Harvest- Crush

My first day of harvest was quite a fast paced and confusing learning experience. As I said earlier, I knew nothing of the wine world. I arrived at 7 AM, introduced myself to my new co-workers and boss and then got a quick tour. Making wine seemed easy enough. Crush the grapes, let them sit in a tank with some yeast for a few weeks, and then put the wine into bottles or barrels, right? I could only wish it were really that easy. I quickly learned how much more there is to this winemaking business and very quickly grew to appreciate the hard work that gets put into every bottle.

That first morning, Brutocao Vineyards employees hand picked several tons of Sauvignon Blanc and delivered them to our crush pad around 8 AM. I had no clue how much work goes into setting up the machinery. First, we need to grab our duty list for the day and make sure all appropriate tanks, presses, and pumps are cleaned, prepped, and ready to receive the grape juice. Next we needed to get a 100 gallon tub, partially fill it with water, add some chemicals and take it all to the crush pad to scrub it down and make sure it is properly cleaned so as not to contaminate the grapes. Next connect all of the hoses from the crush pad to the press and then finally to the tank and run the remaining cleaning water through the hoses and pumps to kill any bacteria in there. The cleaning process ends with a full water rinse. When the grapes finally arrive, they are emptied from the picking bins into a large holding bin with an auger in it. From there the grapes travel up the auger into a de-stemmer where the grapes and juice fall down to a collection bin/pump and are pumped to the press. The stems come out the back of the de-stemmer and are loaded into our dump truck for composting back into the fields. The grapes are pumped from the crush pad to the press which works by a giant air bladder squeezing the grapes until all of the juice is out. This juice is pumped into the tank and chilled to about 60 degrees. After all of this is done, everything needs to be scrubbed and rinsed clean so it is ready for the next day.

That is the basics of how white wines are made. Red wines do not get pressed. Instead the grapes are de-stemmed and pumped directly into the tanks where they will essentially sit and ferment for a few weeks. The reason red grapes do not get pressed in the beginning is because the red skins give the juice its color, tannins, and flavor structure. Red wines are pressed at the end of their fermentation process.

These are some photos of the Sauvignon Blanc grapes going from the bin to the press and then the skins being emptied back to a bin at the end. This is the ancient dump truck I drove around the vineyard to compost all of the skins and stems