Our winemaking with Holly’s Garden Pinot Noir has been modified to try and emphasize the fruit characters and soften the palette.

Fruit is destemed into three tonne open fermenters. It is plunged or “pigeaged” three times a day and allowed to commence ferment slowly without inoculation. The pigeage is a gentle method of extracting flavour and colour from the grape skins. A slow start to the fermentation produces a large number of generations of yeast, enhancing complex flavour development. Once fermentation has finished the Pinot Noir is gently pressed into barrel.

We are also experimenting, with pleasing results, with simply draining into oak rather than pressing. Again trying to soften the tannins, we get much lower yields this way however. The barriques are 30 to 40% new, mostly Remond Tronçais but with some Domenique Laurent Tronçais also. The barrels from the forest of Tronçais seem ideal for Pinot Noir. They have a very tight grain and impart savoury tannins. I like Remond as a cooper because the flavours are complimentary, not overt. The Pinot Noir is left on gross lees for as long as possible to enhance flavour integration between fruit, acid and tannin. Malolactic fermentation proceeds in barrique without inoculation. We are moving back to leaving the wine in barrique for about eighteen months. This extended time in oak seems to make for softer tannin, greater fruit emphasis and greater integration of flavour. At least six months on bottle is required before the wine recovers from bottling.