The sun is shining once again, and the picking is moving along at a steady pace. However, work has already started inside the cellar as our fresh grape must takes the first step in its transition into wine. After a couple of days of cold settling (when all the soil particles, debris and other fragments drop to the bottom of the tank), we draw off the clean must from above, leaving all the debris behind at the bottom. This process is known as racking.

When the clean must is being drawn off we use a special connection in our hoses that includes a short glass ‘window’ so we can judge when we are reaching the debris (or fangos as we call it). There is a special mechanism which extends inside the tank that we can lower bit by bit and then stop as soon as the colour of the liquid in the window changes. All very technical (well, not actually, it’s quite a simple, but clever mechanism).

Meanwhile our presses are slowly processing more and more fruit as our team moves between our various vineyard sites. The flow has actually slowed a little in the last day or so, as the weekend is always the most hectic time for harvest (when our growers often have more family members available to pick).