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- Grape Harvest 2025
"It’s Harvest 2025 and… I’m back on crate-washing duty.
Next to a machine that sprays me in the face every few seconds. Ah! the glamour of winemaking. It’s been years since I personally made wine. My sons reassigned me to crate-washing. Apparently, that’s now my level.
They gave me a Karcher high pressure jet spray at La Clarière – great fun, very Rambo. But now here at Harrow & Hope in England (where Henry makes our English fizzes) we have “progress”; this new machine. I feed dirty crates in one end and the other 70-something grandad on the team pulls them out at the other.
But … every time the plastic curtain lifts, I get blasted in the face. Never happened with the Karcher.
So... why all the washing? After every trip from the pickers in vineyard, crates are covered in sticky grape juice which will oxidise brown. If this gets in the wine it will dull the bright flavours we seek. So good winemakers like to keep them - and everything else for that matter - spotless.
Still, about 19,000 bottles’ worth came in… and I’ve never seen grapes so healthy.
The dry summer kept disease away, and the ladybirds are everywhere – doing a brilliant job on the aphids. The rain’s no threat as long as we don’t dawdle. And we don’t. Pickers go full tilt and crushing runs from before dawn to after dusk.
Once the frantic work is over and the fruit is in the press, we get a breather. It’s a slow, gentle 3-hour squeeze – the rubber bag inflates very slowly inside a horizontal tank, pressing grapes against a mesh. So I can sit for a bit, dry off, and write this.
Lunch is a highlight – catered by my dear wife. We learnt in France that good food makes good wine. Boeuf Bourguignon, Minestrone, Moroccan Chicken, Roast Pork, Sausage & Bean casserole … and, and, and … the grand finale: steak and chips. We couldn’t harvest, especially us oldies, without the food.
And what about our La Clarière, Bordeaux?
Every time I endure the worsening airport chaos I wish I could just magic myself to Bordeaux.
And I can, of course; just open a nice bottle. Travel by Wine. No stress. But alas, that doesn’t quite help with harvest…
Anyway I physically got to Bordeaux - remembering, as I always do, my first flight here in the Sixties when the plane had propellers and you got a nice meal and there was only one arrival hall, just two arrivals a day and my welcoming hosts could simply walk me out and across the road to their car parked on the kerb. No hassles... we were passengers, not cattle. Ahhh!
Bordeaux 2025 generally was a good harvest… good for those still making wine; who haven’t abandoned their vines in today’s tough market.
The white wine harvest was good but with tiny grapes… no rain! The red grapes were bigger because, being harvested later they got some good rain and so have excellent physiological ripeness, displaying concentrated fruit, healthy mature - ie not green - tannins, and balanced acidity.
The Merlot grapes showed plush plum and red-berry character, while Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon added structure and spice and are both were very ripe.
So … Overall, the 2025 harvest appears promising. Although white grapes were few, we actually made a late-harvest white from withered grapes, for the first time ever. Just a few barrels. No idea if it’ll be any good but hey - you gotta listen to Mother Nature and try and play along with her caprices.
Until next time,
Tony
