The Terra del Capo cellar
Whereas the Anthonij Rupert cellar is geared exclusively to produce the highest quality red wines, the Terra del Capo cellar is equipped to handle both red and white wine.
Originally a 1 200-ton winery, the refurbished cellar now caters for just 400 tons and features similar versions of some of the equipment designed for the Anthonij Rupert red wine cellar. With entry at ground floor level through a new cold room where bunch and berry sorting is done by hand, white grapes are either destemmed and pumped through a mash cooler into the cellar, or fall down a chute directly into the press for whole bunch pressing (in the case of Pinot Grigio and Chardonnay). Red grapes are ferried into the cellar on conveyor belt.
Built on a slope, the Terra del Capo cellar allows for a degree of gravitational flow for both white and red grapes, whether into cold-soaking drainers for the whites or the wooden red wine fermenters. Automation includes a pneumatic punch that runs along a ceiling-mounted track.
On the lower level, batches of juice are treated separately in different fermenters, each with its own dedicated tank to enable pump-overs of the same wine for greater colour and flavour extraction, and allows for some oxidation to soften the wine. Large stainless steel tanks have been compartmentalised into two smaller tanks, again to give special attention to select individual parcels of white wine. A mobile press can be positioned beneath the red wine fermenters to be fed by natural flow.
An automated temperature control system, run by computer, manages fermentation temperatures in each individual tank of white wine, allowing the winemakers to capture specific styles, depending on different vineyard blocks planted to a single variety. For example, warmer ferments may bring out inherent tropical flavours, while a colder ferment will concentrate on a greener character. Deviations of half a degree on a set temperature will activate a cell phone message to alert the winemaker enabling him to act and rectify the temperature to ensure he obtains the flavour components and characteristics he desires in the final product.
French oak barrels holding either 225l or 500l are used in the Terra del Capo maturation cellar, and for three years only before being replaced.
