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Jason Haas

Organic Vineyards... and Organic Wines

I was recently approached by an eco-friendly marketing agency who, along with the Wine Institute, was thinking about a campaign promoting wine made from organic grapes. At Tablas Creek, we believe strongly that organic farming gives us better grapes that taste more like where they are grown and more like

Vertical Tasting of 1997-2004 Signature Red Wines

The following article appeared in our February 2006 newsletter, and received so many comments that I thought it would be useful to put up online. We've always thought our red Rhone blends would age well, but hadn't done a formal vertical tasting in a while. Before

Cover Crops in the Vineyard

Each winter, we plant our vineyard with a cover crop. This mix of peas, oats and vetch keeps erosion to a minimum, provides a habitat for beneficial insects, and contributes nutrients to the organic vineyard. In the winter, this cover crop is mostly green, dominated by the oats and vetch.

Congratulations to Lane Forsythe

Congratulations to Lane Forsythe of Arlington, VA, who won the first-ever Tablas Creek VINsider NCAA Tournament pool. In this crazy year where no #1 seed made the final four, Lane correctly picked two of the four final four participants (UCLA and Florida) and ended up in the 94.7th percentile

New Tasting Room at Tablas Creek

When we built the Tablas Creek winery and office building in 1997, we were under the belief that we would be purely a production facility, and leave the marketing and sales of our wine entirely to other people. So, when we designed the building, we did not include a tasting

Field grafting Picpoul Blanc

We grafted over a section of Roussanne yesterday, replacing it with Picpoul Blanc. Picpoul has thrived here, and its bright acidity makes a nice addition in our Esprit de Beaucastel Blanc blend. The crew first cut the Roussanne vines about a foot from the surface, and then field grafted the

Winter Returns to Paso Robles

So, just when we think that we're ready to escape from winter and move onto spring, we're reminded that March in California is tremendously unpredictable. This morning, we had snow for the second time this winter (after 5 winters with no snow at all). To celebrate,

Blending with Francois Perrin

One of the most crucial (as well as most fun) parts of the winemaking process is when the individual wines have finished their fermentation, and we are ready to start assembling the blends. This past weekend, Francois Perrin joined us (Robert Haas, Jason Haas, Neil Collins, and Ryan Hebert) to

Snow in Paso Robles!

Update 2/9/2009: We have had our next snow (3 years, almost to the day, later). You can view photos and read descriptions at https://tablascreek.wpcomstaging.com/2009/02/snow-in-the-vineyard Every 5 years or so, it does snow in Paso Robles. This weekend, we got a few inches

Tablas Creek Wetland Area

At the end of January, we finally completed our new wetlands project. The project, in response to a new California law requiring wineries to treat their waste water before releasing it into the environment, consistes of a series of ponds designed to filter runoff water from the winery while breaking