Hardscrabble Journal

Palate Based Winemaking

During crush and fermentation, winemaking decisions are made by tasting. Palate based analysis produces instant results. During a time when we have no time this works wonderfully. Winegrowers can do this successfully as we have been intimately tied to our vines for decades. Same grapes from the same vines at the same winery. Decisions are not so much intuitive as they are empirical.

The crush pad and red fermentation cellar are very active filled with big machines, hoses of all types, and scurrying humans. For safety reasons we ban glass from the press pad and red fermentation cellar. Shards from a broken wine glass could be a major problem. Therefor we use little plastic cups to taste. Not elegant, but safe.

It takes about two hours for a complete pressing of grapes. We taste the juice (or wine in the case of reds) along the way. Press fractions or cuts are made as the nature, texture and flavor profile changes. Each cut goes to a separate tank. Blending and declassification decisions will be made months later. By taste of course.

There is a critical one-week period during red wine fermentation when most of the critical winemaking decisions are made. Extraction is the winemaking term for pulling the tannins out of the skins and seeds and into the wine. Time, temperature and movement all influence the degree of this extraction. Each vintage, grape variety and vineyard block is different. If one has really high-quality tannins, then warm fermentation temperatures, and lots of movement (more frequent pump-overs and/or punch downs) are appropriate to pull as many goodies out of the grape. If the tannins are not well developed, or ripening was uneven, we wouldn’t want to over extract “green tannins”. So we proceed gently. These decisions are based on taste: taste of the grape skins, seeds, juice and subsequent fermenting wine.

Those little plastic cups are everywhere.

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Linden Vineyards / Learn More / Latest at Linden | Journal: October 25, 2020