Puccioni Vineyards - Mule News

Review of Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel

2009-06-15T10:01:00.000-07:00

Puccioni Vineyards - 2006 Old Vine Zinfandel

Here is a recent review by Gabe and Dry Dry Creek.com - very good guys!!

The Facts:

Glenn Proctor who runs Puccioni Vineyards along with his wife is the fourth generation to grow grapes on the property. Before starting Puccioni Vineyards to showcase the fruit from his family vineyards, Glenn worked for wineries such as Glen Ellen, Benzinger, BV & Sterling, involving himself in many aspects of the grape growing and wine-making business

The 2006 Puccioni Vineyards Old Vine Zinfandel is sourced from two vineyards. One site is the Puccioni Vineyard which features 100 year old vines planted by Winemaker Glenn Proctor’s Great Grandfather, over 100 years ago. The other site is the Buchignani Vineyard planted about 50 years ago by their cousins. 260 cases of the 2006 Zinfandel were produced. The suggested retail price is $28.

Gabe’s Take:

The nose of this 2006 Old Vine Zinfandel is loaded with a quartet of aromatics. Cedar, cloves, allspice and vibrant berry jam notes explode from the glass upon pouring. Throughout the palate blackberry pie characteristics are prominent and mouth-filling, joined by earth, bramble and black cherry reference points. Dusty Baker’s chocolate and an absolute avalanche of black pepper emerge on a long, layered and slightly lusty finish that beckons you back to the glass for another sip. Good acidity and firm but yielding tannins frame this well structured Zinfandel.

Several things stood out to me about the Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel. It’s accessible from the word go; but decanting and giving it some air really allows its charms to blossom and flavors to explode on your palate. Secondly, certain things on a wine label hold special meaning. For me, when I read Old Vine Zinfandel and Dry Creek Valley on the same label I tend to get excited. Having never had any wine from Puccioni Vineyards, before now, I was curious if it would live up to my label expectations. I’m happy to report that this wine is a textbook example of Old Vine Dry Creek Zin. Sometimes people will ask what Old Vine means, I wish I had a bottle of Puccioni to pour for each of them; it would be a lesson in a glass. Finally, while this wine is drinking quite well right now, I wouldn’t be shy about laying it down for 5 years; it has the structure to age.

2009-02-23T22:13:00.000-08:00

New Release Special
Thank you for your past support and interest in our handcrafted limited production wines. As Mules, you are the first ones to hear that our 2006 wines will be available February 2009. We know you’ll love what we produced in 2006 – we think this was a great vintage for Puccioni Vineyards!

Our Economic Stimulus Plan:
As always, we want to give our loyal Mules the first opportunity to order our new release wine. Place your order by April 15, 2009, and get a 25% discount on Zin, 20% discount on Petite Sirah, and if you order 2 or more cases get free shipping! What could be better than having some delicious Puccioni wine ready to uncork and enjoy after you send off your tax forms?

WINES AVAILABLE NOW!

2006 Old Vine Zinfandel
The grapes for this wine were sourced from 100-year-old vines at the Puccioni Ranch that were planted by our great-grandfather, and 50-year-old vines planted and farmed by our cousins (not sure if they will admit it?) at the Buchignani Vineyard on Dry Creek Road. The wine has lovely aromas of ripe blackberries with hints of violet and cedar, and dark cherry/chocolate flavors balanced with that characteristic Puccioni spice in the finish. This wine is ready to be enjoyed today, but can be aged for a few years too.
260 cases Produced Regular Price $28 ($336/case)

2006 Petite Sirah
We are excited to be offering a VERY limited bottling of a vineyard-designated Petite Sirah for the very first time! The grapes came from Lambert Bridge Vineyard (Van Alyea) in the heart of the Dry Creek Valley – just after Lambert Bridge. The wine has deep, dark berry aromas, blueberry and chocolate flavors through the mid palate, finishing with black pepper spice. You can age this wine, but don’t be afraid to drink this Petite Sirah now – why wait?!
50 cases Produced Regular Price $30 ($360/case)

WINE ORDER FORM (Fax or Mail)

Updates:
We really like the 2007 wines that will be bottled in a few months, and the 2008 wines are showing some great intensity at a very young age. The Old Vine Zin and Petite Sirah will continue to be our focus with these vintages.
As always we would love to hear from you – what you like, where and with whom you are drinking our wines, and those “I’ll bet you never heard this story before” stories. We are making the wines for you to enjoy and share with your friends and family – because nothing is more special than Friends, Family, and some nice Zin!

Please Note: Habu and Muddy’s pictures are in the new Wine Dogs USA 2 book. Check it out at your local bookstore!

Mule History:
Our family used a Mule and a plow until 1968. My grandfather had four mules through the early and mid 1900s – his favorites were Jack and Prince. Prince, our last mule, always came home at 6pm, whether my grandfather was done in the field or not. You could say we’re as stubborn as Prince when it comes to "doing things the right way”!

Our Story:
Puccioni Vineyards produces hand-crafted Zinfandel wine from our vineyard in the hills of Sonoma County's Dry Creek Valley, where we have a long family heritage in the wine business. In 1904, our great-grandfather Angelo bought the property and planted Zinfandel grapes that have been growing there ever since. Our family ran a winery on the property from 1918 to 1935. Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel is made using those 100-year-old vines and the knowledge passed down from our family’s generations of winegrowers and winemakers.

Salute!
Glenn, Laurie, Joshua & Noah Proctor (Habu & Muddy too…)

Update from ZAP - Great Reviews for 2006

2009-02-16T10:30:00.000-08:00

We poured at ZAP two weeks ago - it was a great event as always. My Uncle Angelo Puccioni, and my cousin Allison and her husband Tim helped me pour. We poured the 2005 and 2006 Old Vine Zinfandel - We got a great response on the 2006 - with at least two writers/retailers ranking it in the top five of the entire tasting!!!!!!!!!!! We were extremely happy with that. Also we got a nice write up in the Connoisseurs' Guide - They gave us one puff and an 87 - using the descriptors - gutsy, deep fruit, sweet oak, ripe, extracted - and said it would go well with hearty barbecued meats on the bone.

I will add some pictures with the next post - need to get those from my uncle.

Also you have to love the rain - keep it coming we need it.

Crush Has Begun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-09-09T14:37:00.000-07:00

It has been awhile - sorry we have not posted more blogs. My sister called me earlier today and told me my blog is getting dusty!! Now I am in trouble. That must be what happens when you have two kids under three.

Harvest is upon us - we picked some Buchignani Old Vine Zin yesterday. It looks great - we will do a cold soak for three days and then start the fermentation in small open top fermenters. The crop was 50% of what it was last year - the early frost we had and the dry weather have produced a lighter crop throughout Dry Creek.

Things have been getting ripe very quickly - we have had some very warm days and they have caused our Zin to reach maturity much earlier than last year.

We will be picking the fruit off the Old Vines at the Puccioni Ranch at the end of this week and the Lambert Bridge Petite Sirah we buy should come off next week.

We are extremely happy with the quality so far - now it is just managing the fermentations.

We still have a few cases of the 2005 Old Vine Zin left - let us know if you are interested. We will be releasing the 2006 in a few months.

I will work on being more active with my writing.

Be a Mule - Stubborn about Puccioni Wine!!!!!

Thanks Glenn

2005 Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel Release

2007-11-23T15:07:00.000-08:00

We are officially releasing our 2005 Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel on Dec 15th - but we have made it available to some of the people that have been so supportive of our little brand - and if you order a case by Jan 1st there is a savings available. Just clink on the link below if you want to take a look at our order form.


Link

We had a very nice Thanksgiving with Family and Friends yesterday and did a 2004 and 2005 tasting - they seemed to both do fine - but there was a preference with the 2005.

Not sure how many of you hunt for wild mushrooms out there - let me know if you do - but it has been great to far this year. With the early rain and the warm fall weather - the bolete's have been plentiful. If you go, make sure you take somebody that knows what they are doing - it can be dangerous if you pick the wrong one.

We hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving.

Thanks

WINTER UPDATE

2007-11-16T14:01:00.000-08:00

It has been awhile since I updated our blog - two kids under two years old does seem to sap away any and all of your free time. Above is our oldest son Joshua - he may be ready to hook the mule up to this plow sooner than we thought.
We have had a busy year - but it has been a very good year. We crushed almost 9 tons this year of Old Vine Zinfandel and Petite Sirah and barreled our wines down about a month ago. They are going through ML fermentation as we speak. The quality of the wine has been excellent - the year started out with a bang - we had a fairly warm heat spike in late Aug that got our fruit almost ripe and then it cooled down for a few weeks. We let our fruit hang through the cool period hoping to take advantage of extra flavor development the added hangtime can give - we were glad we did this and think it had very nice benefit.
Now we are just getting the vyd ready for winter - it is important to get the grass growing and open all our drains - we want to be prepared for that first downpour - we are ready.
We are releasing our 2005 Old Vine Zinfandel on Dec 15th - we think this is our best wine yet.
We will be a little more active in keeping our blog up to date.
Wish everyone the happiest of turkey days.

Glenn

Spring Already!! Here comes the Sun

2007-03-28T17:57:00.000-07:00

Our 1946 Willys Jeep - Bringing back to life!

WOW!! Time does fly when you are having fun.

Vineyard:
It has been too long since we had a chance to write a post. But things are moving right along. This winter was a moderate with rain levels 50% of average in the Dry Creek Valley. Hopefully that will not be a problem - especially for us because we are virtually dry farmed. We finished pruning on the old vines and doing some replanting of misses on the young vines. We are just seeing bud break in the vineyard now ( that is when the bud begins to open) which is about normal. We have begun to mow our covercrops that we let grow over the winter - we use these to prevent erosion and add organic matter back into the soil - it makes a better vine.

Wine:
We are almost sold out of our 2004 Puccioni Old Vine Zin - we have had great response from our individual orders and have also placed our wine in some very nice accounts. We are getting ready to bottle our 2005 Old Vine Zin next month - we are very excited about this wine it is tasting very nice. Regarding our 2006 wines - we finished malo-lactic on them and have topped and racked them. Besides our Old Vine Zin in 2006 we will be doing a limited release Petite Sirah which we are very excited about. We know you will enjoy that.

Other Ramblings:
We have a Willys Jeep on the property that was driven by our grandfather everywhere he went and when visitors came to the vineyard he would use it to tour all his guests. It has been sitting idle for a few years - but we have decided to put some resources in it and bring it back to life. So I am reading all the articles I can find about refurbishing and rebuilding our Jeep. Above is a picture of it - you can see we have a little work to do.

Salute!!

Enjoy Puccioni Zin

Glenn

2007-01-28T11:01:00.000-08:00

ZAP 2007 Puccioni Vineyards - What a Time!!

Our Team: l to r Laurie, Glenn, Joel, Angelo, Bart - taking the pic Amy.
We had a great time pouring Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel at the ZAP festival yesterday. We got there at 7am and left at 5:30pm - it was a long day. All I can say is when you are on your feet]that long get a floor mat(we did thanks to Laurie). There were some great wines to taste. We had great response on our Zin - we are still new so people would come up asking us who we were etc, but once they tasted the wine they took a card and said they wanted to get our our mailing list. For a small winery like us this is a great opportunity to get exposure with some very knowledgeable Zinfandel fans. If you have not gone to this event - make sure you go at least once in your life!
Glenn

Puccioni Old Vine Zin Reviews - Good Stuff

2006-12-20T20:46:00.000-08:00

We wanted to share with you some recent reviews we have gotten for our 2004 Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel . The Connoisseur's Guide liked the wine and gave it a puff - which means they consider it to be an outstanding wine. The Wine Enthusiast gave the wine a 90 score and liked the rich character the wine offers. We are appreciative that we have been able to recieve these types of reviews - but our hope is that each of you who drink this wine get more than just the flavors or tastes or remember the scores - but that you take pleasure and time to enjoy each and every sip and in some way we have helped you make life just a little better. And of course its nice to know people have been tasting wine from these vineyards for over 100 years. All The Best!

Glenn Proctor

Appreciate any comments.

Harvest 2006 Puccioni Vineyards

2006-10-14T16:07:00.000-07:00

The 2006 Harvest at Puccioni Vyds has begun. We harvested the Nicoletti blk and the Old Back Blk at the Puccioni Ranch and we also harvested Zinfandel from the Buchignani Ranch. Just to make the day more fun we also harvested the Lambert Bridge Vyds Petite Sirah on the same day. As you can see the whole family participated.
(Laurie, Joshua, and Glenn)

New Release 2004 Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel

2006-08-17T21:16:00.000-07:00

It is here!!

We have just released our 2004 Puccioni Old Vine Dry Creek Zinfandel. We have gotten some excellent comments on the wine with our early tastings. We are very excited about the wine and know you will enjoy it. Click on the title above to order our wine. Salute!

Puccioni 2004 "Old Vine" Zinfandel Dry Creek Valley

Vineyard: Puccioni Vineyard in the hills above Dry Creek Valley. Zinfandel grapes came from the Old Block and the Nicoletti Ranch. The Old Block is 90-100 years old and the Nicoletti Ranch is 50-60 years old. Both blocks are head-trained and dry farmed. These blocks were planted by my great grandfather and grandfather. The Old Block was harvested on September 13^th at 25.2 brix and the Nicoletti Ranch on September 30th at 24.2 brix. This was blended at 18% with Petite Sirah from Lambert Bridge Vineyards in Dry Creek Valley harvested on September 12th at 23.8 brix.

Winemaking: The grapes were cold soaked for three days to promote extraction and concentration. It was then fermented in ¾ ton open top fermenters and hand-punched 3x per day for maximum development of color and varietal flavors. The wine was direct pressed to barrels composed of 70% older French and 30% new American Oak where it finished Malo-Lactic fermentation. The wine was aged for 17 months in Barrel, bottled in the spring of 2006 and is now being released.

Tasting Notes: Aromas of dark berries with hints of cedar and spice, complex flavors of raspberry and blackberry and notes of chocolate, creamy oak and black pepper spice in the finish. Alcohol 14.9 %, TA .66, PH 3.86

2004 Puccioni Zinfandel Release - Aug 15

2006-08-08T20:32:00.000-07:00

We are very excited!! We will be releasing our 2004 Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel Dry Creek Valley on Aug 15th. A newsletter will be getting to our Puccioni Mules in the next week. We hope you enjoy the wine - we have gotten some wonderful comments on it .

It will be on a first come first serve basis so get your orders in !!

Thanks Glenn

Puccioni Vineyards - Summer

2006-07-26T18:01:00.000-07:00

It has been awhile since we have had a chance to put up a new post. Things have been busy at Puccioni Vineyards. THE 2004 Old Vine Zinfandel will be released in August 2006 - get your orders in!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As you can see we have a group of very tired guard dogs - Muddy and Habu - that make sure no one gets too close to our Old Vine Zinfandel grapes. This is the OLD BLOCK with 100 year old vines - so these dogs need to be on their toes (you can see we added drip recently to the old block - we only use it once or twice a year during heat spells - we needed it this year).

Things look very good with our old vines - they are growing well - we have suckered each vine removing unwanted shoots to open up the vine to light and air and reduce the crop - we have also gone through by hand and removed laterals in the fruit zone and removed wings on the clusters. Wings are parts of the Zinfandel cluster that can lead to too much congestion in the vine and cause uneven color - removing the wings help improve the quality.

Also as we are getting excited about the quality of fruit that will come off our old vines we are also replanting parts of our ranch - as we tend these young vines we are very excited about the great fruit we will get off these new vineyards in a few years. It is all old clone Zinfandel and we are also putting in a small sections of Alicante Bouchet and Petite Sirah. All varieties we have grown on this property for over 100 years. Here is a picture of the young vines in the foreground and the OLD BLOCK Zinfandel in the back.

We know you will be enjoying new Puccioni Zinfandel from these new blocks in a few years - All the hillside blocks will be head trained - just like we have always done at Puccioni Vineyards - we can't wait to taste the wine!!!!!!!!

Thank you for supporting Puccioni Vineyards and being stubborn about our wine.

Glenn

Vinography Wine Review

2006-05-22T10:10:00.000-07:00

Alder at Vinography.com - a very well respected and written blog gave us a nice write-up and review. Here are his comments on our 2003 - to read entire article please click on the title above. We appreciate your support!!
Glenn

Tasting Notes:
A medium garnet color in the glass, this wine has a candied nose of blueberries, and blackberries with a slight piney note to them. In the mouth it is medium bodied with a nice mouthfeel and excellent acidity. This acid, coupled with a nice, light tannic structure keeps the blackberry flavors from becoming too jammy (it probably helps that someone didn't let the grapes dry out too much on the vines) so that the overall wine has a lighter, less common style for Sonoma Zinfandels. The finish is moderate in length and pleasant.

Food Pairing:This is a great wine for grilling -- I'd love to drink it (just slightly chilled) with grilled sausages on a hot day.

Overall Score: 9

The Vines Are Growing - 2004 Wine is Almost Ready

2006-05-21T06:56:00.000-07:00

It is May and the vines are growing. The season got off to a late start given all the late spring - specifically April - rains we had this year. It was a wet one - at our ranch we totaled over 88 inches of rain. Everything held up fine though. We have just started suckering our old vines - we go through and remove any unwanted shoot growth - this concentrates the growth with those shoots that have clusters and ensures good ripening and fruit exposure. We will also be sulfur dusting the vineyard - this is an organic way of preventing any powdery mildew developing on the vines [the picture is of my grandfather - Louie - dusting by hand in the 1970's] On our young vineyard - the new vines are just growing from a long winter. We are training them up the stake now - the first 3 years of a vines life are the most important - a little like raising a child - they need good roots.

The 2004 Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel is slowly bottle aging and we expect to be releasing it at the end of June or mid July. IT IS ALMOST READY!! We are very excited about the wine - it has great concentration and intense rasberry/blackberry fruit. If you have signed up for the Puccioni Mules we will let you know when it is ready. If you have not - go to our website www.puccionivineyards and sign up for the "Puccioni Mules". You can pre-order the 2004 now by also going to our site. Thank you to all for your support!!

We will be doing a few Puccioni hats and shirts - let us know if you are interested and we can make them available to all.

Glenn

Silver Medal winner at Dallas Morning News wine competition

2006-04-24T08:12:00.000-07:00

April 21, 2006
Puccioni "Old Vine" 2003 Zinfandel wins a silver medal in the Dallas Morning News wine competition.
Multimedia presentation is here
http://www.dallasnews.com/s/dws/spe/2006/wine/

Puccioni Vineyards featured in American Vineyards publication

2006-04-12T07:45:00.000-07:00

Sustaining a Family Legacy in Dry Creek Valley "Glenn Proctor leads two lives"
By Dan Clarke
We are excited about the article just published in the March issue of American Vineyard.
Use the link above to retrieve the entire article from our website.
www.puccionivineyards.com

Our Wine Label - Philippe Becker Designs

2006-03-14T17:44:00.000-08:00

We cannot say enough about Philippe Becker Designs in San Francisco. They helped us in designing our label. They were wonderful to work with and their team outlined the process, gave us time targets, and produced some wonderful options and concepts for us to consider. We would recommend that anyone looking for a top notch design firm to work on wine labels or any other designs should give Philippe and David Becker a call at PBD. Let them know the guys with the Mule on their label recommended you.

Philippe Becker Design Inc.
612 Howard Street, Suite 200
San Francisco, CA 94105
T 415 348 0054 F 415 348 0063
E info@pbdsf.com Web www.pbdsf.com

Puccioni Vineyards Update

2006-03-05T08:28:00.000-08:00

Good Morning - we have just sold out of our 2003 Puccioni Zinfandel Old Vine Dry Creek - all 96 cases- the response was great and we appreciate all the support from our friends, family, and retail partners. We will release the 2004 Puccioni Zinfandel in June - you can begin ordering the 2004 on our website. We will have approx 230 cases of the 2004 - get your order in now! You can still buy the 2003 at the our retail partners - see the previous post or our website under - Find It.

We just finished pruning our old vine Zinfandel at the Puccioni Ranch and Vineyard. The winter has been a little unusual - we had spring like conditions into Jan and Feb and then recently we have had periods of winter cold - yesterday you could see snow scattered on the hilltops around Healdsburg. The vines should start pushing out in the next few weeks. We are excited that spring is almost here.

The 2004 Puccioni Zinfandel is just going into bottles. Our 2005 Puccioni Zinfandel has finished malolactic fermentation and is still in barrels. We will be racking it again in a few weeks and then potentially blending it with some Petite Sirah and putting it back in barrel. We are usually aging our Zinfandel in barrel for 14-16 months. www.puccionivineyards.com

BE A MULE - STUBBORN ABOUT PUCCIONI WINES

Glenn

Awards/Reviews

2006-02-28T22:00:00.000-08:00

2006 San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition
Silver Medal - 2003 Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel
http://www.winejudging.com/medal_winners_2006/412.htm

2006 Dallas Morning News Wine Competition
Silver Medal - 2003 Puccioni Old Vine Zinfandel

Taste California Travel - Wine of the Week
February 16, 2006
“Bright, spicy berry aromas and flavors with black pepper background in both departments. Plenty of depth and power but lively, rather than ponderous. This is a top-quality, small-production Zin,”“Serve with braised lamb shanks on a cool evening or with grilled T-bones for a summer barbecue.”
Puccioni
Dry Creek Valley
2003 “Old Vine” Zinfandel $28
http://www.tastecaliforniatravel.com/pick-of-the-week.htm

Stop by for a visit at these fine establishments and ask for Puccioni Zinfandel!!

2006-02-28T21:58:00.000-08:00

Wineshops

Beltramo's
1540 El Camino Real
Menlo Park, CA 94025
650 325 2806
http://www.beltramos.com/

Traverso's
106 B Street
Santa Rosa, CA 95401
707 542 2530
http://www.traversos.com/

Rancho Cellars
23640 Carmel Rancho Blvd
Carmel, CA 93923
831 625 5646
http://www.ranchocellars.com/

Russian River Wine Co.
132 Plaza St
Healdsburg, CA 95448
707 433 0490
http://www.russianriverwineco.com/

K + L Wine Merchants
3005 El Camino Real
Redwood City, CA 94061
800 247 5987
www.klwines.com

Restaurants

Willi's Wine Bar
4404 Old Redwood Hwy
Santa Rosa, CA 95403
707 526 3096
http://www.williswinebar.net/

Ravenous
420 Center St
Healdsburg, CA 95448
707 431 1302

Fleur De Lys
777 Sutter St
San Francisco, CA 94109
415 673 7779
http://www.fleurdelyssf.com/