Ouf – plenty of action today!
We started at about 09h45 with Santenay Clos Rousseau, The lost were a little variable – a lot of what we had before lunch (it was a big pick) needed to triage a little rot but more often, fruit that was a little unripe – there was no signs of hail and no dried berries. By 11h00 it was raining and got steadily heavier over the next hours – it didn’t stop until about 15h30. Actually in Santenay it was more like a storm and our pickers had to stop – they will probably be back tomorrow for more Santenay villages…
We didn’t break for lunch until close to 14h00, but there was plenty for even the biggest appetites – my 2012 Chezeaux/Ponsot Griotte was nice enough, but it was rather ripe and seemed to tail off a little too quickly – it was easy to drink, but honestly less interesting that the home domaine’s 2011 Pommard 1er Clos Vergers – honestly! Not a patch on the Clos St.Denis of a couple of days ago…
Feeling full, back to the triage table 1 hour later. Wow! these last pallets of Clos Rousseau are super – they are just flying across the triage table. Now we were ready for the Charmes-Chambertin 😉 We have had grapes from the same grower since 2006, and they are not known a) for their triage at the vine, or b) the cleanest of fruit – but today – brilliant, the best I’ve ever seen from them – ever! The table ran faster, there was virtually no rot to cut, just the removal of a forest of leaves and some unripe clusters – I was very impressed. The grapes were not the smallest I’ve ever seen, indeed some of the cases had quite big berries – always on the ‘shoulders’ see image – but I’m pretty sure we’d take them every year. And there was no acetic rot like our Gevrey villages.
Okay, it was now 18h30 and just time for a quick coffee, before attacking our last grapes of the day – Bourgogne from a vineyard in Premeaux. For the first time this vintage, we ran the table at full-speed – and not just because it was Bourgogne – it was pretty-much rot free, again just a little under-ripe fruit to sort out. The grapes were rather large, but I assume the clones in a BR vineyard are not chosen for the tiniest bunches they can produce! Anyway, we were fully equipped at the table (6 pairs of hands) but it was quite easy for us – unlike the guy who had to keep changing the bin under the de-stemmer 😉
Triage finishes at 19h45 – yipee! Lucky that we could run the Bourgogne so fast and that we hadn’t picked all the Santenay, otherwise we would have been at the table beyond 21h00!
There is one response to “Burgundy Harvest: 19 Sept 2014…”
Bill – What kinds of yields are you seeing? Obviously, they are going to be minuscule for Pommard/Volnay and parts of Meursault and Beaune, but what about the rest?
A little early for anyone to do calculations Claude, but it’s safe to say that outside the ‘strike-zones’ there seems to be plenty of grapes – I don’t doubt that one or two domaines might be challenging their AOC limits….