NELSEN BARTER
Matt Nelsen is a writer, comedian, filmmaker, and winemaker. He currently writes and directs deeply researched comedy videos about the climate crisis for Climate Town. For the past four years, he’s been filming throughout California for a project documenting the intersection of wine and climate change. He also ventured into winemaking. In his own words:
"These wines started as a trade. If I took enough harvest photos and vineyard drone shots, I could get one ton of Merlot from the most special vineyard in the world to me. This is the vineyard where my sister got married, where I took friends to show off the 140-year-old vines, where I learned about pruning and soil rehabilitation and cover crops and shoot thinning and partied to celebrate the end of harvest. And that first ton of Merlot in 2020 turned into great wine. But I kept coming back each vintage, each harvest, to trade filmmaking for more fruit. And now, after four vintages, it’s time to let these wines out into the world.
Native yeasts. Unfined and unfiltered. Minimal intervention. Neutral oak. Some whole cluster, depending on how I felt. The vineyards are practicing organic and I join some of the best, most thoughtful wineries in California in sourcing fruit from these sites. I make two wines, both for special reasons: The Merlot comes from my brother-in-law’s vineyard (Morgan Twain-Peterson of Bedrock Wine Co). My journey into wine is entirely because of Morgan and the hours and hours and hours we’ve spent together filming in vineyards. I’m very close with him and my sister, and I made my first wine (2020 Merlot) while my sister was pregnant with my nephew - I thought I might just make that wine, as a connection to my nephew over the years. This wine is all about family for me. The Cinsault is for my girlfriend of 10 years, Caroline. One of her all time favorite wines is the Sandlands Cinsault, that Tegan Passalacqua makes from very old Cinsault vines at Bechtold vineyard in Lodi. I wanted to make a Cinsault for her, but I wasn’t able to line up any of that Bechtold fruit. So I spent a couple years trying Cinsaults and asking around – there’s not a lot planted in CA, and it’s also a vigorous variety, so some of it is over-cropped and pretty neutral tasting. But then Katie Rouse (assistant winemaker at Bedrock) started getting some El Dorado Cinsault for her label Birdhorse - and that was the first Cinsault other than Bechtold that tasted great to me. So the next year (2023), I joined Katie in getting fruit from that vineyard, and made this wine for Caroline (Little Liney)."
