Winemaking at De Grendel: Part 1

The 2010 harvest is not looking good due to unfavourable growing conditions towards the end of 2009 (a late, wet winter and alternating hotter and cooler spells, followed by above average rainfall recorded for September and October, according to the KWV Harvest Report released in December last year) which has resulted in the ‘vast and fast' spread of powdery mildew. According to sources the 2010 harvest might be down by up to 30% - an especially painful hit after the celebrated 2009 harvest.

It's amidst these conditions that I embark on my maiden winemaking journey - thankfully flanked by one of the most experienced winemakers in the Cape, Charles Hopkins of De Grendel.

This journey was initiated by wine / travel / outdoors journalist Johann Crafford, who coaxed me into a winemaking initiative with him after I had too many glasses of wine at a luncheon. I misguidedly agreed to participate in the venture, suspecting that our wine-infused ambitions would wane like our hangovers the next day. I forgot that Crafford had served in the South African army, and I clearly under estimated his determination. An email duly arrived in my inbox late last year announcing that I had officially been conscripted as fellow rookie winemaker in Winemaking 101 under Commandeer Crafford. And honestly, I was excited.  

I undertook my first official expedition on Friday last week. The mission: to pick grapes for first analysis. Commandeer Crafford and I embarked on the mission with such vigour that instead of merely picking samples we did a mini-harvest on the four rows of Sauvignon Blanc vineyard in the Tarentaalbos block.

During execution of duty I tried to have a conversation with Commandeer but as he tasked himself with picking grapes (three per bunch) he only returned my questions with stern, loud counting. Realising the seriousness of the task at hand I imitated his unabated manner and picked whole bunches until the bucket I was loading them into became too heavy for me to carry. I was becoming worried, too, because we were at the end of the first row and I noted that due to some uneven ripening and my liberal grape sampling methods that I might've just halved our yield - and Commandeer Crafford made it clear that he wanted at least 100 bottles of each of our wines (our goal is to make a Sauvignon Blanc / Semillon and a Merlot / Malbec blend).

I didn't want to stress him out unnecessarily, so instead of putting an official halt to our sampling I told Commandeer that my face was getting sunburnt and I needed to return to the shade of the laboratory. He agreed that since he lost count with all my talking anyhow we might as well return to finish our mission indoors.

If Elzette du Preez, assistant winemaker at De Grendel, was surprised to find us back at the laboratory after such a short while she did not show it. She immediately set up the lab counter for our analysis. Meanwhile we had to squash the grapes to extract juice for pH, acidity and sugar measurement. Commandeer liked this very much, since the smell of the grape pulp reminded him of freshly cut grass on a December day. I told him that I live in a flat in the City Bowl and therefore don't have a patch of grass to smell.

Tests on the juice showed that our grapes might be ready for real harvest soon - it currently stands at 20.5˚B, pH 3.03 and acidity at 12.05.