We are coming into week three here at Calle Bodega and things are hitting full stride. We are probably about half way through the Crush portion of things which is both encouraging and daunting, knowing that another half still awaits. What that also means is that we have various
tanks of wine fermenting at various stages with our first two finishing up shortly. Since I've given the rundown of the crush side of things, here is a look at the day to day work in the winery and why it's like making a cup of tea.
We do 2 different types of pumpovers here in 2 different ways as well as delestage or 'rack and return.' A pumpover is basically the act of pumping must (soon to be wine) on top of the cap (grapes, seeds, skins, etc which have risen to the top). The idea is always to extract as much as you can from the grapes. The skin contains the color that a wine will have and also gives some tannin and that ever illusive term, complexity. The seeds also give the wine some tannin structure. The goal is to mix it all up together, the more surface area between must and grapes the better. Another purpose for keeping the cap moist and in contact with th
e must is to ensure that it doesn't dry out. If it does, it is much more likely to home all of the problematic microbes that winemakers try so hard to keep out of their wine.
--Which tea would be darker and have more pronounced taste: The one that you poor water on top of, or the one that you poor the water and place the tea bag on top of? The more a tea bag is in contact with the water, the darker and more pungent the tea.
1)Closed pumpover: Tank-Pump-Tank
Less exposure to air involved here and used more frequently before fermentation begins and as it is finishing up. Before a wine is inoculated with yeast, it's best not to give the 'bad' yeast the oxygen necessary to start fermentation. At this stage, the purpose of the pumpover is to extract color and keep the whatever cap has begun to form moist.
2)Open pumpover: Tank-Bin-Pump-Tank
Here the goal is to let the fermenting must breathe more. This process is beneficial in that it gives yeast the needed oxygen necessary to keep fermentation going. To a small extent, it might help 'blow off' any off odors (rotten eggs for example) that inevitably will be found in varying amounts. It is a little more aggressive in that and will also help soften tannins to some extent. This requires a bit more labor since one has to constantly monitor the level of wine in the bin so that it neither overflows nor sucks air into the pump (which would be a pity since they cost a few thousand dollars a piece).
Both techniques are done either by hand or with an irrigator, which basically sprays the cap like a sprinkler.
A) By Hand: A bit tedious and uncomfortable, but the personaled care of a trained professional (or a complete novice such as myself) ensures a job well done. it is also a little more gentle on the wine than the irrigator. On hands and knees this can get very uncomfortable, especially for the bigger tanks which we pumpover for 40 minutes. When done correctly however, one can make sure that every nook and cranny of the tank has gotten its far share of must sprayed on top. I believe that achieving excellence is all about the details and use this incentive to do the best job I can.
B) Irrigator: This is one of a cellar workers best friends since you can set everything up and let 'er rip. If it's a closed fermentation, you can walk away and get other things done. The idea is that it equally sprays the cap, which it does, but in most cases won't be able to spray the entire cap. That said, it does a good job and is only slightly harsher than by hand.
Delestage-Rack and Return:
This is the grand daddy for getting oxygen to your fermenting tank and for softening up tannins. This whole idea of softening tannins is key when making wine that is ready to drink young, as many Argentine wines are and in Napa is used to tame some of the (in)famous Cabernet Sauvignon tannins. Must is pumped out of the body of one tank into another. As the must diminishes (as well as any lazy yeast that have settled at the bottom), the cap sinks to the bottom of the tank. At this point, air/oxygen fills the first tank and the skins, seeds, etc lay at the bottom. After a period of time, here about an hour or two, the must in tank two is pumped back on top of tank one. As the tank begins to fill with fermenting must, the CO2 produced in fermentation slowly pushes all the solid particles back to the top of the tank and in doing so, ensures that all the must is in contact with the skins at some point.
The regimen in regards to how many times a day and for how long depends on the winemaker, what style of wine he wants to make, what type of grape is fermenting, and various other factors. Here, we generally do 3 pumpovers per day, each one lasting from 10 minutes to 40 minutes depending on the size of the tank. As mentioned earlier, a wine is more fragile before inoculation and once it has about finished fermenting and thus we use primarily closed fermentations for shorter durations of time. When fermentation is humming along nicely, we use more open fermentations for longer periods of time. The other part of the day to day maitenance is analyses of temperature and Baume (how much sugar is left in the must).
For each of the three pumpover shifts (morning, afternoon, and evening), we are given a worksheet of our tasks. It tells us what type of pumpover is due for each tank and if any additions need to be made. Here is where we write down our findings for temperature and Baume, which is later entered into a spreadsheet or graph to track the fermentation of each tank. If anything looks fishy, further action will ensue to make sure that all is well and that the people will have wine to drink.
More importantly than any data we record, however, is tasting each tank daily. Sergio, the winemaker, makes his rounds and smells, swirls, tastes, and spits each and every tank. He looks at the color and usually says, something like, 'this has great color.' I nod and agree. If the yeast aren't happy, they begin to make stinky rotten egg smells and it's a cue to either give it some food or give it some oxygen in most cases. Here, we also get an idea as to whether the acidity is where it needs to be, what type of mouthfeel the wine will have, and what flavors it will have. The nose and aromatics will only become more pronounced after the secondary or malolactic fermentation. I always make myself available when I see Sergio walking around with his glass and bucket to see if I can taste what he tastes and bounce ideas off him. It's pretty tough to taste a huge difference in the musts at this stage for me, but there are some sublte differences that I can't quite put my finger on yet. I also make a glass available to myself when he isn't around to double check everything of course. Spitting optional.
As you can see, an infinite amount of variables are always in play and there are no set rules as to how wine 'should' be made. At this point, I am following orders and taking note of whats happening. Most of the day to day work in the winery is to extract color and tannins and to make sure that a healthy fermentation is taking place. The concepts are simple, just as putting a tea bag in hot water for a period of time depending on your taste, but the seemingly insignifcant decisions made along the way make all the difference. If it weren't this way, I'd probably not be here and I probably wouldn't ever think abou the similarities between tea and wine.
