OATLEY VINEBLOG
OATLEY VINEBLOG
It WAS a bird year. The grapes were in fantastic nick, so no rot worries, but the pheasants, after a phoney war, turned ferocious that last nervy week. Hurling themselves at the nets they were, making holes and squeezing under. But Milo-the-collie recovered his old enthusiasm for the chase and was a Really Useful Dog. We lost a bit though, perhaps 10%. And always the best - very discriminating, birds.
Our offspring were all on their travels, but it was lovely to see our niece Isie, boyfriend Josh, Iain’s sister Mary and her friend Chris pitching up all the way from Wales in time to help with the prep. Josh provided some welcome muscle for the loading and us girls were the core of the kitchen crew though Iain, as usual, got up early to bake bread and coffee-time pizzas. Jan again sent lovely flowers from her Glastonbury garden even though she couldn’t make it, and Isie did artistic magic with the table.
Harvest dawned warm and pearly grey. Sun didn’t really get through much but it was dry and benign. Pickers arrived to the usual coffee and croissants and the team was big enough to make reasonably light work. Milo was pleased to have doggy visitors. There’s a little movie of the arrivals and the start of picking HERE>>. Sadly, or you may well think thankfully, I got too wrapped up in catering to carry on shooting.
By two thirty we were all loaded up, team photo taken and ready to eat. Warm enough for the tent. We’d ordered an Iberico ham shoulder (see last post) which set the Spanish theme for the meal. Here’s a link to the menu: Menu K Harvest 14.pdf. Thank to the efforts of the kitchen crew, we were relatively unpanicked on the cooking front and the food worked out rather well. The rabo de toro - a recipe from the Moro cookbook - was maybe the star.
Twilight was falling when the pickers wended, carrying their “wages” of a bottle of last years vintage. An Advance Promotion Copy this time, we haven’t released the Leonora’s 13 yet. Too dark to do more than rescue the cheese from the overnight attentions of the squirrels, noisily-roosting pheasants and less mentionable wildlife and collapse with the part-drunk bottles in front of the fire. And then began Feeding the Dishwasher. It takes a couple of days, but blessedly it can get the work done while we get the grapes to Steve, an hour away in Shepton Mallet, clear buckets, nets and cafe tables from the vineyard and wash the tubs and buckets.
Even though I didn’t have much time to photo, Isie and Josh took over my camera, and Sim and Howard have contributed theirs. A selection in our gallery HERE>>
Other than a tricky encounter with a builders lorry in our little lane, the morning’s journey was uneventful, though the tubs were heaped up to get everything into one trailer and the back of the truck, and so heavy we had to keep below 35 mph, causing frustration on the A39 (sorry folks).
Grapes still looked great in the hopper. A brief blockage in the de-stemmer partway through brought a low-tech intervention from Peter with the wrong end of a broom, but otherwise all went smoothly into Steve’s two presses. A short movie of the pretty pink grapes being crushed and loaded into the presses is HERE>>
The free run juice was 74 Oechsle. Not as high as Kernling can go but not bad given the heavy crop. And the acid on the high-but-not-disastrously side at 12 g/l. Steve will sort that out in the winemaking. Could we have hung on longer? Well, all my geeky spreadsheets have shown no increase in sugar, or reduction in acid, in the years when we’ve waited that extra week into November, so we decided against. Maybe it’s because marauders keep taking the best grapes as they ripen. There certainly would have been big inroads in another week this year. So no regrets.
Phew, end of the year for us. A truly exceptional growing season and two wonderful crops. The “English Vintage of Dreams” the press have dubbed it. Many thanks to all who helped, through the year and at harvest. We couldn’t do it without you! Now it’s over to Steve and his team. We’ll taste the wines in the new year. Here’s to Vintage Oatley 2014!
And, hmmm, time to plan our post-harvest break....?
SAFELY GATHERED IN: KERNLING HARVEST
Wednesday, 29 October 2014
Harvest over for another year. A wonderful crop, great picking team, convivial day and, phew, the meal worked out pretty well.
The juice is in the tank, and all is tidy in the field. Time to stash everything away in the barn and plan some R&R.
Grapes in the hopper
Field cleared down for winter