Fermentation and Maturation for Foggy Hill

After the three-day "cold maceration" the 1 tonne tubs of Foggy Hill Pinot Noir are seeded with our vineyard selected yeast strain and malo-lactic bacterium. The fermentation begins slowly over the first 3 days and the mash is only plunged by hand once/day. As the temperature rises the tubs are hand plunged twice/day and take 10 days to ferment to dryness. The peak of fermentation lasts 3 to 4 days and temperatures up to 35ºC are achieved.

Once fermentation is complete the tubs are sealed down to allow post fermentation maceration of the skins for 7 days.

The total time on skins including "cold maceration" is approximately 20 days.

The contents of the tubs are transferred by hand to a small press and gently squeezed to 1 bar of pressure. The dry wine is immediately gravitated to barriques with all lees.

The barriques are all French oak from the Centre of France and the Vosges Forest, 30% are new and the balance 1 and 2 years old.

The Pinot Noir red wine remains in barrique undisturbed from the beginning of April to the end of malo-lactic fermentation in August. The wine is racked off gross lees and given a dose of sulphur dioxide before being returned to barrique for further maturation.