Sip And Savor – The Ultimate Wine Barrel Tasting Experience!

It was a rainy afternoon in April as we made our way through the winding roads of Santa Ynez (Santa Barbara Wine Country). Our hearts were pounding with excitement. Peter Baedeker, Star Lane/Dierberg Vineyard’s managing director, invited Laurent and I to spend the afternoon at one of my favorite wineries, Star Lane Vineyards, participating in a wine blending event. I was fortunate in that I had been to this property in 2013 for a winemaker’s dinner… Which is when winemaker Tyler Thomas joined Star Lane/Dierberg. It is an absolutely gorgeous property, not to mention a beautiful winemaking facility. The Dierberg family owns Dierberg and Star Lane and Tyler is the winemaker and president for both brands.

Unleash The Flavors Of Wine Barrel Tasting

The endearing staff greeted Laurent and me with a glass of a “Bordeaux-inspired” white blend called ‘Faron’.  I immediately went up to Tyler and reintroduced myself.  He certainly was aware of who I was since he graciously had given me permission to shoot my Wine Spectator award-winning wine videos at the Dierberg Drum Canyon Vineyard. I introduced him to Laurent, after which we were off and running.

Tyler led a group of about 60 of us into the caves of the winery, in the heart of where the barrels rest and do their fermentation magic with the juice that becomes wine. We were going to do barrel tastings for Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir. This is where the winemaker siphons a little wine out of the barrel and puts it into a glass to taste. It’s a way to check on the aging process and get an idea of how the wine is going to turn out.

Barrel Tasting Star Lane Sauvignon Blanc

The first barrel tasting was focusing on the Star Lane Sauvignon Blanc. There were two barrels that we were going to taste from. The first came from a neutral French oak barrel. Neutral oak means that the barrel has been previously used and most, if not all the attributes that come from the wood are used up. As a result, this tasted a bit “unfinished” as well as a bit “acidic”.

The second barrel was a new French oak barrel and the wine tasted like it was almost ready to be bottled. Same varietal, same vineyard, different barrel profiles – neutral vs new. Totally different taste experience. And for the record, according to Tyler, the acidity in each was the same. It was the perceived taste and mouth feel that gave the first one a sense of being more acidic.

Barrel Tasting Dierberg Pinot Noir

The second barrel tasting featured the Dierberg Pinot Noir from the Drum Canyon Vineyard (see above reference). This was a particularly interesting tasting in that the wine in the two different barrels came from the same vineyard. The vines are close to each other. But each barrel’s wine that we tasted had totally different profiles.

The first was a bit more muted. The second was a lot livelier and had more layers. It was a great process to go through to learn more about what Tyler and his team must deal with when crafting the wine. In fact, they actually blend what ends up in the bottle – in this case, all Pinot Noir.

Every Good Thing Must Come To An End

Ultimately, we wrapped up that part of the day and headed back upstairs. The team casually guided us to the room where we were going to have the opportunity to create our own Bordeaux-style blends. But that’ll be for our next article. Until then, enjoy a 20 minute video of Tyler Thomas talking so passionately about the art of making wine. We weren’t going to make a video of this but Tyler was being so enthusiastic and educational, we decided to share it with you all. Enjoy!

To be continued…

Hello Wine Ponderers! Laurent here. As Steve said, this barrel wine-tasting event was a fantastic experience. Both Steve and I had tasted wine straight out of the barrel many times, but listening to winemaker Tyler Thomas explain all the intricacies of making wine made me quite humble. To put it bluntly, we actually know very little of what goes on before the wine is being poured into our glass.

At last, don’t miss our next Wine Ponder’s Exclusive article about the Wine Blending Seminar. This is an event during which we got to mix 4 Bordeaux-style varietals to make our own blend. Tyler Thomas himself tasted all the different blends, before giving his final verdict… Guess which blend he picked as his favorite! Oh yeah ;)

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