Crushing and Pressing
After the grapes are transferred into the hopper, an auger moves them into the crusher/destemmer. For red wine, the juice, skins and seeds referred to as ‘must,’ are then pumped into open top fermentation tanks. Red wine fermentation will take from 7 to 10 days at a temperature of about 78 degrees. By allowing the juice to remain in contact with the skins, the color and flavors are extracted from the grapes. This process is further enhanced by “pumping over” or by “punching down the cap,” which consists of skins and other solid matter. White grapes first pass thru the destemmer and are then gently pumped into our Wilmes press. There, an internal bladder presses the grapes against the sides of the press, gently releasing the juice from the whole berries. The must is then pumped into our cold fermentation tanks, where fermentation can take between 10 and 60 days, at a temperature of about 55 degrees.