Tons and tons of Syrah from Alder Springs Vineyard in Mendocino County, CA arrived on Randolph St. this week, ready to be transformed into wine. Facing a veritable mountain of grapes and work, our friend, Beverage Director Rachel Driver Speckan, sent an invitation to help make the first vintage of Syrah at City Winery Chicago. [...]
Posts in the Scherrer Winery: How category aim to describe how Fred Scherrer and the farmers he works with do what they do along the road to creating elegant, age-worthy wines from California’s Russian River Valley, Sonoma Coast, Sonoma County and Alexander Valley appellations. Fred’s thoughtful approach to wine making and his unique ability to [...]
The presses are just beyond the insulated wall. The Chardonnay is being pumped into the stainless steel tank in the corner on the right. The juice from the two presses is combined and left to sit over night. The next day, Fred will inoculate, or add yeast, before pumping the juice into wooden barrels. The [...]
The small dark spots are equivalent to freckles. The grapes with a purple tinge have been affected with the first stage of botrytis, or Noble Rot. I tried to help harvest the grapes at the start of the morning, but I was so much slower that the rest of the team that I was literally [...]
October 12th, 2006, 2 PM. The decision of when to harvest is crucial. Don Helfer (standing) brings a few clusters of his Chardonnay to the Scherrer Winery for Fred to evaluate. The grapes are healthy, but the cool end of season weather is making Don nervous. He and his wife Patricia literally work all year [...]
Don and Patricia Helfer planted this tiny vineyard which butts up to their backyard in 1993 after tasting the success their neighbor Steve Kistler was having with his vineyards a quarter of a mile away. What you see here is the entire vineyard. Fred Scherrer buys their crop and produces 40 to 50 cases of [...]
Chardonnay leaves; the power-plant behind your favorite glass of wine. All of these pictures full of color and clearly the plant is turning itself off for the winter. The fall colors appeal to tourists like us. Vineyard owners and growers see the red edged leaves and wonder about possible mineral deficiency in the soil. Helfer [...]
In 2009, Ed Scherrer gave me the better part of a day, allowing me to pester him with questions on everything from the family history to viticulture to how he grows tomatoes (he has a terrific system). In this video, Ed shows off one of the year’s best looking Zinfandel vines. At the time of [...]
In 2009, Connor O’Rourke worked on Fred Scherrer’s bottling line for a few days. He shot this video, for which Fred provided commentary on his annual trip to Chicago. To learn more from Fred on all aspects of wine, please take a look at our library of videos on YouTube.
Fred Scherrer loads the 2006 Helfer Vineyard Chardonnay into his Swiss and German presses. Inside of the press is a rubber bladder that Fred slowly inflates to gently squeeze the juice from the grapes. Red wines need to stay in contact with their skins to extract tannins and color. Chardonnay is a little like [...]
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