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/wine/vintage2011
Thu, 27 Oct 2011
The start of vintage
Vintage starts tomorrow. I am working as an intern/stagiaire in
a negociant in Beaune (Remoissenet) thanks to the CFPPA's "Odyssey
in Burgundy" course.
So far, no idea what to expect. I'm staying in the stagiaire's house.
Accomodation is fairly basic, just a dormitory. Blankets would be nice....
No internet access there, so expect weblog posts to be somewhat
intermittent. I'm looking into finding an SCP program for Android so I
can type short posts on my phone and upload them.
Winery looks well appointed: lots of oak vats.
But I don't find out anything more until we start tomorrow....
posted at: 03:36 | path: /wine/vintage2011 |
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The sorting table...
Not much to report, so not much blogging recently.
The past few days I've been on the sorting table the whole
time.
My view
It gets repetive, but it has its interesting points. It's
certainly interesting to see grapes from different appelations
come in. We've already had a few premier cru sites.
So far it's been only the Cotes de Beaune, but presumably we'll get
Cotes de Nuits soon too.
Sorting has been quite aggressive, we're only keeping the good
grapes -- no rot or unripe ones are tolerated. From this, it
seems they're aiming to become one of the top negociants
for quality (again, apparently they were during the 1940's and 50's).
It will be interesting to see how the finished wines turn out: I think
the insistance on stringent sorting will pay off in good quality wines.
Probably more sorting over the next few days. I hope I get to see
some other aspects of how the winery works, too. I'm particularly
interested to learn more about "spontaneous"/uninnoculated ferments (ie., using
native yeasts, rather than cultivated yeasts). I'll have to see
what happens.
posted at: 03:36 | path: /wine/vintage2011 |
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Nearing the end of vintage...
The vintage is nearly over, for me at least. Next
week I'll be doing a short course at the CFPPA, then
that's it for now.
The vintage isn't really over: wines are still fermenting,
and will be for a week or so more. I don't think any more
grapes are arriving after this week, though.
The vintage didn't go exactly as I'd hoped: I spent nearly
all my time on the sorting table, and ideally would have
liked to help with a number of other things as well. Still,
I think I've learnt quite a bit about how winemaking is done
in Burgundy from talking to people, and watching how things are
done in the winery.
After the course, I'm off for a brief visit to the Jura.
I worry I might get there at harvest time, which might
make it harder to visit smaller domaines. Still, I'll see
what I can. And I'll post more frequent updates here...
posted at: 03:36 | path: /wine/vintage2011 |
permanent link to this entry
Sat, 24 Sep 2011
CFPPA: Oddyssey in Burgundy
I wanted to blog about this earlier in the week, but
never seemed to have time some how.
Some interesting parts, and some not so interesting
parts. A highlight was a visit to Domaine Confuron
near Nuits-Saint-George -- some excellent barrel samples,
and a taste of a 1993 Vosne-Romanee 1er cru.
Not so good was a trip to the Imaginarium in Nuits-Saint-George --
some really interesting old winery and vineyard tools on
display, but the sound and light display was not very well
done (though unintentionally funny...) and detracted somewhat
from the whole thing. It would have been nicer to just be able
to look at their collection at your own leisure. But then, maybe
that would be boring for people who aren't winemakers?
Another highlight was a visit to Remoissenet, where I had worked.
Again, we got to try some older wines as well as barrel samples.
Older wines included a 1997 Nuits-Saint-George and a 1967 Volnay
1er cru (still very much alive, and surprisingly fruity...). Barrel
samples included 2010 Montrachet and 2010 Clos Vougeot... so can't
complain there either.
Fellow students were mostly Australian & NZ winemakers and viticulturalists
(plus one from Chile, one from California and one from Washington).
It seemed that I was the only one not currently working in the
industry, which was a bit intimidating at times. I kept telling
myself that I'll be working in the wine "industry" one day (I don't really
like to think of it as an industry... great wines aren't made in
an industrial manner).
Well, it was a good week and I'm sad it's over. But, next stop
is the Jura. I have a couple of appointments with wineries already
lined up, and can't wait to get there!
posted at: 16:26 | path: /wine/vintage2011 |
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