Mid-Harvest update or a Viking in the Alentejo

A brief mid September update and some new vineyard photos.

As you can see in the photos, our vines are still in a good healthy state, with their working canopy helping the grapes to finish the most important stage of the ripening process, the phenolic maturity, or development of the grape flavor, color, aroma and tannin. In a warm climate grape growing region like the Alentejo, ripeness cannot be measured only by the simple method of measuring sugar level (or Baumé), because these levels are often achieved prior to reaching satisfactory phenolic maturity. If we only guided ourselves with the sugar and alcohol levels to determine our picking time, the result would be green, hard tannin and unripe flavors in the wine - which our wine fans do not enjoy!

As we head into autumn, the days here are turning noticeably shorter, but luckily, the fantastic harvest weather continues - with warm, dry days and cooler nights. Vine plants work best in a temperature range between 16 and 25 degrees, which is just what we have been experiencing during September. However how long the good weather continues, is anyone’s guess. This is the sort of situation when it pays to have a Viking in the family. Hans with his Danish ‘nerves of steel’ refuses to hurry things up, preferring to run the gamble with the weather.

So although most grape growers in the area have rushed into harvest full speed, and many of our neighbors have even finished the year’s harvest by now, we have only harvested our white grapes to date, and are just beginning, at a relaxed ‘Alentejan’ pace with the earliest red varieties.

The winery crew is jittery, anxious to see the fermenting tanks filled to capacity, with the sight and smells of the purple grapes, skin, pulp and juice. In the meantime, they busy themselves lavishing extra care on pumping over and punch down of the few early ferments already bubbling away in the winery.