published on: Thursday, 12 March 2015
Grape harvest time comes around beginning February, unless you are the year 2015, which had wine and farm folk hurriedly packing up at the seaside mid January to get home to harvest.
Harvest brings the excitement of a new vintage, eager anticipation awaiting the grapes to reach full ripeness and all the action in the cellar. The fermentation flavours fill the cellar and predictions of the new vintage are rife.
Our last Sunday Country Market is drawing fans from far and wide with the February market attracting a great deal of European visitors and conversations in German were plentiful. The March market will see the firing of a half pounder cannon at Noon and 2pm. Cannons were a vital communication tool in the 18th and 19th Century. The March market also marks the release of our 2015 Pinot Noir Rosé , exclusively available at the market.
HARVEST REPORT 2015 by LUKAS WENTZEL
“If history repeats itself, the unexpected always happens, how incapable must man be of learning from experience” - George Bernard Shaw I am sitting here writing my 15th harvest report at Groote Post. You would think that over this period, I would have experienced it all, but the unexpected made its appearance and made me feel truly inexperienced . This year the harvest started 14 days earlier and found some winemakers still at the seaside.
The 2015 vintage is smaller than the record 2014 vintage, but most certainly up a notch or two on quality. This was to be expected after our dry and hot summer. The white wines are fruitier than the previous 2 years with wonderful mid palate intensity. This will be a standout white year with Sauvignon Blanc and Riesling being the leading contenders. The red crop is still smaller than the white. This can be seen in the smaller grape berries which give more concentrated juice due to the lower juice to skin ratio. As with the whites the fruit intensity of the wines will benefit considerably. The Pinot Noir and Merlot are the reds to look out for.
This year saw experimentation with Chenin Blanc in oak and Rhone style red blends.
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