Spontaneous Second Fermentation

Usually in sparkling wine production, the so-called "tirage" is added to the base wines in spring. A mixture of sugar and yeast is added to the base wine and thus initiates the second fermentation. Of course, this approach is not suitable for our approach of fermentation with local yeasts from the respective vineyards. The moment industrial pure yeasts are used in a cellar, they are also part of the cellar flora. Thus, the fermentation that takes place in such a cellar is no longer caused exclusively by local yeasts, because of course it can not be determined with the naked eye which yeasts initiate fermentation. In order to preserve the cellar flora accordingly, no yeasts can be introduced into the cellar from the outside. Therefore, no industrial yeast can be used for sparkling wine either. As a result, the only moment of the year when local vineyard yeasts are available in sufficient quantities is the moment of fermentation of the base wine. This means that the sparkling wine must take place with the fermenting must of the following year. Of course, this also means that no sugar has to be added, as this is sufficiently present in the fermenting must.

This means that the sparkling wine produced by this process has been completely fermented with vineyard yeasts, in the first and second fermentation. However, this also means that the time until the grapes of a given vintage can be enjoyed as sparkling wine takes at least 2 years - 12 months of base wine storage and at least 12 months of storage on the bottle. Of course, this can be much longer with the matured cuvées.