We spent the first weekend of February on the banks of the Garonne river for a couple of Vinification Experience Days at Château Beau Rivage. After working in the vineyard and the harvest, this third day of the Gourmet Odyssey Wine Experience picks up where we left off after the harvest and takes us through to the bottling of the wine, with particular attention paid to the art of blending.
We started the day in the chai with Christine Nadalié, the château's winemaker. She explained how the grapes were received during the harvest and how the grape juice was transformed into alcohol during the fermentation process.
Next door, in the barrel room, Chrsitine told us about the work done whilst the wine is ageing such as stirring the lees and topping up the barrels. Christine comes from a family of coopers, and so she let us in on the fascinating world of barrels and the harmony between oak and wine.
Once we had visited the chai, the plan was to visit our adopted vines. However on the Saturday it started to pour down with rain at that point so we changed the plan. On Sunday, we got booted up and braved the mud to take a look at our vines!
The Vinification Experience Day is where we taste the most wine. To help us describe what we are tasting, we organised a workshop to help us identify the aromas that we can find in the wine. It's not as easy as you would think!
We then tasted three wines that are still in the process of ageing. Each wine was from the same grape varietal, Cabernet Sauvignon, picked on the same day from the same plot of vines, but each had been aged in a different type of barrel. It's amazing to smell and taste the marked differences between the three wines.
To accompany the lunch, we tasted several of the Bordeaux Supérieur and Haut-Médoc wines produced at the winery.
The afternoon was dedicated to blending, using the four principle grape varietals grown at Château Beau Rivage; Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Malbec. First of all we tasted each grape varietal separately to appreciate the individual characteristics that each brings to a blended wine.
In small groups, we then made several different blends to understand for ourselves how we can make completely different styles of wine.
At the end of the afternoon, each group chose their best blend to present to Christine and the rest of the group.
All in all a day rich in information, aromas and tastes!
Comments
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A really amazing day! Who would have thought that so much work and skill goes into making a glass of wine!
Something that I'll remember when I next open a bottle of wine.
Respect to the winemaker, œnologue and cooper!
Envoyé le Mercredi 05 February 2014 by Pierre