somerset wine

Viticulture is nothing new in this country. Grape vines were first planted by the Romans as they considered wine an essential element in their legionaries’ rations. The Domesday Book recorded twelve vineyards in Somerset alone. But, a decline began in 1152 because Henry II’s marriage to Eleanor of Acquitania brought Bordeaux to the English Crown as a dowry. This resulted in the availability of more and cheaper imported wine…a situation not unlike what English winemakers face today!

Most wine production continued in the monasteries and practically ceased after the Dissolution. Some grapes were still grown and small amounts of wine were produced. This, however, was mainly by individuals, for personal consumption or purely local sale. For many years, English wine alternated, for most people, between a fun novelty and a joke.

A slow renaissance began in the early 1980s. By 1997, over 400 vineyards had been established in England and Wales, producing 0.2% of the wine purchased from Britain.

Producers have had an uphill battle against prejudice against British wine. In fact, it was only five years ago that I met Stephen Brooksbank at the Bath and West Show and tried his Bagborough Medium Dry.

I liked what I tried, and recently visited Bagborough Vineyard and Winery to find out more, during the grape harvest, when something would happen to photograph. Stephen told me that they normally pick the grapes in mid-October, but the actual time depended on sugar levels, which in turn depended on the weather.

I learned that a late spring frost would kill the young shoots on the vine. They would be replaced, but they would not generate enough sugar before winter came. However, contrary to popular belief, you don’t need a Mediterranean summer to grow the best grapes. Only the average summer sun of southern England will do…as long as it doesn’t get a late frost.

Any type of soil will do, as long as it is well drained. A south-facing slope is ideal, and this is the situation at North Wootton Vineyard, near Shepton Mallet, where I drove on a sunny October afternoon to meet George Martin and his gang of grape pickers.

The first thing I noticed was the complete absence of anything mechanical. Picking grapes correctly still requires the human eye and touch, which no machine can come close to. I noticed that the collectors were wearing surgical gloves. Wouldn’t gardening gloves be better? I asked.

George explained that a thick glove would take away the sense of touch needed to handle the grapes correctly. For the same reason, he said, collectors were paid a daily fee. Piece work was not in progress; would lead to the fruit being mistreated and damaged, or possibly left on the vine.

Picking a grape to taste demonstrated the reason for care. If these grapes were offered for the table in the supermarket, I would immediately reject them, as being too ripe. The slightest pressure produces juice, and each drop that spills on the way to the cellar is one less drop of wine in Primavera.

‘We’ll finish these few rows,’ said George, ‘then we’ll go to Bagborough to collect. The rest of the grapes are not ready yet. I asked how they decided that with a romantic vision of an old man, a very experienced gentleman doing the ‘taste test’. However, I was told that although you can get a rough idea by tasting the grapes, Stephen would do a simple chemical test, which would measure the sugar level much more accurately.

I’m told that Stephen Brooksbank doesn’t own the land in North Wooton, but he does own the vineyards. It is similar to the traditional ‘metayage’ of France… readers of ‘A Year in Provence’ will remember that Peter Mayle had such an arrangement with his neighbour, Faustin.

Just then Stephen arrived with a van and trailer to take the boxes of grapes to Bagborough. I followed him, to see what would happen next. Of course, he hadn’t expected Bagborough to be a castle on the side of a hill, looking down a valley, planted with vines as far as the eye could see. Not in Somerset, anyway. But, the house and the cellar were built in the same nice and smooth stone of my imaginary castle. Would the wine taste different if it was made on an anonymous commercial estate? Probably not……… but something would be missing.

In the yard was a long, trough-like wheeled hopper hitched to a tractor. In this the grapes were loaded, and they were crushed by means of a rotary blade in the form of a screw, activated by the power take-off of the tractor, at the bottom of the hopper.

The arrangement was on wheels so that it could be driven up to the vineyard and the grapes loaded directly into it. That way, there is no loss of juice in the trailer, as there is when they are transported from vineyards further away. The trailer is then driven into the cellar and the chopped contents are pumped into the pressing machine.

There went another illusion. There are no stocky, barefoot peasant women raising their skirts and jumping into the pressing vat to trample the grapes! The Public Health people probably wouldn’t like it, and the machine does a much more efficient job anyway.

The grape juice is pumped into vats to begin a long filtering and fermentation process. It’s going to be five to six months before we see any wine. But they had several bottles from previous years on hand and offered me a taste.

They have the courage to put Bagborough Medium Dry in a clear glass bottle. Color brings visions of many things English…sunlight on a freshly thatched roof, even Bagborough stone. But, this is just one of the wines they produce. The most outstanding is ‘Leveret’, a sparkling wine made ‘with the traditional method of champagne’.

In fact, they could call it ‘champagne’… if they wanted a lifetime of torts from a host of French lawyers!

And that’s not all. Anyone with a small vineyard, but not a winery, could bring their grapes to Bagborough and have their wine made for them.

Now, there is an idea! I wonder if our local council has any south facing assignments available?