Red and white, sparkling and still!
Make the best wine with the least intervention. Let nature decide, a wine of the place.

Varietals and vineyard management:
First off, everything we do is minimally invasive. Organic fertilization is used only when necessary. We have no insecticide or weed spray program. Only organic treatments are utilized as needed. Lots of hand labor is required to keep the vineyard in good shape. In 2015, We made our first 3500 plantings of nine European varietals in virgin soil, we did not plow the rows to disturb what nature had perfected. These nine varietals were determined mostly by chance, in Mexico sometimes you take what you can get! We trellis to a Vertical Shoot Positioning system to take advantage of our copious sunlight and cooling afternoon breezes. We utilize a drip irrigation system to water the vines as it rarely rains here. We hope in the future that the mature vines may not need regular irrigation. After a few years of growth and production of fruit, the winners were separated from the losers and we narrowed our vineyard down to three varietals that were doing well, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chenin Blanc and Sauvignon Blanc. In 2017 we also imported two Texas bred hybrid varietals, Lomanto, a dark blue grape, and Brilliant, a pink grape. The process of getting these grapes to Mulege was a story in and of itself, ask Scott about it sometime if he’s in a good mood. Both varietals are adapted to the climate and disease pressures of the area. 2020 should see our first fruit production from these hybrid varietals. There are two other hybrid grape vine varietals that we believe would do well in our vineyard and we are currently considering adding them when they become commercially available.

Vineyard management begins in January when the vines are dormant. All of the vines are pruned individually and the cuttings from the premiere vines are saved for propagation of new vines. Bud break generally occurs at the end of February and we begin watering the first of March. In late May, the vines are thinned of excessive vegetation and fruit to enhance the quality of the final grape clusters. Mid-June signals the time to put up the nets to protect the grapes from bird and bee damage. Without the nets we experience 99% crop loss, with the nets the loss is 1%. Harvest begins in July and may extended into early August. The wines from the fifth year (2019) harvest showed great potential for sparkling white, still white, rose and still red wines. Two more years will bring vine maturity and full commercial production. We anticipate the production of 3000 bottles of wine by 2021, ramping up from there as the vines mature and we expand the vineyard. In 2020 we are planning on planting a section of the vineyard with Sauvignon Blanc in goblet form. This is a centuries old training method that limits the number of grape clusters per vine to enhance the overall fruit quality. The vines are then planted closer together to help make up some of the lost volume. The vines have indicated that they would thrive in this arrangement.

Our wine grapes are all estate grown, cared for by hand, picked and processed by hand, and minimally modified. Depending upon the juice chemistry at harvest, we may add a small amount of sulfites if it is believed it will enhance the quality of the final wines. Our processing machinery is all hand operated to ensure the gentlest handling of our prized grapes.

The white grapes are processed by a combination of whole cluster press and crushing/destemming. The juice is allowed to settle for 24 hours and then gravity fed to a fermenter. A combination of natural fermentation and cultured yeast inoculation is utilized to add structure to the wine. The wine is allowed to ferment to completion then racked off of its lees and allowed to rest for six months. Depending upon the chemistry of the final wine, we may add a touch of sweetener to ensure a well rounded mouth feel without being detectably sweet. If the wine is destined to become a sparkling product, a dosage is added and the secondary fermentation/carbonation occurs in the bottle. This technique is called Methode Naturelle and leaves a small amount of yeast debris in the base of the bottle.

Red grapes are hand picked and immediately crushed and de-stemmed, some high quality whole clusters are allowed to ferment in the must untouched. They are almost exclusively allowed to ferment naturally. We press the must at about 4 degrees Brix (percent sugar) and allow it to finish fermentation. The wine is allowed to rest for three to six months, oak chips are added to round out the flavor. We may add sulfites at bottling if it is thought to enhance the quality of the wine.

Mulege is a pretty isolated town. Getting materials here can be challenging. Because of this we have chosen to package most of our wines in pouches. The pouches are easier to get here and they offer far more protection from oxygen, heat, humidity and light than bottles and corks. Sparkling wines and Reserve wines will always be bottled. Our wines are meant to be consumed immediately. At this time we do not recommend cellaring the wines.