How to Make Great Pinot Noir - Winemaking

In the final of this two part series, Wim Julicher discusses the winemaking processes once the grapes hit the winery.

Harvest time for Martinborough is usually in April. All the grapes are hand harvested at optimum ripeness over a period of 3 – 4 weeks. Pinot Noir in particular is very difficult to ripen to optimum flavour and to obtain ideal sugar levels in the short growing season.

The Pinot Noir grapes are de-stemmed into small open vats for a 4-5 days cool pre-fermentation maceration at 8-10 degrees.  Some winemakers use whole bunches without de-stemming, but our approach is for a cleaner flavour. After that fermentation takes place about at 25-30 degrees and the cap is hand-plunged 3 times daily. After fermentation is finished we macerate the wine on skins a bit longer taking the total time on skins to about 20 days. The wine is then pressed and put into French Burgundy oak barrels (~25 % new oak) for ageing for about 10-12 months.

Malolactic fermentation happens at spring and after it’s finished the wine is racked off lees, blended with minimal fining and filtering.  Pinot Noir is at it's best when it can express the terroir from which it came, and too much winemaking influence through fining, filtering and other processes can make the wine somehwat generic.

The Pinot Noir clones are fermented in separate batches to allow the winemaker to assess the quality of each clone for blending later. They are then assembled and bottled for several months before release in July of the year following vintage.