Life in vineyards seems to roll on, year in year out, at Mother Nature’s slow and relaxed rhythm that slip-slides behind the frantic speed in our cities and concrete jungles where time feels to tick us by in a New York minute, faster than anywhere else on earth.
The grapevine goes through a yearly growth cycle. Once the vineyard awakens from its dormant stage, viticulturists will get busy again guiding the vines along the right path for the growing and ripening of quality grapes which the skilful winemaker shall turn into quality wine.
The pace at the winery, too, follows nature’s beat and picks up when the calm winter peace in the fermentation hall gets disturbed by the bottling of the new wine. Eventually the upbeat cadence of the destemmer and press, squeezing ripe grapes into fresh juice in summer, will turn every cellar hand’s attention to the arrival of the new vintage.
The Delicata winery is capturing these remarkable sights and sounds, the moments and highlights that define the character and pedigree of a fine wine in a series of concise, behind-the-scenes movie clips of 60 seconds.
Each one provides an informative insight in one particular aspect of viticulture or winemaking. Since all the clips are narrated in Maltese, I thought I would provide a quick summary of the first three released episodes.
The first ‘Minuta ma’ Delicata’, or ‘Delicata Minute’, is titled ‘Ix-Ix-xogħol tal-btieti’. It touches on the fermentation and maturation of wine in wooden vats.
Each year, Delicata uses over 100 new bespoke barriques made by a world-renowned cooper from French and American oak. Different barrels are used to ferment fuller-flavoured white wines and mature lush reds.
Maturation will stabilise the tannins, impart a deeper colour and give a more complex flavour, all under the watchful eye of the winemaker.
‘Iż-żabra’ is the title of the second episode and explains the expertise involved in the pruning of grapevines in winter. Secateurs snip and remove wilted shoots and canes to ensure that the vine saves as much energy as possible as it enters its dormant phase. This is labour-intensive work but needs to be done each year since the grapevine only bears fruit on shoots growing from one-year-old canes. Pruning is important since it determines how the plant will come back to life in spring and infuences the quality and the size of the grape crop in summer.
The third video, ‘It-taħwil’, shows the planting of a new vineyard. Once the soil of a prospective site has been analysed, a suitable grape variety is chosen and the terrain prepared.
Young rootlings imported from top nurseries overseas are put in the soil before the end of their dormant period, usually in March, to give them the best chance to grow in spring. Each healthy one-year-old plant is made up of two parts which have been skilfully grafted together: the top fruiting variety (such as Chardonnay or Merlot) is joined to another, hardier variety providing the roots.
Delicata’s mini documentaries ooze an unparalled passion for the Maltese land and its boutique wines. They either offer a unique glimpse of the work involved at Delicata’s domain of over 380 pocket-sized vineyards in Malta and Gozo, or open the doors of Malta’s most awarded winery wide for all to witness the winemaking family’s commitment to quality.
The initial three local videos have been been viewed by tens of thousands of wine enthusiasts on social media within just weeks of their release.
Given their huge success, more videos are planned for release in the coming weeks and months.
Each ‘Minuta ma’ Delicata’ can be viewed online on the winery’s Facebook page bit.ly/DelicataFacebook and the dedicated YouTube playlist http://bit.ly/MinutaMaDelicata .