We were very fortunate today to be invited by Alessandro at Le Chiusure to his vineyard to witness the ‘vendemmia’, the harvesting of the grapes. It was a great opportunity to grow my knowledge of the wine making process, but I also got to see the plump ripe grapes right at the point when they are perfect to produce fantastic wine. It is important to leave the grapes on the vine until they are perfectly ripe but to harvest them before they turn. It is also important that when they reach maturity they are not subjected to too much rain, it may make them plumper but it also dilutes the flavour and the sugar level and therefore the alcohol content and quality of the wine. A dry warm September has made it possible to leave the red grapes on the vines into October so this years vintage should be good. The Rebo and Groppello grapes were beautiful and I filled up a memory card with a thousand photos of them.

It was great to see Alessandro and his team of dedicated and skilled workers in action, and we were fortunate to be invited to eat a fantastic home cooked lunch with them, which was washed down with a fine bottle of Le Chiusure Valtenesi.

Whenever you are in the region you must visit Le Chiusure to sample the amazing wine. For more information about wine tasting at Le Chiusure click on the page link above, or check out my blog post here.