What you see is what you get.

If I weren't a winemaker, I might be a brewer or chef. I have always worked in food and beverage and love the way it brings people together—sharing a drink or breaking bread is such an ancient way to connect. The craft of taking raw ingredients and making something delicious stirs my soul.

For me, cultivating excellence is a commitment to continuous improvement. This involves a broad view of all the elements that go into our pursuit of delivering world-class wines and experiences to the people who visit our area and enjoy our wines. As a winemaker, this involves lifelong learning of new technology and techniques, and most importantly it requires maintaining a fire in me to refine every detail of the process and master my craft. The best wines are made with love for the land, people and craft.

My favorite memory of Napa Valley is from a few years before I moved here. I was at the time studying in SoCal with aspirations of transferring to UC Davis for their V&E program. I had come up with my fiancé to tour the school and learn more about the program and came to Napa for a visit. It was right after Christmas and it rained the whole time we were here. We went wine tasting and dined at local restaurants. At that time it seemed like a distant dream to live and work here. Periodically, something will remind me of that and I feel immensely fortunate to have realized my dream.

I began my wine journey on the hospitality side as a fine dining server. I was quickly captivated by the depth and mystique of wine and started studying independently and later receiving mentorship, eventually earning my level 1 certification from the Guild of Sommeliers. The fateful day was when I met a winemaker in Santa Barbara who had recently finished a Viticulture & Enology degree. Upon hearing about the program and internships, my future was clear and I was enrolled in the local college the next semester to complete the perquisites to transfer to UC Davis, from where I graduated.

My first harvest in Napa was a six-month lab internship at Nickel and Nickel. I started shortly after completing my studies at UC Davis and the opportunity to work in a wine lab cemented many of the technical skills I learned in school and was the perfect transition to a career in the wine industry.

My winemaking philosophy is to abandon preconceptions. One must strive to understand the most true expression of what the fruit can be, and work towards that. Generally speaking, for red wines this involves pushing the fruit to extract its potential but knowing when to back off. You need to guard against going too far.

Wine descriptors are designed to evoke a memory that communicates a characteristic of a particular wine. In some contexts it only needs to be meaningful to oneself; in other applications, it's meant to tell others about a given wine. The most abstract one that comes to mind is when tasting a 1997 Harlan Estate that reminded me of a fresh bicycle inner-tube. Having worked as a bike mechanic as a teenager it is a very intimate memory that I think is relatable.

The Napa Valley vintner who has influenced me most is Jean Hoefliger. I have worked under his mentorship for several vintages and have greatly benefited from his knowledge and intuitive sense of winemaking. His breadth of experience, patience and openness have made him a valued friend and role model.

If I could share a bottle of wine with any three people in history, I would choose Jesus Christ, Socrates and Genghis Khan.

There are many great wine and food pairings like Pinot Noir and duck, Cabernet and NY strip or Banyuls and chocolate tort, but the most magical is a good Sauterne (Chateau Yekem) and foie gras (goose).