And with that, there is no more fruit to harvest! On Friday, October 9 we harvested the last of the grapes – Syrah and Grenache! We brought in 9.3 tons of fruit, a record for the amount we crushed in one day all season. With the large amount of grapes to process and the complexity of having two varieties, it was a big crushing day! We had been practicing for this moment all harvest though, and we crushed it.
Until Tuesday of this week, we were not expecting to harvest the last fruit until the end of October! However, due to the heat waves here, the grapes ripened more quickly than planned. Of course, there’s only so much planning you can do when Mother Nature is involved. Some of the grapes ripened more than is ideal and we ended up with a lot of raisins to sort out.
Leading up to the big crush day, we had a few long days to prepare for the arrival of more fruit. The facility is pretty small, and the winery received almost double the tonnage of grapes this year versus last year. So, it has been an adventure for the winemaker to figure out where everything goes. To make room for the Syrah and Grenache that was coming, we had to drain the finished wine from tanks and press the rest of the wine from the grapes in those tanks.
Now that we’ve processed all the fruit, things should start slowing down! We might even get two days off next week. We will have the daily tasks of pump-overs and punch-downs for the fermenting Grenach and Syrah. The remaining Pinot Noir in tanks also needs to be barreled down, and malolactic bacteria needs to be added to the barrels that are completely dry (finished fermenting). Originally, this internship was going to go until Thanksgiving, but with the earlier end to harvesting fruit, things might slow down sooner than expected. Sounds like I need to start thinking about what I’m going to do next…
3 Highlights
The Last Bin! This phrase refers to the last bin that you process for the season, marking the end of harvesting and processing fruit. It was fun for us all to yell “Last bin!” as we started sorting through the last bin of grapes and loading them into the crusher/destemmer. However, there is still plenty to do until the wine can just sit and age!
The day after the last bin. A nice calm after the storm, we had a chill day of simple tasks, like punch-downs, breaking down a barrel into smaller vessels, moving some barrels into the cold room, and adding enzymes to the newly processed Grenache and Syrah. We started at 8 am instead of the usual 7 and were finished by 4:30! What a nice change of pace. There is something fun and exciting about those long days.
Stomping by foot on the Grenache and Syrah! Grenache and Syrah have such tough, thick skins that for the bins and tanks with whole cluster grapes (not crushed or destemmed) we had to get in and stomp on them by foot! First, I had to clean and sanitize my boots, then climb into the bin and actually stomp on the grapes. This was surprisingly tiring but also really fun. At one point four of us got into one tank and we got some great photos.
3 Things I Learned
Set a timer to turn off the chiller/heater! Don’t let your wine cook at 90 degrees overnight… Luckily the wine turned out ok but this could have killed the yeast and stopped fermentation too early, or otherwise adversely affected the taste/smell of the wine.
Make sure to clean any wine spills immediately and thoroughly! Fruit flies are attracted to wine and will multiply. Once they arrive it’s hard to get rid of them.
Check the pressure in your line/hose before opening a valve! Otherwise, wine might go everywhere.
3 Things I’m Looking Forward To
The upcoming harvest party! Everyone at the winery (cellar and tasting room) is going to get together to grill and drink some nice wines to celebrate harvest. We did it! We processed all the fruit!
Tasting all the wines we have aging in the cellar! Someday soon, on a slow day, we will get to sample all the wines from last year to see how they taste and learn about the aging process.
Seeing what this week has in store for us at the winery. Every week is so different and I’m curious to learn what’s next. I’m also looking forward to having some shorter days so I can do some more wine reading/watching/listening.
