While visiting the Sonoma Valley in California a few weeks ago, my husband and I enjoyed a couple of peeks into the wine making process during the hectic harvest and crush season. Late one afternoon we stopped in at Carol Shelton Wines, located in Santa Rosa. The office park warehouse where Carol’s tasting room and production facility may be found don’t give a hint as to the incredible wines she produces, with a heavy emphasis on Zinfandel. Carol Shelton, a graduate of U.C. Davis, has been named Winemaker of the Year several times and has worked as a winemaker and consultant for decades and at her own winery since 2000, producing over 5,000 cases a year.

In addition to tasting the range of bottlings currently available that day, we sampled a few of the Cabernet Sauvignon grapes from the King Ridge vineyard which had been picked that day (small, very dark and sweet) as well as the just-squeezed juice, prior to the fermentation process — also very sweet and fruity. Then we stepped through the door to the barrel room, bustling with activity. High above, a forklift was dumping a full bin of Cab grape clusters into the stemmer/crusher. Out the other end came a steady flow of partially mashed grapes on one side and the barren stems on another. As the purple mass rose in the receiving bin, Carol stepped in to throw scoops of dry ice into the mix. Temperatures in the vineyards were close to 100 that day, and it was important to keep the temperatures down — something I’d never seen before!

The next morning we met Nancy Walker of Stephen & Walker Trust Winery Limited in her new production facility on the edge of Healdsburg. Like Carol, Nancy is a highly respected graduate of U.C. Davis and spent years working as a winemaker and consultant before starting her own winery with husband Tony Stephen. The day before, we had stopped in for a tasting at her elegant tasting room just off the Healdsburg Plaza, but today we stood on the concrete slab floor of a pre-fab warehouse, surrounded by barrels of aging wine on one side and large stainless steel and plastic tanks on the other. The plastic tanks held the juice of this year’s Sauvignon Blanc, a blond, opaque liquid with a light, fresh, sweet taste. The eight-foot-tall steel tanks held Pinot Noir, the thick cap of seeds and skins floating atop the juice. Nancy proudly showed off these expensive pieces of equipment, which were fitted with a system which automatically “punched down” the cap eight times a day — a valuable time- and labor-saver. Here we learned Nancy, too, would use dry ice (which apparently doesn’t kill the yeast essential to fermentation) to cool down the process as needed. We enjoyed a barrel taste of her 2011 Cabernet Sauvignon (wonderful fruit and beautifully balanced, even at this young age) before letting her get back to making wine.

We came away thankful for the hospitality, generosity and friendliness of these two talented women who cheerfully took time out from the busiest time of their work year to welcome us and share their knowledge of and passion for wine making. It was fun to sample the “fruit of the grape” at the beginning of the wine making process and get a look behind the curtain during crush.

— Patty Vanikiotis, associate editor/copy editor