The Wine Knows

This morning, I caught up with Gino Cuneo of Tre Nova as he was checking on grapes at famed Ciel du Cheval Vineyard on Washington's Red Mountain. There, Cuneo and owner Jim Holmes have planted a number of Sangiovese clones, which the Carlton, Ore., winemaker uses in his various Italian-style wines.

Under cloudless skies on a crisp morning, we walked through the impeccable vineyard, stopping to taste and test the brix on grapes.

What I noticed this morning - as I did Sunday while in the Horse Heaven Hills with Wade Wolfe - is the grapes are not having any trouble ripening. Most of those we tested this morning were in the 23 to 26 brix range. That's plenty of ripeness for the winemaker. Now, it's just a matter of finding that sweet spot of flavor development before the grapes are harvested.

In Cuneo's case, some of these grapes will be good to go within a week.

I've heard a lot of good things about this year's vintage in Washington. Wolfe mentioned Sunday that acids are as good as he's seen, thanks to the relative lateness of the season. Because we're expected to dip well into the 30s overnight this week, that acidity is not likely to drop off.

Thus, all would appear to be happy in Washington wine country.