People who know me, or perhaps those who have read our blog before, will know that I am a pretty huge Liverpool F.C. supporter, and that we actually have one small corner of our wine cellar dedicated to my favourite team…. a small shrine if you will.

A week or two ago I was browsing the LFC website, when I came across a t-shirt design that made me smile. By complete co-incidence it was almost a carbon copy of our new A2O label design – a sort of  ‘Da Vinci-esque’ logo, using architectural construction lines. Of course I could not resist, I had found yet another perfect excuse to add to my already substantial collection of Liverpool shirts!

What is it they say? Great minds think alike (or is it that fools seldom differ?)

People who know me, or perhaps those who have read our blog before, will know that I am a pretty huge Liverpool F.C. supporter, and that we actually have one small corner of our wine cellar dedicated to my favourite team…. a small shrine if you will.

A week or two ago I was browsing the LFC website, when I came across a t-shirt design that made me smile. By complete co-incidence it was almost a carbon copy of our new A2O label design – a sort of  ‘Da Vinci-esque’ logo, using architectural construction lines. Of course I could not resist, I had found yet another perfect excuse to add to my already substantial collection of Liverpool shirts!

What is it they say? Great minds think alike (or is it that fools seldom differ?)

If you look back at our blogs or vintage reports over the last few years you will probably find a photo or two of Fran (our cellar guy) balancing precariously on top of the presses during harvest. His task at this point is simply to distribute the grapes evenly inside the press as they tumble from the reception area on the level above, which is much more difficult than it sounds. To be completely honest, clambering up on a ladder and then straddling the machine is very far from ideal, some might say, even a little dangerous.

Finding a solution to alleviate the danger was never going to be easy, and whatever we decided would certainly have to be a customised design and build to fit into a very tight space. Indeed, we quickly realised that short of removing the roof, it was probably a design that would have to be built in situ. Our planners (Fran and myself) got our heads together, and based on our experience of working together on the presses over the last decade, came up with a plan of what was needed.

Having missed the window to do this last year (we left it to late!), we got an early start this year, and presto! Our design has now come to fruition. It is an in-house build (as Fran is also very handy with a welding torch), but I’m sure you will agree from today’s photograph, that the finished platform looks both very solid and very professional. Of course the one thing that you don’t really appreciate is that this new working areas is actually 1.80m (nearly 6ft) above the floor, and that the top of the press is nearly 3.0m (over 9ft), which would be a long way to fall onto the tiled concrete floor below!

The genius of the design (that you can just about make out from the photo) are the two side platforms that pull up from each side of the main platform, rather like a draw bridge, allowing the press to be closed up and to turn freely once it has been charged with grapes. 

It’s so impressive that maybe we should give up making wine and move into light engineering!

If you look back at our blogs or vintage reports over the last few years you will probably find a photo or two of Fran (our cellar guy) balancing precariously on top of the presses during harvest. His task at this point is simply to distribute the grapes evenly inside the press as they tumble from the reception area on the level above, which is much more difficult than it sounds. To be completely honest, clambering up on a ladder and then straddling the machine is very far from ideal, some might say, even a little dangerous.

Finding a solution to alleviate the danger was never going to be easy, and whatever we decided would certainly have to be a customised design and build to fit into a very tight space. Indeed, we quickly realised that short of removing the roof, it was probably a design that would have to be built in situ. Our planners (Fran and myself) got our heads together, and based on our experience of working together on the presses over the last decade, came up with a plan of what was needed.

Having missed the window to do this last year (we left it to late!), we got an early start this year, and presto! Our design has now come to fruition. It is an in-house build (as Fran is also very handy with a welding torch), but I’m sure you will agree from today’s photograph, that the finished platform looks both very solid and very professional. Of course the one thing that you don’t really appreciate is that this new working areas is actually 1.80m (nearly 6ft) above the floor, and that the top of the press is nearly 3.0m (over 9ft), which would be a long way to fall onto the tiled concrete floor below!

The genius of the design (that you can just about make out from the photo) are the two side platforms that pull up from each side of the main platform, rather like a draw bridge, allowing the press to be closed up and to turn freely once it has been charged with grapes. 

It’s so impressive that maybe we should give up making wine and move into light engineering!

The long, cool spring of 2013 has certainly had a profound effect in the vineyard. One of the most significant consequences was the delayed and unusually protracted flowering period. Indeed, in some vineyards (not ours) many potential bunches were lost completely as pollination simply didn’t happen.

The knock-on effect of this is of course, that as a direct result, we will probably have a very late harvest too. Clearly it is very early days and a lot can change over the next month or two, but it would seem that we are now looking at collecting our fruit closer to the end of September, rather than the beginning of the month.

As for the bus in the photo advertising the Summer White festival here in Galicia…… Well, I just happened to have a couple of spray cans in my backpack and couldn’t resist a bit of artistic modification. (Only joking – just Photoshop, click on image to enlarge)

The long, cool spring of 2013 has certainly had a profound effect in the vineyard. One of the most significant consequences was the delayed and unusually protracted flowering period. Indeed, in some vineyards (not ours) many potential bunches were lost completely as pollination simply didn’t happen.

The knock-on effect of this is of course, that as a direct result, we will probably have a very late harvest too. Clearly it is very early days and a lot can change over the next month or two, but it would seem that we are now looking at collecting our fruit closer to the end of September, rather than the beginning of the month.

As for the bus in the photo advertising the Summer White festival here in Galicia…… Well, I just happened to have a couple of spray cans in my backpack and couldn’t resist a bit of artistic modification. (Only joking – just Photoshop, click on image to enlarge)

After a long, cool, wet spring building up the water table in the soil, we now have very hot, sunny weather. Of course our vines really revel in these conditions, and they start to grow very, very quickly – almost out of control. This very rapid development of the shoots is known as vine vigour, and will hopefully slow down as the grape clusters start to develop during ‘veraison’ – the moment when the recognisable fruit starts to develop. The problem is that if the canopy grows unchecked then this will simply detract from the quality of the grapes, as the excess foliage competes for the resources of the vine plant. This is why we spend long periods during the summer removing leaves and thinning the canopy.

Of course vines are natural climbers, which is why we use wires to train them. Unfortunately they do not distinguish between different types of wire, which is why today’s photo shows a vine plotting its escape from the vineyard by means of a telephone cable. (Yes, we still have some overhead telephone cables out here in the wilds of Galicia – fibre optics are merely a dream of the future!)

After a long, cool, wet spring building up the water table in the soil, we now have very hot, sunny weather. Of course our vines really revel in these conditions, and they start to grow very, very quickly – almost out of control. This very rapid development of the shoots is known as vine vigour, and will hopefully slow down as the grape clusters start to develop during ‘veraison’ – the moment when the recognisable fruit starts to develop. The problem is that if the canopy grows unchecked then this will simply detract from the quality of the grapes, as the excess foliage competes for the resources of the vine plant. This is why we spend long periods during the summer removing leaves and thinning the canopy.

Of course vines are natural climbers, which is why we use wires to train them. Unfortunately they do not distinguish between different types of wire, which is why today’s photo shows a vine plotting its escape from the vineyard by means of a telephone cable. (Yes, we still have some overhead telephone cables out here in the wilds of Galicia – fibre optics are merely a dream of the future!)

I have now been living in Spain for 11 years, and although there have been quite a few changes and modifications in the bodega, the office where we work remains largely unchanged. Having spent several years working on a large table, I now at least, have a desk.

One of the other things I noticed is that, following a decidedly chilly winter, we are now sitting in the office perspiring (and quite profusely in recent days). The problem is that our offices have no fixed heating or cooling system. In winter we have a couple of plug-in radiators, and in summer we leave the windows open as long as we dare, until our south-facing office becomes too unbearable. On the wall of the office we have a very old air conditioning unit which has never worked in all the time that I have lived here. I have therefore come to one simple conclusion – we take much greater care of the temperature of our cellar, tanks and wine, than we do of ourselves. And quite right too…. our wine will always take priority.

Having said that, we have now decided that enough is enough (Angela has finally objected to me sitting here in my Speedos). We have just placed an order for a new aircon unit that will replace the original Sanyo unit which may have been here since the bodega was first built (see picture).

Of course, Sod’s Law dictates that the moment that we have the new air conditioning installed, then so the current period of stifling weather will come to an end!

I have now been living in Spain for 11 years, and although there have been quite a few changes and modifications in the bodega, the office where we work remains largely unchanged. Having spent several years working on a large table, I now at least, have a desk.

One of the other things I noticed is that, following a decidedly chilly winter, we are now sitting in the office perspiring (and quite profusely in recent days). The problem is that our offices have no fixed heating or cooling system. In winter we have a couple of plug-in radiators, and in summer we leave the windows open as long as we dare, until our south-facing office becomes too unbearable. On the wall of the office we have a very old air conditioning unit which has never worked in all the time that I have lived here. I have therefore come to one simple conclusion – we take much greater care of the temperature of our cellar, tanks and wine, than we do of ourselves. And quite right too…. our wine will always take priority.

Having said that, we have now decided that enough is enough (Angela has finally objected to me sitting here in my Speedos). We have just placed an order for a new aircon unit that will replace the original Sanyo unit which may have been here since the bodega was first built (see picture).

Of course, Sod’s Law dictates that the moment that we have the new air conditioning installed, then so the current period of stifling weather will come to an end!

It suddenly occurred to me the other day that of all the things I have written about our bodega over the last several years, there is one thing that I have never mentioned….. our baskets!

When it comes albariño at Bodegas Castro Martin we chose to store our wines in tank and bottle only as and when required – simply because the wine keeps better and stays fresher in tank. In an ideal world we would bottle each tank, label it at the time of bottling, and then simply sell it, but unfortunately life in the world of wine is never that simple.

As I have mentioned on previous occasions, as we increase the number of overseas markets that we sell to, so the range of different labelling requirements becomes more complicated. It’s not because we are inventing different brands for each market, but it’s simply that the legal label requirements vary so much from country to country. So, for example, if we are bottling a tank of our Castro Martin Family Estate wine, then the question is, how many cases do we label with the EU back label, how many with the U.S. back label, how many with the Australian back label, and so on. The simple answer is that we never know, and so there is only one solution….. to bottle at least a part of each tank without any labels at all. Of course this may sound slightly illegal, but as long as we keep copious bottling records and mark each batch very clearly, then this means that we can store the unlabelled bottles in large metal baskets until required. This wine without label is known as ‘clean skin’ stock. 

Each time we receive an order for a market that requires its own specific back label, then we simply select the appropriate baskets, take out the wine, and label it accordingly. Job done.

It suddenly occurred to me the other day that of all the things I have written about our bodega over the last several years, there is one thing that I have never mentioned….. our baskets!

When it comes albariño at Bodegas Castro Martin we chose to store our wines in tank and bottle only as and when required – simply because the wine keeps better and stays fresher in tank. In an ideal world we would bottle each tank, label it at the time of bottling, and then simply sell it, but unfortunately life in the world of wine is never that simple.

As I have mentioned on previous occasions, as we increase the number of overseas markets that we sell to, so the range of different labelling requirements becomes more complicated. It’s not because we are inventing different brands for each market, but it’s simply that the legal label requirements vary so much from country to country. So, for example, if we are bottling a tank of our Castro Martin Family Estate wine, then the question is, how many cases do we label with the EU back label, how many with the U.S. back label, how many with the Australian back label, and so on. The simple answer is that we never know, and so there is only one solution….. to bottle at least a part of each tank without any labels at all. Of course this may sound slightly illegal, but as long as we keep copious bottling records and mark each batch very clearly, then this means that we can store the unlabelled bottles in large metal baskets until required. This wine without label is known as ‘clean skin’ stock. 

Each time we receive an order for a market that requires its own specific back label, then we simply select the appropriate baskets, take out the wine, and label it accordingly. Job done.

It must be something in my blood, or perhaps something in the genes of every Englishman, but I’m going to mention the weather again! Only a few days ago I posted that there had been a sudden change and that someone, somewhere, had pressed the ‘summer’ button, at the same time raising the question of how long would it last? Well, I can tell you that not only has it continued, but it has actually become even hotter – on the coast (where we live) reaching 38°C (100°F), with not a breath of wind. A little further inland, in the city of Ourense, that lies in a natural basin surrounded by hills (notorious for trapping heat), it is even worse, with temperatures of over 43°C (110°F)

The problem is that being Galicia, we are not really geared up for long periods of extreme heat, and there are not that many locations fitted with air conditioning – it is certainly not a common fixture in people’s homes. In circumstance like this, when there is nowhere to escape the heat, the only thing we can do is keep the shutters closed and stay in the shade!

It must be something in my blood, or perhaps something in the genes of every Englishman, but I’m going to mention the weather again! Only a few days ago I posted that there had been a sudden change and that someone, somewhere, had pressed the ‘summer’ button, at the same time raising the question of how long would it last? Well, I can tell you that not only has it continued, but it has actually become even hotter – on the coast (where we live) reaching 38°C (100°F), with not a breath of wind. A little further inland, in the city of Ourense, that lies in a natural basin surrounded by hills (notorious for trapping heat), it is even worse, with temperatures of over 43°C (110°F)

The problem is that being Galicia, we are not really geared up for long periods of extreme heat, and there are not that many locations fitted with air conditioning – it is certainly not a common fixture in people’s homes. In circumstance like this, when there is nowhere to escape the heat, the only thing we can do is keep the shutters closed and stay in the shade!

Having just written about changing the membrane in one of our presses I thought that this might be the ideal moment to explain how the wine press really works…..

Using today’s photo you can clearly see that the press is a cylinder more or less divided into two halves. On one side there is the new (beautifully white) inflatable membrane, whilst on the other side you can see a series of silicone rubber ‘fingers’. Once the press has been filled with grapes the pressing cycle begins and the whole cylinder rotates rather like a large tumble dryer. As it rotates the pneumatic membrane slowly inflates to a predetermined pressure, and the grapes are gently crushed, releasing their juice. The juice escapes through holes and is collected in a large tray underneath before it is chilled rapidly and moved to the tank room ready for fermentation. The membrane then deflates and the rubber ‘fingers’ begin to do their job.

Once the bag has deflated the cylinder rotates and the fingers serve to break up the compacted grape pomace. (Pomace is the mixture of grape skins and stalks – known as marc in French, and bagazo in Spanish). Once the pomace is broken up a little the membrane re-inflates to a slightly higher pressure and crushes the grapes again extracting yet more juice.

The length of the cycle, amount of pressure used and the number of pressings for each load of grapes is determined according to the requirement of the individual winemaker and the style and quality of wine they are attempting to make. Less pressing, less pressure and shorter cycles usually equate to a higher quality wine – indeed, some high quality wines are made entirely from ‘free run’ juice, or possibly just the first press. However, there is a danger that if the juice is too clean and pure, lacking in phenolic compounds, that the finished wine could potentially lack a bit of structure and balance.

Of course another decision which has to be made even before the grapes are pressed is whether they should be de-stemmed or not. Certainly the act of de-stemming will allow a much greater weight of grapes to enter the press (without the stems they occupy much less space), but on  the downside, for a white wine maker, fruit oxidation starts from the very second that the skin of the fruit is broken. Again this is the winemaker’s choice, and again this will have an influence on the style of the finished wine.

Having just written about changing the membrane in one of our presses I thought that this might be the ideal moment to explain how the wine press really works…..

Using today’s photo you can clearly see that the press is a cylinder more or less divided into two halves. On one side there is the new (beautifully white) inflatable membrane, whilst on the other side you can see a series of silicone rubber ‘fingers’. Once the press has been filled with grapes the pressing cycle begins and the whole cylinder rotates rather like a large tumble dryer. As it rotates the pneumatic membrane slowly inflates to a predetermined pressure, and the grapes are gently crushed, releasing their juice. The juice escapes through holes and is collected in a large tray underneath before it is chilled rapidly and moved to the tank room ready for fermentation. The membrane then deflates and the rubber ‘fingers’ begin to do their job.

Once the bag has deflated the cylinder rotates and the fingers serve to break up the compacted grape pomace. (Pomace is the mixture of grape skins and stalks – known as marc in French, and bagazo in Spanish). Once the pomace is broken up a little the membrane re-inflates to a slightly higher pressure and crushes the grapes again extracting yet more juice.

The length of the cycle, amount of pressure used and the number of pressings for each load of grapes is determined according to the requirement of the individual winemaker and the style and quality of wine they are attempting to make. Less pressing, less pressure and shorter cycles usually equate to a higher quality wine – indeed, some high quality wines are made entirely from ‘free run’ juice, or possibly just the first press. However, there is a danger that if the juice is too clean and pure, lacking in phenolic compounds, that the finished wine could potentially lack a bit of structure and balance.

Of course another decision which has to be made even before the grapes are pressed is whether they should be de-stemmed or not. Certainly the act of de-stemming will allow a much greater weight of grapes to enter the press (without the stems they occupy much less space), but on  the downside, for a white wine maker, fruit oxidation starts from the very second that the skin of the fruit is broken. Again this is the winemaker’s choice, and again this will have an influence on the style of the finished wine.

With all the controversy surrounding Formula One at the moment, and the problems with Pirelli, I thought that now might be a good time to change the neumáticos in our bodega too! Well, strictly speaking, these are not tyres, but rather the large pneumatic ‘airbags’ that we have inside our presses. A membrane ‘blowout’ in our presses during harvest can be just as devastating for us as it was for Luis Hamilton or Felipe Massa in the British Grand Prix last week.

Thankfully this is not a job that we have to do every year, but just once every several years. Sometimes it takes the form of an emergency replacement during harvest when a membrane is damaged beyond repair, but on this occasion it is a pro-active change, as we decide that one of the current airbags has reached the end of its working life. The repairs that are made during harvest can sometimes be the result of debris or a foreign object that accidentally finds its way into the press in one of the collection cases. Perhaps the most common example would be a pair of secateurs carelessly discarded in the vineyard. Obviously this punctures the membrane and caused rapid deflation in exactly the same way as a piece of debris on the racetrack during a Grand Prix might cause a tyre to explode.

However, that is where the Grand Prix analogy ends. We don’t have four helmeted guys standing at the side of the press waiting to rip out the old membrane and change it in under 5 seconds. For this job someone spends the best part of half a day sweating, actually inside the press, removing and replacing the hundreds of nuts and bolts that secure the bag (see today’s photo). Nothing glamorous about this job, and I suspect that the pay is not quite as high as a Formula One team either……

The annual job of servicing our presses is one of the first signs that this year’s harvest is not that far away!

With all the controversy surrounding Formula One at the moment, and the problems with Pirelli, I thought that now might be a good time to change the neumáticos in our bodega too! Well, strictly speaking, these are not tyres, but rather the large pneumatic ‘airbags’ that we have inside our presses. A membrane ‘blowout’ in our presses during harvest can be just as devastating for us as it was for Luis Hamilton or Felipe Massa in the British Grand Prix last week.

Thankfully this is not a job that we have to do every year, but just once every several years. Sometimes it takes the form of an emergency replacement during harvest when a membrane is damaged beyond repair, but on this occasion it is a pro-active change, as we decide that one of the current airbags has reached the end of its working life. The repairs that are made during harvest can sometimes be the result of debris or a foreign object that accidentally finds its way into the press in one of the collection cases. Perhaps the most common example would be a pair of secateurs carelessly discarded in the vineyard. Obviously this punctures the membrane and caused rapid deflation in exactly the same way as a piece of debris on the racetrack during a Grand Prix might cause a tyre to explode.

However, that is where the Grand Prix analogy ends. We don’t have four helmeted guys standing at the side of the press waiting to rip out the old membrane and change it in under 5 seconds. For this job someone spends the best part of half a day sweating, actually inside the press, removing and replacing the hundreds of nuts and bolts that secure the bag (see today’s photo). Nothing glamorous about this job, and I suspect that the pay is not quite as high as a Formula One team either……

The annual job of servicing our presses is one of the first signs that this year’s harvest is not that far away!

In Spain people do not need an excuse for a fiesta. Halloween, for example, is now almost as big here as it is in the States, although I rather suspect that few people know its origin or what it is really supposed to represent. 

Anyway, enough of all that. Today is 4th of July, celebrated by Americans around the world (but not the Spanish…….. just yet).

Happy Independence day!

In Spain people do not need an excuse for a fiesta. Halloween, for example, is now almost as big here as it is in the States, although I rather suspect that few people know its origin or what it is really supposed to represent. 

Anyway, enough of all that. Today is 4th of July, celebrated by Americans around the world (but not the Spanish…….. just yet).

Happy Independence day!