After 8 hours of harvesting, I would have thought that it was time for bed. On the 20 minute hike back to the cellar all I could think about was taking a shower, eating and relaxing. Lo and behold, a bout of new energy coursed through my system upon first sight of Jurij working in the cellar with his new wine. Here I learned about yeasts, pumping over, making rose wine and taking laboratory samples amongst other things. I will go into detail about these concepts in Part 2.
Being in the cellar with one of Tuscany’s finest producers was an opportunity that I could not pass up. Having a chance to be a part of the wine making process, especially at Podere Poggio Scalatte, is something that I could not miss. All of the soreness and tiredness within me seemed to be replaced with interest and vigor. I was ready to work again.
Jurij is a staunch believer in that great wine comes from the grapes, not from the technology that you have. While technology can make your life easier, it doesn’t add anything to the grapes that isn’t already there. For instance his crusher/destemmer was bought in 1996 and is still working like a champion to this day. As you can see from the picture, he uses wooden wedges to keep the machine in place and he stands on some old palettes so he can pour the grapes into the destemmer. Now that’s classy.
Now this is state of the art!
When you walk into the wine cellar you will not be amazed by the fancy shmancy technology either. It is rather small and looks like it could pass for an ordinary garage. He uses both stainless steel tanks and cement tanks for fermentation. When I asked him what he used to control the fermentation temperatures he pointed to the windows and said,”When it gets hot I open and when it gets cold I close.”
Those were simple yet inspiring words. It could not have been said more elegantly. But just like in cooking, the simpler the dish the higher the quality of ingredients there has to be. If your making spaghetti al pomodoro, and you have bad tomatoes…guess what? Your s*** out of luck. The same thing is true for wine. GREAT GRAPES MAKE GREAT WINE! BASTA!
Before you leave here’s a quick little video of the cellar where the magic happens, or should I say hard work…
The Ride Inside 
vinosseur Said:
on October 20, 2009 at 2:04 pm
Hey!
Nice story! Simplicity at it’s best! Looking forward to the next parts!
-cheers
fvig Said:
on October 21, 2009 at 12:23 pm
Vinosseur,
I glad you are enjoying the posts. There still is some more to come, including a nice interview with the winemaker. It is rather long so I will have to split it up in 2-3 parts, but really interesting.