Harvests 2016 all done

Another year, and once again all the grapes are in. My last harvest was the Malvar on Monday 10^th October.  And not a moment too soon! Because after a long, long, hot, endless summer with zero rainfall, it stated raining heavily and properly all over Spain on Wed 12^th! Ha! So I’ll have to find something else to complain about, as viticultural tradition demands J

I did a total of 15 harvests this year, in 15 different plots, for a total of 15 different wines:

1.      Albillo (Charco)

2.      Albillo (Fx)

3.      Garnacha (Charco)

4.      Doré (Fx)

5.      Doré (Pp)

6.      Sauvignon Blanc (Qx)

7.      Tempranillo (TET-A)

8.      Garnacha (Castañar)

9.      Garnacha (Dehesa)

10.   Garnacha (McCarb)

11.   Chelva (Early)

12.   Villanueva

13.   Chelva (Late)

14.   Airén (Carabaña)

15.   Malvar (Villarejo)

That’s 2 red varieties (Garnacha and Tempranillo) and 7 white varieties (Albillo, Doré, Sauv, blanc, Chelva, Villanueva, Airén and Malvar).

I vinify each plot separately even if it’s the same variety, because it’s more interesting that way. It’s amazing how different the wines are, even if the plots are close together and the winemaking techniques are the same. For example, in El Tiemblo (Sierra de Gredos) the Garnacha Castañar plot is only about 1 km away from the Garnacha Dehesa plot as the crow flies, but the grapes and wines are totally different.

The novelty this year is a variety called Villanueva. It’s not uncommon in the area but it’s usually just a few vines interspersed among another predominant white variety. But by chance a local grower, who has an entire vineyard planted to Villanueva, came by the winery one day to offer them to me. ‘Why not?’ I thought. It’s a rather tiny plot, and there was only 150 kg. So I crushed them and pressed them and let the must ferment in small tinaja – in tinaja because it was the only container small enough available at the time!

All the rest I’ve done before, and am following the line of ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’! That’s to say that for all of the wines listed above, I followed (am following) the same techniques that have worked for me in the past, with regard to decisions on type of container (steel tank, wooden barrel, clay tinaja), maceration times if any, with or without stems, etc.

The only crazy experiment I’ve done this year is to follow a recipe I read in Pliny the Elder’s ‘Natural History, Book 14, Chapter 12. I followed the first recipe of the three he gives. So I guess I’ve made (am making) a beverage called ‘deuteria’ by the ancient Greeks and ‘lora’ by the ancient Romans. This is the stuff that was quaffed by slaves and labourers. The original glou-glou wine?

Following are some assorted photos, from over the summer:

 

View of the Albillo (Charco) vineyard, with the Alberche river in the background.
El Tiemblo, Sierra de Gredos

Bird's eye view of Albillo macerating

Bottling machine

My Garnacha vineyard using no chemicals, next to a naked agro-chemical wasteland vineyard!

Bottling up

At a wine fair

Sheep in the Garnacha vineyard, eating weeds and dropping caca!

Sheep entering

Living soil, for healthy vines

My pet nat exploding on me! Too much pressure!

My Chelva vineyard, surrounded by the houses of El Tiemblo village

In another Garnacha vineyard, steep, in El Tiemblo, Sierra de Gredos

Bottling up!

And to finish off, a note on the word “sapid”

I generally find it impossible to have decent in-depth discussion on FB or other social media sites. And a few weeks ago, I found myself feeling frustrated because I couldn’t say what I wanted to say! I think that FB and other sites are just not the right place for a proper discussion or debate: basically, they all tend to favour spur-of-the moment, shooting-from-the-hip type comments, right there and then, whenever you happen to come across an interesting post that you feel like commenting on. There’s just no time to think before typing! Apart from wine, I also like words, so I was doubly affected!

This had been annoying me for days, so I decided to do something about it. After searching on the internet and after doing a bit of ‘due diligence’, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s not a very useful word to use in written wine-tasting notes or while speaking live to an audience. The due diligence consisted in asking native-English-speakers, uncontaminated by knowledge of a foreign language, if they knew what ‘sapid’ meant. Not one did! English-speakers who know a Latin language would know ‘sapido’ (It, Sp, Pt) or ‘sapide’ (Fr) where it’s quite a common word for everyday use and just make the connection.

Firstly it’s not a very common word at all in English (see here, this is just one of many word-frequency sites) and so it’s not likely that the readers/audience would understand what it means. This may depend on the level of knowledge/culture of the audience though, so an audience of hardened winelovers may have come across it before. But still!

Secondly, once you discover the meaning of ‘sapid’, you also discover how useless it is, for it means “having flavour” “tasty”. Which covers just about every edible/drinkable substance in existence, except for water!

I suppose that a slight degree of usefulness might be attained if a bit of common sense is applied by the reader/listener, ie by assuming that the writer/speaker really means ‘very’ or ‘extra’ flavourful/tasty. But then why bother with ‘sapid’ at all? Why not just say ‘very/extra tasty/flavourful’ and make life easier for your readers/listeners, who are after all reading/listening to you with a view to learning something about wine! But then again, maybe they would enjoy learning a new word? Or are happy to be introduced to the secret and occult world of wine-tasting? Or would they hate wine forever on account of the arcane vocabulary used?

Well, whatever. Anyway, I feel a lot better, now that I’ve got that off my chest.  J

With my Favourite Importer Again

A few weeks ago my favourite importer came to visit and to taste my wines. I'm of course talking about José Pastor, of JosePastorSelections, who is in fact my only importer! And he imports my wines to the USA. It was him who 'discovered' me back in 2010, see this post! Until then I'd been making wine for about 7 years in splendid isolation, as it were. I had no contact with anyone and didn't even know that there was such a thing as 'the wine world', let alone such a thing as 'natural wine' and I cared even less. I'd started writing this blog about a year before in 2009, but I don't think many people read it. Not many people read it now either, about 50 pageviews/day. Well, at least José read it, as that was how he found me. From that moment on I was doomed! Because I then started thinking about wine and getting aspirations! For 7 years I'd been making wine as a sort of hobby, mostly for my own consumption and also selling some to friends and contacts in the organic vegetable co-op that I was a member of (and still am). About 2000 bottles max. I suppose I was happy and innocent - I had my day job (I still do!), I grew grapes and made wine at weekends, and I didn't worry about a thing. :)

But then I got hooked. Via the internet, via blogs, via Twitter and FaceBook and all the other social media stuff. Then I started going to wine fairs, and to winebars, and to wine shops, and hanging out with wine people, both physically and virtually. No looking back! Now I'm poised to start a viable wine business. Poised. Not actually starting a viable wine biz yet, but at least poised and with some chance of success if I take the plunge!

Life is short, we all know that. Apart from being too short to drink bad wine, it's also too short to spend all of it in an office doing useless, meaningless tasks all day every day, which is a great incentive to give up the day job and go for it. But then again, on the other hand, I like to think that I'm not a complete idiot, and I have to remind myself that I have two small children that I have to educate and feed, and that I'm not a carefree student anymore, but instead have great responsibilities to avoid deal with. Yes. So basically, that's why it's taken my 10 years to get where I am today in the wine world, ie not a very meteoric or impressive trajectory. But, I'm happy with it, and happy with the direction I'm going in, and happy with the speed I'm going at. Wine, like food, should be slow, I say.

What's all this got to do with my importer? Well, nothing really. It's just that spending a whole day with him set me thinking about the past and about the future. The thing that gives me the greatest satisfaction I think, is the fact that I'm making/producing a quality product that is really appreciated by a lot of people, some of them very knowledgeable. And making a product that is not only delicious and tasty and enjoyable, etc, but made in a natural, organic, ecological way that doesn't impact on the environment and on people's health. All the rest is icing on the cake. So if I could make more wine, and more types of wines, not only could I give up the day job, but I could be contributing more to making the world healthier and less polluted. And so go my thoughts, .. round and round and round!

In the morning we visited some high altitude vineyards in the Sierra de Gredos mountains. We saw 7 tiny plots planted to Garnacha, tended by fellow winemaker Alfredo Maestro, from which he makes a beautiful wine called El Marciano. I was so happy to be there with Alfredo and Richard and José, I don't know why. I was so happy that it made me sad and want to cry! I was just existing in the present and enjoying the moment. I had no worries or pressures or expectations or anything that morning.

Then we went for a beer in a bar in Navarredondilla, which is a tiny village high up in the Gredos mountains. All the houses were made of stone, and were integrated with the boulders and outcrops of rock that stuck out all over. I think it's the only village in Spain that I've seen that didn't have a housing development next to it, created during the construction boom bubble. We were sitting outside at a table in the street, and must have been lunchtime because the owner of the bar came out with a second tray of beers, said they were on the house, locked the door of the bar, and left us to it!

Then we went for lunch to El Rondón restaurant, in Cebreros, a village a bit lower down in the Gredos mountains, and there we met Daniel Ramos and Rubén Diaz, also winemakers. So four winemakers, times about 3 or 4 wines each, equals 15 wines which we tasted before and during lunch. Too many wines for me! I obviously haven't been practicing enough, because after about 8 or 10 wines, they all start to taste the same to me :(

Then it was time to head back to Madrid, and another reality!

Harvest Report 2013: Dammit, Everything is Going Wrong this Year!

Well, not everything, but it's hard to be objective when all sorts of sh** happens every day!

I really shouldn't complain, because, despite everything, I've managed to find an awesomely beautiful and spacious bodega (winery) which has infinite possibilities, and which only requires a bit of time, thinking, and planning to make a go of. In the meantime, though, short term, many things are going pear-shaped, and my wine plans (such as they are) seem to be changing every other day. I've made a big effort this year to be rigorous and systematic, and to actually write things down on paper, but I wonder why I bother, as every day brings an new 'event', phone call, circumstance or whatever, that radically changes all my previous plans.

My awesomely beautiful and spacious bodega!

 Anyway, whatever. Here's my latest status, as of today:

Grapes in, wines made, wines being made:

1. Albillo. This year, I made my first ever lot of Albillo. Seeing I've just moved into my new bodega in El Tiemblo, in the Gredos mountain range, I just had to make some Albillo. It seems that this is a variety that is in danger of extinction, as only a few winemakers use it. The problem is that it's also used as a table grape, and is very expensive and difficult to find. I was only able to find a small lot of about 400 kg at the last minute (see this previous post of mine). The wine I made is now practically dry, or perhaps still fermenting very slowly, as I can get a slight whiff of CO2 when I stick my nose into the tank. I don't know what it's going to be like, but I think it will be OK and will only get better after the cold of winter. The fermentation was fast and hot, as I wasn't able to keep it cool, due to 'circumstances'. Next year I will definitely do at least two different experiments. Live and learn. And enjoy!


2. Tempranillo from Carabaña. I harvested it a few weeks ago, last Sunday 22 September. Lovely bunches, totally healthy, not a single symptom of mildew or anything else. I was well pleased. I destemmed and crushed the bunches by hand, and the wine is still fermenting slowly on its skins. The last reading I took a few days ago showed a density of 1020, so almost finished. I've been punching the cap down once a day (and sometimes no times at all). That's not a lot by present day standards, but I don't really want to extract it to death. Nice and easy does it :)  I think I'll press it off over the next few days, before the weekend, maybe. There's only enough to make one barrica (225 liters, or 300 bottles) of Crianza.

3. Chelva. This is a local white variety that grows mostly in Extremadura, but which is found around El Tiemblo too. It's a variety that is looked down upon and frowned upon. It's used for table grapes and has a very negative cultural and vinous reputation. But hey, so does Airén, and I've managed to make a pretty mean and interesting Airén over the past 10 years, which sells very well and generates positive feedback for me, so who's to say I can't do the same with Chelva? There's only one way to find out, isn't there? So I'm doing several different experimental lots this year:

- Chelva Experiment #1. Carbonic Maceration. On Wed 18th September I sealed up a 300 liter tank with selected whole bunches of Chelva. It's still sealed as I write today. Soon, I'll check it out and decide what to do.

- Chelva Experiment #2. Frutteto style. Acting on the good advice of fellow winemaker Daniel Ramos (with whom I'm sharing the new bodega), I laid out about 500 kg of bunches upstairs on the 1st floor of the bodega, in order to dry them out a bit and increase the sugar concentration. They lay there for about two weeks and the other day I also crushed and pressed them, and they had indeed increased in sugar concentration. The reading I got showed 12.5% of probable alcohol; which seems rather a big increase, so I'm suspecting that one of the two reading may have been a bit off.

- Chelva Experiment #3. Crushed and left soaking on the skins, 'orange wine' style. That's about two weeks skin-contact time. This could well be one of the experiments that go wrong. The sugar content was very low and hence the probable alcohol level - only about 10.5%. This could well be lost to acetic acid. I did in fact have a close shave, as the other day when I opened the lid to check the cap, I got a huge whiff of vinegar. To be expected I suppose, with no added SO2, and such low level of alcohol. But all was not lost, it was only in the cap, as the wine I tasted from the tap at the bottom of the tank was OK. So I separated the cap, threw it out, and pressed the rest of rest of the skins.

After all that, I decided to blend the 'frutteto' and the 'carbonic maceration'). The regular vinegary lot, I doused with metabisulfite (about 40 mg/l), and sealed the tank hermetically. I don't know what will happen, maybe it'll turn to vinegar after all, or maybe it will survive. I'll check it every couple of days. Maybe I`ll blend it in turn with the other already blended lot of Chelva.

I was going to do more experiments with Chelva but I won't be able to now. This is because the grapegrower I bought the grapes from is completely unreliable and I couldn't get him to harvest on the dates I wanted.  For some reason or another he unilaterally decided to harvest one day (19th September) and appeared at the door of the winery with almost 1000 kg of grapes. Now if I had been a hard-nosed business-first type of person I would have told him to get lost and sell his grapes to someone else, and that I didn't want grapes with a probable alcohol level of 10.5%; but I don't know why, I took his grapes!

Actually, I'm even more pissed off with that grower because there was another 1000 kg left in the vineyard, which I intended to harvest this weekend, but which now I can't, because he's gone back on his word and he's decided to use it to make some wine himself!  What a disaster! Basically I end up with 1000 kg of grapes that I didn't want, and I don't get the 1000 kg of the grapes I did want!

All I can say is that I won't be buying any grapes off him next year. In fact, I'm even more pissed off, if possible, because I turned down another local Chelva grower who offered to sell me his grapes! Grrrrrrr.

4. Garnacha from Sotillo de la Adrada. Last week, Sat 28th and Sun 29th September, I harvested three different plots of Garnacha. It was hairy. The weather here in Spain that weekend was weird. They were calling for rain, but not too much. To harvest or not to harvest? In the end I decided to harvest, because 2 of the plots were ripe and had to be harvested, and if we got wet, well, we got wet! In the end we were very lucky, because we only got rained on a little on Saturday morning, and not at all after that. So I took in about 2000 kg, all of which I've decided to ferment whole-bunch carbonic maceration. And there they lie, fermenting carbonically, as I write.

Harvests Pending

1. My own Airén, in Carabaña. I checked it out the other day and it's showing just over 11% probable alcohol, which is not a lot really, cansidering the time of year. I'm going to leave it for another week to see how it goes. It was lloking really good, totally healthy, no signs of any rot or mildew or anything. Touch wood!

2. My own Malvar, in Villarejo. It was showing 12% probable le alcohol, so I'm going to leave it for another 10 days / two weeks too. In contrast to the Airén, the Malvar was rather uneven. There were lots of vines that had ripe or ripening bunches and at the same time bunches with tiny immature berries. Very irregular.

3. Tempranillo, El Tiemblo. A nice plot of organic Tempranillo (officially uncertified but grown by a trustworthy grower), which was at a probable 13% last week, but still unripe.

4. Garnacha, from El Tiemblo. Also uncertified organic. Only showing 12% last week, so probably another 2 weeks to go.

5. Maybe an extra surprise that I'm not expecting? I wouldn't be surprised :)

Apart from all that

Now apart from all the above unknowns, I also have other complications or "challenges" to deal with over the next few days or weeks.

Firstly, adding up all the kilos of grapes that will be coming in, I don't currently have enough storage capacity to process them all! This is incredible and/or ironic, but true, as I'm installed in bodega with a theoretical capcity of 1.2 million liters of wine, in the form of concrete tanks (of 16,000 liters each). The problem is that I can't really use them, as I don't have enough grapes/wine to fill even one of them, and it's very risky to only partially use a tank (especially a concrete one). Because of the oxygen contact and possible contamination from the walls of the unused part. So basically I have to buy a few thousand liters of capacity in the form of bins, containers, tanks, whatever. And my only practical option is plastic, because of the price. I would prefer stainless steel, or clay pots, but the cost would be prohibitive for me. I'm almost tempted to do a crowd-sourcing thing, to finance the purchase of say, 4 or 5 1000 liter stainless steel tanks or clay amphorae, but I just couldn't deal with that now. Maybe next year.

Secondly, I don't own a van, so I either have to borrow one from a friend, or rent one. Or not, depending on whether the grapes are ripe or not!

Thirdly, I don't own any cases for harvesting the grapes! I've always borrowed them. This is ridiculous really, and I ought to just go and buy some; there're not even that expensive! So it depends on whether my friends/acquainances are using their cases or not.

- Fourthly, labour!  Whether to hire a few professionals for the day, or to invite friends and family? That is the question.

So, all things considered...

Writing a post like this is very therapeutic for me, because it actually really does put things into perspective. It's very easy, in the middle of the harvesting season, to lose sight of the bigger picture, and small insignificant details can take on utterly ridiculous proportions and make you lose the plot and/or obsess about trivialities! I think it's important to maintain your grace under pressure. It doesn't matter if it all doesn't go 100% according to plan. Like someone once said "No plan ever survives contact with the enemy". And anyway, it's not like this is making war, it's just making wine! Though it is a bit like being a general, or a film director at times, because you are the person who's ultimately responsible for everything, and you're surrounded by people (be they friends/family, be thsy hired help) who are constantly looking to you for decisions, orders and answers to their questions. If you happen to be a general or a film director and you do this kind of thing every day, then I suppose it's easy, but if you only do it once a year, then it's hard to keep on the straight and narrow, to keep that grace under pressure.

Also, I think wine is a slow business, and I don't want to over-expand too fast. I'd rather go slowly and keep the same level of quality that I've been keeping over the years, than throw it all overboard in a year. I think this will be a good year for me, no matter what happens with the rest of the harvests. I have an awesome bodega in the middle of an undiscovered, traditional, wine-producing, terroir-rich, mountain range! It's all up to me to make the most of it now. Who cares if if I got a hair in my soup, or got 1000 kg of Chelva that I didn't really need?

New Bodega - The Last Lap

Well, we seem to be getting there - slowly but surely - and we should be ready for the Albillo harvest in mid-August. (Touching wood as I write!)

The list of tasks and works to be done seems to be a lot longer than it was a few months ago (!) but at the same time they all seem a lot more doable.

This is what still has to be done:

- Electrical installation. We can't do this ourselves, and proper qualified electricians are busy working as I write, and they should be finished in about 2 weeks. This is hugely expensive and has blown my budget out of the water, and means that I won't be able to buy in as many grapes as I thought, or buy more equipment and capacity. After getting several estimates, haggling and negotiating on the prices, and reducing the installations to the absolute minimum, we still have to fork out about €8000 !!!!!

All these other tasks we can do ourselves:

- Finish off the painting. There are still a few doors and walls to do.

- Insulate the doors against the heat. The doors are just thin metal plate (from the 1950's) and hardly insulate at all, so we're going to line them with sheets of expandedpolystyrene.

- Buy a foot-operated wash-hand basin. This is a legal requirement.

- Buy a water-heater for the bathroom. This is also a legal requirement.

- Buy and install anti-moquito netting on the windows. This is also a legal requirement.

- Find, buy and install a rubber strip on all the doors, to cover the gap between the ground and the bottom of the door. This is also a legal requirement.

- Install false ceilings in the bathroom and bottling room. This is also a legal requirement.

- Fix the bars/railings on the windows. This is not actually a legal requirement, but needs to be done (to keep burglars out!)

- Call the scrap merchant, for him to take away the two conveyor belts. We tried to sell them to some neighbouring wineries, but no-one wanted them!

- Classify all the other 'scrap' that we found in the bodega (stuff to be sold, stuff to be thrown away, and stuff to be kept in case it comes in useful one day!)

- Tidy up and beautify the patio, or at least make it accessible for vehicles carrying grapes!

- Last but not least, hire a van and take all my equipment, machinery and assorted stuff from the old bodega to the new!

Apart from all of the above tasks, that are directly related to the physical bodega, I also have other things to do:

- Check out local vineyards and grapes, with a view to buying in at harvest time

- Check out and possibly buy some clay amphoras

- Check out and possibly buy some wooden beams, on which to place my oak crianza barrels

- Legal and bureacratic stuff:

   1. Buy all the required books and ledgers that have to be kept by grape-growers and wineries

   2. Design (or have designed) a new name and logo

   3. Design (or have designed) some new labels, to be registered with the Ministry of Agriculture

   4. Look for and contract an insurance policy (fire and theft, etc)

  

- Take some time out to actually define my Wine Plan for this year!

Phew! It's made me tired just writing all those tasks out. Maybe I ought to prioritize and make a proper schedule, instead of just getting on with whichever task takes my fancy on any given day! Whatever!

Anyways, this is all interesting stuff, and it keeps me off the streets! :) I just can't stand the thought of being bored and having to watch TV with all that football, news, reality shows, series, etc. I'd rather watch the paint dry on all those walls and gates that I've painted recently!!!

(photos pending: they're on another computer that I dont have access to right now!)

Red grapes all in, White not ready yet

Here’s another harvest post or update of the state of my harvesting this year. This is a good time for me to write this because I’m between harvests, as it were :)

I’ve brought in all the red grapes that I’ll be bringing in this year, and the white grapes are not ready to be picked yet.

So, what have I got this year?

1. The usual Tempranillo from Carabaña that I’ve been harvesting for the last 9 years! The quantity this year was ridiculously tiny – even more ridiculously tiny than usual! On the one hand, because of the drought (it hasn’t rained properly for about a year) and on the other hand because of the rabbits, who have again eaten more than their fair share of grapes this year, just like they did last year.

So, basically there’s less than 300 litres of juice + skins fermenting at this very moment as I write, which means that there will hopefully just be enough to make 1 barrel (225 l) of Tempranillo Crianza including a few litres for top-ups during the year. I harvested early this year, because I was fed up with making the usual +14% alcohol tinto Crianza! Although there’s never been anything actually wrong with my previous Crianzas, they’ve never been anything exceptional either, imho, and in that of others! Hence the risk of experimenting this year. Maybe it’ll turn out better at 13% or 13.5%. Who knows? But I’ll never know if I don’t try it at least once!

2. Some Garnacha from Gredos. I’m going to be a bit secretive here and save the details for later :) Ha ha! I’ll just say that I’ve got four (4) separate lots of old vine Garnacha that is already fermenting separately. Some in open top old wooden barrels, and some in stainless steel. Two lots are from separate plots in Sotillo de la Adrada (see this previous post) and two lots are from ... somewhere else in the Gredos region! Ha ha!

That’s all there is tinto-wise. This is what there will be, blanco-wise:

1- The usual Airén from Carabaña that I’ve been harvesting for the last 10 years. The grapes are not ripe yet – they were at 11% a few days ago, and there are still quite a lot of green bunches visible. I’d like to harvest this at between 12% and 13%, and make the usual young white that I usually make every year. I’m really happy with the way it’s been turning out, and I think my clients are too. I’m on a little, personal Airén crusade here, I think, because I believe that really good wines can be made with Airén, especially if a better winemaker than me were to put his/her mind and hand to it!

Airén has such a negative cultural and vinous baggage to carry! Sigh! Oh woe, is life not hard enough already without having to shoulder all this negative baggage? :) Ha ha, only jesting! Deep down, I’m really a masochistic cynical bastard who thrives on hardship and albatrosses! Ha ha, jesting again! But seriously, I really do like Airén and really do believe that great wines can be made from it. So I shall make more of the same this year, plus of course I shall do a few experiments. Firstly, as I have all these old barrels available, I’ll do a bit of fermenting in them, in addition to the usual stainless steel. Secondly, I hope to come up with some other experiment to do when the time comes! Suggestions welcome! Here’s an interesting article about Airén by FringeWines: 

2. Malvar from Villarejo. Again I’m going to do the same as last year with these grapes. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” I was really pleased with last years’ wines and experiments. There were three lots of wines last year: Carbonic Maceration, Skin Contact (15 days) (‘orange’), and a straight 5-month skin contact ‘orange’ from an old amphora (tinaja in Spanish), all from the same Malvar from Villarejo. And I think my clients were happy with them too. So this year, I bought another amphora (see photo) so as to make another 300 bottles, in addition to the original 300!

And that’s it, I’m afraid (apart from the older wines from previous years that are still aging). Only about 4,000 bottles in total, I think. I had originally intended to make quite a lot more wine this year, but my best laid plans were rudely scattered to the winds by the great plough of life and circumstances, and will have to be rebuilt next year. C’est la vie!

So now, it’s the calm before the storm, ie just checking the white grapes in the vineyards, and checking on the red fermentations in the bodega.

Lastly, quite a few people have contacted me over the last few months with a view to visiting the vineyards and winery, but I haven’t been able to arrange these visits properly – due to my own inability to deal with emails and to arranging visits, etc. But I really do like receiving visits, so if you’re reading this, please just contact me again and insist harder! I’m not being exclusive or playing hard to get here, it’s just that I can’t cope with everything that I have to do all at once! So the ‘de facto’ or ‘fait accompli’ solution or whatever it’s called, is to tell me that you ‘have to’ visit on such-and-such a day, and then I’ll work all my other tasks and activities and urgent urgencies around the visit! Et violà! Problem solved!

And really lastly, I read somewhere that all posts should have at least one photo, so here it is:
 

Ambite vineyard under snow in January 2009!