Picked by Hand

Near harvest time, Richard Flatman and Dean Shaw walk the vineyards, checking and tasting the grapes to determine when picking time is near. The decision to pick is made primarily on taste and the flavour direction of the grape, backed up by tests on the degree of brix (percent of sugar, measured with a refractometer), the concentration of malic and tartaric acid, and whether full phenolic maturity has been achieved. When they are ready, the grapes are carefully hand picked and quickly transported from the vineyard to the winery.

Fermented With Care

At the vineyard, the grapes are tipped into the destemmer-crusher, which separates the berries from their stems and breaks their skins open to allow yeast access to the juice inside. The resulting mixture of grape pulp, juice, skins and seeds is called "must."

Dean then separates the crush into lots and allows the grapes to macerate and ferment with their skins and seeds to extract colour and the tannins that help support and balance the delicate fruit flavours of the Pinot Noir. He keeps close tabs on the progress of the fermentation by tasting the wine daily.

During fermentation the "cap" of the wine (skins that are pushed to the top of the fermenter by CO² gas) is kept moist by gently plunging the cap down three times a day, rather than pumping over, to reduce aeration and protect the delicate flavours of the Pinot Noir grapes.

Aged in Barrels

After fermentation is complete, the wine is pressed off the must and sent to small French oak barrels for aging.

Dean ages the wine in barrels to allow the flavours and aromas to come into balance with the tannins and bring notes of toast, spice and lightly charred aromas to the wines. Only French oak barrels are used. To maintain the individual terroir flavour of the wine, Dean uses approximately 20% new barrels and 80% 1- to 3-year old barrels.

Dean continues to taste the aging wine regularly to monitor its progress. When he decides that the wine has developed to his satisfaction, he creates a blend using the different lots to make a finished wine that reflects the flavour characteristics of the vineyards it came from.

The finished wine is then bottled and labeled and set aside to continue the aging process until Dean decides it is time for its release.