When I joined Doug Braun and two colleagues outside the Allan Hancock College winery on a blustery December afternoon — Braun’s final day of teaching — he held his retirement “project,” a 4-month-old puppy, Coal.
Coal would likely become the focus of Braun’s attention as he segued from a 30-year career teaching at both Hancock’s Lompoc and Santa Maria campuses. During his tenure at the college, Braun witnessed the Viticulture & Enology program morph from a handful of classes in 1987 to a department with its own vineyard, solid connections in the Central Coast wine industry and a bonded on-campus winery where students now craft award-winning wines.
Today, students in the program can discuss the benefits of organic wines, concrete eggs as aging vessels and in-barrel fermentations, Braun said. Read more…
