Visit to the Organic Gardens at Frog's Leap Vineyards

The following is a photo essay on a trip to Frog's Leap vineyards where the mission is to "Produce wines that deeply reflect the thoughtfully chosen soils and climates from which they emanate".

Excuse the funky formatting... blogger doesn't seem to like this many photos.

The grouds surrounding the property have been recently renovated. All of Frog's Leaps gardens, along with their vines, are grown organically.

As more and more wineries seem to be doing recently, Frog's Leap aims for as green and as natural a growth and harvest of their vines as possible. Their vines are grown by "dry farming" (no irrigation), a method that harkens back to the old Italian manner of wine production in California.

In order to successfully dry farm, Frog's Leap chose the Saint George (Vitis rupestris) root stock which grows under a custom cover blend of peas, oats, and vetch. Apparently, through dry farming, the grapes at Frog's Leap achieve maximum flavor at only around 23 brix as opposed to the more common 28 brix harvest mark for irrigated vines. This lower sugar content allows lower alcohol wines and greater sense of terroir with each crush.

A field of photovoltaic solar panels, accompanied by geothermal power, produces all of the energy that the winery needs.

The vegetable and flower gardens are a bonus attraction for those visitng the vineyards. Visitors can take home much of the day's vegetable harvest for free.

In addition to visual interest, the gardens promote biodiveristy and attract beneficial insect species such as this monarch butterfly caterpiller.

Frog's Leap maintains an apiary in order to increase pollination in the garden and vineyards. Every year, the bees produce about three gallons of honey. In the foreground of the picture, one of Frog's Leap's bountiful olive trees can be seen. Last year one ton of olives and thirty five gallons of olive oil were produced from these trees.

Two chicken coops are kept, one for eggs (and tourist amusement) and another under the solar panel field where the chickens can keep weeds at bay. There's more agri-tainment to come to Frog's Leap with the future addition of some dairy cows.

Fruits of the garden...

Worlds of Flavor 2007

The problem with having so much stuff to write about is that, while all that material-worthy action is going on, there’s not enough time to write anything down. Such has been the case since last week’s World’s of Flavors Conference on “The Rise of Asia.” Admittedly, the details of last week aren’t as fresh in my mind as they could be. Still, I witnessed so much mind-bogglingly impressive culinary expression in those three days that even my stale recollections are worth putting on paper.

Like a lot of my classmates who volunteered to work the conference, I was assigned to team India. A day before the conference officially started, our team began organizing the mise en place for all of our presenters' recipes. To take a break from the flurry of prepping, I offered to run our orders up from the purchasing department. Just getting to see some of the more unusual ingredients coming through purchasing would have made volunteering a worthwhile effort. Of course the Indian team ordered novel spices like asafoetida, aamchur (mango powder), several kinds of tamarind, and a dozen different masalas. On other teams' speed racks I glimpsed fresh wasabi, galangal, kaffir lime leaves, and mangosteens among boxes and bags of ingredients that I couldn’t even guess as to what they were.

During one trip downstairs to collect some of our proteins, Maridith and I stepped out of the walk-in and stood face to face with Masaharu Morimoto. The Iron Chef, clad in a day-glo orange puffy jacket, shorts, and some flip flops, had arrived a day early to inspect his fish order. I pretended to be unmoved by this sudden run-in with a celebrity, but Maridith’s eye’s and smile could not have been bigger.

The next day (the first official day of the conference), I became the de facto personal assistant to the presenter Ammini Ramachandran. Mrs. Ramachandran, or Ammini as she preferred to be called, is the author of Grains, Greens, and Grated Coconuts a book about recipes and food related memories from her life growing up in the Indian state of Kerala. I was thrilled to be paired up with Ammini. Not only was she a food writer (as I hope to be), but she hailed from a state that I had spent some time in while traveling through India.

Though Ammini would never have admitted it herself, she grew up with an aristocratic background -her grandfather was the maharaja of Kochi. Rather than projecting a patrician or entitled air, however, she could not have been more modest or humble about both her heritage and her culinary talents. In truth, I sensed that the hectic kitchen environment may have actually intimidated her somewhat. Since she is food writer, rather than a classically trained chef, I think Ammini did not expect to be surrounded by the insane amount of activity that greeted her in the Greystone kitchens. Despite her initial trepidation, however, she jumped into the fray with grace and skill. I flitted about the kitchen gathering equipment and ingredients as she prepared over thirteen individual recipes. Out of the thirteen, my two favorite preparations were her “Brown Stew” of potatoes in spicy coconut milk and a yam and coconut curry. Both were one pot dishes that evoked the essence of Kerelan home cooking that Ammini’s book focused on. Fairly simple to prepare, each of the curries displayed a complex balance of sweet and spicy flavors that I found very appealing.

Just before the first day of the conference ended, I took a moment to walk through the evening’s “Marketplace.” Greystone’s usually stark barrel room was converted into an overwhelmingly fantastic Asian bazaar. Swaths of colorful fabric hung from every possible corner, music and dancers performed, and conference attendees lined up to receive Thai massages. Food and drink was foisted on me from every table. Morimoto stood at one table signing books and the occasional volunteer’s toque. True to his title, he prepared the standout dish of the night- a dessert of candied salmon and yuzu ice cream.

By Friday, we had prepped and prepared almost all of Ammini’s recipes. Earlier in the day, I helped bring her mise en place over to the Ventura Center where she demoed her Black Pepper Soup for most of the conference participants. Back in the kitchen, I was able to watch the live feed of Ammini presenting. I could tell that her demure yet engaging banter with the emcee was quite a hit with the audience. After Ammini’s taping, I went back to work heating up some tuvar dal fritters and making five hundred quenelles of semolina pudding for Ammini’s table at that night’s marketplace.

As the conference drew to a close on Saturday night, I was entirely exhausted from over fifty hours of work in four days. Still, I couldn’t believe how exciting the experience had been. I was dizzy with the scope of the food I’d eaten and seen prepared in the last few days and was incredibly grateful to have met so many inspiring chefs, diligent cooks, and fascinating writers. Though I was completely worn-out from the conference, I found myself anxious to do the whole thing again next year.

Ammini Ramachandran's site with articles about Kerala and information about her book:

http://peppertrail.com/