Make a little wine, have a little fun

At Coeur d’Alene Cellars, the crush passes in a rush.

In a six-week sprint, the small winery will crush and press 60 tons of grapes for next year’s vintages. Rosy, pale and purple-opalescent, the grapes move down conveyor belts, sorted by a volunteer crew made up of friends of the winery’s five owners.

Crush is a hectic but festive time. Friday evening, mellow strains of jazz drifted through the production room. Sorters with sticky fingers plucked leaves and twigs out of grape clusters. During breaks, the room took on a cocktail party atmosphere, as volunteers sipped wine and chatted about their day. The action could last until about 10 p.m. – an early evening by winery standards. Sometimes, the work lasts till 2 a.m.

“When we do the red grapes, it goes on and on and on – one bin after the other,” said Sarah Gates, one of the owners.

Crush starts in mid- to late September, and will last through the end of October. Every two to three days, a new batch of grapes arrives.

Winemaker Warren Schutz snatches five hours of sleep each night, wedged between the processing, the cleanup and the delivery of each new batch of fruit. “Crush” is an apt name in more ways than one.

“Crush is an incredibly busy time. It is part of the harvest,” said Kimber Gates, Sarah Gates’ daughter and Coeur d’Alene Cellars’ general manager. “We make all the grapes into juice, and we like to process them within 24 hours. It’s a critical time for the wine.”

About 12 volunteers lend a hand. Robin Chisholm and her husband, Dr. Don Chisholm, are on the regular list. The couple tries to support local producers, said Robin Chisholm.

“I like the idea of buying locally, and not trucking things 2,000 miles before you eat or drink them,” she said.

Chisholm, a substitute teacher, takes herself off the school district’s “call list” during crush to work at the winery. She and her brother plan to plant a vineyard on land they inherited near Processor, Wash., so volunteering at Coeur d’Alene Cellars gives her valuable insight into the industry, Chisholm said.

Brad Pendleton is another regular volunteer. After joining a wine club, the retired Twin Lakes firefighter wanted to know more about what goes into producing a good vintage.

“I’ve learned to appreciate the fruit a lot,” Pendleton said.

Yellow jackets buzzed appreciatively around bins of viognier and syrah grapes at the winery’s unloading area. The grapes were hand-picked at Stillwater Vineyards near Royal City, Wash., on Thursday. The viogniers make a dry, white wine. They’re sweeter than table grapes, with subtle flavors.

“Melon … with some nectarine,” Kimber Gates said authoritatively.

The red syrahs hinted of huckleberries, cherries and blackberries.

Juice squeezed from the grapes makes store-bought concentrate taste blandly sugary. Viogniers yield a delicately sweet juice, with an aftertaste like biting into a tangy apple. “I could drink it by the gallon,” Kimber Gates said.

The difference is the quality of the grapes, and their “perfect balance” of sugars and acids, she said.

The grapes’ quality is no surprise. During the growing season, Sarah Gates pays twice weekly visits to the Columbia Basin to inspect vineyards that the winery buys from. She checks the vines for fungus and other potential problems and brings back grape samples for taste tests and chemical analysis.

Within 10 to 14 days, the grape juice will be wine. It will spend the winter in oak barrels, developing a smoother taste. The viognier will be ready by summer. The syrah ages 18 to 24 months.

The end of crush signals a long, restful period at the winery. It’s taste and tinkering time. The wines’ flavors are tested, adjusted and heightened.

“We baby-sit the wine,” Kimber Gates said. “It’s a very calm time of year. I put in a lot of work on sales, distribution and marketing.”