ELISE - 2022 PINOT NOIR ROSÉ

I moved to the UK in August 2019 (on my 29th birthday), and what I didn’t know then is it would be years before I got to go home and see my family and friends.

The COVID lockdowns in the UK were a rollercoaster. I worked at some amazing vineyards and wineries, began projects that never came to fruition, purchased the property where my winery is, went through periods where we were locked in our houses and I felt both deep depression and creative mania.

During one of those manic episodes in the spring of 2021, I painted this figure. It reflected how I felt at the time. A faceless body, away from my tribe, bobbing through the world, not sure if I was doing the right thing, or if it was even worth it.

It turns out it was worth it, and every single good and bad moment I’d had living in the UK got me to the point of my first harvest in the winery.

I was really disappointed in 2021 that I didn’t get any red grapes for rosé. If you know me, then you know rosé is even more my thing than sparkling wine. And so, when I made this wine in 2022, I wanted to make something I wanted to enjoy, a wine I liked drinking, an expression of how, if I was going to make Pinot Noir rosé, it should be.

A reflection of myself. Where I’ve been and where I want to go.

This wine’s about me.

Hence the label, the image I’d painted in 2021 when I was still months and months from being able to go home and see my family, but still working towards this huge dream I had, which was now very much attainable.

The thought process behind the label is simply: the intense experiences I’ve been through got me to the point where I was able to make something amazing like this rosé wine, and I’m proud of it. It’s the one label I painted myself.

The original painting is in the carousel, and David Hearn helped me turn it into label form with the addition of terroir and grape bunches, maintaining the structure and colors of the original painting.

The wine has my middle name. Maybe another version of me. What I do know is there’s a lot of love and good energy that’s gone into this wine.

This rosé is made from Pinot Noir grapes from two different vineyards. The first portion of grapes came from Lamberhurst Vineyard in Kent. These are some of the oldest Pinot Noir vines planted in the UK, with most of the parcel dating back to the 1970s. These were the first grapes I received in 2022 on September 26th, the earliest I’ve pressed grapes in the UK since I’ve been here (2019 vintage). They were perfectly ripe for still wine, and I decided half of the tonne I received was to be dedicated to rosé. 

The area of the vineyard these grapes come from has a very warm microclimate, hence the perfect ripeness so early in the harvest schedule. 

The other portion of Pinot Noir grapes I was fortunate to buy from one of my favourite vineyards in the country, Coolhurst Vineyard in West Sussex. Coolhurst is one of the most beautiful, well-maintained vineyards I’ve ever been to and it’s a family-owned vineyard surrounded by ancient woods (which are mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1068, with the land owned by the same family it is today). I initially purchased these grapes for base wine for sparkling rosé, but decided the sugar levels and colour of the macerated juice was good enough after pressing to increase the volume of rosé I wanted to make. 

Together, the grapes from these two vineyards show the best of what English Pinot Noir can offer.

One of the things I like least about Pinot Noir rosé is that it’s usually very pale and watery. It lacks the pink and red fruit characteristics other grape varieties (like those from Provence) can give to a pale rosé. 

I have also never been concerned about making a super pale rosé. I love colour. And beautiful colours in rosé can be really difficult to achieve, as colour usually drops out during fermentation, and then even more if the wine undergoes fining and filtering. 

When the Lamberhurst grapes came in and I knew a portion was going to be dedicated to still rosé, I destemmed about 120kg of grapes and put them in a small tank where they were then crushed gently and left to sit overnight on the skins. 

The rest of the grapes that were for rosé were whole bunch pressed in the hydropress and not given any additional skin contact. The whole bunch pressed juice was a pretty pale pink colour and the portion that sat overnight on the skins resulted in a deep magenta/hot pink must that was still very much clear (as opposed to red wine which becomes opaque after extended skin contact). 

I blended the two to ferment, and no additional sugars were needed to kickstart fermentation, only the aid of yeast nutrients were added to help the natural yeasts finish the job. 

When I received the Coolhurst grapes, I knew I wanted to have some maceration time so I could extract enough colour (for sparkling base rosé) that the colour would carry through secondary fermentation. So, these grapes were destemmed and given about two hours of skin contact. The resulting must was a perfect medium between the other two colours from the previous batch of Pinot Noir grapes. 

I waited until all the Coolhurst grapes had finished fermenting before I racked all of the rosé wine and added about 100L to the Lamberhurst rosé. The resulting colour was vibrant and beautiful, and the three parcels of rosé were blended before bottling. The fine lees settled out enough that I didn’t feel the need to fine or filter the wine, it cleared up naturally over a few months and I felt like stripping out flavours, aromas, and colour would be working against all the decision-making I’d done during harvest. 

The resulting wine is fruity, and refreshing, and is a Pinot Noir rosé I like drinking.

I am a believer that all rosés should be chilled – not cold-cold, but chilled. It’s just more refreshing that way. 

This rosé has a lot of layered flavours. 

The nose isn’t overly complex, you get the common cherry-berry notes, I think it’s mostly a cherry cranberry combination, but the palate is where this wine sings. I get everything from watermelon, cranberry, and pink grapefruit. 

It’s extremely quaffable. And because it’s not a wimpy rosé, it’s incredibly food versatile. 

I always say, “rosé is red wine in a pink dress”, and what I mean by that is: it’s made with red grapes, so, of course, it’s going to go well with foods we would traditionally think to pair with red wine. I love this rosé with BBQ, especially pulled pork, I like it with anything tomato based, and I like it with spicy food. Of course, it’ll pair perfectly well with grilled veggies or shellfish, but the experimentation is where it’s a fun wine to drink.

ABV: 10.5%

pH: 2.93

Free SO2: 0ppm

Total SO2: 5ppm

Residual Sugar: 0.13g/L

VA: 0.264g/L