Recent trip to France Dec 2010

• In my capacity as a winemaker I often get asked to attend a lunch or a seminar by our suppliers however in December last year I was asked by an oak company if I would like to visit their cooperage........here are my notes from what turned out to be a truely amazing, and insightful trip to France. Thank you Tonnelerie Sylvain for your generosity.
  
  Tonnellerie Sylvain.
  
  From log processing to barrel manufacturing.
  Followed the process through milling of the logs, selection of the grain, stacking and seasoning.
  No irrigation in the stave yard, trials have proved it un-necessary.
  Toasting done by experienced coopers – no thermometers or fancy electronic eyes. Very traditional.
  Sylvain are one of only 6 cooperages that buy plots and cut their own logs. Demptos, Seguin Moreau, Nadalie, Francois Frere, Taransaud. (apparently) all other tonnelerie purchase staves from stave mills such as Charlois (Ermitage,Saury group)
  80% of a French oak tree is waste, used for firewood, furniture and floorboards.
  On the best trees the cooperage will often sell the first 2 meters of the tree to furniture veneer cutters where they will cut 800-2000 veneer sheets from it for furniture manufacture. (1 – 2 mm thick)
  The top third of the tree is often knotty and will be sold to floor board manufacturers.
  On average , for a 30 mtr tall tree, the cooperage will use 8 – 12 metres for stave production only and produce 15 – 20 barrels per tree.
  Once the logs arrive at the cooperage they are stacked in lots and irrigated to keep the bugs away. Log storage for 12 months + is not considered part of the ageing process.
  Air seasoning using traditional stacking method on untreated PINE pallets. This surprised me. Minimum air seasoning at Sylvain is 24 months.
  All Sylvain barrels are made on grain selection rather than forest origin.
  All Sylvain barrels are a blended barrel.
  I left the cooperage with a sense that Sylvain had all the bases covered, from sourcing the best logs, high level of control in their stave yard, a good balance of high tech and tradition during the barrel making process, and a view to protecting their quality at every stage of production with a high level QA.
  Jean-Luc Sylvain has been elected as the next president of the oak industry body that works with the French forestry department.
  We were all very impressed with the cooperage and with Jean-Luc’s passion for his industry and his company.
  
  Ch.Angelus – Premier Grand Cru Classe B –
  St Emillion
  
  Production about 7500 doz of the 1er Classified wine.
  50% Merlot , 47% Cabernet Franc and 3% Cabernet Sauvignon
  Crop thinning in most years, leaf plucking every year.
  Hand picked and carried to the winery by the pickers.
  23.4 ha in one single block surrounding the winery on south facing slope.
  Harvest is between 12 and 20 days duration depending on rain.
  7500 vines/ha density pruned to 2 canes only
  First sorting in the vineyard then 3 sorting tables at the winery, one before destemming and 2 after destemming.
  Transported to the top of the oak fermenters by a conveyor, no must pumping.
  All inoculated yeast.
  Old concrete fermenters being replaced by SS and oak fermenters still used.
  “hand” plunged with giant pneumatic plunger. No pump overs.
  YAN and FAN measurements every year.
  12 – 24 days on skins , depending on vintage.
  Air bag press to SS tank then filled to 100% new oak.
  20+ months in oak.
  Egg fining in barrel, settle for 6 weeks before racking.
  Sterile filtration before bottling (brett prevention) however suggested that Angelus has no issue with brett and never has but prevention is better than cure in the winemakers eyes.
  
  
  Chateau Canon – 1er Grand Cru Classe B – St Emillion
  
  22 ha of vines
  6500 vines/ha
  80% Merlot, 20% Cabernet Franc
  2 cane pruning with “green harvest” and leaf plucking every year
  Harvest is 10 days with 20 pickers
  2 vibrating sorting tables
  Situated on the limestone terrace adjacent to the township of St Emillion.
  Vineyard planted on the limestone quarries under St Emillion
  Protected from frost by elevation, slope and the old limestone walls surrounding the vineyard, one of the only wineries that produced wine from the bitterly cold 1766 and 1956 vintages.
  Elevation of 87 meters
  Vineyard surrounds the winery and first sorting is done in the vineyard. The vineyard will be picked 2 or 3 times in one harvest.
  20kg plastic baskets used for picking.
  Grape bunches are then sorted at the winery prior to destemming.
  Grapes are destemmed onto a second sorting table where berries are sorted.
  Berries are then put into a SS “trough” and taken to the top of the SS Vat fermenters and tipped in by hand.
  No crushing and pumping.
  Fermentation in oak vats and double skinned SS tanks (shaped like vats) nearly all SS fermenters are Double skinned in the wealthy Chateau properties.
  1 punch down per day with 2 pump overs. Calculated to move the entire volume of the tank in one pump over.
  Ferment temp up to 32 deg C.
  MLF in SS vat or new oak, usually 17 – 24 days, each batch inoculated with direct inoculation MLF bacteria.
  Barrel hall holds 900 barrels, 600 new, 300 1year old, fully air conditioned.
  Wine is racked from oak every 3 months, with SO2 adjusted to 40ppm free prior to refilling.
  20 – 24 months in oak.
  Egg fining in barrel – usually 3 – 4 egg whites/barrique.
  No filtration – not worried about brett, however it was the PR girl we spoke to not the winemaker!
  3500 doz of Ch.Canon each year.
  
  Visited the underground quarries under Ch.Canon. Pretty amazing!
  
  
  Chateau Cos d’Estournel – 1er Grand Cru - St Estephe
  
  Second growth 1855 Medoc classification.
  70ha surrounding the winery on the hill of “Cos” , “Hill of pebbles”.
  20ha of Sauv blanc (80%) and Semillon (20%) at a different site
  60% Cabernet, 40% merlot.
  Elevation is around 100 ft above sea level
  Very dense planting at 10000 vines/ha
  Traditional management techniques used on the 20+ year old vines, each vineyard hand is responsible for 45000 vines and must manage the yearly cycle of these vines, usually everything is done by hand.
  Only the 20+ year old vines will be harvested for first label
  Average age of vines is 35 years old, regarded as old vines in St Estephe.
  4 – 5 canes per vine
  Harvest is generally 12 days
  32000 case production across the 2 labels
  All grapes are hand sorted in vineyard, de-stemmed and berry sorted prior to conveyor to the fermenters.
  Fully refurbished wine fermentation cellar and barrel store
  80 – 100 % new oak, dependant on vintage
  MLF in tank and oak.
  Double skin SS fermenters
  Innoculated yeast.
  D&R daily, many skins left overnight without their wine then wine returned the next morning.
  2 additional pump overs per 24 hours.
  26 – 30 deg C depending on vintage and tannin extraction.
  Basket pressed
  Up to 20 days on skins post ferment
  No topping of EM’s however gassed every day.
  Pump overs rather than punch down on most ferments however some of the vineyard parcels (they have 30 separate sections within their 70ha of red surrounding the winery) will be hand plunged.
  Temperature controlled barrel hall for MLF completion in oak
  24 months in oak
  Egg fining only
  Sterile filtration of all red wines.- very very very worried about brett, all wines are analysed for 4 EP and 4 EG.
  Just spent millions of Euro on a brand new fermentation cellar and barrel storage hall so they are keen to minimize any potential brett infection in the new winery.
  Wines stored at 35-40ppm free SO2 in oak
  
  Controversial Sauv/Sem as it bears the name Cos d’Estournel however the vineyard is many km’s from the winery.
  Cos blanc vineyard is Bordeaux’s northern most white grapes.
  Hand harvested, de-stemmed and sorted prior to pressing.
  100% barrel ferment in 1 year old barrels (could not work out where they get the 1 year old barrels from! They dodged the question!)
  Line priced with the red at 150 Euro per bottle from the first release.
  This caused more controversy as even the French thought this was arrogant!
  
  Chateau Mouton Rothschild – 1er Grand Cru Classe - Paulliac
  
  First Growth (1973 review of the 1855 Medoc classification)
  207 acres of vines
  77% Cabernet, 12% Merlot, 9% Cabernet Franc, 2% Petit verdot
  Average vine age is 45 years (positively ancient in Paulliac)
  8500 vines / ha
  Elevated to first growth in 1973- classic quote from Baroness Phillipine on the short intro movie we watched….. “in 1973 my father successfully had Mouton recognized for the superior wine it has always been and with the elevation to first growth status, bought the 1855 classification in line with reality.”
  What is interesting about this is that Mouton Rothschild was only founded in 1853 after the purchase of an existing chateau however they took until 1953 to begin challenging the 1855 classification.
  The 207 acres are harvested by 400 pickers however if it looks like it is going to rain they use 800 pickers!
  Harvested into 15kg baskets, hand sorted after destemming and pumped to oak fermenters.
  15 – 25 days on skins however in wet years this is significantly reduced as they have limited fermentation capacity.
  temperature controlled to 28 – 30 deg C
  There are only 24 vessels at Mouton in total, all oak fermenters. Mouton have no Stainless tanks. There fermenters range in size from 13kl to 28kl.
  There other wineries, Mouton Cadet and ??????, is all SS and very few barrels! You don’t get to see this side of the business, it destroys the image!
  No inoculated yeast, 100% wild ferments
  Plans to build another 48 oak fermenters to expand capacity to a single fill situation.
  Mouton was the first winery we visited that did not have a single fill regime for vintage.
  For such a wealthy Chateau, the facilities were bordering on sub-standard. It was a huge surprise to everyone on the trip. I would have liked to see the other more modern winery to see where all there money is going.
  80 – 100% new oak
  MLF bacteria innoculation
  Egg fining only – in oak.
  All racking is done barrel to barrel, manually, with candles and compressed air hoses.
  Barrels are rinsed with cold water only
  The underground barrel caves were classically 19th century, filthy conditions and dirt floors. OLD SKOOL….
  Blending is using the “l’octopus” , a SS vessel about 1500 ltrs with 12 or so inlets and one outlet. It uses the length of hose and gravity to blend the different batches. Most peculiar situation however Mouton do not have any capacity to make a homogenous blend in 1 tank.
  Oak vats are cleaned with water only when empty and dried with a massive blower.
  22 months oak maturation.
  Racked every 6 months approx with an additional racking 10 days after egg fining in oak.
  Sterile filtration before bottling, very brett conscience.
  Tasted the 2008 from oak, simply unbelievable wine.
  Proudly boasted several times that Mouton was the first to “estate bottle” in Bordeaux.
  25000 cases of the Grand Vin every year, that’s 300,000 bottles at a retail price between AUD$300 - $700 depending on vintage. Someone is making a lot of money down the line……
  
  Chateau Legrange – Grand Cru Classe – St Julian

Third growth 1855 Medoc classification
Established in 1631 – well before Australia.!
115 Ha in 1 single block surrounding the winery, mostly gravel and sand.
Average age of the vines is 35 years
7500 – 10000 vines / ha
65% cab Sauv, 28% merlot, 7% Petit Verdot. They have pulled out their Cabernet Franc as it was a disaster.
4 Ha of white, Sauv Blanc , Semillon and Muscadelle.
Pruning to 2 canes/vine, green harvesting and leaf plucking to maintain vineyard quality.
Altitude of 24 metres…..the highest point in St Julien!
Owned by Suntory Beverage Company since 1983.
Purchased for 9 million Euro and have spent 30 million Euro on redevelopment.
Hand picking , no sorting at the winery, crushing and destemming.
New barrel hall, bottling hall and fermentation cellar over the last 5 years.
60 odd fermenters ranging from 7 kl to 23kl in size with a total fermentation capacity of 1 million litres ! Twice our capacity for about 1000 tonnes.
Up to 25 days on skins in total
Direct MLF inoculation into the fermenters during primary and find that primary alcoholic fermentation and secondary MLF usually finish simultaneously in the fermenter prior to pressing with no adverse effects of VA production, infact they were confident that this method has contributed to a significant increase in the wines quality over the last 2 – 3 years.
Ferment temp 28 deg C.
60% new oak aged for 20 months.
We say 2 vintages, 2008 and 1998. the 1998 had huge brett problems, the 2008 looked fantastic.
Sterile filtration of all red wines begun 5 or 6 years ago due to brett issues in several vintages.
A Chateau to watch as the quality has improved since new winemaker started 6 years ago.
Very reasonably priced.

Chateau Larrivet Haut Brion – Cru Classe – Pessac–Leognan , Graves

No association with Haut Brion, the first growth classified winery
Vineyards are on a gravel ridge.
50% Cabernet and 50% Merlot
Average age of 20 years.
45 ha of red and 5 ha of white (Sauv Blanc 60%, Semillon 30%, Muscadelle 10%)
Stainless and epoxy fermentation.
Huge investment in the last decade to improve wine quality
Once the quality was said to rival Haut Brion, a century ago, and the aim is to return to that level.
Inoculated yeast and MLF
Ferment temperatures around 26 deg C
Pump overs only, no D&R or punch down.
15 days on skins Max, more like 7 – 9 days most years.
MLF in tank and oak.
70% new oak
Really cool barrel stacking system.
White left on lees and battonage for 12 months by rotating barrel on individual.
35 – 40ppm free SO2 for reds prior to oak filling.
18 months approx in oak for reds, barrel rotation is important part of the winemaking process, essentially stirring without mixing up the heavy lees on the bottom.
They feel that leaving the heavy lees on the bottom of the barrel and only encouraging the fine lees into solution by gentle rotation allows maximum fruit preservation and oxidative prevention.
Really cool system that made perfect sense at the time but must have cost a bomb.
Wines were OK – probably the weakest of the wines we tried.


Chateau Carbonnieux – Cru Classe – Pessac-Leognan , Graves

Founded in the late 1300’s by Benedictine Monks.
47 Ha red, Cabernet , Merlot , Cab Franc, Petit Verdot and Malbec.
43 ha white, Semillon , Sauvignon Blanc and Muscadelle.
White grapes are cold soaked for 8 hours before pressing.
Green harvest to reduce crop levels if required.
100% wild yeast ferments, both red and white grapes.
Red ferment temp is 28 – 32 deg c
EM for 4 weeks post fermentation. No topping of tanks.
30% new oak maturation for 18 months
This Chateau is more highly regarded for its white wine rather than its red wine.
Amazing freshness in the whites we tried, the 2005 looked like a current white release.
Not so impressed with the red wine.
Very elaborate sorting system for all the grapes, first sorting in the vineyard, second sorting as bunches on a vibrating table, then into destemmer via conveyor onto second sorting table for the berry sorting then into peristaltic pump to either the must chiller for white cold soak or directly into the top of the red fermenters. No CRUSHER on site.
Red is aged for 18 months in oak.
White is 12 months in oak.
Sterile filtration of red and white prior to bottling.


Chateau Cheval Blanc – 1er Grand Cru Classe A – St Emillion

St Emillion’s First Growth (alond with Ausone)
Owned by LVMH (along with Yquem)
Borders Pomerol
41 ha
57% Cabernet Franc, 43% Merlot
Soil is quite varied, gravel, sand and clay with small sections of iron rich sand and clay. Unique terrior in the region.
Average vine age is 30 years
Organic vineyard practices
Green harvest to reduce crop every year to approx 2 tonne/acre.
Bunch selection is critical in the vineyard, winemaker stressed that it is not uncommon for them to only pick 1 or 2 bunches per vine in the first selection through the vineyard, leaving the rest of the bunches for the second or third pick.
The bunches are then sorted again at the winery prior to destemming, then the berries are sorted after destemming. He emphasized this quite a lot!
Fermentation is carried out in small, untreated concrete fermenters, each holding 3 – 4 tonne of fruit only.
Concrete is rinsed with Tartaric acid prior to filling.
Skin contact time varied from 10 days to 30 days.
Only hand plunged, no pump overs.
The EM’s are not topped, in fact when primary was finished the fermenter lid is closed and the cap is encouraged to dry out ASAP. The fermenters are gassed every 2 days.
Ferment drainings are innoc with MLF bacteria and complete in tank.
Post MLF , gravity to oak.
Cap is basket pressed however pressings are usually discarded or used in cheap unclassified Vin d’Table (never used for winery product)
Egg fining most years in oak, usually 4 egg whites/barrique.
Doing away with some of the old epoxy lined fermenters in favour of smaller untreated concrete fermenters. Several trial conducted over 2 years , concrete vs Stainless and settled on concrete……
6000 cases/year made of Grand Vin Cheval-Blanc
2500 cases/year of Le Petit Cheval
Grand Vin - 100% new oak for 18 months
Le Petit Cheval – 100% new oak – 12 months
2008 wines tasted and definitely my favourite young wines of the trip.


The Berce Forest (on the outskirts of the township of Jupille, surrounding the Commune de Jupille)

This is the forest used when coopers state Jupille as the source of wood, however it should be stated as Berce as this is the name of the forest.
The forest is 5400 ha in size, 97% is dedicated to production and 3% is a reserve.
Berce is in the greater Loire river region.
Managed by the ONF , Office National des Forets, the government department responsible for Forest Management in France.
Not all oak forests are managed by the government, some are privately owned, however Sylvain only source from the ONF managed forests as they are sustainably managed.
The Berce forest is divided into 265 allotments for management purposes.
The forest became the property of the French crown in 1595 and in 1791, after the revolution, it became state property.
In 1669, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the secretary of state in Loius XIV’s court, embarked on an ambitious task of cataloguing all of France’s oak forests.
It was primarily to ensure the French had enough timber to continue building great ships of war (it requires 74 acres or 3500 oak trees to make one war ship in the late 1600’s).
Colbert classified the straightest and tallest trees as “selected” reserve trees to be used as source trees for acorn collection to begin replanting of the forests. This was done to ensure a continual supply of masts for centuries to come.
As a result of this selection, many thousands of acres of forest were thinned and replanted with acorns from these reserve trees.
Several hundred of Colbert’s trees are still growing in the forests.
Every now and then they get hit by lightning and die, the ONF make a decision to cut down these trees and sell them. Sylvain have bought 2 of these trees in the last decade for oak barrel production .
Napolean banned indiscriminate tree felling in the forests in 1803 and set in law that any tree felled must be 150 years. The ONF have now revised this law to ensure sustainable forest management by selecting the weaker trees for felling rather than deciding purely on age.
The complete regeneration of a forest life cycle is approximately 240 years, from seedling to the “final cut” felling, so appropriate long term management strategies must be in place to ensure France does not run out of oak.





Germination

The life cycle begins after the “final cut” felling of one of the plots with germination of the seedlings. There are many hundreds of thousands of acorns waiting to germinate once the old canopy disappears and as a result the plot becomes a thicket of oak trees with hundreds of thousands of seedlings per acre.
The oak trees dominate the forest floor, eliminating competition from other species however the ONF will clear foreign trees if they manage to grow.
I asked the question if they ever need to replant sections that do not germinate….they laughed at my question and moved on so I am guessing they either did not understand my question, thought it was a silly question, thought the answer was to obvious as to not warrant an answer or they just did not know the answer! Gotta love the French.
The ONF are not expanding the ha under oak forest, they feel that the sustainable management of the forests in place now will maintain a supply of French oak for many, many centuries to come.

Gaulis (the Poles)

At 15 – 30 years old the forest has reached 10 – 15 metres.
Natural selection has ensured the strongest trees survive however the ONF will selectively fell any undesirable twisted or weak trees.
It is almost impossible to walk through a 15 – 20 year old oak forest as it is so dense.
Complete canopy cover ensures foreign trees (aside from the beech) does not grow.

An aside- the Beech tree grows brilliantly in an oak forest and the ONF manage the beech trees within the oak forest. They are encouraged to grow with the oak trees to ensure the canopy of the forest remains closed and therefore maintains a hostile environment at ground level for any other plants. The beech trees grow 3 times faster than an oak. The Beech are felled for benchtops, building materials, furniture and laminate timber furniture on a similar sustainable forestry programme managed by a separate arm of the ONF.

The oak tree naturally wants to grow arms, they are not like Pinus Radiata, so it is important to keep the forest under the canopy as dark as possible so any arms that do grow soon die and drop off due to lack of light. The ONF do not trim trees.

Perch 40 – 60 years

Up to 30 meters at this point in there life cycle.
It is at this point that the ONF begin a rigorous active management regime within the Perch plots. These cuts are called “Improvement Cuts”.
Weak, poorly shaped or twisted trees are cut down. Many are left on the forest floor to rot and add to the soil profile. A few larger trees may be sold for firewood and local contractors come into the forest to collect the felled trees.
The human intervention in the separate plots has been set out be regulation and follows a strict set of guidelines, every 6 years for 10 – 75 year old trees, every 8 years for 75 – 125 year old trees and every 10 years for trees over 125 years old.



Futaie (young) – 100 years

The oak tree is now about 40 + metres high and has finished growing in height.
They are about 30 cm in diameter
The ONF continue thinning the forest (improvement cuts), these trees are sold to furniture makers and timber floor companies with several of the exceptional trees being purchased by the coopers however many still regard these trees as to small and non-profitable for barrel production (as 80% of the tree is wasted).
Many of these trees will be sold as firewood.
It is at this point that the ONF inspectors begin looking for the trees that will be marked as “Final Cut” trees. These trees will be banded with white paint and will be destined for the final felling of the plot once they are 250 years old (approx).


Haute Futaie – (Old futaie) 200 years

These forest have been progressively thinned every 10 years to about 100 – 150 trees per Ha with the “improvement Cuts” every 10 years.
The coopers begin to get excited about the Haute Futaie plots as these trees are now quite profitable for barrel production.
The beech trees are removed at this stage to encourage light penetration to the forest floor. The ONF begin the process of germination by preparing the canopy floor by allowing mottled light to penetrate the forest and reach the ground.
Acorns begin to germinate.


Sowers – 220 – 250 years.

These are the final “white banded trees” that act as the acorn sowers for continual germination of the forest floor.
Once the ONF had determined that the germination is good enough the “definitive cut” of the white banded trees in the plot is made.
These trees are the most sought after for barrel manufacture.
Often the lower 2 meters is sold for timber veneer as it is extra high quality. The furniture manufacturers will cut 800 veneer sheets from 1 x 2 mtr tree trunk.
The top 1/3 of the tree is not good enough for oak production and will be sold as firewood.
Sylvain target these plots.
From 200 to 250 years of age the forest is progressively thinned to promote health germination,
The “seedling” cut removes 40 % of the remaining trees in the 200 year old plot.
2 – 3 years later the ONF will clear a further 25% of the trees in the plot.
The next cut , 3 – 5 years later will remove a further 14% of the trees.
A further 14% of the trees will be removed 3 – 5 years down the track.
The definitive cut will remove the final 7% once the ONF have determined that germination is adequate, this may be 5 – 10 years later.
All up it may take 20 – 50 years to make the definitive cut.

The Auction process

The auction process is no longer a reverse auction as it has been in previous years.
The ONF auctions “plots” not individual trees.
The ONF inspectors mark the trees to be cut and publish a yearly brochure with all the forest plots stating the trees available in each plot.
Not all the trees in a plot are available to cut, if you purchase a plot at auction you only own the marked trees to be cut.
These publications are done by forest and the individual auctions are held close to the forests, so if a cooper sources from more than 1 forest they need to refer to more than one brochure and attend several auctions around the country.
Sylvain have a guy, Thiery, who travels France inspecting each and every plot available for sale, looking at every tree that will be sold within each plot and evaluating each individual tree.
This is a full time job.
His estimation is critical to the profitability of the cooperage as it determines how much Jean-Luc will pay for a plot. If Thiery estimates that there will be 120 linear meters of oak available for barrel production within a plot, yet once the trees are felled and evaluated it turns out that imperfections in the trees means that only 80 meters is available for barrel production it naturally makes the barrels more expensive.
There are only a handful of great tree assessors in France
Once you purchase a plot, and therefore the available trees within the plot, not all will be suitable for Barrel production so you can on sell these to other timber merchants or lesser stave mills.
The cooperage has 2 years to fell the trees within a plot.
If you damage another tree while cutting down your trees you get a massive fine from the ONF. Skilled lumberjacks earn quite a lot of money in France!
Once your trees have been removed from the plot, it will be a further 8 years before any other trees become available on the same plot so cooperages have several preferred plots on the go at any one time.
A standard oak tree will have enough timber in it to produce 20 – 30 barrels.
One of the giant 350 year old trees will make around 40 barrels.
As mentioned previously Sylvain have purchased two of the original Colbert trees in recent years and have produced 56 barrels from these trees. They are the Reserve Collection barrels and several have been donated to charity auctions. The last sold for 6000 Euro.
One only is coming to Australia this year.

The exceptional trees of the reserve in Berce Forest

3% of the Berce forest has been designated as Heritage forest and will never be logged.
In the17th century, Colbert planted several exceptional trees in this Berce forest and just 2 remain in the forest. A third was struck by lightning a decade ago and stands as a decaying monument as it was destroyed beyond use.
The best of these trees is regarded as the Chene Boppe, named after a 17th century forest worker, and is regarded as the most perfect oak tree in France.
The original Chene Boppe is now only a stump, as it to died and was cut down over a century ago. The new Chene Boppe stands only 50 metres from the original one and it is an impressive tree. 60 mtrs tall and towering over all the other trees, perfectly straight with no twists in its bark. Pretty impressive tree!
Next door is another of Colbert original trees, 350 years old and equally impressive however a little more twisted.
It is so French , they have a tree classified as the perfect oak tree. …….
Jean-Luc made a big deal out of this tree, it is a special tree for the French.


Impressions

Every winery we visited with the exception of Lagrange sorted at the winery, many pre and post destemming.
There was an enormous emphasis on how many sortings they did, however only Angelus mentioned it was for disease, everyone else said they were looking for green or damaged berries!
I think we only saw 2 crushers, Lagrange and Mouton from memory.
Most of the berries were transported by conveyors to the fermenters or in small
We saw a huge number of peristaltic pumps in all the wineries.
Lots of hand plunging as this compensates for the lack of crushing.
Barrel to barrel racking. 3 guys at Mouton will rack approx 30 barrels per day.
Egg fining in barrel – up to 4 egg whites/barrel (500 ppm)
No one machine harvested, or at least did not admit to it.
Loads of gravity processes and peristaltic pumps in the cellars.
Several of the wineries, including Cheval Blanc, use glass bungs after MLF for 2 months to allow CO2 to escape from solution on bring on tannin/wine development more rapidly. Cheval Blanc believe this to be a critical part of new oak integration.
Mouton was the only winery with 2 o’clock storage in the wineries we visited.
Red SO2 levels at 35 – 40 ppm free post MLF in oak.
Traditional shaped fermenters, even the new SS fermenters were shaped like the old oak vats, and we saw this shape in every winery.
I wonder where all the 1 yr old barrels go? – as the wineries we visited used predominately new oak.
Most wineries were replacing old oak with SS fermenters. Conscience effort to counteract brett. (Mouton are continuing with Oak, Cheval Blanc with concrete)
Most new SS fermenters were double temp controlled, hot and cold, and double skinned with a layer of insulation.

Aussie or French - you be the judge......

Why are Australian wines better than French wines?

Firstly…..how do you answer this question objectively?

The answer is obvious, you can’t!

Wine is an emotive product and has the ability to create great passion. Wine relies heavily on the consumers state of mind and in any debate over the merits of French wine quality compared to Australian wine quality emotions will quickly take over. In some way this is positive proof of the importance of wine in our society for where would we be without emotions!

Here are a few of my ideas which may help you and your sales team when confronted with the question…..why should I buy Australian wine?

Wine is a complex product, its characteristics are shaped by such attributes as region, grape variety, climatic conditions, soil type, winemaker, winery and wine style, all of which will influence a particular wine. It is true to say that both French and Australian wines are influenced by the same set of attributes however there is one distinct difference between our two countries, and that is our winemakers knowledge base on how these attributes affect our wine…… and it’s all a matter of history!

French wines are often classified as “Old World” along with wines from Spain, Italy, Germany and Austria. The “Old World” can generally date their wine origins back beyond the Roman Empire, some 2000+ years of winemaking history. Grape growers and winemakers can draw on centuries of practical experience when making their wines, a history unrivaled in any other grape growing region on the planet. Over the centuries these grape growers have been able to figure out which grape varieties grow best in which regions, not through science but rather through the process of Natural Selection. Over time vineyards are often abandoned due to factors such as drought, tough economic times, a death in the family or some other such reason, and through this process the “Old World” has managed to work out the best “survivor” varieties and the regions they do best in. It is no accident that Cabernet Sauvignon is found predominately in Bordeaux, Shiraz in the Rhone, Pinot Noir in Burgundy and Riesling in Alsace. These are the “survivor” varieties that were best adapted to surviving the centuries of relatively poor viticultural practices.

Obviously the vignerons of these regions are proud of their history. Many of the current grape growing and winemaking families can trace their heritage back hundreds of years, working the same patch of dirt year after year, using similar techniques to those used by their descendants many hundreds of years ago. This type of history makes for a wonderful story however can lead to complacency. “If it ain’t broke , don’t fix it” mentality works in many instances however can be a dangerous state of mind in such a dynamic consumer driven industry such as ours.

Over time, and as a result of the natural selection process in France, the Fench vignerons have placed a greater emphasis on the region rather than the grape variety when it comes to the taste of their wine. The world has become accustomed to recognizing that a Burgundy will not taste like a Bordeaux or that a Chateau Neuf du Pape will be quite different to a Champagne. It seems obvious to us now that the reason for this is that these wines are made from different grape varieties but prior to ampelography (the science of classification of grapevine species) consumers differentiated wine styles by geography rather than variety.

Nobody will deny that geography plays an important role in how a wine will taste, however it is the grape variety that truly determines the characteristics of a particular wine. Change the percentage of Merlot in a Cabernet based wine from the same vineyard in Bordeaux and you obviously change the characteristics of the wine. Traditionally this has been of no consequence to the French wine industry as it was not an issue of quality of any one individual wine as such rather an overall quality expression of each individual region.

In 1855, Bordeaux wineries were ranked in 5 classes (1st growth, 2nd growth…….5th growth) in an attempt to differentiate superior wineries from inferior wineries. This was the first indication that the French wine industry recognized that “All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others” (George Orwell’s Animal Farm). A set of extremely strict rules were set out governing the classification system and in 150 or so years since its inception only one winery in Bordeaux, Mouton Rothschild in 1973, has managed to successfully change its classification from second growth to first growth. Such an inflexible system does not promote innovation and experimentation within the regions wine producers as they know it will lead them nowhere.

In 1935 the French wine industry collectively put in place the Appellation system, designed to protect the then established French wine brands and the quality (and quantity) of wine released from Appellation regions. The rules governed such things as permitted grape varieties, yields, alcohol content, cultivation, maturation practices, and labeling procedures. Wine producers were told if they did not follow the rules, they were not allowed to use the Appellation label. That is to say, if you produced wine from the Burgundy region for example and you did not strictly follow the rules set out by the French wine industry, you would not be able to label your wine as Burgundy. It was not good enough that your vineyard was located in the designated region of Burgundy. Follow the rules and get a classification, allowing you to use the regions branding, or go it alone and see how you get on. These were the options facing the French wine producer and to nobodies surprise most of the vignerons followed the rules.

By essentially forcing the vignerons to conform to a uniform set of rules within the region they were located it became easy for one region to develop a reputation for one particular wine style. Ch.Neuf du Pape became known for easy drinking reds utilizing the 12 common varierties of the region, Beaujolais become known for lighter reds made from Gamay, Burgundy was known for mid weight reds based on Pinot Noir, Champagne for sparkling and so on……Furthermore if a region became famous for one style of wine, then all those producers within that region become famous for that style of wine, and if each region is famous for an individual style there is no need for the regions within France to compete against each other. It’s a group approach to success, if the group succeeds then each individual member of that group benefits from the success.

This has obvious advantages, certainly when it comes to marketing French wine to the world, however the disadvantages of the strict constraints placed on wine producers certainly outweighs the marketing advantages gained by Appellation system, as a result the wines released under the Appellation system are often poor quality. The system effectively does away with innovation. The French winemaker becomes a puppet, following the guidelines set out under the Appellation system. There is no need to learn new techniques or experiment with different products, in fact the opposite is the reality, for innovation and a departure from the regional style will lead to declassification of your winery and you will no longer be able to use the regional Appellation branding.

In 1979, as a result of the constraints of the Appellation system, the French industry created a new classification, Vin de Pay. The restrictions placed on producers wishing to label their wine Vin de Pay are far less than those wishing to use the Appellation system, allowing those producers more scope to experiment and innovate however the French public see this new classification as inferior consequently the Vin de pay wines sell for less than the Appellation wines.

As a result of the restrictive French classification system the wine producers of France have no alternative but play down the importance of the variety and the individual winemaker in determining the quality of the wine and instead hang their hopes on one word….terroir. It’s a term the French use to describe the unique qualities that a wine draws from its soil, water and environs. It’s a word that evokes emotion in every Frenchman. It’s a word that helps describe the very best and the very worst of French wine. One word, not backed by any scientific research, simply a word that describes everything that is French about a wine. They have been so successful convincing the world that their terroir is simply the only terroir that can make the world best wines that we have begun to adopt it into our own English language! I concede that there is some truth to this statement as quite simply many of the world great wines are produced in France however not ALL the worlds great wines are French.

The vast majority of French wines remain as they were centuries ago, poorly made and lacking fruit expression. Often the wines are a reflection of the cleanliness of the winery and their equipment used in winemaking more so a reflection of the quality of the grapes and the definition of the region.

The French wine industry had a wakeup call several years ago when Australian wine surpassed French wine as the preferred wine of UK consumers. As a result of this many French producers begun to employ new techniques, taking note of the “new World” style to ensure a more marketable product. There is change in the French wine industry and countries like Australia, Argentina, Chile and South Africa are driving it (our wine styles atleast).
The New World dominance of the world wine market has its grounding in the 1980’s when a wave of new wine drinkers, myself included, began experimenting with different wine styles. We struggled with the leaner, poorly made, restrictive styles from France and went seeking more generous wines that exploded from the glass with fruit expression and weight. In these days the wines from Australia were well made, almost clinical wines with fruit and oak (in the case of reds and Chardonnay). They may have lacked finesse but they were a good drink! They were unsophisticated wines for the unsophisticated palate, great value for money and immediately appealing.

The Australian wine industry is grounded in science rather than history. We do not have centuries of grape growing knowledge to draw on nor the advantage of Natural Selection of varieties and their most suited regions. What we do have is a well informed, highly educated group of wine professionals with enthusiasm for Australian wine and a passion to produce the best. We also have ….terroir! We did not immediately recognize it as terroir and certainly did not utilize it in the early days of the Australian wine industry however we are now coming to understand the importance of our ancient, fertile soils and our brilliantly warm and dry climatic conditions in creating uniquely Australian wine. An early attempt to catagorise our unique Australian terroir was the phrase “Sunshine in a bottle” and quite simply it is now OUR phrase. It is our Terroir!

“Sunshine in a bottle”is a good start but we have come to understand that it is only one aspect of what makes Australian wine so good. Our soils are ancient, fertile and varied ranging from Black silty loams in the Hunter Valley, gravelly sands in Margaret River, Grey sandy loam in the Adelaide Hills, red clays in Heathcote and obviously the famed Terra Rossa of Coonawarra (to name only a few). What other country in the world could offer such a diverse range of soil types to its grape growers? Sunshine and soil combine with water and wind to produce our unique Australian Terroir.

Most regions in Australia can boast older vines than in France. Phyloxera devastated the French wine industry and many vineyards became commercially unviable and had to be pulled out. As a result France lost many (actually nearly all) of its famed old vines responsible for producing many of the great wines of the late 1800’s and early to mid 1900’s. Aside from a couple of small, well contained areas in Victoria, Australia is free of Phyloxera and we can be proud of the fact that we have many of the oldest vines in the world, still bearing commercial quantities of fruit, here in Australia.

It is believed that Penfolds Kalimna vineyard has the oldest commercially bearing Cabernet Sauvignon vines in the world! Right here in the Barossa! Langmeil have Shiraz vines in the ground in Tanunda that date to the first years of Selesian settlement in the Barossa in the 1840’s. The French again downplay the importance of vine age in the production of fine wines, again hanging their hat on the their terroir but I am sure they are secretly jealous of the fact that they have very few vines in France that are older than about 50 years and we are making commercial quantities of wine from vineyards planted well over 100 years ago.

The French winemakers can convince themselves that vine age is not important however we know that Meshach could not be made from grapes grown in a 10 year old vineyard. Meshach is predominately made from vines that went in the ground in the early 1900’s!

As a result of Phyloxera, France must plant the vast majority of their grapevines on phyloxera resistant rootstocks. These rootstocks are most often from a grapevine species not native to the European continent therefore not entirely suited to the growing conditions encountered in Europe (the species is often a hybrid American species). It is well documented that grapevines planted on their own roots outperform the same variety planted on a rootstock when ranked by quality rather than quantity. It is true that rootstocks can lead to higher yields from a vineyard however in the winemakers eyes generally higher yields means lower quality!

Old vines, on their own roots, in ancient fertile soils coupled with our ideal growing conditions in Australia make for the perfect combination when it comes to producing great wines. These old vines are an asset that we, the Australian wine industry, should protect at all costs and promote at every opportunity as they may prove to be the key to securing a position at the top of that international quality ladder.

There is no denying that Australian wine quality rivals, and most often surpasses, French wine quality at every price point. The UK market is proof that this is indeed the case however we have one distinct disadvantage and that is our image. Marketing Australian wine to the world (and in particular the UK) in the 1980’s was simple, use the “sunshine in a bottle” phrase and the wine will sell, and it did, however at a cost to our image. We were seen to be cheap and cheerful, delivering quality wines at an affordable price. We quickly gained a reputation for producing good cheap plonk preventing many wines from gaining the recognition they deserved. When we decided to market our premium wines to the world we foolishly used French and German wine terms to describe our wines thereby setting these wines as our benchmark and what we aspired to produce. Australian Shiraz was marketed as Hermitage (Grange Hermitage…..our most famous Australian wine described as Hermitage!), Hunter Semillon being sold as Rhine Riesling and many white wines being described as White Burgundy. By naming our wines after famous French wine regions we were setting the wines of these regions as the pinnacle. We were being judged as to how closely our wines matched the wines of these regions. Our wines could never be superior, only similar.

Things began to change in the 1990’s when the EU forced the Australian wine industry to cease using European names to describe our wines. At the time it was seen to be using bully tactics and many Australian producers were opposed to the change but in hindsight it is probably the best thing the EU, and in particular France, could have possibly done for us! Grange was no longer a Hermitage, it was now identifiably an AUSTRALIAN SHIRAZ! Margaret River no longer produced the best White Burgundies in Australia, they now produced Australias best CLASSIC DRY WHITE, and the Hunter Semillon no longer hid behind the veil of Rhine Riesling and became one of the most internationally recognizable Australian white wine styles. Thank you Europe, you have no idea what a favour you did us…..or perhaps you are now starting to understand!

A second marketing problem faces us now, our lack of high cultural image that will help us sell wine in emerging markets. A great deal of wine produced in traditional “Old World” countries such as France, Italy and Spain is of questionable quality it continues to sell in the international marketplace as it carries the romantic and cultural image of the country it comes from. This is particularly true for many of the emerging Asian markets where consumers feel safe buying wines from countries with long histories and strong cultural background in wine. Often the romance associated with the country of origin is as appealing to the consumer as the wine itself. Australia will struggle to compete at this level and have failed in our attempts to convince the world that science is better than culture when it comes to making good wine.

The challenge ahead for our Australian wine industry is not one of quality but of image. Our wines compete on the international stage with the best the world has to offer, often coming out on top, yet we are struggling to cement a place at the top of the ladder as a producer of the worlds truly great wines. A place many would say (outside Australia) we so richly deserve. Matthew Dukes, well known and respected wine writer from the UK states “I have more pleasure drinking Australian wine than even the great wines of France.” High praise indeed, and he is not alone, yet this is not enough to cement that position at the top of the ladder. What is the answer? I wish I knew……I guess we will continue to promote our wines in the international market place and foster such programmes as Wine Australia’s “Regional Heroes”, pitting our wines against the best in the world.

Australian Wine - to age or not to age

Australian Wine – “to age or not to age, what a question!”



“ Age in wine is not necessarily a virtue” Jancis Robinson

“ New world reds are a different case to old world reds from classic wine regions with a track record of ageing over decades” Jamie Goode (UK)

For new world reds its all about fruit quality and expression, something Australia has become famous for expressing in its young reds. The primary appeal of aged old world reds comes from non-fruit derived complexity.

Jancis Robinson states “ The ageing of wine is an important element in getting the most from it but, contrary to popular opinion, only a small subgroup benefit from extended bottle ageing. The great bulk of wine sold today, red as well as white and pink, is “designed” to be drunk within a year, or at most two, of bottling.” JR goes on to state the small sub-group basically comprises of Cabernet based wines originating from Bordeaux, white wines with very low ph and hence corresponding elevated acid levels such as some German Rieslings and red wines with higher levels of tannins such as Nebiollo. This is obviously a broad generalisation however indirectly makes the point that generally “old world” wines are better suited to ageing.

The chemistry of red wine ageing is a jigsaw puzzle of chemical and physical reactions still not fully understood. Why some red wines age better than others can be loosely based on their tannin level, total acidity, the concentration of anthocyanins (colour compounds) and the wines ability to polymerise these tannin and anthocyanin compounds. This ability to polymerise in turn depends on pH, sulphur dioxide concentration, storage conditions and temperature, level of dissolved oxygen in the wine at bottling and the superiority of the seal in its ability to exclude oxygen from the bottle during ageing.

Australia has made a name for itself around the world for producing wines of great fruit intensity while maintaining an acceptable level of tannin and acid in young red wines. This is not by mistake rather by design as winemakers in Australia realized that our climatic conditions allowed us to retain fruit characters in wines such as Shiraz and Cabernet not seen in European wines made from these varieties. We have become expert in producing wines with “soft” tannins in young reds as wine consumers have demanded “softer and fruitier” red wines. We have had the freedom to explore new techniques and new technology from around the world in our quest to deliver young red wines to the market that do not require additional cellaring.


If the jigsaw of red wine ageing is still not fully completed it would be fair to say that the puzzle has yet to be taken from the box with regard white wine ageing. It is clear that the ageing of white wine depends less on the tannins (phenolic compounds) of white wine as they are obviously fewer in white wine but has more to do with total acidity, pH, sulphur dioxide concentration and dissolved oxygen levels within the wine. The quality of the seal plays a role also as the browning of white wine is directly related to the oxidation of phenols in white wine.

Australian wine growing regions experience sunshine at the correct time of year to allow full ripeness of our fruit. With ripeness comes elevated sugar levels and lower acid levels ( to the point where most wines in Australia are acid adjusted). This allows us to manipulate the acidity in the majority of our wines, both red and white, allowing us to produce less acidic wines. As acidity is one of the factors associated with a white wines ability to age, higher acidity generally coinciding with longer aging potential, we have to ability to produce “softer acid” wines designed for immediate consumption.

With sunshine comes flavour ripeness hence Australian winemakers are able to produce fully flavoured wines, generally lower in acidity than their European counterparts, with lower tannin levels and high levels of anthocyanins (colour in reds) which lend themselves to early consumption.

So in short there is no easy answer to the question “why does a wine not always get better with age?” It is a question of the composition of the wine, the variety, the region, climatic conditions during the growing season and what the winemaker envisaged the wine should be like upon bottling and ultimate release to the consumer. Wine ageing is a series of complex reactions, some good, some bad and most often unpredictable due to the nature of the compounds involved and the high number of variables relating to the process of wine ageing.

Jancis Robinson sums up “ Ageing of wine…….distinguishes wine from almost every other drink.”

Red wine deposits

I often receive e-mails from wine lovers asking why there are deposits in red wine bottles and why, as winemakers, don't we just take them out before bottling. I drafted the response below to one such e-mail and thought I would post it for others to read........


"You have received a gift from the wine gods!

The sediment you have noticed in the bottom of your bottle of Miamba Shiraz has been formed by a series of chemical reactions that have taken place after bottling. No matter how good a winemaker I am there is little I can do to prevent the formation of these deposits short of over purifying the wine you are drinking.

I’ll explain further…..

Firstly, the sediment is harmless, it doesn’t taste too good and it makes your wine a little “crunchy” if you get a mouthful of it however it will do no harm to your health. Actually the complete opposite is in fact true, the deposits are a rich source of antioxidants. They also have significant anti-bacterial properties and, believe it or not, can be used as pigment dyes (when dissolved with organic polymers) or even used for disinfecting skin when applied topically.

So you can see why I refer to them as a gift from the gods!

The chemistry of their formation is not difficult. It simply starts with the formation of potassium bitartrate crystals (KHT) formed through the reaction of the potassium ion (K+) extracted from the skins of grapes and the bitartrate ion (HT) from tartaric acid, a naturally occurring acid in grapes (we also use Tartaric acid as an addition to alter the pH/acid balance of the wine).

The potassium bitratrate is a colourless crystal. You may have seen a few of these crystals in bottles of white wine, often firmly attached to the bottom of the cork.

The potassium bitartrate crystals, when formed in red wine, become a nucleation site for tannin and anthocyanin complexes, the colour pigments in red wine. These complexes are relatively stable compounds however over time they grow into enormous molecular weight compounds and become insoluable in wine. They attach themselves to the bitartrate crystals to form a red wine “crust”.

The simplest way for a winemaker to avoid the formation of these deposits in wine is to put the wine through a cold stabilization process. We do this with all white wines, removing the bulk of the excess KHT through this process, by chilling the tanks to -5 deg C then filtering out the excess KHT crystals formed in the wine. This reduces the incidence of KHT crystal formation in white wine bottles, although often does not eliminate it completely.

We could do the same to red wine, and many commercial red wines are cold stabilized, however the process changes the structure, colour and character of the wine considerably. We believe that the disadvantages outweigh the advantages when it comes to our red wine and so have chosen to not cold stabilize our red wines. The trade off is a better quality red wine with the potential to “throw a crust”.

If you see sediment in a bottle of red wine and you would prefer to keep it out of your glass there are a couple of things you should do. First, simply stand the bottle upright for a few hours (or days) prior to pulling the cork or opening the screw cap, this will give the crust plenty of time to settle to the bottom of the bottle. You could then take this process one step further by decanting the wine prior to serving. There are a couple of good reasons to decant wine, it will stop your wine from becoming “crunchy” with sediment but it will also incorporate some air into your wine allowing your wine to “breathe” . I won’t go into the benefits of “breathing” your wine here, short of saying it’s a good thing if you want to get the best from your bottle of red wine."


Quite simple really......happy drinking!

Why can wine turn people into complete tossers?

So what is is about wine that can turn ordinary people into complete tossers? You know the ones I am referring to....the serial winetasters that follow the public in-store tastings around the suburbs every weekend, they carry their own tasting glasses and make notes in tatty old tasting books.



"Ah, a Barossa Shiraz, what is the alcohol? " If I had a dollar for every time someone asked me that question before they have even tried the wine...........its not always about alcohol !



I refuse to answer this qustion directly, I now answer with my own question. " I don't know, so how do you like the wine?"



And still they go on. " ...so what is the pH of this blend?" Seriously people, how is this information going to help you enjoy your wine tasting experience?



Come on people! It's ONLY wine, a product that should not be taken too seriously. We make the wine so you can enjoy it and don't have to worry about such technical details.

I love wine clubs don't get me wrong. I think the idea that a group of people getting together to talk about and taste wine is fantastic. Education is the key to increasing peoples awareness of the wonderful world of wine and wine clubs are one avenue for wine education. BUT never loose sight of what wine is...........wine is FUN!