Tagged with "wine education"

The Loire is the second biggest producer of sparkling wine in France after Champagne but here we call it Crémant de Loire.

Why would you bother picking grapes by hand when you can use a machine? Small growers often choose to pick by hand. Why do they do that?

Veraison is the point at which grapes start to change colour. Black grapes that until this point are green, take on a pink or purple hue and white grapes change from green to a slightly more golden colour. It marks the transition from berry growth to berry ripening. 

A single vine is capable of producing many bunches of grapes. The only way to make good wine is to have great raw ingredients and that means fully ripe grapes.

Planting at this time, with no rain and high temperatures has its problems but the team at Chateau de Fesles was unable to get onto the ground earlier.

Downy mildew is indigenous to north-eastern North America where it spread from wild vines into cultivated vineyards. It probably came over to Europe during the phylloxera crises when native American rootstock were being tested for their resistance to the disease that wiped out around two thirds of Europe’s vineyards.

Domaine Arnaud Lambert invites its professional buyers to a day of discovery and tasting every year at Arnaud’s beautiful home in St Cyr en Bourg. This year we went to take a look at the Clos du Midi.

As the summer weather finally seems to be settling in and we are able to eat out in the garden, my thoughts turn to the rosés of the Loire.

Well, what a month we’ve had since I last reported from the Loire valley vineyards. Huge amounts of rain during the first 2 weeks of June caused chaos around the region. On the 11th June Amboise had 80mm of rain in just 2 hours.

The sun has finally made an entrance after 6 weeks of stormy wet weather and huge amounts of rain.

The weather has been dire over the past week with huge quantities of rain making vineyards practically inaccessible. This is worrying as the damp, humid conditions lead to mildew (downy and powdery) which requires treating on a regular basis, especially if you are working organically.

Flowering is an important stage in the vineyard year. Vines further east have flowered and the fruit has set whereas here in Anjou, our vines are in full flower.