February 26 - March 3, 2012

	Monday February 27, 2012 This has been a very complicated day so I need a break. I will have more to say tomorrow about our labels. It took three days to chill our barrels down to 25 degrees. Matt and I will now replace the barrels every week. More to say about this tomorrow also. Has anyone had an ice maker not work? Pat does not think that is important. I purchased a refrigerator 4 years ago. My main frig had failed after several years. The new replacement was an inexpensive frig and was not flashy. A few months later I purchased the same brand but a much more interesting frig. This frig does everything except make ice correctly. The first new one was sent to the garage. Ok there is frig #1 and there is frig #2. Frig #2 is the one that does not make ice right, so I will start with it. #2 does almost everything right. It was one of the most expensive frig's that General Electric makes. It has everything. After one week I noticed it was hard to get consistent ice. I have purchased 5 GE frig's over the last 40 years. In most cases I have been very happy. After a month I called GE and asked about the poor ice dispensed. They were so bubbly and sent me off another ice maker, but without the tray and dispenser. I did not think much about that until I realized I was still not getting ice on a consistent way. I have lived with stuck together ice for 3 years so I went to Amazon.com and found a replacement for both the ice maker and dispenser which included the augur. I love Amazon!! It cost me about $100. Of course I went to Google first and found out many other customers were complaining about this refrigerator's ice maker. Some had said the new model I just ordered would solve the problem. After installing the new ice maker I was encouraged to see my old augur was damaged, probably because it was trying to break up the chunks of frozen ice. But now after several months I realized I have a refrigerator that will never do what I want.....dispense ice.
	Frig #1. Pat and I agree the less expensive Refrigerator in our garage will be moved up to our kitchen soon. It is less flashy but it does dispense great ice on demand. Pat and I agree to disagree about how important dispensing consistent ice is. It is everything to me. Wednesday February 29, 2012 I just want to remind everyone as in the past, the prices will go up by a dollar or two tomorrow for "Futures". As before we want to support those who love our crazy system of offering wine at half price before the barrel tasting event. If you don't like a wine you taste this weekend while here at our winery do not purchase it even if a server says: "I think it is a great wine". If you like it somewhat it is hard, because the wine will evolve and become somewhat different. BUT if you like the wine now, it will only get better. It will become more complex, more smooth and lose that young taste and smell and become more concentrated. Oxidation is good in moderation and in control. I still love young wine.  Some of us think ice is important in our lives. A few of us think it is imperative. Some of us think ice is important at times some of us think they need it only on occasion. As you know from the last entry, I am one of those who thinks I could not live without ice. But at times I have trouble understanding how someone does not need ice. Ice wakes me up and keeps me alert in moderation. As you know I hate sleep. Thursday March 1, 2012 Matt, Catarino and Salvador are working on our wine that was chilled in our new freezer. We only put 10 barrels in. They were mostly Zp2c from last year. They are now racking the wine off the tartrates. Matt seems to think we have to rack now at temperatures in the low thirties....I disagree. He informs me he is having trouble seeing the wine clear at this low a temperature. I say we should let the wine warm back up to at least 55 and then rack. He thinks the tartrates will dissolve back into the wine...again I disagree, SO I took a bottle of our 2010 Sauv Blanc out of my refrigerator where it had been for a week. It has some crystals at the bottom of the bottle which are the tartrates. We put the bottle in a warm bucket of water and it is easy to see the tartrates are still there. Matt wants to keep the bottle in this warm water for another hour or so to make sure I am right. We have now put 16 more wine barrels in the freezer including some of the mud wine we obtained from racking our 2011 wines in January. Remember we leave 4 gallons at the bottom in all barrels and rack the cloudy wine into barrels we call mud. Also we put the 2011 Matt's Zin barrels in the freezer. This is a new wine that will go on sale next month. Next month we will be offering our 2011 Futures that will be aged 16 months. That will include this new Zinfandel and the Ultimate Cuvee for 2011. Most of the 2011 wines being sold now will be bottled in July but I plan to stop selling them and just sell the same wine aged for 6 months longer. Also about April one we will offer our 2012 Futures. This will be confusing because besides our new offer of the 2011 Futures aged 16 months, for the first time you will have an option to purchase either the 2012 Wine aged 10 months and the 2012 wines aged 16 months for $2 more a bottle. Some of you prefer the wines aged 16 months so this will give you the opportunity to purchase them early at prices less than in the past.   Now about my ice makers. I almost decided to purchase a new refrigerator and put the one in my kitchen out in the building where Catarino, Salvador and Martha hang out at lunch and on breaks. But I decided for now I will take the ice from the older refrigerator in my garage and move it up to my Refrigerator in my kitchen. It took about 5 minutes and I find the auger dispenser in my kitchen freezer works great, real fast. It is the ice maker that is failing in the kitchen. The ice maker in the garage works well and looks like it may fit in the freezer in my kitchen BUT would it make a difference? Is there something wrong with the way the refrigerator makes ice? Could it be the water coming in or the way the freezer dispenses the water in the ice tray? Time will tell, but I do have plenty of ice for now. I am awake!!
	Dave david@coffaro.com
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