The Inaugural Harvest

BySara Hulbert

Bright and early the 2022 Inaugural Harvest started. We awoke by 3am and in full harvest mode by 4am. Grapes were at optimum ripeness. Hardworking vineyard crew was scheduled and ready for picking. Bins, sheers, buckets were all ready to go. Coffee was pre-made. Protein bar was ready. It was an exciting morning for us. We felt a moment of … ‘we’ve got this’, ‘we can do this’, ‘we ARE doing this’. There have been many moving parts, hurdles even, to make harvest happen this year for our brand, Hometown Wine Company. Harvest feels like the end in some ways, a success that has been accomplished but really its just the beginning. Making wine is such a fun and rewarding process and we are thrilled to be including (and sharing!) with you.

We have harvested. We have pressed our white wine and rośe. We have crushed and destemmed our red wine. The process took us Friday at 3am until Sunday at 6pm. Long days. We had all the supplies ready and as soon as the grapes were delivered, by 10am on Friday, we were getting started. Its funny.. those who aren’t in winemaking or in the wine industry, day in and day out, we have found do not understand really what a winemaker does. It sounds glamorous, right? As we have said before, winemaking is an art and a science. Correct. But… a LOT of winemaking is cleaning. Cleaning? To give you an idea.. imagine cleaning your entire kitchen. Not just the counters, washing used dishes, wiping down the cabinets or stove top – we are talking about cleaning, everything! You would pull out everything to wash – every plate, cup, bowl, serving dishes, utensils, small kitchen appliances.. etc. and scrub them by hand individually. Then, you would do it again. After the second time, that is when you start winemaking. That IS winemaking.

We have recorded the next two Winemaking Bootcamp Classes – Class #3, Harvest and Class #4, Crush and Destem. Those classes should be going live soon for a small fee. If you are a home winemaker – the classes are a great quick resource for the winemaking process.

What’s next? We will be monitoring the wines throughout the day. Each of the wines, white, rośe and red, require something a little different. White and rośe were just racked and fermentation is starting. Whoo-hoo! The red wine will continue multiple times a day of punch downs. Punch down? Check out our fermentation and punch down videos on our Facebook, Instagram or YouTube Channel. So! Has anyone guessed what we are making? Drumroll, please. We will be making a Rośe of Cabernet, Cabernet Sauvignon and Vermentino – all Temecula appellation.

Then… packaging! We can’t wait to answer questions like… Burgundy or Bordeaux glass? Capsule or Wax? Ooo.. or what will the label look like? Do you all have any ideas, thoughts or suggestions? We would love to hear!

We will be indebted to those who have helped us get this far and propel us forward towards success. It’s the vineyard who graciously worked with us to obtain the grapes, the vineyard crew who is extremely hardworking, kind and really funny, those who helped us create our company legally – the nuts and bolts so to say – lawyer, bank, CPA… to our family and friends’ endless love. Isn’t that a song? But, seriously. Thank you. It does take a village and we are beyond grateful.

Until the next update… we’ll be making wine.

#locatedhere

Brian and Sara

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