Well that was better than last year!
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The aftermath of the hurricane - empty crates everywhere!
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After the disaster that was the grape harvest in 2012 we were taken pleasantly by surprise this year with 20 times the volume of fruit coming into the winery over October and early November. It was hard work, especially with the hurricane that swept over southern England on the last weekend in October, meaning that every vineyard in the UK rushed to pick their grapes before the wind and rain came in. The sugars were generally lowish - about 16-16.5 brix - but the acidities and pHs were at great levels meaning the fruit and juice tasted ripe - and we prefer it that way round. We, like the champenois, can add sugar by chaptalizing while we hate de-acidification. The newly fermented wines are so varied and the different sites with the same vineyard managers, same winemaking techniques, only a few miles or even a few hundred metres apart have distinct characters. This gives us as the winemakers a fantastic palette of flavours to work with. Anyone who claims terroir does not exist should come and taste each tank and then think again. The fun of blending begins next week so that we can start cold-stabilising and filtering in the New Year.
With 16 partner vineyards and/or contract clients all bringing their fruit to us for processing it is a real juggling act to make sure we don't run out of tanks and barrels for everyone. On the last day of pressing we had just one empty tank left - absolutely vital to be able to move the wines after ferment. We had to turn some last-minute fruit down in the end because we simply didn't have the space (that, and I think there would have been a rebellion in the winery).
There was a great team of young cellar-hands from all walks of life, some of whom actually took holiday from their proper jobs to be worked half to death in the winery for 4 weeks. Crazy, but brilliant to work with such enthusiastic people. We estimated we washed about 14,000 picking crates over the course of the harvest - and although the enthusiasm for that waned slightly by the end everyone still had smiles on their faces at the end.
