Day-to-day winemaking, reducing our carbon footprint and perks of the job

So, what does a small winery get up to day to day? March so far has been busy, but no busier than usual!

At DJ Wines, as well as making our own wines, we make wines for other people too. This month we’ve been working with a Suffolk neighbour, Arthur at Agora Vermouth, on his new batch, as well as on two of the four new grape wines for Burnt Foot Vineyard, the Pinot Noir and the Pinot Noir Rosé. We’ve spent two days filtering these two and, if the spare pump and other parts arrive, the second two will follow – the Bacchus and Rondo.

To help reduce our carbon footprint, we are going 50:50 CO2 and Nitrogen to cover the wines. In the past, we only used CO2, so we’re moving in the right direction. I spent hours looking for the right valve connection, though, as these bottles have a different connector to our old ones. Change is never easy! The parts are on order now, but it does mean that I can’t filter at the moment, as I can’t cover the wines safely without the regulator.

I spent a day lab testing all four new Burnt Foot wines for ph, TA and alcohol, as well as samples from the 2018 vintage for comparison. Now for the good bit – sitting down with Ian Pettitt, the owner of Burnt Foot Vineyard, for the afternoon to sample the wines to see their progress and agree on what next. That was the real hard work! The wines look promising, particularly Bacchus and Rondo. There’s got to be some perks of the job!