TEACHER NOMAD: CHILEAN WINE TASTING - AND WE THOUGHT WE KNEW IT ALL

Today we went wine tasting in the Maipo Valley which is just south of Santiago. We stopped at three wineries. Two were boutique wineries and one was a huge winery which is the third largest in the world.

First stop Aquitania which is a tiny winery making very small quantities of wine. We really didn't expect to see or hear or taste anything new. We were quite wrong. The valley itself lies between the coastal mountains and the Andes. It is large and eventually was divided into three districts, upper, middle and lower. Aquitania was in the middle. Apparently two French vintner students met a Chilean student and Aquitania was created back in Chile. The lady who took us on the tour was a wine making student and was fascinating. She explained the picking, cleaning, and crushing. The wine is then put into large steel containers with double interiors. Inner most for the wine outer for water which can control the temperature. The wine is first stored at 10° C for a day. Natural yeast is then removed, then re-added to ferment the wine. More added if necessary, and the water is heated to 30° C. The grape skins and liquid sit in this for a time stirring occasionally. Red wine requires longer sitting with the skins. Eventually the skins are removed and the wine is put into oak kegs. There are two kinds of oak kegs - American oak and French oak. The American oak grows faster, has larger pores, so the wine in those casts ages faster. The French oak grows more slowly, has smaller pores, so the wine ages more slowly. Eventually, the two types of aged wines are mixed in proportions that taste nice to the vintner - and voila - wine to drink. Here were some photos.

This is a view from our room this morning. The smoke from the coastal fire was better and we could see the mountains more clearly.

Aquitania winery from a viewing tower

Charlie and I on the viewing tower

Wine crusher - no feet here

Different oak kegs - American and French. Wine brewing containers on the left

Bottles ready to be shipped

The group above is putting the metal seal on the tops of the bottles and cleaning them before shipment

Waiting for tasting

Me too

Our wine tour guide ready to pour. She was incredibly knowledgeable, spoke five languages, and was super friendly.

Our next winery was called Perez Cruz. This winery was started by the children a Pablo Perez and his wife Ms. Cruz - hence the name. Another small winery, and another great - "I didn't know that" tour. The tour guide here let us try the same wine that had been put in two different kegs - French and American. The difference was amazing. It was also a kick to try some wine right out of the keg.

We tasted some wines too, of course. Here's some more factoids we picked up - how to taste wine.

1.) smell the wine in the glass 2.) look at the color - if you can get light to shine through it let the colored light on a white piece of paper. Younger wine has a sharper brighter color - older wine is more terra cotta. Of course, the different wines have different colors themselves. 3.) swirl the wine around the glass. After some of the wine has dripped down, check the second circle of wine. The slower the "tears" drip from that circle - the greater the alcohol content. It actually works. 4.) Check the temperature of the wine. If you touch the bottle/glass it shouldn't be a sharp contrast from the room for red wines - not too hot not too cold. 5.) Sip it.

Perez Cruz winery was built to be green so the building has a large wooden structure with an interesting shape. They make wines straight from the metal containers and into the bottles (kind of like the New Zealanders have been doing with their Sauvignon Blanc) and into kegs like the Aquitania winery did. Here's some photos of that winery.

Interesting shape of wooden structure for the winery

More of the weird shape

The steel container only wines go into the containers above

These kegs have had sulphite which is burned and the gas is put into them. The sulphite is used for killing germs and as a preservative.

A view of the low hills behind the winery. It was in the high Maipo Valley section

All the glasses above were tested for taste and quality. There were sinks where the taster spit out the wine each time. He drank mate in-between tastings to clear his palate.

Chemistry set up for the vintners

Kegs filled with wine. When the wine evaporates in the kegs a bit more is added so there isn't a lot of space at the top. Eventually nitrogen gas is pumped in to avoid adding too much new wine.

We then went to lunch in a strange little restaurant where a man named Sergio specialises in Chilean traditional food. The food was lovely, but his house was amazing! Below are some photos of his place.

After lunch we went to our last winery, the Concha y Toro winery. It is the largest winery in Chile, one of the oldest, and the third largest in the world. The first half of the tour was more like a California wine tour. A big group of us wandering through the winery, tasting some wines, gawking at the grape vines, and checking the cellar called Castoro del Diablo. The name scared the locals so they wouldn't steal the wine. Much to our surprise, we had a second private tasting after the first. We tried three excellent wines that were paired with cheeses. All of them were delightful. The most interesting wine we tried was called Carmenere. Several decades ago, the French vineyards were attacked by a fungus called phylloxera. Most of the varietals could be brought back thanks to California (and other American) vines. The US saved the French wine industry. One type of wine could not be found - Carmenere. It was very difficult to grow, very delicate, needed precise amounts of water, and correct soil. No one noticed that the Chileans had been doing very well with Carmenere. It has now become the Chilean speciality, and I must say, is very nice to drink. Here's the last bunch of photos.