Brut Rosé NV – Akarua

The grapes to produce the Brut Rosé Akarua were whole bunch pressed and the different vineyard parcels were kept separate during vinification. The juice was left to settle and then racked into a mixture of old French oak barriques and stainless-steel tanks for fermentation using a combination of native yeasts and inoculated yeasts. One Pinot Noir batch was fermented on its skins to produce a red coloured base wine which comprises about 10% of the final blend. Once malolactic fermentation was complete, the base wines, together with up to 15% of reserve wine aged for several years in old French oak, were blended. The blended wine was then transferred to bottles with the addition of yeast and a precise amount of sugar to undergo the secondary sparkling fermentation. The wine was aged for a minimum of 18 months in bottle on the lees before riddling, disgorgement and labelling.

The grapes for the Brut Rosé come from four different vineyards. In Bannockburn the ‘Cairnmuir Road’ and ‘Felton Road Terraces’ vineyards are planted on alluvial soils over schist and the average vine age is 22 years. In Pisa the ’25 Steps’ and ‘Murrel de Bettencor’ vineyards sit on sandy loam soils over gravels. The vineyard elevation ranges from 200 to 317 metres and all of the vines are trellised with a vertical shoot positioning system. All of the grapes are hand harvested.