Late, but eagerly anticipated 24 February 2008

Chris Williams gives a harvest update from Stellenbosch

The harvest is late at Meerlust this year, about 2 weeks late. We harvested pinot noir on the 1st of February, which is more or less on time for pinot, but the chardonnay is ripening slowly. The mornings have been quite  cool. My thermometer read 12 degrees outside my office this morning. That, coupled with late summer rain and pervasive early morning mist (photo), has slowed the ripening process.

Not that I’m complaining. We have all learned about how slow, gradual ripening leads to more intense, complex flavours and my grape tasting bears this out. ‘Ripeness’ at lower sugar levels means flavour with less alcohol. The grape seeds are browning and the bunch rachis are lignifying, so we will pick our first chardonnay on Monday (24 February). The weather, along with modified viticultural techniques, is helping us in one of our long term goals, lower alcohol content in the wine.

We are hoping for a cool, dry, windy weekend. This will help to dry off any moisture remaining in the bunches from dew and mist. To this end, we have dispatched the women workers into the vineyard to break away the leaves from the bunch zone(photo), allowing air and light penetration so, come Monday, the harvesters can move through the vineyard quickly, with maximum visibility so that any bunches showing bird damage (a problem in the first few rows next to the river) and rot can be left behind so that only healthy fruit makes it into the press.

Apart from the chemistry of the fruit, the flavours are promising. Chardonnay is quite a neutral grape variety on its own, and needs a few conjuring tricks to bring out the flavours that we as winemakers want. The acids are fresh, there is quite a balanced, even ripeness across the different vineyards and the fruit is more citrussy than tropical.

Apart from the chardonnay, our pinot is already in barrel, undergoing malolactic fermentation in new and older wood. After the chardonnay, we will probably pick one of our earlier clone cabernet sauvignon vineyards and some merlot.