Brix Readings

We have now introduced a more formalised measure of Brix readings, the idea being that this will help us track and monitor grape ripeness and help anticipate future year picking dates; The table below will be updated every 7 days;

                                8th   15th   22nd   29th    5th   12th   19th   26th
                                Aug  Aug    Aug    Aug    Sep   Sep   Sep   Sep
Montepulciano          12     12.5     16     17.5  17.5  20.0
Acid %                                                   10
Pecorino                    16     15       20     20.5  20.0  22.0
Acid %                                                     9.0    7.0    7.5
Sangiovese                14     15       18      21     19.5  21
Total Acid %                                            7.5    6.7    5.0
Temperature 'C          36     36       36      21      18   21.0


It is worth noting that the summer thus far in Italy has been very hot and dry, as a result the grapes look very dry, and fruit is still small. But the crop looks healthy and sizeable.

Note;  Brix readings have not been adjusted for Temperature.

PRUNING AND RACKING SPRING 2012

The wines have been racked once 1st week of December 2011. They were racked again on te 16th and 17th March, a small amount of sulphite added to the White and Rose, all wines look great except the experimental malolactic Pecorino which was discarded due to bad flavour.

The vines were pruned; it took me, BrendyH and GrahamF a good 1.5 days, the weather (again!) was very kind to us.

Montepulciano; 8 spurs of 4 buds each per vine
Sangiovese; 2 or 3 canes of 6 buds each per vine
Pecorino; 2 or 3 canes, 8-10 buds each per vine

We also fertilised the Pecorino and Montepulciano.

Grape Harvest and Winemaking Update

This morning I added yeast nutrient to the Sangiovese, it is already fermenting slowly.

For the past few days, the Montepulciano has been fermenting strongly, weve been punching the cap at least 3 times a day. At 4pm today, after around 70 hours of on the skin fermentation, we pressed the Montepulciano firmly for around 50 litres of juice.

To this we added 4 teaspoons of yeast nutrient and left to warm ferment in the workroom.

Grape Harvest and Winemaking Notes

The Sangiovese are still showing only at 19 Brix, there is far too much fruit, next year we need to cluster thin at 50%.

Rain is forecast for tomorrow, so we thought we would try and experiment,.

At 5pm we picked 101 Kgs of Sangiovese (less than half what we could have picked), crushed and sulphited at 2grams per 23Kgs of grapes, (8 grams in total). We then gave the grapes a quick squeeze by hand, and put them straight into the press, so probably 30 minutes in total from picking to press.

Then we took about 40 litres of 100% free run juice, put into the coldroom and added yeast Lalvin D47. The objective is to make a low alcohol, light white or pink wine, or even a high acid wine that we can blend with the overripe Pecorino.

Grape Harvest and Winemaking Notes

The Pecorino ferment in the workroom is slowing right down, it looks like the fermentation is pretty well finished, whereas the Pecorino in the coldroom is still fermenting very strongly.

We measured the Montepulciano at 24 Brix, the fruit looks excellent, so we decided to pick straightaway.

At around 4pm we picked 117 Kgs of Montepulciano, sulphited at around 2 grams per 23 Kgs of grapes, 10 Grams of sulphite in total. Destemmed around 75% of the stems and then added 100 grams of Oak Chips, and the yeast starter (we are still using Lalvin D47). The fermentation was off !

Pecorino Update

Added yeast nutrients, 3 teaspoons, to each batch of fermenting Pecorino

Pecorino Update

Friday 30th September

We pressed the Pecorino after about 20 hours on the skins to get around 100 litres of Juice. Well most of the juice (at least 75%) was free run. We put about 80 litres of Juice into the cold room with yeast, and a small batch, about 20 litres, in the hotter workroom also with yeast. The idea is to put the smaller batch thru malolactic and compare the results