LA, White & Co. Wine Trading.
Located on the tenth floor of a fairly large building, Christopher’s company was one of countless wine distribution firms based in California, presently recognized as mid-sized.
One might think it advantageous to have a representative who was a wine critic, but since the wines he reviewed could not be distributed, the speed of business expansion was surprisingly slow. The entries of wines he handled varied from low to high prices; if White & Co. had any particular strength, it was the word that their high-priced wines were at least trustworthy.
“Sorry I’m late.”
Christopher White entered the conference room. In his hand was a contract he had just brought from Napa.
“Everyone, please be seated.”
The department heads under him quickly took their seats. Sales team leader Mark, logistics officer Helen, marketing manager Andrew. All watched Christopher’s lips with tense faces.
He placed the contract on the table and spoke quietly.
“As I mentioned before, this is the exclusive distribution contract with Redwood Winery. The product name is Sylphide. A Russian River Valley Single Vineyard Pinot Noir.”
Instantly, murmurs swept through the conference room. One salesperson, a former sommelier, muttered with wide eyes.
“Huh? Redwood—sir, isn’t that the place that made Aesylon, which you reviewed not long ago?”
“That’s right. It was quite a shocking wine. A Cabernet should only reveal a firm structure and deep aromatics after years of aging, yet they awakened it in merely one year. Unfortunately, since Aesylon was already published in a review, we cannot touch it, but this is different.”
Since the CEO himself, a wine critic, had tasted and selected it, the employees could raise no objections. Nor did they even think to question his choice. Because, at least at the mid-tier entry level and above, Christopher had never once been wrong.
“Now then, what we have to do is simple. Spread this wine across the entire East Coast. But we don’t need noisy advertising. Instead, place it on the finest tables.”
He continued, pointing at several spots on the map of the United States attached to the wall.
“Mark, the sales team must secure a list of New York’s finest restaurants. Per Se, Daniel, Eleven Madison Park. Hand tasting samples directly to their chefs. Make the story start from their mouths first.”
“Yes, understood.”
“Helen, logistics—by air cargo from Napa, California, send two hundred cases priority to New York JFK airport. Simultaneously, arrange overland truck schedules for Boston and Philadelphia. They must arrive before the fall banquet season begins.”
From late October through November, corporate events, banquets for politicians and lobbyists, art museums, operas, and charity galas are held in succession. Christopher’s orders were a strategy to concentrate promotion of Sylphide during this period.
“Yes, I will proceed immediately.”
“Andrew, marketing—do not advertise directly. Instead, subtly leak the message ‘Christopher White’s chosen wine’ through the critic network and sommelier associations. The absence of an official review will actually stimulate curiosity.”
The marketing manager nodded.
“Understood. We don’t tell them directly; we make people curious.”
“Exactly. People embrace more fervently the wines they discovered themselves. Remember—this wine must not be made to appear like an awkward Pinot Noir from a newborn winery. Depending on how we handle it in the East, Sylphide’s value will be decided.”
“Yes!”
As the employees left the conference room, Christopher remained alone and examined the map. Though quantity was sorely lacking for the company to climb higher, he felt certain that he could raise market share further with this opportunity.
---
The autumn sunlight in Alexander Valley lay low but was still warm. At Laguna Creek Farm, the vineyards were entering harvest for Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. At this most crucial time, Armando was waiting for me in a thoroughly cleaned winery.
“Spent money cleaning again. Money draining everywhere.”
Already the way he spoke reeked of a CEO.
“So you’ve come to understand how I feel.”
“Yeah, no kidding.”
Opening the warehouse door, a thick fruit fragrance poured out from harvest bins brimming with freshly picked grapes. I immediately put on gloves and placed my hand on the pile of grapes.
“Good, let’s start now. The camera?”
“Got it ready, this camcorder. But this costs money too.”
“...”
I had told him to prepare one beforehand, just as my father had once recorded with a camera when he first learned, lest he forget, but Armando was sulking again over the money spent. Because I understood that feeling, I merely nodded.
“Don’t worry too much. When we start selling vinegar later, we’ll be able to recover all the enormous funds spent up to now.”
“It’ll have to. I believe it can.”
Armando nodded with wide eyes. Several stainless steel fermentation tanks stood around, and among them, a small prepared tank was today’s stage.
First, the crushing step. As workers poured grape clusters into the crusher-destemmer, stems, seeds, and skins were crushed together, and pulp-like grape must flowed down. As the red liquid filled the vat, I said to Armando:
“When making wine, you have to watch out for the bitter taste from the seeds and skins, but vinegar is different. Even that bitterness becomes part of the flavor. We’ll put this grape must in the tank for primary fermentation. We need to produce alcohol here, so we have to add yeast.”
I took out a small packet. Saccharomyces cerevisiae, the most stable and commonly used yeast in winemaking.
“Most ordinary vinegars on the market are fermented quickly through natural fermentation or mass continuous systems—industrial setups that blow in oxygen—so their taste is simple and sharp. But we use wine yeast and wine-grade grapes with good commercial value, not grapes with poor commercial value, so the flavor is bound to be different.”
“Ooh—”
“Maintain the temperature between twenty-two and twenty-five degrees. If it’s too hot or too cold, the yeast dies or the flavor becomes muddy. Keep checking with this attached temperature sensor, and if necessary, run water to cool the outer wall of the tank.”
Armando looked at the sensor and muttered.
“Twenty-two degrees… I’ll have to keep watching. Got it.”
After sprinkling the yeast and closing the lid, foam slowly began to rise in the grape must. A uniquely sweet and pungent aroma spread through the air.
“In just a few days, alcohol will form. And then comes the real core.”
I immediately lifted a glass bottle brought from home. Inside was a transparent culture medium, covered on the surface by a cloudy, delicate film.
“Acetobacter. Acetic acid bacteria. These are what turn alcohol into vinegar.”
Armando raised his eyebrows.
“So we add this after the yeast?”
“Right. But there’s something to watch out for. Wine needs to be blocked from oxygen, but vinegar is the opposite. Acetic acid bacteria feed on oxygen, so the surface needs to be exposed widely. That’s why we use a shallow, wide tank like this.”
I explained while leaving the tank lid half open.
“Temperature between twenty-eight and thirty degrees. It needs to be slightly high for vigorous activity. But be careful—if it exceeds thirty-five degrees, the bacteria will die.”
Armando nodded, camcorder in hand, and I pointed into the tank as if picturing a few days later.
“Now, instead of an alcohol aroma, a sour smell will rise. That’s the sign acetic acid fermentation is underway. But if we stop here, it’s no different from common table vinegar.”
I brought over sacks of oak chips stacked on one side of the warehouse. Finely cut French oak fragments exuded a heavy fragrance.
“If we add this during the aging process, the aroma changes. Like wine, wood and fruit harmonize. We must wait at least six months. The longer the time, the rounder the acidity becomes, and instead of merely sharp, stinging vinegar, it becomes vinegar fit to be used as a base for dressing or sauce in fine restaurants.”
Armando picked up an oak chip and held it to his nose, inhaling deeply.
“Ooh—this sweet woody scent where vanilla and subtle coconut overlap feels just like wine.”
“Right. It’s no different from wine. Only whether you can endure until the end.”
Pouring grape must into the tank, preparing yeast and acetic acid bacteria in turn, we sweated profusely. When the work was finished, the tank was already filled with red liquid, alive with tiny bubbles bursting and churning.
I took off my gloves and said,
“Now begins the waiting. In a few months, from this tank, the first vinegar bearing your name will be born.”
Armando looked at the grape must on his fingertips. The sticky red liquid gleamed in the sunlight. He smiled and muttered low.
“I’m so excited and trembling, it feels like my heart will burst.”
I nodded.
“It does now. Don’t forget what I told you.”
“Of course, naturally.”
“Let’s go out now.”
When we stepped outside, workers were still toiling hard in the vineyard. I walked slowly with Armando, watching them work.
“How is it? Running pretty well?”
Armando’s words were soaked in anticipation and excitement.
“Yeah, it’s running better than I thought?”
“I trained the workers a lot. I deliberately paid slightly higher wages and provided good food so the workers wouldn’t rotate out each time. There are also people from back home who come here specifically to work. My mom’s a good cook, too.”
“Oho, so your mom’s helping out a lot?”
“Of course. Mom worried a lot before we acquired the farm, but now she tries to help as much as she can.”
“I see.”
Armando, who had been staring blankly at the farm, stopped walking and slowly ran his hand along a grapevine.
“Uh… America is a country of immigrants, but still, I always felt like I was floating somewhere. I was always just a laborer. Do you know what my mom did best?”
“What?”
“Sending me to school. It was public school, so there was no tuition, but still she sent me to Vintage High School, which is quite prestigious around our neighborhood, and told me to concentrate on my studies. Honestly, I didn’t study that hard, but meeting you seems to have changed my life.”
“Not necessarily.”
“Ah, right. Before Mom married my current dad, I didn’t even have proper permanent residency. I was completely a foreigner. But after acquiring the farm, somehow… it’s hard to put into words, but somehow I feel recognized as someone who belongs here. Even though most of it is bank debt, it’s still mine on paper, right? You know how I feel?”
“…I do. Because we’re both foreigners.”
“I knew you’d understand.”
Leaving the vineyard behind, Armando stretched both arms wide and smiled brilliantly.
“See? All the way back there to where the end isn’t visible—it’s all my farm. Everything gained here is mine. Isn’t it awesome? These trees, this soil, the grapes… and the winery too. Sometimes my hair stands on end and I get chills.”
“I know that feeling.”
“A week ago, while watching the movie Gladiator, some music came on, and I strangely thought of my farm then? I felt a shiver. Later I looked up what that music was. It’s called ‘Now We Are Free.’ These days I listen to it all the time. Walking through the vineyard while listening to the music, it feels like the whole world is mine. And I somehow feel that someday, I’ll become the owner of some… great winery in Sonoma.”
At Armando’s dreamlike expression, even I felt a strange emotion.
“You can become that.”
“Really?”
“Of course. Because I’m going to become that, so you will too.”
“Haha, good. I’m certain you’ll become that. But I know my place. The great winery I mentioned isn’t enormously big and famous. Delicious grapes growing, many people seeking the vinegar and wine produced at my winery, and a loved one by my side. That’s the happiest winery in the world. Of course, the wife has to be pretty. That’s the most important thing.”
“…”
“Don’t tell me you’re saying no? That’s ridiculous.”
Behind the bantering Armando, the vineyard dyed red by the setting sun and the Russian River visible in the distance formed a background truly as beautiful as a painting.