Napa winemaker has no offseason
Chris Kajani says she's always trying to learn and grow
The winter months tend for be slower for wineries and their personnel.
But listening to Chris Kajani, the president and winemaker at Bouchaine Vineyards in Napa a few weeks ago talk about her schedule, she still is pushing the pedal to the metal.
“I'm about to do a bunch of events and be on the road a little bit,” she says in answer to a question about this time of the year, one that bridges harvest to the next growing season. “Our wine is being paired at the Palm Desert Food and Wine Festival with Dominique Crenn, and she's one of my idols as the first female three-star Michelin chef. We're really, really excited for this and I'm thrilled to meet her. We also attend the World of Pinot where there are 100 or 150 Pinot Noir wineries that are presenting. You get to see friends. It's like a big reunion. Plus, there are Pinot fanatics there. Just absolute insanity. You know the fandom for Pinot Noir and that's really exciting to be around.”
Between the traveling is the obvious work that never ends in the cellar, from a rosé going into the bottle now to whites following suit in April to working on several blends. “Even in what's considered offseason,” she says, “when we're not in full harvest, there's so much going on.”
Kajani has found a home in an area she has called home since birth, a Napa native who fondly recalls raiding her parents' wine cellar and riding the neighbors' horses. In what is Women's History Month, she's a shining example of the talented influx of women joining the ranks. Of the 4,200-plus wineries in California, approximately 14% of them reported a woman as their lead winemaker in a 2020 Santa Clara University study. That's an increase from the 10% figure reported in its 2011 study.
Headed toward a career in biotech, Kajani says she was living in San Francisco and immersing herself in the many wine classes that the local university was offering. “I had taken a lot of classes. I really enjoyed learning about wine, really enjoyed tasting wine,” she says. “I just didn't know people did that for a living as far as making wine goes.”
Then came what she calls her kismet moment, a dinner party hosted by her roommate in 2000 that included Ed Kurtzman on the guest list, a Pinot Noir
master who has brought his consulting and winemaking skills to the cellars of several producers while also creating his own labels. Ironically, he had a similarly unique circuitous journey, sparked by taking a job at an East Coast wine shop near university and discovering wine to be far more than a part-time job.
“He talked me into this, let me do kind of do a parttime harvest,” she says. “He let me hang out in the cellar and clean tanks and help with bottling and I got to see the process and really just got bit by the winemaking bug.”
He was the first person to write a letter of recommendation for her for the master's program at UC Davis in viticulture and enology, where she began studying in 2003. “I don't know what would have happened had I not met Ed. He really gave me a push,” she says.
Graduating in 2005, she has since held several roles, from winemaking assistant at Pahlmeyer Winery where she became involved in the producer's newly launched Pinot Noir program, to associate winemaker and eventually winemaker at Saintsbury Winery in mid-2006 as associate winemaker, to Bouchaine Vineyards in April 2015, where she originally was winemaker and general manager, the first woman to hold this position. She was promoted to president there in 2023 and remains the winemaker.
“It really does get into your bones,” she says of the business. “You're experiencing just the joys of tasting wine, of course. But when you're able to kind of get out in a vineyard and you're able to watch the crew who worked so hard all year long, you know to bring in the highest quality grapes and then be in a cellar when they're crushing, the smell of wine and juice everywhere and the energy of creating something and making something and trying to shepherd, you know, all of the efforts from the
vineyard through the cellar into a bottle. It's a pretty special experience.”
For those unfamiliar, Bouchaine Vineyards is the oldest continuously operating winery in Carneros, in northern California. It is situated in the Los Carneros AVA. Located on Buschli Station Road, it traces its history to the late 1880s, when a Missouri-born settler named Boon Fly planted grapes and fruit trees on the property, according to the history that appears on the website. An Italian winemaker named Johnny Garetto bought the land in 1927 and farmed it until 1961, when he sold it to Beringer.
After two decades of being used for storage, as a storage facility, Gerret and Tatiana Copeland bought the winery building and surrounding 30 acres. Since then, they have purchased more land, expanding the vineyard to more than 85 acres while building a brand well-known for its Pinot Noirs in addition to a mix of varietals that include Chardonnay, Riesling, Pinot Gris, Gewurztraminer, Pinot Meunier and Syrah, most of them sold at the winery.
The couple, who live in California and Delaware, are also well-known for their philanthropy, as massive supporters of everything from the arts to the SPCA and helping rescue animals to heart health. The Tatiana Copeland Breast Center at the Helen F. Graham Cancer Center Research Institute in Wilmington is devoted exclusively to breast care, diagnosis and treatment. In 2018 they donated $15 million to the Delaware Art Museum with the stated hope that others would follow to assist in putting the museum back on a better financial footing following some instability.
Kajani points out that a family-owned winery such as Bouchaine is becoming rarer in California, and also cites the ongoing relationships
they have with grape growers such as Larry Hyde and Dr. Paul Gee that supplement the grapes Kajani's all-female crew pulls from their vineyard blocks. It's a fully sustainability-farmed vineyard that benefits from its proximity to the maritime influences that provide fog, breezes, and cooler temperatures. On a sunny day, she says, from a vineyard terrace you can see San Francisco, 30 miles to the south.
It is a cycle she has learned to treasure, one that in a sense is the same every year but completely different depending on “what Mother Nature throws at you. So if it's a hot year or cold year or a dry year or wet year, things are never the same. And so you have to be on your toes. You have to be ready to pivot. There's no recipe that works every year. You have to change things up and taste and observe in the vineyard and really think about what this year is giving you and how you're going to take that through your cellar into a bottle.”
As for her dual role, it has enhanced what she can do in the cellar, she says.
“It allows me to go further because if I was just the winemaker, I wouldn't have a seat at the table regarding the budget, right, how much you're going to spend on farming, how much you're going to spend on barrels, how much you're going to be able to purchase for maybe some new vessels or equipment year to year,” she says. “But being the President, I do. I have that final say. I also get to have a seat at the table as far as pricing, as far as where the wine goes. Is it all DTC and sold at the winery? Is it put into wholesale? What is it that we're trying to show the customer and how do we divvy up that business?”
That oversight extends to deciding on packaging and hiring and “creating a culture around what we're doing that's like-minded and inspired by who we are that continues to move the whole brand forward,” she says. “No one does this in a silo, and so the ability to create a team that's jazzed up and wanting to take everything to the next level.”
For all the work, there's also time to play, from hiking to hanging out on the beach. “Anytime I can sit on a sand dune and watch whale spouts, I'm super excited,” she says. “I love skiing, love the mountains, love the desert. It's important when you work a lot and you run a business to get away, recharge, rejuvenate. So I try to find those moments to do that.”
Indeed, the week after we chatted, she was headed to Tahoe with her 14-year-old son to ski.
Remi Cohen, the CEO of nearby Domaine Carneros, met Kajani when she came on as a consulting viticulturist at Saintsbury, and their friendship has flourished since then. Both are members of the Wine Women GM Forum, a group of wine industry females who share stories and find answers to common problems that often emerge.
Cohen says that Kajani's talents reach far beyond her winemaking ability. “Chris has been an innovator and has brought many creative ideas to Bouchaine and the Carneros region. Chris oversaw the addition of a beautiful new hospitality space at Bouchaine that has both a modern feel and yet it fits beautifully with the natural surroundings of hills and vineyards,” Cohen says, noting that the building features a gorgeous professional kitchen where Chris has partnered with chefs to develop creative food pairings and experiences for her members and guests. “She was highly innovative with this space, even leading the way during the pandemic with virtual tastings and experiences. Chris has also pioneered the use of falconry in the region to keep away pesky birds in a natural and noninvasive way.”
For Kajani, it has all become part of a routine that's always challenging and rewarding, whether it's heading toward another growing season or finishing one up in the vineyard.
“There's an energy during harvest that's contagious and it kind of allows us all to push ourselves because as you can imagine the grapes don't wait,” she says. “So if there's a heat spike coming, you have to get certain tons out of the vineyard and into your cellar and maybe that's a seven-day week. Maybe those are 14-hour days. You do what it takes so that you're protecting the quality of the grapes and allowing for quality in your wine, and it keeps it exciting for sure.”