Dear Friends, I realize that my personal fear of email overload provides a comfortable excuse for being terrible at communicating with those of you who have, in fact, volunteered to receive emails from me. But I like to think I’ve spared you from anything extraneous, waiting instead to share only what I hope you will […]
Letters from the Edge
Imaginarium
Dear Friends, Almost exactly a year ago, I was asked to speak at the incredible 2023 Napa Rise event in California, sponsored by Napa Green. If you don’t know Napa Green, it is one of the most thoughtful certification programs I have seen, providing concierge-level service to growers, wherever they are on their journey, while […]
Can Biodiversity Create Terroir: A Conversation With Mimi Casteel
Here is a deep dive into one of my favorite questions, in an interview with Joseph V Micallef, published in Forbes, October 22, 2023. “You have suggested that the microflora in a vineyard, especially the portion that coinhabits a grape vine’s rooting system, plays a critical role in translating soil features into a […]
What if things get better?
“As the predictions of climate scientists become reality, imagining a better future can feel impossible. But hope might be right beneath our feet… Mimi Casteel shows us what’s possible with regenerative agriculture.” Read the full story by Pulitzer finalist Karen Russell in Esquire, October 19, 2023 Read it here: What If Things Get Better?
A Drink from the Well of Improbable Hope
An Autumnal Tale with a most Improbable End Equinox Eve, Sept 22, 2023 Friends, Once a year, just before the first rain beetle takes flight, as the angle of shifting light splits umbrellas of leaves in a syrupy prism of golden green into carmine, as the redolence of sappy summer dries to a heavy blaze […]
Blush and the Bovine – A tale of two deaths and eternal life
As goes rosé, so goes beef. Rosé is dead, long live rosé Whilst summer fills our cups with sunshine, before her longest day grows dim, let us pass a moment together and let our thoughts be fluid, quenching the desiccated landscapes of our wrung-out minds. Put down spinning worries and numbing problems and let’s make […]
“Is this thing on?” In which Mimi gets a Microphone
Uh, for those of you who just tuned in, the Pinedale Shopping Mall has just been bombed with live turkeys. Film at eleven. ~Dr Johnny Fever I’ve got lists. Do you have them? For me, listing is a love / hate relationship. It’s like all kinds of things that I know I should do; I […]
new Hope Well, and new wines!
HUNTER’S MOON October 9, 2022 Friends, First and foremost, we finally have some Pinot Noir to sell and I’m so excited to share these wines with you. As you know from my earlier letter about Vendange 2021, these are the last wines I made at my old site, and for that their stories carry special […]