Just got back from delivering the precious and LOVEly Madeleine grapes to Steve’s winery. We should be washing the tubs. But, errrr, maybe not just yet. They’ll be harder to wash tomorrow when the grape juice has dried on, but, well, just now a gentle winding down seems absolutely the ticket.

Great day yesterday except for the weather. Started off misty and very cold but the sun was peeping through as pickers gathered for coffee and croissants and we hoped it would be like it’s been the last fortnight, clear and warm. But it never really made it. Cleared at ground level by mid morning but  stayed stubbornly above us, just the odd glimpse of a pale sun.  

Our son Ned and daughter-in-law Paula pitched up the night before to help so it was a family event. They really could run the harvest themselves after all these years, but they humour us into thinking we’re still in charge. And there were old friends and new. Good company and no one let the weather get them down.

A big enough crew to make pretty light work of it. Picking went smoothly though it was drippy-down-the-neck-and-sleeves  out there and cold-fingered pickers were glad to break at coffee-time. My apple cakes turned out, amazingly, really quite well. Although generally a passable cook, I am a famously hopeless cake maker.  Along with Iain’s chunky home made pizza, warm from the oven, they seemed to do the trick to keep people going.

The vines were carrying quite a heavy crop after last year’s good summer and this year’s sunny flowering, but we’d made a lot of gaps last winter by cutting out all the old, long cordons that had been covering multiple gaps, needing to cosset our aging vines and coax them into producing beyond their allotted span. We wanted to give the baby gap-fillers we’ve planted room to grow too, which worked - they’re mostly looking big and strong now at the season’s end; some will crop next year, most the year after. But the upshot, along with a spring frost in the bottom corner, is less grapes. Rarely, the trailer wasn’t quite full. It’s about three quarters of our normal Madeleine crop, maybe 2000-ish bottles?

The grapes were good and clean. Not too many inroads from wasps, birds or sundry wildlife in the end. No mildew. A few brown botrytised berries but recent cold nights and sunny days kept dreaded grey mould away.

The meal - a big 5 course job and my main responsibility for the day - went down OK. The menu was courgette soup using courgettes from Paula’s allotment, serrano ham (from a whole air-dried ham from Spain) with salad/spiced chickpeas, oxtail with prunes (recipe courtesy of Ottolenghi) with  celeriac mash and stir-fried spinach, spiced quinces baked with Oatley honey, and Montgomery’s artisan cheddar.

Everyone wended their way seeming replete and happy with their harvest day. The pickers’ bottles, their reward, are traditionally the wine of last year, this time that’s“Jane’s 2014”, the one with the alternative labels. The new labels arrived back from the printers a couple of days ago, so people had the choice of the black or the white label (see previous post). Honours about even. The traditional white label had the advantage by one.

This morning was warm, blustery and wet. A shock after all that crisp sunnyness but a relief to have the grapes safely off the vines by the end of the dry spell.  Off to Steve’s winery, pulling the fruits of our year’s work, very carefully, behind us. It’s near Shepton Mallet, Steve’s, an hour away with the heavy trailer.

They were ready, busy with the small press already turning and pressing their first load of the day.

Our grapes still looked and smelled great when Steve’s assistant Peter and  son Harry took the tarp off the trailer (photo below). But how would the juice be when it ran from the press?  We knew the sugars would be lowish. Chose the date to make sure the acids were high enough, not to maximise the sugars. A nervous moment scooping a glass of juice from the tray under the press to taste. Oh yesss! Lovely! Hmm, but was there maybe a smidgeon less sharp crispness than usual?  Steve and Peter seemed happy with it though, so I guess it’ll be fine. The free-run juice sugar measured at 66 Oechse, just above our last sample figure (good to know the samples mean what they say), and when Steve tested the acid it was a very workable, if a bit low-for-Oatley, 7.5 g/l.

So now it’s over to Steve and crew. They were busy clearing the small press as we left  at mid-day, ready for its next load expected shortly, with the big press starting to work on our grapes in turn. Busy up there. We’ll see them again at the end-of-the-month for our Kernling crush (we hope) but won’t taste the Madeleine again till New Year.

Thanks to everyone who helped make yesterday such a lovely, enjoyable day, including Farmer John from Secret Valley Vineyard for entrusting his 3 ton trailer to us again and Jan for bringing flowers from her own garden and decorating our harvest table. We’re so lucky to be doing something we love and have people around us who want  to share the experience and lend a hand so generously.

Didn’t have time for more than the odd phone photo yesterday so the ones here and the full set of photos in our Gallery, here>> are a compilation of Ned’s, some that Russ and Kelli tweeted (hope you don’t mind me using them guys) and a few of mine. Anyone got any more? Just email them and we’ll add them in.

There’s a little video of the activity at the winery on what turned into a drizzly morning, here >>