Vineyard Article
Booker Vineyard
Last edited on 10/4/2009 by RedFilth
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Vineyard website
We are active members in the Central Coast Vineyard Team and are a fully sustainable vineyard, using no chemicals or pesticides in our daily farming. Our entire vineyard is on hillsides that are made up of pure calcareous shale, allowing for very little vine vigor. Other than large projects such as pruning and fruit thinning, Eric Jensen farms the entire vineyard alone, allowing total visual and physical control. Most of the Vineyard is on 7x3 spacing, averaging about 2.5 tons to the acre which is just over two pounds per plant. Below is a list of the wineries that purchase our fruit; all of whom we are very proud.
* Jacob Toft Wines
* Linne Calodo
* Lone Madrone (owner/winemaker Neal Collins also is the winemaker at Tablas Creek)
* Saxum
* Villa Creek Cellars
* Summerwood Winery
* Sashi Moorman (Sashi makes wines for Stolpman Vineyards and Piedra Sassi)
* L'Aventure
Booker Vineyard is located on Paso Robles' Westside, immediately joining the famous Stephan Vineyards that produce L'Aventure Wines. The high-density vineyard is mostly Rhone varietals planted on steep hillsides of calcareous shale.
The name Booker comes from the two orphan brothers Claude and Dick Booker who had owned the land, as well as hundreds more acres on Paso's Westside. The Booker brothers were Paso's favorite sons, dedicating their lives to being great farmers and humanitarians. Aside from lending their farming knowledge and manual labor to neighbors and those in need, they were the area's biggest philanthropists, leaving 100% of their estate to charity when they passed.
After making wine with Justin Smith for five years and Stephan Asseo for two years the Jensens decided it was time to create their own expression with Booker Vineyard. The 2005 Vintage was Booker Vineyards first release with the wines being made by owner Eric Jensen. The wine making style is extremely soft and hands-off, attempting to let the fruit finish what it started seven months earlier. We rarely use a pump, never rack or filter, and use minimal sulphur.
We bottle 50% of our wines after 18 months, with the rest going roughly 30 months in oak prior to bottling. The two exceptions are Grenache, which gets bottled after 18 months and the white which is bottled after a year of aging.
We are active members in the Central Coast Vineyard Team and are a fully sustainable vineyard, using no chemicals or pesticides in our daily farming. Our entire vineyard is on hillsides that are made up of pure calcareous shale, allowing for very little vine vigor. Other than large projects such as pruning and fruit thinning, Eric Jensen farms the entire vineyard alone, allowing total visual and physical control. Most of the Vineyard is on 7x3 spacing, averaging about 2.5 tons to the acre which is just over two pounds per plant. Below is a list of the wineries that purchase our fruit; all of whom we are very proud.
* Jacob Toft Wines
* Linne Calodo
* Lone Madrone (owner/winemaker Neal Collins also is the winemaker at Tablas Creek)
* Saxum
* Villa Creek Cellars
* Summerwood Winery
* Sashi Moorman (Sashi makes wines for Stolpman Vineyards and Piedra Sassi)
* L'Aventure
Booker Vineyard is located on Paso Robles' Westside, immediately joining the famous Stephan Vineyards that produce L'Aventure Wines. The high-density vineyard is mostly Rhone varietals planted on steep hillsides of calcareous shale.
The name Booker comes from the two orphan brothers Claude and Dick Booker who had owned the land, as well as hundreds more acres on Paso's Westside. The Booker brothers were Paso's favorite sons, dedicating their lives to being great farmers and humanitarians. Aside from lending their farming knowledge and manual labor to neighbors and those in need, they were the area's biggest philanthropists, leaving 100% of their estate to charity when they passed.
After making wine with Justin Smith for five years and Stephan Asseo for two years the Jensens decided it was time to create their own expression with Booker Vineyard. The 2005 Vintage was Booker Vineyards first release with the wines being made by owner Eric Jensen. The wine making style is extremely soft and hands-off, attempting to let the fruit finish what it started seven months earlier. We rarely use a pump, never rack or filter, and use minimal sulphur.
We bottle 50% of our wines after 18 months, with the rest going roughly 30 months in oak prior to bottling. The two exceptions are Grenache, which gets bottled after 18 months and the white which is bottled after a year of aging.