The wine cellar

Although not deep, even on the hottest of summer days the cellar at the Brunnenhof is pleasantly cool. It is a place of peace and calm, of patience and relaxation, the main ingredients for producing top quality wines.

Stone, oak, steel and glass are the materials used in our cellar. The art lies in the way each one is used. How much new oak, for example, is used has to be considered very carefully as the wine is stored in 500 litre oak casks for a whole year. Before this, however, the must of the Blauburgunder has to ferment in 25hl casks at a maximum of 25°c for the pungent malic acid to break down and the aromas to unfold and mature.

The following twelve months in the oak casks is the time when body, fruit and tannin harmonize, when the complex, yet smooth, character of Pinot Noir is formed. Finally the wine has to be bottled, but everything in its own time. First the wine is stored in a steel tank and left to rest for several months. Once in bottles of 7 to 10 litres it is celllared for a further seven or eight months. From oak, to steel, to glass - all in the cool, stone vaults of the Brunnenhof cellar.