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New York Muscat, Nova Scotia’s most aromatic grape variety was used to make this slightly pink-in-colour wine. The grape itself is purple skinned but the flesh inside the grapes is clear. To extract as much of the aromatics as possible from the skins (where most of the aromatics in the grape variety concentrate), we employ a cold maceration or cold soak of the skins, seeds and juice. What this does is allows the aromatics of the skins to move to the juice. What also happens is that there is a movement as well of the color from the skins to the juice. This is why the Muscat has a copper/pink color.

2018 was a challenging growing season, beginning with an un-seasonally warm spring followed by a monumental spring freeze in early June. The spring frost, or freeze as it is more correct, affected the young shoots of varieties in frost-prone areas. As a result, yields in affected varieties and areas were drastically reduced. Lucky for us, the Riesling, grown in the upper Eastern block of our estate, was virtually untouched. Likewise for the Riesling at two of our growers’ Riesling sites (Fox Harb’r and Den Haan Vineyards).

The summer was warm and dry but our usual Indian summer was cut short in the fall, abruptly ending our usual period for extended ripening. The grapes coming in to the winery were healthy and clean and the acidity and minerality pronounced.

Each block of Riesling was individually hand harvested at a ripeness level that both allowed us to capture fresh yet mature flavours and to retain a bright acidity that gives the wine its refreshing lift. 100% of the grapes were cold macerated on the skins overnight prior to pressing. The Gaspereau and Den Haan Vineyards Rieslings were were cool-fermented together while the Fox Harb’r Riesling was individually cool-fermented. Both ferments occurred in stainless steel. This year, new to Gaspereau Vineyards, we held back a small amount of unfermented juice and added it back to the fermented wine prior to bottling. This juice is called Suess Reserve and is used to give added fruit and weight to the final wine. The Riesling 2018 was assembled and bottled thereafter in the winter of 2019.

White Rock 2017 is an experimental blend of seven, predominantly Estate-grown, varieties including L’Acadie Seyval, Chardonnay and Muscat. Each varietal wine was barrel-fermented separately, taken through malo-lactic fermentation and aged in French oak barrels for over a year.