Well, it's a quiet time for winemaking right now. The tanks and barrels in the winery are sitting quietly through the winter months, with just a couple of barrels needing to finish fermentation. Since we use 100% indigenous yeasts, it can be hard sometimes at the end of ferment to get the wines to go 'dry', that is 2g/L or less of sugar. Any more than this, and we run the risk of the wines refermenting once in bottle and shipped in a warm container. So we have to heat the wine gently, give it some air, and in extreme cases try and add some active yeast. This is the risk with natural ferments, but we believe in the long run that the wine is more complex and true to its origins.
In the vines the leaves are dying away and the plants return to dormancy. Some people have started to prune already, but its too soon for most Grenache is this will encourage it to sprout early in the season. Not a bad time to get started in the Mourvedre though, as long as the leaves browning.
Much of our time is devoted to selling the wine at this point in the year, and encouraging people to drink more for the festive season! It has been a tough year in many markets (the USA seems hardest hit in terms of sales of high-end wines)
but we feel you've really got to get out there, let people taste the wines, and see how passionate we are about the whole thing. So there you go....get out there and buy some Coume del Mas to keep you wamr over the winter months!
If you're in the South of France in February, come and see us at Vinisud...it's a huge exhibition for Mediterranean wines and is a wonderful 3 days. We meet up with clients from all over the world in this time, and launch our new wines. There will be lots to do and lots to taste...click on the link below to come and joins us.....www.vinisud.com
