SEVA Awards

Winemaker Ulrich Hoffmann

Last night our Silent Pool Rosé was award a bronze medal at the South East Vineyards Association (SEVA) awards ceremony. This was quite an achievement given that it is our very first wine. Congratulations to Alex, who lovingly nurtured the vines to give us great quality grapes in a difficult year, and Ulrich who turned them into a lovely wine.

There were no gold medals this year, which probably reflects that the judges are now assessing the wines by international standards: overall there were 7 silver medals, 29 bronze and 17 highly commended. The chair of the judges was Andy Howard who heads up the Marks and Spencer wine department. Silver medals were awarded to the following wines:

   Plumpton Estate’s Dean Blush Brut (NV)

   Gusbourne’s Estate’s Blanc de Blancs (2007)

   Bolney Wine Estate’s Pinot Noir (2011)

   Biddenden Vineyard’s Gribble Bridge Rosé (2011)

   Denbies Wine Estate’s Ranmore Hill (2009)

   Hill Farm Vineyard’s Hill Farm Dry White (2011)

   Sandhurst Vineyard’s Sandhurst Bacchus (2011)

We tasted these wines during dinner and they were all fabulous. Peter Morgan from Plumpton collected the best wine trophy for The Dean Brut Blush, and Gusbourne's Blanc de Blanc won the cup for second place.

Silent Pool Rosé- The toast of the Royal Barge!

Much to our delight, our first wine, Silent Pool Rosé 2011, has been selected to be served to the Royal party on board the Royal Barge, Spirit of Chartwell, as it sails down the Thames leading the historic flotilla to celebrate the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations on Sunday.

Two other English wines will also be served: Nytimber Classic Cuvee 2007 and the Stopham Pinot Blanc 2010.

Silent Pool Rosé is made from organic Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier grapes from our own vineyard which is expertly cared for by vineyard manager Alex Valsecchi.  Winemaker Ulrich Hoffman, of Vivid Wines, made the wine at his new boutique winery. Thanks must also go to Stephen Skelton who, as well as helping me establish the vineyard, continues to provide us with expert advice.

Royal approval in our first year!

Silent Pool Rosé available for sale on the 2nd June

Silent Pool Rosé 2011

Our first wine, Silent Pool Rosé, is already proving extremely popular. It's not officially for sale yet but local off-licences, restaurants and retail outlets are clamouring to include it on their lists!

Retail outlets
The Guildford Wine Company, Shalford
Taurus Wines, Bramley
The Vineyard, Dorking

Pubs/Restaurants
Drummond Arms, Albury
Kinghams Restaurant, Shere
Percy Arms, Chilworth
William Bray, Shere
William IV, Little London
Wisley Golf Club, Ripley

The Guildford Wine Company will be hosting a small tasting at the beginning of English Wine Week on Saturday 2nd June between 11.00am and 5.00pm. I'll be there to provide information about the vineyard and the wine to anyone who is prepared to listen!

We are delighted with the quality of the wine which has been produced from hand picked Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier organic grapes from our own vineyard. I just wish we had more bottles available this year as we are likely to run out of the meagre 820 we produced before summer arrives. If you manage to get some, you'll be one of the lucky few!

Our Very First Wine - Silent Pool Rosé

                                            

The Silent Pool

Earlier this week we bottled our first wine which we have called Silent Pool Rosé. It has been made exclusively from hand-picked organic Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier grapes from our own vineyard. We are delighted with our first effort; our winemaker, Ulrich Hoffmann, describes the wine as elegant and crisp with subtle and fresh summer fruit flavours.

We only have 820 bottles this year so it will be in scarce supply. Next year we hope to have around 5000 bottles.

Silent Pool is a lake of crystal clear water adjacent to the vineyard. Natural filtration leaves the water completely clear with a lovely blue-green colour. According to local legend a beautiful young maiden drowned there, escaping the clutches of King John, and now haunts the Silent Pool.

A Frosty Night

Much appreciated help from Philip, JB, Peter and Gary

We were out on the vineyard last night as temperatures reached as low as -4C. At this time of year frost is our biggest nightmare as it can cause significant damage even before bud burst. Michigan State University have produced a chart showing vine frost tolerance at different temperature levels according to bud development http://www.ristcanyonvineyards.com/grape_frost_tolerance.html

Our vines are mainly at the stage of full swell and some damage will occur at around -3C. With the help of the boujies, orchard burners, a FrostBuster and a converted corn dryer, we managed to keep most of the vineyard above -2.5C. However I recorded some areas at -3.5C so we will have to wait and see how much damage has been done.

No frost is forecast for the next few days but we still have some time to go before the risk of frost diminishes. Once the buds have burst -1C will cause around 10% damage but this could increase to 90% at -3C when there are three leaves on the vines.

No doubt some more sleepless nights ahead.

Were Going Biodynamic!

Horn Manure (Preparation 500) 

Alex thinks I've gone crazy but we've taken the plunge anyway and gone biodynamic!

Biodynamics is  sort of organics plus. Like organics, it excludes the use of artificial chemicals and encourages the use of composts and manures. However it also promotes the holistic interrelationships between the soil, the plants and animals, as well as the more subtle rhythms associated with the moon, the sun and the planets.

Special manure and herb based preparations are applied to the vineyard to enhance and stimulate microbiological life in the soil and improve fertility. We sprayed our first preparation last Monday which included Horn Manure (500) and Barrel Preparation, which is made from fermented cow manure to which is added small amounts of basalt meal and ground egg shells as well as the herb preparations of yarrow, chamomile, dandelion and valerian flowers, oak bark and stinging nettle. Later in the year we will spray Horn Silica (501).

Many famous vineyards throughout the world have adopted the biodynamic approach, including Coulee de Serrant, Domaine de Romanee Conti, Domaine Laflaive, Beaux Freres in Oragon and Henschke in Australia. In Burgundy alone there are more than forty biodynamic estates.

By going biodynamic we believe that we are encouraging the natural terroir of the land, which will give the wine its own special character, as well as taking another step towards sustainable viticulture and wine making.

Gary and the Frost Killer vs Jack Frost

Gary and the Frost Killer

Our latest piece of armoury in the war against Jack Frost is now ready for action!

Gary has converted and old corn dryer machine so that it continually sucks in huge amounts of cold air at ground level and shots it skywards. This will hopefully create enough air movement in the lowest part of the vineyard to fight off the worst of potential frosts.

The Frost Killer will be used with our other frost prevention equipment which comprises a FrostGuard machine, which blasts warm air around the vineyard, and hundreds of boujies (French for candle) which are paraffin heaters which we put in the rows near to the vines.

The warm weather at the moment means that we are likely to get bud burst  in early April, following which we will have to be ready to get up in the middle of the night to fight off Jack Frost.