Ep. 5: Summer Movie Nights And New Wines

We’re tired from movie night, but we’re still buzzing about how outdoor films and small hospitality touches turn a winery into a place where families make real summer memories. We also go deep on rosé, wine pairing science, and the unglamorous truth about wine storage and faults that every wine lover eventually runs into. 

• What worked about The Sandlot on the lawn and why the turnout matters 
• Soft launch pours of our Sauvignon Blanc and Grenache rosé and what guests say 
• Why Ratatouille always makes us think about iconic wine flexes 
• The hidden social math of helping friends move as we get older 
• Aged Riesling favorites, petrol notes, and why it becomes more complex 
• Sweetness vs spice in pairings, including off-dry Riesling and off-dry Chenin Blanc 
• The challenge of making off-dry natural wine without refermentation 
• Why leaving wine in the car can ruin bottles fast 
• What “first and last” or “push wine” means in bottling 
• How volatile acidity shows up, what causes it, and how to avoid it 
• Film yeast in cider, flor in sherry, and what headspace can do 
• What a wine thief is and how barrel sampling works 

Release party on August 7th. It is $15 for wine club members, and it is $30 to the public. It is up on our Tock website under From the Sky Down. You can also give us a call on the phone number that’s on Google and we will help you purchase the tickets. 

Transcript

Morning After Movie Night

SPEAKER_00 0:12

Good morning, good morning, good morning. Welcome to another episode of Wine Stories with From the Sky Down. Here with Ian once again. Here we are. Indeed. We're back. Two tired men after another movie night.

SPEAKER_03 0:26

Yeah, we're always tired when we record this podcast because it's like Friday morning. And last night I got home from the movie night, probably at midnight, I think. After teardown and everything, you know. But yeah, it was so much fun. The sandlot, so many families came out to watch, and it was it was a blast, man. It was it was really cool witnessing all of these kids make summer memories, and we get to help them create a a really awesome summer memory with these movie nights outdoors on the lawn.

SPEAKER_00 1:06

Yeah, it was awesome to see the turnout this time. See, it was really fun. All the families getting all their kids together. The kids were hanging out on blankets out in front, running around, having a great time, and they seemed to enjoy it. Oh, yeah. Which I was pleasantly surprised by. I didn't didn't know what the reaction would be to Sandlaw in 2026.

SPEAKER_03 1:26

Oh, the the kids loved it. There's this one this one kid, he had to be like 12 years old. He was like, Where's the guy that was like working the projector and everything? And I was like, Oh, that was me. And he's like, I just want to thank you for playing the Sandlaw, it's a really good movie. And next week we're playing Ratatouille, and he's very excited about that as well. And then he's like, You know what you should do? He's like, you should also play Little Rascals.

SPEAKER_00 1:55

Yeah, you know, I have to agree with them. Little Rascals is in my top kids' movies for sure.

SPEAKER_03 2:00

So I'm thinking we will swap out Bottleshock for Little Rascals.

SPEAKER_00 2:06

I think Bottleshock is definitely the most ripe for swapping out. It's more of like a kid-friendly family movie versus versus a family movie.

SPEAKER_03 2:14

Yeah, exactly. And I don't really remember how kid friendly it really is. You know? No, you just picked it because we're a winery, we should show Bottleshock. Yeah, and I and it's like generally, I think I remember it being like generally okay for wide audiences, but one of our coworkers, Connor, and I were talking about Little Rascals actually as well.

SPEAKER_00 2:37

And also through Honey I Shrunk the Kids. Oh, that's a good one. That's a classic. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:43

That was a Disney Channel original, right? Honey I shunk. It was, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:47

I think it was Rick Moranis starring in it, though. Okay. I think it was the guy that's like ghost but she's like, Dana, Dana, come to my accounting party.

SPEAKER_03 2:56

That's right. And then I learned about potassium for Honey I Trunk the Kids movie.

SPEAKER_00 3:02

Potassium.

SPEAKER_03 3:02

Potassium, because a kid, I think one of the kids in the movie passes out, and they're like, he needs potassium, and they feed him a banana, and he wakes up.

SPEAKER_00 3:14

And I didn't know low potassium could make you pass out. I'm I wonder. I highly doubt. I wonder if it was a low glucose thing. You know, it might have been. Bananas will fix that too.

SPEAKER_03 3:25

So yeah, but I do remember them talking about potassium, which is hilarious. Yeah, that's how I learned that bananas have potassium, which is crazy. Yeah.

Soft Launch For Whites And Rosé

SPEAKER_03 3:37

Last night was so cool. We were selling popcorn out of the farm shed, and everyone was buying wines, mostly bottles. We started selling the From the Sky Down Whites in Rose.

SPEAKER_00 3:53

Yes, we did.

SPEAKER_03 3:54

Yesterday. And so I created all the necessary items that are needed for selling it to our POS system. And I started just like offering it to people, just like as a sample. And we had some really awesome reviews for the Savion Blanc and Rose, especially.

SPEAKER_00 4:15

Yeah, I think people have been receiving it really well. I mean, this is kind of our soft launch ahead of our August 7th release party, which all of you listeners should attend. Absolutely. So some of the staff I've noticed prior to it being listed in our system have been doing little sneak peek pours of it for the past week or two.

SPEAKER_03 4:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:36

Yeah. They're just so excited about it. They can't help themselves.

SPEAKER_03 4:39

Yeah, they they they like to do that a lot. They're if they're excited about something, they just really want to pour it for people.

SPEAKER_00 4:45

Yeah. And if I was going to a winery and a staff member pulled something out, so this isn't released yet. This is like, but I love it and I want you to try it. I would be so excited as someone going to a tasting thing. So I I get the reasoning behind it, and I'm glad that they're able to do that.

SPEAKER_03 4:58

Yeah. Yeah, I remember that happening a few times for different tasting rooms I've been, and they're like, oh, we want to share this with you. And and it's just like creates the experience, you know, and it makes it really special.

SPEAKER_00 5:13

Yeah, and now we can follow through with if they actually really enjoy it and they want to buy a bottle. Now we can provide. Before that, we had a few people interested, and we sadly couldn't give the bottles at that time. Yeah. Um, but they came back for more.

SPEAKER_03 5:25

They came back. Yeah. Absolutely. So yeah, that rose last night was a hit. People were buying that a whole lot.

SPEAKER_00 5:33

Yeah, it's pretty zesty, high acid. It's a rose of Grenache, for those who don't know what we're talking about, from Thunderstone Vineyard in the Royal Slope. And we have made rose from there before in the past for the wineries that we've worked for and been affiliated with. So we're very familiar, and it definitely doesn't disappoint. It's reliably a great site for Grenache and a great site to make Grenache rose.

SPEAKER_03 5:56

Yeah. And there's like there's 1%, there's a few other grapes blended in a little bit, but like 1% country's, Cinso, and Carignan. So it's a really cool Southern Rhone, Provence style rose. It's crazy. I only had like a few hours on the skin, so in your glass, it kind of looks like a white wine, but in the bottle you can see the uh the little red blush pink sort of.

SPEAKER_00 6:24

In the glass, it's almost a pale copper. Yeah. Uh, but it does have a really nice blush, very pale pink, almost like, you know, like a little tuna poke, you know? Raw raw tuna.

SPEAKER_03 6:36

Raw tuna looking at it. This is funny. Didn't think about that.

SPEAKER_00 6:41

But yeah, it's gorgeous. Beautiful wine. Beautiful wine.

SPEAKER_03 6:44

I wish I could have poke. It looks really cool.

SPEAKER_00 6:46

Oh, right. You have a fish thing. No finned fish for eating.

SPEAKER_03 6:49

Yeah, I can't eat any finned fish. Otherwise, except for halibut for some reason.

SPEAKER_00 6:54

It's interesting that you named your dog Finlay. You can't have any finned fish.

SPEAKER_03 6:58

I know, exactly. There was a kid last night named Finley. Oh. Did you say here boy? I think I think the kid was a girl. I think it was a girl. And so Finley is a pretty, I wouldn't say super common, but it is a relatively common female name for girls. So fun. Fun fact. But my dog is named Finlay. So it's a cool name.

SPEAKER_00 7:27

I like it. Yeah. It's unique, it has character. It doesn't like seem like you're trying too hard. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:35

It's kind of like a gender neutral, I think. Yeah. Name. Yeah. Sort of like uh I'm trying to think of Taylor. Taylor.

SPEAKER_00 7:44

Alex. Alex. Good example. My name's Devin.

SPEAKER_03 7:48

Devin, yeah. I've I've met a girl named Devin before.

SPEAKER_00 7:50

Yeah. I've met more women than men named Devin.

SPEAKER_03 7:52

I've met a woman named Ryan before.

SPEAKER_00 7:55

I have also, yeah. O'Reilly. Yeah, right. Not O'Reilly.

SPEAKER_02 8:00

Oh, oh.

SPEAKER_00 8:00

Hey, we're not sponsored. Not sponsored. O'Reilly. Auto parts. You can't help yourself. I can't. Oh man.

SPEAKER_03 8:11

I used to go there all the time when I was working on my car.

SPEAKER_00 8:13

So, I mean, we could possibly do an ad break during the movie. What would we what would we advertise during the movie if we took an ad break?

SPEAKER_03 8:22

Uh, some new wines that we have.

SPEAKER_00 8:24

Take a moment to stand up there.

SPEAKER_03 8:26

No one's sponsoring us. So, unless they want to buy us a project.

SPEAKER_00 8:30

It would be really funny if we recorded you, you know, standing and doing an intermission bit and we switched the camera to you.

SPEAKER_03 8:37

That would be funny.

SPEAKER_00 8:38

Middle of the movie.

SPEAKER_03 8:39

That would be funny. Unfortunately, I can't be here for the next movie night.

SPEAKER_00 8:44

Oh, what a shame.

SPEAKER_03 8:45

Yeah, well, it's my dad's birthday. I'm going to Lake Shellan as well. Very fun. Yeah. And my friends are getting married too.

SPEAKER_00 8:53

Perhaps we do need to video you in for your MC duties for movie night.

SPEAKER_03 8:58

Yeah, absolutely. I did get up there and I was like, everyone, please silence your phones, you know, all that good stuff.

SPEAKER_00 9:05

Oh, nice. You really put on a show. I tried. Tried my best. Everyone, please come to our next movie night. What are we showing? Back to the future? No, Ratatouille. Ratatouille.

SPEAKER_03 9:16

Ratatouille, which is one of my favorite movies of all time. So I'm kind of sad I can't be there next week.

SPEAKER_00 9:20

Yes. I wish you were there. We'll probably bring, you know, we'll have we'll have some light bites, some cheese and crackers available at the our farm shed for those to purchase because you know you can't watch Ratatouille without maybe cheese and crackers and it's a perfect charcuterie and wine movie.

SPEAKER_03 9:39

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

You know? Have to have the acutrement with Ratatouille. Ratatouille.

SPEAKER_03 9:45

Ratatouille. Yeah. It's a rat.

unknown 9:49

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 9:51

Well, we hope to see you there next week in other news. In other

Ratatouille Wine Moments And Favorites

SPEAKER_00 9:57

news? In other news.

SPEAKER_03 9:58

Do you have a topic you want to talk about?

SPEAKER_00 9:59

I forgot we're gonna talk about today.

SPEAKER_03 10:01

I was gonna say it is kind of crazy that in the movie Ratatouille, Ego, I think we already talked about this, but Ego orders a glass of 1960, whatever, Chateau Cheval Blanc. That is pretty insane. But I always think about that every time. It's like, oh, just buy the glass.

SPEAKER_00 10:23

Yeah, ego. I don't know if I have more to say about him. He's an interesting character, you know. He's rail thin because he only eats food he absolutely loves. Right. That's like the story there. We definitely have uh kind of covered him a little bit in the past, but uh I wonder what some of his other favorite dishes were. They don't mention it, they don't see really show him eating anything else.

SPEAKER_03 10:48

Besides Ratatouille.

SPEAKER_00 10:50

Yeah, I think he maybe eats some soup at one point that they serve him.

SPEAKER_03 10:54

Yeah, some soup, and he definitely likes perspective, apparently. He orders perspective.

SPEAKER_00 11:02

That's correct. He does. He asks the waiter for some perspective.

SPEAKER_03 11:07

Yes, perspective. Since you're fresh out of perspective, tell the chef to surprise me. Something that he dares or whatever he says. Something like that.

SPEAKER_00 11:21

Yeah. To make me something if he dares, something like that. Yeah, I guess we need to watch the movie. It's a disappointment that you won't be there.

SPEAKER_03 11:29

I will be there for the back to the future, which is the week after.

SPEAKER_00 11:32

Doc Brown. Back to the Future was one of my childhood favorites. Same. Absolutely loved anything to do with like mad scientists experiments. I loved all the props, how they have all of the wires and tubes all over the car. Yeah. And uh also his lab with everything laying around. And the opening scene with scene with Marty and the speakers and like them being so loud that they throw them across the room. I thought was hilarious. Also it was a great scene. So definitely looking forward to that.

SPEAKER_03 12:07

I was also thinking, I wish we had like one more week because I would like to screen the movie Rudy. Did you ever see Rudy growing up?

SPEAKER_00 12:16

Yeah, the one about the guy that goes to Notre Dame.

SPEAKER_03 12:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:20

And he tries to play football.

SPEAKER_03 12:21

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 12:22

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:23

And I think that actor is Samwise K.

SPEAKER_00 12:31

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He likes he mash them, boil them, stick them in a stew. Yeah, exactly. In Lord of the Rings. Potatoes.

SPEAKER_03 12:39

Potatoes. Yeah, it totally is. Sean Aston is actors.

SPEAKER_00 12:46

He's a good actor. He is. Yeah, I haven't seen him in much recently. I think he's been doing some television roles here and there.

SPEAKER_03 12:52

Well, he was also in Stranger Things as well. He was. Early on.

SPEAKER_00 12:58

You're right. He was, I think, one of the dads or something.

SPEAKER_03 13:00

Yeah, he was he was Will's he was dating Will's mom. His name was Bob.

SPEAKER_00 13:06

That's right.

SPEAKER_03 13:07

Yeah. And he was he owned a Radio Shack. I love how you know that.

SPEAKER_00 13:12

I need to rewatch Stranger Things.

SPEAKER_03 13:14

Stranger Things is great. It's actually it made me interested in playing D D for the first time in my life. Which I've never played ever. But it is the thing that got me interested in it. I think a lot of people interested in it.

SPEAKER_00 13:29

It was it's an interesting anthology of the creator's childhoods a little bit. They inserted that, especially in season one. Because they think they grew up kind of nerdy playing D D.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:39

And they wanted to capture that. And I think the kids also are in like the A V club early on. And that was really interesting. And I feel like that part of the story fell off. That QC, like in high school not high school, in school, being the losers, who are also kind of smart trying to be an A V club and exploring things. And I feel like once they got so deep in the plot for all of the supernatural stuff, they kind of lost the mundane, the fascinating parts of the mundane. Yeah. Which I think is what like made so many people interested in it in season one is there was this mundane aspect, it captured nostalgia, it captured that feeling of kids exploring the sense of wonder. And yeah, there was a big mystery and everything too. But it kind of really fitted in well in terms of the writing of how does it fit within these kids' lives. Yeah. So that that was that was really interesting to me. And so later seasons definitely did not capture my interest quite as much because the the context was, I feel like, a little bit lost at that point because so much had happened. They finished the all the seasons, right? Yeah, I think it's done. It's done now. It was done with season five, I believe.

SPEAKER_03 14:48

Yeah, I did watch it. I did watch it all the way through. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 14:51

Well, no spoilers. No spoilers in chat. Yeah, I just don't I just didn't really remember a whole lot. So I think we're both a little off

Helping People Move And Getting Older

SPEAKER_00 15:01

this morning. I'm a little off partially because, you know, it was such a late night, and also because this morning I was I was surprised to get what my my father reached out to me. He said it was last minute. He's like, hey, I have something I need to move right away. I need to get out of the way for this contractor they have coming in. And he needed me to help him like kind of lift this very heavy cabinet and move it into storage. And so that had me thinking about the things we do for other people, you know, with um kind of like obligations, and I was kind of mulling over. I know it's like not super a direct translation, but I've had to help a couple friends move in the past couple years. And I originally was like I didn't understand why people were so averse to helping their friends move. It was like a meme, right? People talk about it in like in shows, like, oh they asked me to help them move, I gotta come up with an excuse or something. Oh and I I'm I'm down to do it. I think it's fine, but I think the the inconvenience factor and sometimes the chaos of kind of navigating stressful situations where you don't want to break anything, you know, it can cause some some anxiety. So I think I think I understand.

SPEAKER_03 16:21

But it's funny, there's this I think there's this comedian I was watching, a stand-up comic, but he was talking about the aspect of moving. Like when you're in your 20s or like in college, you all your friends help you move and you feed them beer and pizza, you know. And he's like, the older you get, the less that you have that, and you just have to like move by yourself or like hire people and stuff. As you reach like a certain age to where that just gets cut off, kind of.

SPEAKER_00 16:52

Well, I think part of it is time value and money. For sure. I mean where you maybe you're make your incomes a little higher so you can afford to hire movers, and your friends value their time value is higher. So they're less likely to expend the time to do that when they know you can afford the movers.

SPEAKER_03 17:08

And yeah. And the older you get, the more things that are going on in your life, the more responsibilities you have. If you have a family and kids, definitely if you have kids, yeah, you're not helping anyone move.

SPEAKER_00 17:18

Well, both of my friends do have I helped move, do have little kids, and they both helped uh each other.

SPEAKER_03 17:24

So that's nice.

SPEAKER_00 17:25

Uh I'm hoping that when I move next, they'll be willing to help me. Yeah, because I did I did it for them. Funny thing about that, like I get the pizza and beer thing, you know. I think we're in a funny stage where we're still helping each other move, but we're past pizza and beer. So now it's like wine and going out to dinner. Okay. And the person who moved pays for the dinner.

SPEAKER_02 17:49

Yeah.

unknown 17:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:50

Absolutely. It's a little bit little bit nicer. I think one of them we did a Mexican restaurant, another one we did like a nicer like burger joint.

SPEAKER_02 18:00

Cool.

SPEAKER_00 18:00

But yeah, it's definitely fun to go out, especially after the moving is done. And you have kind of that celebration. Kind of feels like when you take the team out for for for dinner after a game, you know, back.

SPEAKER_03 18:12

Oh

Team Dinners And Carbs Before Games

SPEAKER_03 18:13

yeah, that was always fun. We always go to like a sp a pizza shop or something like that for garn up.

SPEAKER_00 18:21

You do pizza shop after after games?

SPEAKER_03 18:24

Yeah, after games or usually like the Thursday before the Thursday before the game, so that's like the day before the Friday night football games in high school. We would have this one certain pizza shop deliver. And we would do a bunch of practice and stuff and go over. We'd all have like a big team dinner kind of thing. It was pretty cool. It was fun. Just like it was supposed to be for like camaraderie and stuff like that. Yeah, also to carbo load. And carbo load for sure.

SPEAKER_00 18:58

I had a similar experience. We would do we would do it at the school, actually. And the moms would all make pasta, usually spaghetti, if not that, like doing like oh, like like a baked fettuccine situation or something. Not fettuccine, what am I thinking of? Baked ZD? Baked ziti, thank you. Yeah, yeah. Like a so some of them would do a baked ziti, and it would be just massive table full of containers of pasta, and we would all just scoop and fill up our plates full of pasta and meat sauce, and the coach would give us a pep talk and talk about the motivation for the game, and we would all have kind of that binding moment and fill our bellies with carbs so the next day we'd be fueled up and ready to go.

Engagement Photos And Restaurant Picks

SPEAKER_00 19:42

That's fair.

SPEAKER_03 19:42

That's awesome. Yeah, I actually need to take out my fiance's mom to dinner soon for a thank you. Oh. Because we took engagement photos last Monday over in Snoqualmie.

SPEAKER_00 19:56

Congratulations, by the way.

SPEAKER_03 19:57

Thank you, sir. We're over in Snoqualmie, kind of Fall City area, taking a bunch of photos for it. And her mom helped us out a whole lot. She was kind of dog sitting during that time and helping us with the with the shoot and everything. So I need to take her out to dinner.

SPEAKER_00 20:15

That's amazing. What is she like?

SPEAKER_03 20:17

Well, when I asked, I asked her mom and her dad. I'm kind of old school. I asked their, I guess, permission for to propose. Right. And so I asked both of them. And so I took both of them separately out to dinner. And for her mom, she really liked Vaughn's Thousand Spirits, which I'm a big fan. So I took her out there last time, and we might do it again. I don't know. It was a really fun time.

SPEAKER_00 20:45

I love Vaughn's.

SPEAKER_03 20:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:47

Great restaurant. Not to, you know, put a plug in here, but they just opened a new location in Kirkland, downtown. That they did. Definitely makes it more accessible for those people on the east side uh who don't want to necessarily come up all the way to Woodenville. So yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:02

That's their third location. Yeah. Yeah, I think the original one's in Seattle somewhere.

SPEAKER_00 21:07

Yes. Yes. I think the first I'm not sure if that's the actual original, but it that they did start in Seattle, and so they still have a Seattle location. Gotcha. Their history's like on their wall and stuff. I'm not a big, like I don't know their whole background or their whole story. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:24

So they have like a five-generation sourdough starter.

SPEAKER_00 21:26

Yes, they do. That they make all their stuff with. And I think that they actually started as a spice company, if I'm not mistaken. I think it was like the because it's been a family business for a century, I think, but it wasn't always a restaurant. Crazy. It was the evolution of their family business. And I think it I'm if I I could be mistaken, it could have been like a seafood company or something. But I'm I'm pretty sure it was a spice company that evolved into the restaurant business. Interesting. Yeah. But next time you're there, go check out the pictures on the wall, I think back near the bathrooms, and it'll tell you the story. You can come back and let us know what you find.

SPEAKER_03 22:02

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I think I want to take her out over there some point. That's a really good spot, man. I've you know brought wines from our place over there to some corkage, and our wines go really well with their food. I will say that their pizzas are they're like flatbreads, and I had their steak sandwich with like a chimichuri sauce on it.

SPEAKER_00 22:29

Out of this world. Definitely a big foodie myself.

SPEAKER_03 22:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:34

I love, love good food.

SPEAKER_03 22:36

Yeah, I think Vaughn's might be my favorite local Woodenville restaurant. Besides, like I like I do like Purple Cafe a whole lot. And also Hollywood Tavern.

SPEAKER_00 22:51

Those are good spots. Those are good spots. I have some favorites too, but you know, I don't want to just keep plugging places. There's so many good ones. You guys want when you whenever you come check us out over here from the sky down, all of our staff have great recommendations. They'd love to kind of help inform you and tell you about all the spots in Woodenville that you should go check out. There's there's a lot of great local spots around here. For sure.

SPEAKER_03 23:15

I know our staff really likes to frequent Hal's sports bar. I frequent there. And they have Dollar Wing Night too, which is dangerous.

SPEAKER_00 23:25

Very dangerous. I just tried the garlic parm wings. Those were those were good.

SPEAKER_03 23:29

Those are really good. I've had the garlic parm, I had the soy Asian wing, which is really good. I'm not much of a Cajun guy. They do have a Cajun rub, but I don't really like Cajun that much, I feel like. And they have you know typical buffalo, which I don't really like buffalo sauce. But I know it's really popular, a lot of folks like it. It's just too aggressive for me.

SPEAKER_00 23:56

Yeah. So,

Aged Whites And Why Riesling Shines

SPEAKER_00 23:58

Ian, tell us a little bit about I know this is a little bit off the off the cuff here, but speaking of like food and wine, bringing porkage. I'm really curious to know what you're going to do for the next Psalm session next week.

SPEAKER_03 24:13

Actually, the next week I am, it's my dad's birthday and my friend's wedding in Shillan.

SPEAKER_00 24:18

Oh, okay. So you're you're also not gonna be here on oh, I guess it did movie nights the same day. So there's so you're taking the day.

SPEAKER_03 24:26

I'm taking the day, but we're still doing psalm session. We have a couple other smolliers that are here on staff, which is very thankful for because sometimes they can step in my place every now and then. Yeah, so we're having one of our staff members fill in and and do that. Last last Psalm session, we went over I think we already talked about it actually last podcast, but aged wines, how wines can age, even white wines like Chardonnay. See, one of my favorite aged whites has been a German Riesling.

SPEAKER_00 25:03

I really like an aged aged Riesling. Yeah, I'm a huge fan. For me, that kind of the petrol note comes through even stronger as it ages. Yeah. As the other flavors kind of die down a little bit, the acidity softens a little bit, makes it a little bit more approachable without food, I want to say. Less lively, but also more flavors to ponder. It really gets kind of complex with the depth of that funky flavor in the Riesling. Yeah. What about aged Riesling really captures your attention?

SPEAKER_03 25:39

I like how it kind of turns in. I mean, I do like the petrol note a whole lot, and that is even more dramatic as it ages, but also it can turn a little nutty sometimes, and I really like that aspect of white wines when they have a nuttiness to them.

SPEAKER_00 25:57

In the spectrum of aged Riesling, would you say that you've enjoyed more of the dessert level sweetness, medium sweet, or aged dry Riesling?

SPEAKER_03 26:09

I've always, if I'm just having a glass by itself, I'm always a dry Riesling kind of guy. But if I'm pairing it with a dish, in the past, I've liked a off-dry Riesling paired with spicy Thai food, like pad thai, like chicken pad thai with an off-dry Riesling is amazing. I've also experienced some aged off-dry Shannon with a more spicy tika masala, which that's kind of wild because when the spice so you have a kind of, you know, you're tasting the sugar of the wine and you're tasting the chilly heat of the of the dish, and those two kind of cancel each other out. So the sugar content in the wine makes the dish taste less spicy, and the spiciness in the in the dish makes the wine taste dry, like it's a dry wine. So you actually it's like one of the most perfect pairings I've ever had in my life with spicy tea comesala and an off-dry or off-dry Shenon Blanc.

SPEAKER_00 27:24

That sounds incredible. Yeah, I I love Indian food. And when you pair Indian without like losing the spice, but pair it with something that helps tame that, especially a sweet wine. Yeah, the flavors in that dish, especially the warming, nutty, spiced flavors with really open up. You're really able to taste more of the food as that kind of painful heat can hide some of those flavors sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 27:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:52

Additionally, if you were to drink that sweet wine on its own, and let's say you're not super accustomed to drinking sweet wines, the sugar can sometimes hide some of the more complex flavors of the wine. So, in a way, you might think, oh, I'm losing heat. Oh, I'm losing sweetness. I'm losing two things when I'm pairing these wines, what pairing the wine on this food, you're actually gaining a whole lot more. Yeah, you're able to taste the flavors of the dishes a lot more, the dish, well, the dish and the wine, uh, versus just tasting sweetness or heat. So uh an amazing pairing, and I absolutely love it. I've done the Riesling way, a Riesling, uh medium sweet Riesling with Indian is one of my favorite. Oh, really? Yeah, I haven't done the Shennan. I would love to try that.

SPEAKER_03 28:30

Oh, yeah, it was really good.

Sweet Wine With Spice Plus Natural Wine

SPEAKER_03 28:32

This guy I knew in Santa Barbara, he had he opened up a restaurant called BBG, and it was a Indian fusion place with a natural wine bar as well. So it was really cool. It's a cool spot because his name is Raj, and he had he was Indian, so it made sense because he wanted to bring a lot of his stuff that he had back home.

SPEAKER_00 28:59

I would definitely be interested to try some semi-sweet or just off-dry natural wines. I usually natural wines are completely dry as far as I've had them. I guess to keep it natural, they'd have to use temperature to arrest fermentation. Yep. My question would be is how they would prevent fermentation from continuing in bottle without stabilizers if you're keeping true to a natural, natural wine.

SPEAKER_03 29:22

Yeah. I don't know how you would do it. I mean, you can stabilize a wine by you know chilling it down a whole lot, but as far as red wines are concerned, it's not going to be stable. You know, it just won't be.

SPEAKER_00 29:37

Yeah. I mean, while we're talking about this, I mean it I'm just trying to work the problem. I think an interesting way you could do it, especially if the small batch, natural wine usually is also local producers. And typically, like the natural natural wine bar owner will have a relationship with some of these wineries. As there's not too many, you know.

SPEAKER_03 29:57

Yeah, I mean, most of the natural wines I've had and at wine bars have been like Vin de France, so declassified wine in France or Italian or span, especially Spanish. The natural wine scene really took off in Spain first, and then we caught up later. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:18

That's a piece of history I didn't know.

SPEAKER_03 30:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:21

Well, regardless of the fact that most natural wine is imported, as you're suggesting, it might be a fun business idea if you are you do operate a wine bar and you are near, let's say, a wine country, and you happen to know a natural wine producer, if they wanted to try doing a sweet natural wine, they'd have to cold stabilize and then keep it cold.

SPEAKER_03 30:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:45

And do kegs. Do kegs. Some wine kegs. Yeah. And serve it.

SPEAKER_03 30:50

I mean, also if you if you do, you could cold stabilize it because it's going to be you're going to go like what a week or two maybe of it being consistently cold at like 45 degrees or below. And so that's going to kill off all the yeast in there, and then you just you just rack it clean. So you just move the wine from the tank to a new tank and then bottle it. And it theoretically, I mean that's how how they usually do it, and it's usually fine, you know. But every now and then you might get a little bit of effervescence sometimes. But yeah, most of the time that's how they do it. Fascinating. Yeah. Kills off like all the all the yeast, so it's not gonna take off in fermentation unless the bottle gets like super, super warm, probably.

SPEAKER_00 31:48

Oh, tweaky of warm ball warm wine. I

Trunk Wine Mistakes And Push Wine

SPEAKER_00 31:51

I made a little mistake the other day.

SPEAKER_03 31:53

Oh.

SPEAKER_00 31:54

I happened to leave some bottles after one of our meetings in my car.

SPEAKER_03 31:58

Oh no.

SPEAKER_00 31:59

Yeah. When I went to take them out, the corks were not pushing out at all, but there were some sticky drips on the side just under the foil. So I'm a little worried that those bottles are no longer good. Yeah, they're probably not. I mean, I will say they were first lasts, so not a huge, huge loss. Okay, but still always disappointing when you forget wine in your car.

SPEAKER_03 32:21

Yeah, it is. For those of you that don't know what first last is, so I've always known it in the industry as push wine. Here they call it first and last, which makes sense because call it well, we call it push wine because you're essentially on the bottling truck, you when you change the wine that you're gonna be bottling, let's say you're bottling a Grenache first and then you're doing a Syrah next, you have to push all of that Grenache out of the lines, the bottling lines, and you do that with another liquid. And so it's usually the next wine that you're gonna be bottling with. And so that's what the first glass is. It's like, oh, this is the first of the Grenache from the bottling line. And so those are unsellable because it could have a blend. They usually do have like a blend of the different grapes inside of them. So it could be an accidental blend of like Grenache and Syrah from the bottling truck, and then you take the first case, first couple cases, and you set those aside, and those are not for sale, and then you do the last few cases, and those are also not for sale, and then you have like two cases of wine that are you don't know what to do with necessarily because they're in bottle. You can't sell them because they're not representative of what's on the label or your wine quality, usually. And so usually we give them out staff members or people that help us out.

SPEAKER_00 33:57

Yeah, and I I squandered squandered those. So we'll see. I'll I'll pop them open. Maybe I'll bring one to the next Psalm study group that we have and see if one's any good.

SPEAKER_03 34:09

It is kind of a roll of the dice opening a bottle of push wine because it could be fantastic. It could could be very representative of what you're selling, or it could be disgusting. I've had some pretty gross ones in the past.

SPEAKER_00 34:29

I will say I've had good luck with them in the pa in the past. I've had some pretty good luck. The only ones I've said that were not of the same quality level is uh they had lost body or structure, they seemed just a little bit flat.

SPEAKER_03 34:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:42

So maybe there was a lighter wine that had made its way in or water from a flush or something.

SPEAKER_03 34:49

Uh they're usually not no, they don't they don't flush between with water between lines.

SPEAKER_00 34:54

Right. But if it's the first the first of the whole round. Yeah, there might be some in there. So you could you could get really unlucky. That's why we don't sell them.

SPEAKER_02 35:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:06

But what was I saying? You left it in the car. I did leave it in the car. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So it got hot. Trunk wine. Don't don't keep trunk wine, guys. Yeah. Don't keep wine in your car. Even on a day in the 70s, your car is gonna get pretty hot and that wine still might cook.

SPEAKER_03 35:23

I know people that keep wine in their car for like the winter months or the fall months, because your car doesn't usually get that hot. And I've had some sex success some success with that because like you never know what you're gonna be doing if you're a social person. You might be going to a friend's house, like, oh, I got some wine in my car, let me go grab that. We want to hang out.

SPEAKER_00 35:46

Especially if you work in wine, it's expected. You know, people are like, where's your wine? Like you where's you didn't show up to a party, you didn't bring any wine. Who are you?

SPEAKER_03 35:52

Yeah, it is expected.

SPEAKER_00 35:54

And I will say when I do go to parties or do go to gatherings and I I bring wine, usually I bring at least two bottles. Oh yeah. I do that for a couple reasons. One, if one's corked. Two, if it doesn't match the tastes of people there, I'll usually try to be bring two different ones.

SPEAKER_01 36:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:10

Or let's say I have a I have like a decent sized cellar and I have some wines that are aging, and sometimes when you pop a bottle, it's not really right the right time to drink it. It's in a weird part of its aging.

SPEAKER_01 36:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:21

And so I'll bring a different bottle, either a different varietal or a different vintage, so that I'm one of them's bound to be drinking okay.

SPEAKER_03 36:29

So that's smart. I used to do that a whole lot. I've stopped doing it lately, but oh Mary, I can bring that back again. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:37

I mean, I don't always bring two bottles, but it's definitely something that's in the back of my mind when I'm going somewhere.

Bringing Backup Bottles And Learning Faults

SPEAKER_00 36:42

And especially if I know that there's not going to be many other wine people there, that's when I'm bringing multiple bottles. Because I'm the only one really bringing good wine, and I want to make sure there's at least going to be one good bottle. Because if I'm the one that brings the good wine to the party, I better bring a good bottle. So if my the one bottle I bring is bad, that doesn't look good for me.

SPEAKER_03 37:01

So yeah, yeah, that's true. That's very true.

SPEAKER_00 37:05

However, if you know, we're in a circle of people who all enjoy a good wine and they're aware of the industry and the nature of the beast. Bringing a bottle ends up being bad, not a big deal. Yeah. You know, I brought a bad bottle the other day to our study group, and it was just by coincidence and like the storage before I'd purchased it must have been subpar and led us to have an interesting experience trying a wine with some faults. And for that purpose, it was educational.

SPEAKER_03 37:32

Yeah. I actually have a wine for the our next staff psalm class that has a bunch of faults in it.

Volatile Acidity And How It Happens

SPEAKER_00 37:45

A bunch of faults, not just one fault.

SPEAKER_03 37:48

Has one main one, one main fault. Which is VA, volatile acidity. It's something that I'm really sensitive to. And if there's a lot of VA in a wine, to me it's undrinkable, and I just I just can't do it.

SPEAKER_00 38:01

I'm really not sensitive to it. I can sense it sometimes. I think I used to get it at a at a other winery I used to work for. Uh some of their wines would have it, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_02 38:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:13

And to me, it kind of smells like a mild version of like nail polish remover.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

Yeah, it could have that.

SPEAKER_00 38:20

Usually how it expresses. I don't typically get like an acetic acid smell of VA, but it can happen. I have seen it happen. But I think I'm less sensitive to that and more sensitive to the more acetone.

SPEAKER_03 38:32

Yeah, the acetone and it's like a balsamic vinegar, a little bit. It can have that vibe. And I can tell, sort of, if it's a ferment issue or if it's a barrel issue. So if you don't manage your ferments correctly and manage the cap, then you can get that's a really easy way for volatile acidity to seep into your wines because you're not managing the ferment enough. Managing just means making sure all the solids that sit on top are all completely immersed in the wine, the juice, as uh much as possible. So if it sits there for too long without being managed, like punch downs, pump overs, or pulse air, if it sits there for too long without being managed, then VA can easily seep into the cap, and then voila, you have a VA riddled wine that you're going to bottle.

SPEAKER_00 39:36

So and that sucks. If it's it's some if it's something, excuse my ignorance, if it's something seeping into the cap, is VA coming from another bacteria, or is it just nothing to do with oxygen exposure or lack of oxygen? What's what's the real cause of VA?

SPEAKER_03 39:52

Well, it's actually VA is the natural lifespan of of wine. If you put grapes in a bucket, it will make wine and then it'll make vinegar. And so it is the process of the wine starting to turn into vinegar. Naturally, wine wants to turn into vinegar, so we're just trying to stop it at a certain point to where it tastes really good. And the fermentation, when it's taking off like that, it wants to turn into vinegar and it has too much oxygen exposure to the cap, then it will turn into vinegar. It'll try. Especially if you get have like fruit flies around, then fruit flies forget exactly the process that happens when they come in contact with wine, but they expedite the process of turning the wine into vinegar because of like a bacteria that they have that they carry. Interesting. They like the sugar aspect of it, but the bacteria that they carry will make the wine turn into vinegar.

SPEAKER_00 40:57

The process of converting ethanol into acetic acid, right? It's it's you need you can't go straight from sugars to vinegar. You have to have alcohol first. Yeah. Yeah. So it's it's it's a really interesting chemistry.

SPEAKER_03 41:09

It is, yeah. But yeah, then there's barrel VA, which can sit in the barrel. Again, if you're not managing the your barrels very well, like if you have a bung that is not in the bunghole of the barrel, if it's just out and not closed, then that barrel is gonna turn into vinegar as well. Yeah. So that's why we have corks on our on our wines. We try and keep it from oxygen until we are ready to drink it.

SPEAKER_00 41:41

Managing headspace is also important.

SPEAKER_03 41:42

Yeah, headspace is very important. Easy to get VA if your barrel's not full. So yeah. But the ferment VA, I feel like is a lot more fruity on the front end, and it's a very sharp sort of acid. And the barrel VA is sits in your palate and lingers almost like a just a bad taste in your mouth, I guess. Just kind of kind of more of like a bitter, lingering and dull vinegar flavor. Fascinating.

SPEAKER_00 42:18

Yeah. So barrel VA is lingering, dull vinegar, and ferment VA is more fruity. Yeah. So ferment you would probably say is more like that balsamic, and the barrel is more like regular acetic acid, like regular vinegar, like white vinegar. Yeah. Okay. Interesting. I'll look for that next time I have kind of a weird acid in the wine to see see what I get. On that note, I'm actually really curious.

Film Yeast In Cider And Flor

SPEAKER_00 42:42

I have a cider that I made years ago. And it's been in a carboy, like a glass five-gallon carboy, for several years. I want to say it's been in that carboy for five years. That's wild. And at one point, it developed the film yeast because I didn't have enough, I had too much headspace.

SPEAKER_03 43:10

Ah.

SPEAKER_00 43:11

And so I still haven't had the courage to I did I did get rid of the film yeast. I was able to knock it down.

SPEAKER_01 43:17

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 43:18

And I then topped it off. I went and bought some other very dry cider, which is compatible with the style that I made, and topped off that little extra bit of headspace to get it up to the neck of the carboy. And I think what I did, what did I try to do? Did I cold try to cold stabilize it? I think I might have done that. I think I tried to fix it during the winter and put it outside. And I did knock it down, but I think the the film yeast had been there for a few months before I was able to knock it down. So I'm wondering what that yeast was and what flavors it changed in the cider. I haven't tested it yet. Interesting.

SPEAKER_03 43:54

Well, there's also Sherry, there's the biological aging, which Is a film yeast that protects the wine from oxygen and it's called floor f L O R. I don't under and they have a lot of head space in their barrels. So I don't I don't quite understand how they don't have like tons of VA in there. I mean some sherries are have a little brandy in them, but I just don't understand.

SPEAKER_00 44:26

That's interesting. I mean the if you have a biological process going on and you have a competing yeast, if those yeasts are trying to also eat the alcohol and turn it into something else, they will probably outcompete the vinegar process. Yeah. Similar to during primary fermentation, if you inoculate with a certain yeast strain that is aggressive and has high alcohol tolerance, that yeast strain will outcompete the natural yeast strains if you don't want to get rid of uh sanitize your juice before you ferment. If you if you outcompete the other yeast, you will end up with your your most dominant yeast. So maybe it has something to do with that.

SPEAKER_03 45:08

Yeah, I mean that's the only thing I can think of, really.

SPEAKER_00 45:11

I'm wondering if I didn't do the cider a favor by knocking down the film yeast. I thought about letting it letting it stay there and experimenting and seeing where it went. So I think it's already enough of a science experiment. I will say it's not cloudy at all, it's crystal clear. Yeah. Have you tasted it? I have not tasted it recently. Are you afraid? Yeah. I mean, at the worst, it'll be apple cider vinegar. Yeah. Which honestly doesn't taste that bad. No, it doesn't taste that bad. It's good for you. I don't know if I want to bottle five and a half gallons of apple cider vinegar.

SPEAKER_03 45:44

Yeah, I don't know. Maybe just take like a straw, like a long straw.

SPEAKER_00 45:50

Well, if I was to sample it, I'd use a turkey baster. I don't have a wine thief.

SPEAKER_03 45:54

Oh, there you go. Turkey baster. Smart. Yeah. Yeah, wine thieves are kind of are nice to have.

SPEAKER_00 46:00

I was

What A Wine Thief Does

SPEAKER_00 46:01

interesting. I was I saw a post on Instagram yesterday, and some winery, a local one, posted, what do you call this really useful device? And it's just a video of someone using a wine thief on a barrel. And it maybe it wasn't a local winery, but it had an international audience. And there were people from all over the world, winemakers and and and just general consumers, shouting out what they call the wine thief. And in many languages, it is some variation of wine thief, but in their native language, and it's like usually slang. In some, they just call it a thief.

SPEAKER_01 46:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:36

And then others, they they had different terms for it that were not wine thief. And they thought wine thief was a was a like a unique term. They're like, whoa, wine thief. I never heard of that before. Really? So I guess it's it's a regionally specific term for what that device is called. I didn't know that. I thought that was universe.

SPEAKER_03 46:52

I thought it was universal too.

SPEAKER_00 46:54

If y'all don't know what wine thief is, it's basically can you how do you explain it's it's if you took chemistry, it's very similar to a giant metal pipette. Although the end of it doesn't have a little squishy bit. It's basically like if you took a straw and stuck it in your water and put your thumb over the end and then pulled the straw out. That's basically a wine thief, but scaled up to basically the size of like, I don't know, one inch, like one inch steel pipe.

SPEAKER_03 47:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:27

About an inch or so. And it has a little curve to the end of it so you can help get it into the barrel. Uh, so you're not going straight down onto the bottom with the lees.

SPEAKER_01 47:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:35

And it has a little place for you to put your thumb to hold the air in there while you pull out the wine thief. And then when you want to let go wine and fill a glass, you take your thumb off of the hole and it releases the the suction and wine will flow out.

SPEAKER_03 47:49

That's a perfect explanation of a wine thief. I love it. There we go. It's amazing. It's makes it very easy to steal wine out of a barrel and be a thief. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:02

I mean, we're not talking about the angel share, though.

SPEAKER_03 48:04

That's a whole nother That's a whole nother thing.

SPEAKER_00 48:08

Angels will steal your headspace. They will.

SPEAKER_03 48:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:11

And the barrel is wood, so it will soak up. It'll soak up, but it's also slightly porous, right? So you are gonna lose some to evaporation, especially a non-temper temperature controlled aging like whiskey. Yeah. Uh you're gonna lose a lot more because the temperature is not regulated silently. So for sure.

SPEAKER_03 48:29

Okay, I think that's a good place to end this episode. Ending on the thief. Ending on the wine thief.

SPEAKER_00 48:35

We rolled a seven in Catan today.

unknown 48:37

Whoop, whoop, whoop.

Release Party Details And Goodbye

SPEAKER_03 48:39

Yeah, so events, yeah, release party on August 7th. It is $15 for wine club members, and it is $30 to the public. So come enjoy some wine. It will be paired with our food truck slash caterer person. So we will be the tasting room will be open for regular business until 5 p.m., 4 p.m. 4 p.m. Because we need about an hour to set up and everything and get those scragglers who are still tasting. August 7th.

SPEAKER_00 49:14

How to get your tickets now? It is up on our talk website under Matthews Winery and From the Sky Down. You want to search that, it'll pop up.

SPEAKER_03 49:24

You can also give us a call on the phone number that's on Google.

SPEAKER_00 49:28

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 49:29

And we will answer it and we will help you purchase the tickets for that.

SPEAKER_00 49:34

Yeah, perhaps we'll have some guest callers next time. Guest caller. Hello. Yeah, that'd be funny. Yeah. Come on August 7th. There'll be live music food pairings and a wonderful time. We'll hope we'll see you there. Yeah. Five to eight PM. All right. Have a great day.

SPEAKER_03 49:49

Have a lovely day. Cheers. Goodbye.