East Anglia Last of the summer wine

Date Published:

12/09/2008

Map user, Jody, added Shawsgate winery and vineyard to the Map saying they sold some of the best wines he'd tasted. I decided I needed to slurp for myself and find out

If you've ever fancied recreating bits from the film Sideways in the UK, you now can, in Suffolk. Shawsgate is just one of a sprinkling of wineries and vineyards in the region, but unlike some of the others it's able to process everything on site. I'm being shown around by Tom Jarrett and my first stop is the vines. It's a stunning late summer/early autumn day and the sun is lightly beating down, the grapes are plump and a team of around 20 workers are gathering the fruit, which will take about two weeks. They're a cross section of society: locals, mature ladies, travellers and seasonal workers. "We've even had city workers and professionals in the past," says Tom. One guy has a radio at his feet to provide some music, others are having a chat, the whole scene seems… natural.

Tom talks me through the site which is 20 acres in size. The white grape varieties grown include Bacchus, Reichensteiner, Seyval Blanc, Muller Thurgau, and Schonburger, with some of the vines dating back to the early 1970s when the vineyard was set up. As for reds there are three plots of Acolon and Rondo.

No damp spirits here

I ask Tom if the wet summer has affected his crop? "Not really, the key time for us is early July when the vines are flowering. If they're damaged then we can have problems. The other key time is about now when we're harvesting," he tells me. I look up, there's not a cloud in the sky. It's a stark contrast to James Barclay whose rain sodden wheat field I viewed in Lincolnshire .

We move into the winery where Tom explains the juicing process. The press is a rotating cylinder containing an air bag that slowly inflates, gently squeezing the grapes to release their juice. From here the juice goes in a large tank where fermentation happens then it's bottled and left to rest. The grapes I've seen picked today might not be ready to drink until 2012.

We move on to the shop, from which a large part of the direct sales for Shawsgate take place. They also offer free tours of the place, there's no entrance fee and the whole site is licensed, so next summer you can bring a picnic, buy a bottle and sit between the vines.

You can see more of my time with Tom at Shawsgate below. Got an opinion on English wine? Can you even get it in your local off licence? Tell us about it in the comments box below.

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