bushes, had our washer and dryer delivered and installed, had the refrigerator delivered, plugged into the outlet in the garage, and now we will have cold beer and sodas available! I ripped out carpeting on the stairs to the garage, Kristin removed all of the contact paper in the kitchen cabinets, which was no small task. The oven and dishwasher were hauled away by the guys from Idler's, so we ripped out the rest of the vinyl flooring. Then we took down all of the cabinet pulls and drawers, removed all of the doors to the garage for refinishing.

We tried to make it to Green Goods to finalize the order for carpet before they closed, but it turns out that they close early on Saturdays, so we missed it. We went looking for a salad, or something healthy for dinner. There are a TON of Mexican restaurants in Atascadero, and they look to be better than most of the options in SLO, but we had breakfast burritos for breakfast (and lunch) so we ended up at Hoover's cafe 101, which has its own brewery as well. KLC had fish & chips, I had prime rib. We earned it today! The beer was good too.

After dinner, just for good measure, we ripped out ALL OF THE CARPETING FROM THE ENTIRE DOWNSTAIRS!! It looks great, we really feel like we accomplished something, and the truck is loaded and ready for another trip to the landfill tomorrow!

Time for sleeping now...

Passed down traditions, ancient methods

I had to go to the doctor's office yesterday, (frighteningly, my doctor's name is Dr. Robert Klaw, MD, but he is actually a good guy,) in order to get a prescription for chloroquine medicine (anti-malarial) in preparation for El Salvador.

While I was waiting, I was checking out the decor in the exam room - charts of acupuncture points all over the body. When the doctor arrived, I asked him if he practiced acupuncture. He said that he did, more as an interest than as a professional pursuit.

I think this is pretty cool. My doctor can be a man of science, keeping up on the latest developments in western medicine and treatment options, and still be a man of passed-down traditions, ancient methods, and belief in the validity of the unprovable.

(Seems very much like being a winemaker!)

Little Fingers

My brother, Benjamin, took this photo last night. It is of he and his new son, Emmett Curtis Carlson, born just a few weeks ago in Minnesota. I can't wait to fly out for a first visit, to meet my new nephew!

Demolition!

I have been chomping at the bit for a few days now to really get into the thick of ripping stuff apart. In particular, the pink valence in the kitchen needed to go away, as did the plate rail on top of the cupboards. The painter is due in tomorrow AM to start removing wallpaper and patching up holes - I needed to get these things out of his way.

Also, I managed to rip out the old range hood, drop two ceiling fans out, and remove all of the switchplate covers that are in the way of wallpaper removal. All the locks are changed out, and it feels like a pretty good day's work!

(I have a pretty bad head cold, which is kicking my butt. I didn't realize it was so bad when I was working; now that I am done it is awful... Time to go to bed!)

Authenticity

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nR5_ceEE0Cc

I came across a news story about 3200 bottles of Gallo’s Andre ‘California Champagne’ being seized by EU officials in Belgium, not more than three hours’ drive from the vineyards of Champagne. (Better yet, I came across a video of the subsequent destruction of the contraband!)

EU laws consider Champagne to be unique to the traditional French region bearing that name, and it is illegal to import wines into the EU bearing any reference to Champagne or ‘Methode Champenoise’ on the label or packaging – it is a serious offense, akin to fraud.

Even in this country, there have been some ‘scuffles’ over regional naming of wines, most notably between Fred Franzia and his neighboring vintners in the Napa Valley, over Fred’s ‘Napa Ridge’ label, which contained mostly cheap fruit from the San Joaquin Valley. Up valley in Calistoga, there are some similar discussions about a proposed AVA there – the owners of Calistoga Cellars are concerned that they may lose the ability to use their brand name, unless they limit their fruit purchases to only the Calistoga area.

At some level, wine drinkers seem to desire authentic wines – they want to know that what they are drinking is a representation and a product of a unique place and vintage. Perhaps this is less important for wines intended as simple, mass-marketed consumer beverages, but at the same time, it is unfair for those types of wines to trade on the reputation of classic regions, such as Champagne – or even upon that of smaller, younger American appellations which are aspiring to create their own vinous legacy.

The wines I make are labeled ‘Estate’ which indicates that they are entirely grown in vineyards under our control, in the same appellation (the Edna Valley AVA, in our case,) as our production facility, that we produce all the wines in our own Estate winery, and that no part of them can ever leave the property for any reason before they are bottled and labeled. The ‘Estate’ designation is one of the strongest guarantees of authenticity under US law – it makes no judgment of quality, but makes provenance a certainty.

Bottom line – if you ask me where one of our wines is from, I can point out over the vines and confidently say “it came from that block right over there…”

Anyway, watch the video. Fascinating to watch as they mash the cases of wine into a soupy pulp with a giant excavator. I would like to think that the smirks on the worker’s faces reflect satisfaction at avenging an affront against one of the classic wine regions of the world, protecting their borders from a fraudulent New-World threat. (Probably, they are smiling just because smashing that many bottles is so much fun!)

-NRC

Laundry Room

Yesterday, we got a plan in place regarding some of the work that needs to be done on the house. In order to stain the concrete floors, we need to have the appliances hauled away. In order to get the appliances hauled away in an efficient manner, we need to have some other appliances delivered. Since the laundry room is only going to be modified minimally, we decided to place the order for our washer and drier today, for delivery next week, at which time they will haul the old range and dishwasher away. We got a front-loading washer and dryer; they are supposed to use a lot less water than the top loaders, while producing cleaner laundry. (We are purchasing all of our appliances from Idler's, a local company with branches in SLO, Atascadero, and Paso Robles.)

There was a refrigerator that we really liked on the floor that had some minor nicks and dents in it, so we purchased that as well, to make sure that we would not lose out on it. It will have to reside in the garage until such a time as the kitchen and main floor are finished, but that is actually fine. (It will be a handy place to cache some cold beer and sandwiches, I guess...) We bought a Fisher & Paykel, which is a New Zealand manufacturer. The Kiwis must be a lot more minimal than most Americans regarding what they refrigerate, as it is a much smaller, more efficient unit than most of the big American models currently available. It has a water filter and ice maker, which usually are not features that we would be interested in, but if a water filter reduces the number of plastic bottles of water that we have to recycle, all the better.

Bottom line is this; I now have a deadline of next Saturday to whip the laundry room into shape. Since the room is below grade, there is an exposed concrete wall / foundation. It was painted, but with a paint that is not well suited to such a situation - it is bubbling off from condensation and moisture from the ground. I spent the afternoon scraping and brushing the old paint off the wall, then washing, prepping and painting. It looks a lot better! I cleaned the floor carefully as well, and wet-vacuumed it with the new shop vac.

A Sustainable Remodel - part 1...

Well, we finally closed on our house, it is now time to get going on making it habitable. We aren't supposed to totally start on ripping the place apart yet, but we had 5 different contractors stop by yesterday to check things out and give us bids on some of the work. They all seem like good guys.

We want to use sustainable, natural products and local businesses & labor as much as possible in the remodel - we have been working with a local company called 'GreenGoods' which is a building supply company that specializes in natural, sustainable, and recycled materials, as well as in materials for chemically sensitive persons. We were looking at using a carpeting that is made from recycled PVC bottles, but Kristin decided that she really likes one of their natural wool carpets instead. (Yeah, it is nice, but it is more than twice as expensive...) We will be installing carpeting in the entire upstairs, from the stairway up.

For the downstairs, we had been thinking about using a combination of cork and bamboo hardwood flooring - we love how it looks, and we love how it is easily renewable, regenerating itself almost every 6 years. It is very hard, and is becoming more popular, and more common all the time. We were almost sold, but then ran across several stained concrete floors that we loved. Since we already have a slab of concrete right under the stained, smelly carpet, it only made sense to investigate using that slab as a flooring surface. One important piece of sustainability includes using what you already have, and that has pushed us over the edge - we will have stained concrete floors throughout the main floor of the house, including the living and dining rooms, kitchen, entry and bathroom. (I have always wanted to live in a warehouse, anyway - this might be as close as Kristin lets me get!)

Here are some pics of the place. It is in pretty rough shape cosmetically, but the bones are solid and the layout is good. It has good views of the mountains around, and is on a decent sized lot. Best of all, there is room for a sizeable garden, even if I have to terrace it into the hillside! I can't wait to go back to eating something homegrown for every meal, as much as possible. Who knows, maybe a small vineyard eventually? With any luck, the after shots will be dramatically different (and hopefully better!)

The Filtration Debate

I was in a tasting with about 40 winemakers last week, discussing production issues. Someone brought up the question of how to manage our unfiltered wines. One winemaker said "With Velcorin!" and another said, "Filter it, and then if anyone asks if it is filtered, it is only because they think that unfiltered is better, so then tell them that it is unfiltered, and they will be satisfied."

If your main motivation for not filtering is because you perceive that the trade or critics will like it better, then recognize that you are starting to let marketing direct your winemaking. These guys are capricious, and not filtering is a less than definite way to encourage their approval.

If you choose not to filter based on philosophical predispositions, be aware that it will likely require more intervention in the wine earlier on to minimize spoilage. pH must be low, SO2 must be maintained at levels high enough to discourage spoilage. Scorpion testing and plating should occur prior to bottling to know what microbes, and what levels are present. Turbidity should be below acceptable levels, or else further fining should take place to lower suspended solids.

Kermit Lynch is an importer who does a good job on so many things, including support for small producers, importation in cooled containers, and generally selection of high quality wines. He absolutely insists on no filtration in his wines, in many cases having a special non-filtered bottling made just for his own importation. However, I have found too many instances, especially with southern French and Italian wines that have been too Bretty to drink, have pressure and seepage through the cork, or which have rafts of spoilage organisms in the glass upon pouring it. That is unacceptable to me, and I only purchase white wines from him now, unless I have a chance to try the wines first. (I have never had a problem in a Chinon or Burgundy, I guess that these wines, from cooler climates have sufficient acidity to prevent these problems.)

Perhaps filtration got a bad name in the past, when the technology was haphazard, and the wines were exposed to oxidation or other problems during the filtration. I tend to filter pretty much everything via a crossflow filter, and we are able to keep O₂ pickup below 0.4ppm, which is similar to a simple racking. I can leave wines on their lees up until bottling, which further protects them; I think that this filtration is a tool that helps me to be LESS manipulative with the wines than if I didn't filter. We have done trials with crossflow vs. pad vs. DE vs. Velcorin vs. non-filtered, and the crossflow is much gentler on the ester chemistry of the wines. In some big reds, and in Pinot Noir, there may be some effect of the colloidial structure being different after filtration, due to proteins that are pretty big getting disturbed, and possibly removed. I don't know how to quantify this, but we have found that the wines come back together very well within a month or two. Velcorin seems to be pretty impactful on the wines, although it holds up well in big Cabernet Sauvignons and Syrahs okay. We haven't used it much more than for just trials.

I do know that we had a problem with a Syrah which was filtered to 1.5 microns going Bretty in the bottle, despite clean microbiology report at bottling (plating method.) This was before I was responsible, but we had to live with the consequences of a really slow selling vintage, and worry about reputation of the winery. We have gone to plating AND scorpions (more reliable, less false negatives,) and we stir barrels / tanks before sampling, as Brett can flocculate to the bottom of a container. We also test for 4EP / 4EG, but there can be Brett present without 4EP / 4EG, (but if it IS present, it means that Brett has at some point been active in the wine.)

I like unfiltered wine philosophically, but pragmatism wins out when our winery is trying to develop a strong reputation for quality and reliability. Just too much at stake, and there is no convincing argument to make me accept the risk.

(Maybe it is like the admiration for these guys who climb rock faces without harness or lines; I admire the elegance and skill, but heck if I'll try it!)

Quality: A Manifesto for Wine

The following came out of a discussion within a class I am taking at UC Davis. The topic was to define wine quality. (The strict structure resembles the many levels of Hell in Dante's Inferno, now that I look back at it!)

I have a difficult time accepting quality definitions that are fuzzy. In all other consumer products, quality control is very defined; not nebulous. In my opinion, when most people talk about wine quality, they are really talking about wine style; critics are always more concerned with wine style than quality, and they sometimes even rate wines highly for style without looking at their basic quality failures.

This generated some push-back from the class, with some great points made. I don't think it would be fair to the other students to upload their comments here without permission, so I will leave to to anyone who comes across this here to challenge my thinking. Please do so if you disagree, I am not afraid to rethink and refine my definition of quality in light of good points from others. And what does quality mean to you?

Cheers! -N.R. Carlson


--------------------------------------

What does Wine Quality mean to me?

I have definite prejudices regarding what is and what is not a quality wine. This tends to strongly influence choices that I make in winemaking, and sets off my alarm bells when clients or other winemakers favor winemaking philosophy over good practice and critical thinking. Here is my hierarchy of criteria, starting from basic wine quality, and progressing towards increasing quality. In my opinion, one may NOT skip over any of these criteria to the next level of quality without satisfying each point in the previously defined level.

1.) The first responsibility of a wine is that it should be stable when it goes into the bottle, and remain stable for the projected lifespan of that given product. If a wine cannot meet this basic definition of quality, it is a failure. This does not mean that the wine has to be sterile, but it does mean that it should not have active spoilage microbes modifying the sensory / chemical properties of the wine post bottling. SO₂ level should be sufficient to minimize oxidative degradation of the wine over its projected lifespan, and care should have been taken with the choice and screening of bottling materials and procedures to ensure minimal disruption of the wine on the way to bottle.

2.) If (and only IF) a wine meets the first criteria, the next step up in quality is that the wine should be well made and without obvious flaws, faults, and off aromas. This means that the wine should not have perceptible volatile acidity/ethyl acetate, sulfide problems, contamination by Brettanomyces, chlorinated anisoles, non-wine chemicals, or other non-wine aromas or contamination.

3.) The next step up in quality would be that the wine reflects the variety and / or appellation which it is labeled to represent. This refers both to basic chemical attributes, such as remaining within acceptable pH / TA / alcohol ranges, as well as to aromatic signature and phenolic composition. To me, it is preferable to blend / supplement / manipulate the must or wine as needed to achieve this basic definition of quality than to choose not to do so out of some inflexible, philosophical belief in ‘hands off’ winemaking. ‘Hands off’ winemaking is to be reserved for perfect fruit conditions ONLY! (The old adage is ‘God makes vinegar, Man makes wine.’) This is the basic quality level for wine as a viable consumer beverage.

4.) My fourth level of quality is that the wine should be a delicious, harmonious example of the style which has been chosen consciously by the winemaker, or which has been developed over time working with the site in question. Up to this point in my quality hierarchy, the wine could have met all of the above goals, and still be an unpleasant beverage. This is the first point at which I require the wine to be pleasant to consume. Worldwide, the great majority of wineries likely strive to operate in this level of quality.

5.) Which brings me to the next step in quality; doing the work in the vineyard to produce fruit which requires the absolute minimum in winery manipulation to achieve the above objectives. This level allows for wines that are less contrived, and more able to convey a sense of place and seasonal variation. Anyone who talks about ‘Terroir’ without achieving this level of quality is absolutely full of it. Brett is not ‘Terroir.’ Neither can a wine with excessive sulfides be considered an example of ‘Terroir.’ Wines blended from multiple appellations spread across vast distances have nothing to do with ‘Terroir’ either.

6.) My sixth and final level of quality would include such things as longevity of the wine, ability to develop interesting and complimentary secondary characteristics, and typicity specific to the place the wine was grown. This is where things start to become more idealistic and less objective. Where previously defined levels can be applied to wine as a simple consumer product, this is where I start to slip into wine as something more lyrical and worthy of legend and tradition. This is the level at which the best estates operate in the best of vintages, where you will find Grand Cru Bourgogne and Alsace and the very best German wines at. This is level at which a very few New World wineries operate as well. This is the level of wine quality that inspires me, whether or not I ever actually am able to attain it in the wines that I work with.