Blue Pinot Noir – from VDP Winery Knipser
The Knipser Winery Blauer Spätburgunder 2020 is a Pinot Noir estate wine composed of grapes from various vineyards around Laumersheim, grown on limestone and gravel. With only 0.5 g of residual sugar, Knipser's Blauer Spätburgunder can rightly be described as dry. It ferments completely and matures for a year and a half in used 225-liter wooden barrels. This gives it a delicate woody note that gives it structure.
The red wine Blauer Spätburgunder shows aromas of wild red berries and juicy cherries on the nose. On the palate, the Knipser Blauer Spätburgunder is delicate and elegant. This Knipser red wine is a fine entry-level Burgundy with good structure and complex flavors of raspberry and heart cherry, accompanied by sweet, delicate notes of cigar box and light roasted aromas of espresso powder.
Winemaking – Knipser
Good vineyard work is a prerequisite for the best wines, which is why Knipser Winery takes important steps to reduce yields through a short winter pruning and green harvesting, vendage vert, in summer. The vines for this Pinot Noir grow in the best vineyards around Laumersheim, characterized by limestone marl or gravel.
The selective hand harvesting of the Pinot Noir grapes in late autumn usually takes place in several passes to harvest optimally ripe grapes. In the winery, all grapes are destemmed, i.e., freed from their stems. This is followed by classic mash fermentation, which takes about 14 days, then gently pressed in a tank press and, after a short settling period during which the coarse lees settle, transferred to wooden barrels. Here, malolactic fermentation then takes place, in which malic acid is converted into milder lactic acid, which gives the wine softness and a good mouthfeel.
Aging always takes place in wood. The basic qualities mature in older barriques. The top qualities are aged either entirely or partly in new barriques, depending on the grape variety. For Pinot Noir, 30% - 50% new barrels are used, while for Dornfelder or Cabernet, up to 100% new barrels are used. The aging period in wood is between 12 and 30 months. For Blauer Burgunder, it is 18 months of aging in used barriques. Bottling usually takes place in August before the harvest after next.
Blue Pinot Noir – a wine and its values
- Origin Wine from Germany
- Growing region Palatinate
- Grape variety Pinot Noir
- 13.5% vol. Alcohol
- 6.0 g/l acidity
- 0.5 g/l residual sugar