Vintage at Château Puynard
Punching down at Château Magdeleine Bouhou was super duper fun, seven tanks to get through, and by the end my arms knew all about it. Punching down is exactly what it sounds like, breaking up the cap of skins that forms on top of a fermenting red so it stays in contact with the juice rather than drying out and doing nothing. It's one of the oldest extraction methods there is, and after seven tanks of it by hand, who needs the gym.
Château Puynard is where I've spent most of my time though, working in the winery and trying to learn everything before the grapes arrive. Cleaning tanks, racking the juice off, inoculating and feeding it, then pumping it over and giving it a little bit of oxygen, so softly does it, like coaxing rather than forcing. That gentleness matters, too rough and you strip out the wrong tannins, too little and the wine never gets what it needs from the skins. Quite foggy and reasonably cold for the first mornings, but it burns off fast and by afternoon it's a different day entirely.
Vintage has started, and it's only Merlot coming in these days, but it's coming in thick and fast. 6am starts, feeling excited but nervous. I'm on receival, the must pump and the sorting table, Fred's on the tractor and Pierre's helping, come over from Château Magdeleine Bouhou.
Went out on the harvester, just to see it all from a different perspective, up above the vines rather than down in amongst them. It ran over my phone but I got a brilliant receival video out of it.
Everything is kept calm and David doesn't stress about anything, it's so good. Even when the must pump wasn't working and the grapes kept coming in, me flying up the stairs in a bit of a panic, he just said slow down. Being calm is all part of this winery, everything is about quality, making sure the wine has elegance, concentration, the right alcohol levels, nothing overlooked, but most things are done by hand, by feel, smell and taste, and on the knowledge that everyone here wants the same thing.
Andrew, who owns both châteaux, is over with his crew from the restaurant he runs in Ireland, in for a couple of nights on what the Irish call a jolly. They're a young team, but incredible fun, and having them here changes the whole feel of the place. Lunch and dinner together, the sales team up from Bordeaux joining us for lunch, everyone around the same table. It's a good reminder that a winery this size runs as much on relationships as it does on Merlot, the people who sell the wine sitting down with the people who make it.
You can always tell when lunch is about to start, because the village goes completely quiet. Everybody just goes off and relaxes, then comes back until about four to finish.
Vintage has been and gone now, and wow. Grape receival, trucks, tractors, pumps, all of it kept calm, no dramas even when something did go wrong. It really shows in the chai, calm, clean and curiosity about the wine.
The noise, the chaos but fun, the learning and the friends I've made… magic.
Slow, calm, nothing is rushed, and everything is quality. There's wine making magic and secrets that always happen in winemaking, and I know they're there, everywhere, quietly working their magic in the background.
Even though I had very little French, when you're talking about the same thing it's easy to understand each other, and somehow I always managed to follow the process and know exactly what was needed. Voilà, job done!
Day off today, went for a run, deer in the vines nibbling berries. Running in the forest, finding my place.
Went to the gym with Fred. No English spoken but it worked, because we were speaking the same two languages the whole time, fitness and wine. It's a funny thing to notice on a trip like this, how little the actual words matter when the thing you're both interested in is doing most of the talking for you.