At last, all viticulture and wine making operations for 2008, are at an end for Vinomaker and me. That is except for topping barrels and general housekeeping in the cellar. I won't have to be out in the vineyard, pruning, until February or March and all the 2008 wine is snoozing in barrels (or still going through malolactic fermentation).Today we bottled our remaining 2006 Cabernet sauvignon and Syrah. It's a little later in the year than we intended but we had moved it into neutral barrels so it hadn't picked up any additional oak. It all tastes rather nice...we are both pleased with how the 2006 vintage turned out. Now we just have to wait until it settles down from bottle-shock before we can imbibe. Can't you hear me tapping my fingers?
10 comments:
Lazy sods!....I too have bottle shock...no bloody full bottles left.
I know where you can get free refills though :)
And you think you're tapping your fingers Vinogirl......!
The thought of that claret sitting in the cellar, the sight of the bottles and the mental image of of emptying barrels.
woohoooo, i think ill pop a cork.
I'd be drumming my fingers too. I'm thirsty just thinking about it!
Malolactic! Cor! What a word. Wasn't he in 'The High Chaparral'?
Ha! 'The High Chaparral' was a staple in our house.
What is a 'neutral' barrel?
A neutral barrel is just an older barrel that has already given up it's good 'stuff', oak tannins, methyl vanillin etc. that make wine taste yummy...but sometimes you don't want a lot of oak on wine (red or white) and you choose to use a neutral barrel and at this point it would just basically be a container. A barrel is generally considered neutral after approx. 4 years of having wine in it.
All kinds of things to learn out there, I'd never heard that term.
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