Berry Baklava with a Honey Rosé Balsamic Glaze

By Darlene Buerger, 1st place winner in our Frey Wine Recipe Contest.

Berry Baklava

I love summertime and the abundance of sweet berries. For me that means berry pie, berry sauce, berries and ice cream or just about anything I can make to enjoy fresh berries. I also love the fresh taste and sweet aroma of Frey Organic Natural Rosé Wine. I decided to incorporate my two favorites into this easy to make, elegant recipe. Who says “You can’t have your wine and eat it too?” This recipe is best when served with an additional glass (or two) of Frey Organic Natural Rosé Wine. Enjoy!   

Ingredients:
1-8oz roll phyllo dough, thawed
½ cup butter, melted
1½ cup walnuts, chopped
6oz raspberries
6oz blueberries
½ cup cherries, pitted, chopped
½ cup sugar
2 tablespoons flour
1 teaspoon lemon zest

Glaze
½ cup honey
½ cup sugar
½ cup Frey’s Organic Natural Rosé Wine
2 Tablespoons lemon juice
1 Tablespoon balsamic vinegar

*Topping
2 tablespoons walnuts, chopped
2 tablespoons shredded sweetened coconut, toasted
1 tablespoon grated ginger
1 teaspoon lemon zest

Directions:
Spray 9x11 inch baking pan with cooking spray.
1) In a medium saucepan combine berries, sugar, flour and 1 teaspoon lemon zest. Cook over low heat 2 to 3 minutes or until berries have broken down and sauce has started to thicken. Cool slightly. 

2) Unroll phyllo and remove single sheet.  Place on flat surface. Brush with butter and repeat until you have 5 layers. Place phyllo in pan and place ¾ cup walnuts on top of phyllo. Top walnuts with 5 more layers phyllo and butter. Top this layer with berries and 5 more sheets of phyllo and butter. Top this layer with remaining walnuts and 5 more sheets of phyllo and butter. Generously butter top of final layer of phyllo and score top, cutting through all layers into desired size pieces. (3x3 inch squares or diamonds)

3) Bake baklava at 350 degrees for 25 to 35 minutes or until golden brown.

4) Glaze: In a saucepan combine honey, sugar, wine and lemon. Heat to a boil and then reduce heat to low and simmer 6 to 8 minutes or until sauce starts to thicken. (Stir sauce to keep it from burning.) Remove sauce from burner and stir in balsamic vinegar.

5) Pour cooled sauce over the baklava. Sprinkle with *Topping. Allow to set for at least 1 hour before serving.
Serves 8

Apr 8, 2015 at 4:58 PM Permalink

Spring Approaches on the Farm!

Goats grazing in Frey organic vineyard.

Spring on the Frey farm has come early this year. The sun shine and rainfall has made a lush and lively winter. Baby lambs frolick in the meadows.  Pregnant goat moms are heavy with kids as they take their daily walks to browse and fertilize the vineyards.  Our duck and chicken friends have recovered from the cold weather with lots of deep orange egg yolks from their free-ranging escapades. The days on the farm are spent managing the farm animals, lettiing them eat the rich green grasses.

My husband and I tend the herd of goats.  We milk and walk the goats each day, and bring them special treats like raspberry and blackberry leaves to prepare them herbally for the kidding season ahead. I try to notice which of the does is "bagging up" in the udder, which indicate she’s pregnant. During this month I'll make several trips to the barn to check if anybody is showing other signs of babies on the way. Fresh straw is spread out, and we partition off parts of the barn as the “delivery rooms.” This year, three goats are expecting: Sophia, Cardamom, and Lhasa. I like to be the midwife, helping along any births, and giving the mother a post-partum tonic of molasses, wheat bran, and ivy (a recipe that I got from Juliette Barclay Levi's fantastic work "The Complete Herbal Handbook for Farm and Stable"). 

As the sun warms everything up and the days get longer, we’ve been making Biodynamic preparations.  They are made at the farm with ingredients from the farm, and stored in ceramic vessels. We apply the "500" preparation in the spring to bring renewed strength and nourishment to the soil. My father-in-law, Luke Frey, has been studying these Biodynamic formulas for over a decade. The preparations foster vitality in the soil and to the farm as a whole.  Biodynamics were brought forth by Rudolph Steiner in 1924, and treat the farm as one large self-sustaining organism. We add these "preps" to hand-swirled water vortices, acting as homeopathic medicinal blessings of fertility and creativity for the farmer, the farm, and the planet. Biodynamics goes beyond organic, connecting the soul to the soil. Click here for more information about Biodynamic agriculture.

Apr 2, 2015 at 1:57 PM Permalink

Syrah and Petite Sirah: Similar Names, Distinct Wines!

Frey Vineyards likes to offer customers a wide range of organic and non-sulfited wines.  Among other things, this has led us into producing both Syrah and Petite Sirah wines.  The similarity in the names leads many to lump them together.  In reality they are distinct varietals with unique histories, characteristics and flavors. 

Syrah and Petite Sirah are both technically French Rhone varietals but Syrah enjoys a much richer and storied history.  Syrah is one of the parent grapes of Petite Sirah, and one of the most widely planted French varietals, while Petite Sirah, although developed in France in the 1860’s, is almost non-existent in Europe!

Syrah is a Noble grape variety and firmly rooted in French winegrowing.  Its origins are ancient and legends of its beginnings abound.  Syrah may have been referenced by Roman philosopher Pliny the Elder.  Some believe it was brought to France by a crusader returning from his journeys and planted in Hermitage, one of the regions famous for its Syrah wines.  DNA profiling in 1999 found Syrah to be the offspring of two obscure grapes from southeastern France: Dureza and Mondeuse blanche, grown for at least 2,000 years.  Syrah is a primary component of Côte du Rhone and Châteauneuf-du-Pape blends in France.  In Australia it is Shiraz, the most cultivated grape Down Under.  Syrah is the seventh most planted grape in California.

Flavors and styles of Syrah are greatly influenced by climate and growing conditions.
French Syrahs are known for subtle flavors of leather, tobacco and “animale,” an almost indescribable flavor hinting of animal, sweat, man or raw meat.  Yum!  Australian “New World” Shiraz wines are fruit-forward, spicy and full of jammy plum flavors.  California Syrahs vary depending on growing region, and here at Frey Vineyards our winemaker Paul Frey always says it is his favorite to work with.  Our Syrahs offer a marriage of the two styles: full-bodied, with forward plum juiciness and a subtle finish of rich earthy tobacco and chewy tannins.

While Syrah and Petite Sirah both made their way to California in the late 1800s, original plantings of Syrah were wiped out by the root-eating Phylloxera louse and weren’t reintroduced until the 1950s.  Syrah has gained wide acceptance and is now a common grape, still far behind Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, but with over 7,000 acres in production.  Petite Sirah plantings in California are older than most other varieties, but it is not widely planted with only an estimated 2,500 acres today. 

Unlike Syrah, the origins of Petite Sirah are clear.  Petite Sirah was originally named Durif for the viticulturist Francois Durif whose nursery first produced the grape in the 1860s.  Durif was bred from a nursery cross-pollination of the noble Syrah grape and Peloursin, an obscure varietal that is now almost extinct in France.  For the first century of its existence Durif was seen as nothing more than a useful grape for strengthening weak blends, as it has lots of tannins and color and good acidity. 
 
Durif made its way to California in the late 1800’s where the name Petite Sirah gradually overtook Durif, due to the fact that it is generally less vigorous than Syrah and the berry size is smaller.  Local Mendocino County growers commonly refer to their Petite Sirah blocks as their “Pets.”  The high skin to juice ratio makes Petite Sirah an inky and full-bodied wine, relatively high in acid with characteristic spicy and peppery tones. Here as well, it was a blender, a common component in field blend plantings where vineyards are planted out to several varieties that are harvested, fermented and aged together.  Petite Sirah was not yet embraced as a varietal wine in its own right.  That changed in the 1970s and 1980s when California was a hotbed of winemaking innovation and experimentation.  Winemakers began to prize Petite Sirah for its unique flavors and cellaring ability and it is now grown throughout the state.  In the last fifty years, the grape became more established in the hotter climates of California, Australia, Israel and Mexico than its native Europe.

Frey Vineyards’ Petite Sirah is grown in a relatively cool section of our Redwood Valley Home Ranch, with afternoon shade and cool breezes blowing down the Enchanted Canyon of Mariposa Creek.  Our Petite is medium-bodied, with a subtle herbal bouquet, plum and blueberry flavors, and a lingering tannic finish with a touch of spice.

Syrah or Petite Sirah are both well adapted to our hot and dry climate in Inland Mendocino.  They are full-bodied rich wines with lots of flavor and color.  We encourage you to explore their uniqueness and similarities and look forward to many more vintages of each of these outstanding wines!

Cheers and Happy Springtime!

Apr 2, 2015 at 11:53 AM Permalink

Spring 2015, Vineyard Report

Peach tree in blossom in Frey organic Syrah vineyard.

April Fools Day dawned early for those who were foolish enough to sign up for vineyard frost protection.  The first of April brought our first spring frost in the early morning hours and the first night of Frost Patrol.  Temperatures dipped into the low 30s and grape growers throughout Mendocino County scurried about, running overhead irrigation to protect tender new grape shoots from freezing.  Looking ahead into April we are anticipating much colder temperatures than we experienced in February and March.  We expect many more nights of freezing temperatures before danger of frost ends in mid May.

The current fabled California Drought has created some of the most incredible vintages in recent memory.  So far, 2015 has started with the warmest winter on record in California and consequently one of the earliest bud breaks observed on the North Coast.  Every variety including Cabernet Sauvignon awoke from dormancy before the first of April.  We are fortunately at our average seasonal rainfall for our region now and are looking forward to April showers to bring May flowers - grape flowers, that is!

Mustard cover crop in Frey organic Cab vineyard.

With the cover crops in full bloom and the fields abuzz with insects and birds, we are starting spring field cultivation.  We are in the process of spreading composted grape skins, stems and seeds from previous harvests that will be incorporated into the soil when the cover crops are mowed and disked in as a green manure.  This introduction of organic matter into the soils year after year is a cornerstone of our organic soil fertility management. 

Young plantings of Tempranillo, Barbera and Malbec from 2013 at our Road D Ranch are getting established right on schedule for a first vintage of 2017.  This site boasts USGS classified Red Vine Clay Loam soil, renowned for growing hearty red grape varietals in Redwood Valley.  We look forward to experimenting with and adding these varieties to our portfolio of organic, additive-free wines.

After three flawless vintages, we are expecting Mother Nature to dish out some heavy weather in 2015.  There is an Old Farmer’s Wive’s Tale that for one in every ten years of farming the conditions are perfect, and that is considered the norm.  The nine years in between always bring something to complain about.  We don’t need 2015 to be an extraordinary year, we’d be perfectly happy with another “normal” vintage!  Cheers and good wishes for a happy and healthful spring season!

Crows search for worms and bugs behind the plow.

Apr 1, 2015 at 12:00 PM Permalink