LA GRANDE OURSE 2019 RED WINE (Pascal CHALON)

TERROIR

blend of 5 grape varieties : Grenache noir (55%), Mourvèdre (30%) and Syrah (10%), the remaining 5% being composed Counoise and of Muscardin, a grape variety native to the Vaucluse and almost forgotten. The Muscardin is never vinified alone but always blended, it brings freshness and a beautiful acidity to the blend.

The grapes come from the TULETTE terroir, where the plots are:

• on terrace, where the vines rest on a soil of Rissian alluvium dating from the last Quaternary glaciations (2 million years ago), and made up of limestone gravels with sometimes the presence of flint and siliceous sandstone,

• on hillside, where the vines rest on a thick and more or less gravelly and sandy silt layer whose deposits, of fluvial origin, are more recent.

WINEGROWING & WINEMAKING

The vines are cultivated in accordance with the biodynamic rules (Demeter certification scheduled for 2021) with the use of biodynamic preparations and herbal teas for the care.

The grapes are harvested manually and are sorted directly in the vineyard at the picking time. Each of the five grape varieties is vinified separately, with very moderate use of SO2 during the different vinification stages.

The grapes are completely destemmed and crushed before being placed in vats for a maceration of about 3 weeks. Alcoholic fermentation starts spontaneously under the indigenous yeasts action, and the marc cap which forms on the must surface is regularly broken to be mixed with the juice (punching action). Once a day, the juice is racked from the tank's bottom and poured back to the tank's top to stir the skins in the must and allow better extraction of the aromas, the tannins and the color.

The Syrah, Counoise and Muscardin musts are then racked (free-run juice), and the marc is pressed in order to recover the press juice which will be combined with the free-run juice. Grenache noir must is racked but the press juice is not reintegrated into the free-run juice. Each variety continues a 12-month maturing phase in different containers : Mourvèdre matures in 228-liter barrels, while Syrah, Counoise and Muscardin does it in demi-muids and Grenache noir in sawn-off cone tanks.

At the end of the ageing phase, the different grape varieties musts are blended, then filtered before bottling. No fining is done.