Our winery is situated at the small vineyard, and is dug in to the hillside.
After harvesting, the bunches of grapes are destalked and crushed with state-of-the-art equipment, and subsequently pressed very gently in a rubber-membrane press. Stainless steel tanks are used for fermenting the grape juice and maturing the wine; in fact almost all of the equipment is made from stainless steel for ease of cleaning and sterilisation.
For our white wines we usually leave the destalked berries overnight in special sealed stainless steel
tanks. This rarely used method of 'skin-contact'
extracts more flavour from the grapes than if they are pressed immediately.
Our red wines are fermented 'on the skins' for 7 to 10 days according to the
variety. We 'rest' our red wines for at least 2 years and have twelve 225 litre
oak barriques in which the wines 'mellow' for at least ten months.
For our sparkling wines we use 'whole-bunch' pressing (without
destalking/crushing), which extracts a smaller amount of juice but gives a very
clear juice essential for quality sparkling wine.
We produce 'Quality Sparkling Wine' (EU regulations terminology) using the traditional method of secondary fermentation in individual bottles - as practiced in Champagne. Trials with the variety Pinot Gris (1987) produced astonishing results, and our 'Exmoor Brut' is comparable with fine Champagne. It was this experience that led us to plant one third of the new vineyard with the principle Champagne vine varieties - Pinot Noir and Chardonnay; only certain vine varieties can produce the special character of Champagne, which is a completely different sensation from other sparkling wines.
More than a third of the new vineyard is dedicated for red wine production.
Out of more than 100 wines submitted for the June 1993 'Decanter'
blind-tasting of 'Pinot Noir from around the world' our 1990 vintage Pinot Noir
red wine was awarded one star, 27 other wines were listed in this category
including some Gevry-Chambertin and Beaune from individual domaines in Burgundy,
Australian wines from Rosemount, Tyrrell and other top producers, and wines
from Carneros, Chalone and other famous vineyards in the USA. More than 36 of
the wines in the tasting were awarded no stars at all. A remarkable achievement
for our first red wine. Our red wines from the 1995 and 1998 vintages were even
better, and those from 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006 are even more promising.