The 2007 harvest here in Walla Walla was awesome.  Great weather and great fruit have created another great vintage.  The fruit we received from our Seven Hills Vineyard was incredible. On February 8th, a few of us got together to see just how good it really was. 

As you know, Seven Hills Vineyard is one of our Estate Vineyards and is a major part of our wines.  For those of you who are in our Bridge Club, you know that when bottled separately, this Vineyard produces an incredible wine with finesse and elegance.  We here at Pepper Bridge Winery only use a small portion of the fruit from our Seven Hills Vineyard.  The rest is sold to wineries all over Washington and Oregon. 

A few years ago we started an annual tasting that consisted of wineries that have purchased blocks from our Seven Hills Vineyard.  The first year there was about twelve of us.  This year there was close to eighty people.  We tasted our way through the wines we had made while discussing some of the differences or similarities that we saw. Very educational.  Its always amazing to see two distinct wines, made by two different wineries, with fruit that may only be few yard apart.  

How can this be?  Well, here is a quick and very basic explanation.  First and foremost is each wineries vineyard practices.  This includes pruning, irrigating, harvesting etc.  After harvesting the fruit, it is delivered to the winery. Some will crush and destem while others will only destem the fruit.  Some may choose to ferment in whole cluster instead.  The next step is fermentation, and this is where i will stop with fermentation, because the methods are so diverse and numerous.  After fermentation you have barrel aging, which is a whole other story. 

So, to make a long story short, it was a total success.  Everyone who attended agreed that the 2007 vintage was excellent. Everyone also agreed that the vineyard itself, seems to be getting better every year.  Knowing this, just imagine what kind of wines we will be producing 20 or 30  years down the road.  Very very exciting.