Vineyard News

Blending the 2008 Reds

admin — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 07:58:58 +0000

This weekend we made the final blends for our 2008 barrel aged merlot cabernet. On Saturday morning we tasted and rated samples of every barrel we then made up trial trial blends before deciding exactly which barrels would make it into our premium oak aged wine and those destined for our increasingly popular second wine, Bin 1! Iain then set off to the winery aided and abetted by our friends Phil “winery monkey” and Sandi “wet t-shirt” to empty the barrels and assemble the wines. The result? We’re pleased – for a young wine the ‘08 is full of fruit and already quite round and soft. Less ‘blockbuster’ than the ‘05 but possibly more elegant along the lines of the ‘04 with less tannin than the more classic ‘06.

Our First Quiz Night

admin — Sat, 08 May 2010 07:36:49 +0000

Our first ever quiz night was a great success. Everyone seemed to really enjoy themselves, as much to do with the quantity of Chater wine consumed as for the entertainment and competition of the quiz itself! The rounds were all well received, particularly the unusual sounds (thanks to my friend Chris for those) and the most ‘groany’ round (when the resuls were read out), Dingbats. As you can see from the results on our very own Laser Display Board it was a very close-run thing but in the end the Mismatchers were triumphant! Winning a special mixed case of Chater wines.

Quiz Night Laser Display Board

100% Organic!

admin — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 13:22:31 +0000

We’ve been working the vineyard organically for the last few years and we’ve just received confirmation of full organic status!

2009 Labels

admin — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 14:31:46 +0000

Chater labels are quite distinctive and each year we adopt a theme for the ‘coloured rectangles’ (that aim to express in colour and form the flavours of each of our wines) on them. Our sauvignon labels below show the changes from 2006 to 2008, each was created by a different artist; Jenny Scott in 2006, Jane Tomlinson in 2007 and Paul De’Ath in 2008.

We’re really excited about the labels for our 2009 wines and think they could even be the best yet! Annie Andrews has created a wonderful mosaic for us, using coloured glass tiles, that we’ll use as the basis for all of our 2009 wines, the mosaic itself measures around 50cm x 50cm;

We’ll select areas of the mosaic for each of the labels, along the lines of the following examples for sauvignon and rosé

Dave and Roger rock the Chater winery

admin — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 11:12:07 +0000

It was with some trepidation that we arranged our very first live music night – in the middle of September, what would the weather be like! We set everything up in the winery with the ’stage’ set up for Dave and Roger on the harvest reception area which we also became an impromptu dance floor. We needn’t have worried – Dave and Roger belted out great classics for the 50s and 60s and virtually all of the 130 visitors got onto their feet and danced the evening away (even Iain!). A wonderful evening. Here are some pictures of the event – we’re already looking forward to the next one!

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Sauvignon successfully picked, eventually……

admin — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 07:35:00 +0000

It was a cool and foggy start to the day (Wednesday 16th Sept). Ideal conditions for picking (keeps the grapes nice and cool) but maybe not quite so ideal for the pickers. Sauvignon are always the trickiest to pick, firstly because they have very short stems so finding them before snipping them off is difficult and secondly because they need to be carefully picked to avoid any rotten grapes. Good start though, very little botrytis (rot) and lots of grapes. In fact so many grapes that we couldn’t pick them all in a day…. As the day went on it got warmer and warmer, increasing the possibility of oxidation but eventually we filled one of our larger tanks and called it a day. Thursday we needed to press the grapes after their skin maceration but before that we had to get out there again and pick and press the rest of the crop. Success. Very very long day and we’re all exhausted but the juice looks really good. This year we’ve nearly 7,500 litres compared to just 2,000 litres last year when the weather severely reduced our crop! Here are some pictures taken during harvest

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Storms slow us down a little!

admin — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 06:05:32 +0000

It certainly looks to be a challenging year, after picking the grapes for the sparkling rosé without any mains water on Monday, the heavens opened on Tuesday (15th Sept). An absolute deluge that immediately deferred our plans to pick the Sauvignon on Wednesday. The weather looks to be rainy after Thursday, so come what may we’ll be out there tomorrow. Ironic really, not enough water Monday, far too much on Tuesday…..

2009 Harvest Underway!

admin — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 03:47:21 +0000

Well, it started yesterday with Cabernet Franc for our sparkling rosé but, as usual, not without a challenge. What a day. We knew it would be a challenge because we had to pick and press the juice on the same day to make a pale salmon coloured wine and the 2008 vintage is so popular that we wanted to double the quantity this year. So, up early to set everything up and picking started around 8am. All went well until about 9am when the water suddenly went off. Several frantic calls by Jack to the french water board revealed it was a planned maintenance period that apprently had been notified at the local Mairie. Great. We decided to plough on – had no real choice, the press was already 1/3 full! Remarkably the day went well but things got stickier and stickier and by the end of the day you couldn’t walk anywhere or touch anything that wasn’t completely yucky. 7pm came and went, we’d finished harvesting, the juice was pressed and still no water. On the plus side, the juice is great – good volume, acidity seems good and just the right level of sugar for sparkling wine (big relief). Problem now was that we needed to chill the wine to clarify the juice and I needed to sterilise the chiller unit. Ended up filling lots of containers of water at a neighbours just down the road – but eventually it worked. Long day but all ok in the end. Need to clean everything up tomorrow, looks like we’ll be picking the sauvignon on Wednesday!

Charity Summer Fair 2009

admin — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 12:15:19 +0000

Well this year’s event really was spectacular. It was blisteringly hot and more than 750 people came along to enjoy the fun. There were lovely art and craft stands, the presentation by the local pompiers was great and the live music by Deja-Vu while hundreds of people tucked into a hog roast was simply wonderful. To cap it all we raised more than €1200 for two local charities. Great stuff. Here’s a selection of photo’s from the day.

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Fun at Bristol

admin — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 08:40:26 +0000

Last weekend we had a stand at the annual Bristol Wine and Food Fair. It was a particularly special event for us this year as we launched our Sparkling Rosé in the UK. Made in exactly the same way as champagne it went down a storm. Iain, Chris and Annie were there for the whole of the three day event and by Sunday night we were all absolutely exhausted. We were happy though, we met loads of new people and sales exceeded last years. The Sparkling Rosé was completely sold out by the end of the show, a great success. Iain even managed to get a picture with the mayor in the local paper! Best of all though were the things customers said about our wines; “Lovely Rosé”, “Mmmmm”, “Fabulous wine”, “Excellent Cabernet 2005″, “Tasty wine, friendly people”, “Yum”, “Love it”, “Friendliest stand of the day and the best wine!”