A wine term - “Delestage”
…the second installment in the “wine terminology” series…
This term is quite a technical one, it referring to a very specific operation in a wine cellar. Delestage is a type of “cap management”. What’s that you ask? In short, the cap refers to a layer of grape soilds (like stems, seeds, and skins) that floats on the top of a wine that is still in the fermentation stage. Delestage involves pumping out the must from the bottom of the fermentation vessel into another large vessel. The cap is then allowed to drain to near dryness for several hours, and then the bottom of this tank is re-sealed. Then, by means of a gentle, low pressure pump, the nascent wine is spilled or sprayed back over the cap which again floats to the top of the tank.
Sounds like fun right? …or maybe not…so why is this done? The answer is compound, but very simple. Delestage does a few things. First, it aerates the must (not fully fermented juice) which augments the final aroma profile. Second, this action allows for a greater color and flavor extraction from the source of these substances, the skins, and to a lesser degree, the seeds and stems as well. Finally, this process has the tendency to remove a certain percentage of the seeds from the whole system. Seeds are often the source of harsh and bitter tannins in wine, especially if they are cracked or become broken down.
Many wine makers utilize this technique, other do not. Some of the delestage skeptics believe that all the pumping and splashing, while it does indeed accomplish the three things above, does so at the expense of a certain delicacy and elegance in the final wine. Some of those who reject delestage often employ a couple of other methods to accomplish most of the same ends. One is called “punching down”. This is a more rustic technique by which a cellar worker, with aid of what looks to be a big canoe paddle, repeatedly “punches down” the floating cap into the wine. The second method is called “submerged cap”. In this method, the cap is trapped between two screens, one above the cap, and one below. Then, by either mechanical means, or by weighting, the cap is submerged into the middle of the must, and let to macerate (steep) for a certain period of time. The proponents of this method tout its gentler extraction of tannins an color.
Something tells me that this is not an operation that everyone was dying to learn about, but it remains a very important technique in the canon of cellar operations nonetheless.
TOM CIOCCO
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Very interesting post, Tom. Is this technique frowned upon by traditionalists or the modern guys? Does it have to do with a wine being more of a new world wine or an old world one? Or is this just a matter of choice and it doesn’t make a significant change in the wine in order to be catalogued as a “new world”or “old world” wine? thank you Tom, yoú’re doing great!
Comment by Ferrigno — August 4, 2007 @ 3:47 am
I’d like to follow up Ferrigno’s question by asking if this is what causes the “extracted fruit” quality in wine that I hear Gary Vaynerchuk talk about.
Are there any commercial uses for the cap after the wine has finished fermentation? Do they use if for composting? Can some animals eat it?
Posts like this are cool because they explain more about the wine making process.
Comment by OrionSlayer — August 5, 2007 @ 12:29 pm
Thanks for another educational post!
Comment by luvgrapesqeezings — August 5, 2007 @ 10:57 pm
Tom,
Delestage is a completely new term to me. Thanks for introducing it. I’m familiar with Remontage, where the must is “pumped over” the cap straight from the bottom of the vessel. But, I’ve never heard of allowing the cap to “drain to near dryness for several hours.”
“Punching down”, or Pigeage, as the French say, is sometimes performed by human feet, instead of some kind of hand-held device. A person suspends themselves on two boards placed across the open tank, sort of parallel bars style, and punches the cap down with their feet.
Some producers use rotary fermenters or autovinification. Rotary fermenters mix the cap with the must either by using horizontal tanks and mechanically rotating them like a cement mixer, or by using a motor-driven rotating shaft inside a vertical tank, sort of like a homemade ice cream maker.
Autovinification is primarily used in port production. Specially designed, closed tanks use the build up of CO2, naturally produced by fermentation, to pump the must to the top of the tank and spray it down on the cap. It is an ingenious design - there are no motors or pumps, only valves.
By the way, for the readers who may not already know, it’s the CO2 that creates the need for all these methods. The CO2 given off by fermentation causes the skins and other material to rise to the top of the vessel. Once fermentation is complete and CO2 is no longer produced, the cap will eventually sink to the bottom. Some producers allow the sunken cap to remain for a period of time for an “extended maceration.”
Comment by Kent Benson, CSW — August 6, 2007 @ 4:55 pm
If you’re geeky, like me, and you want even more on delestage, or “rack and return”, as I learned it is also called, check out another good treatment of the subject by Wine Business Monthly at www.winebusiness.com/html/MonthlyArticle.cfm?dataId=27894
Comment by Kent Benson, CSW — August 6, 2007 @ 5:10 pm
Ferrigno-
Delestage in my understanding is more about choice than being “old school” or “new school”. Thanks for the comments.
TOM CIOCCO
Comment by Tom C — August 7, 2007 @ 9:39 am
Orion-
Yes, the remains of winemaking (skins, seeds, stems) are indeed used for all of the things that you list (fertilizer, animal feeds, etc.) and probably more too…
TC
Comment by Tom C — August 7, 2007 @ 10:05 am