Ed Rasimus wrote:

> Not to nit-pick (or even grape-pick), but we still don't get an "exact
> percentage" without defining percent determined by what?
>
> So, we've got a field with zinfandel, carignane and petite syrah
> vines. Do we get our percentage by weight of grapes picked? By number
> of discrete grapes (I know that's absurd, but bear with me...)? By
> volume of pressing liquid? By volume of the picked grapes--77 barrels
> of picked zin, 16 of picked carignane...? By ratio of vines picked?

Ed, keep in mind that field blends are difficult if not impossible to
harvest mechanically without getting grapes of wildly different
ripeness. When hand-harvesting a vineyard, it's relatively easy to put
different kinds of grapes into different containers, even if you don't
have a vineyard map to help guide picking (in Ridge's case, they do have
such maps, which is how they finally determined accurate %ages back in
the late '90s). Since different varieties ripen at different times, it
would be difficult to do a complete cofermentation, though not
impossible I suppose. Thus, they could use either weight of the picked
grapes or liters of fermented juice to determine their stated %ages.
However, Section 4.38g of the TTB regulations regarding wine labeling
mandates that all percentages be reported as percent by volume, so
that's the law. What winemakers actually do is anybody's guess, though ;-)

Mark Lipton
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