Wine for sale: Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges
Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges
The winemaking estate of the Hospices de Nuits is run alongside the hospital and the profits from the sale of its wine at the annual auction in March are used to support the hospital’s work. Jean-Marc Moron, the estate’s current manger, oversees the 12.4 hectares of vines.
The vines are tended to in an environmentally sustainable manner. No insecticides have been used in the past 20 years and herbicides were last used 15 years ago. Instead, the team regularly works the soils. Harvests are conducted entirely by hand and the grapes are sorted both at the vine and on the sorting table. In the winery, the bunches are entirely destemmed, and the grapes are left to macerate for a few days before fermentation. Alcoholic fermentation is started naturally by indigenous yeast and the cap undergoes daily punch down and pumping over. A pneumatic press gently releases the juice from the grapes and maturation is started in new French oak barrels that come from three coopers.
The estate is mainly made up of plots found around Nuits-Saint-Georges, which includes eight Village appellation and nine premier crus. 19 different wines are produced if vintage conditions allow, reflecting the diversity of the terroirs in the appellation. One of them comes from a plot called Les Didiers which is solely owned by the Hospice de Nuit and the estate also owns a rare white Nuits-Saint-Georges plot called Premier Cru Les Terres Blanches. Only one wine comes from a different village and that is the Gevrey-Chambertin Village Les Champs-Chenys.
The vines are tended to in an environmentally sustainable manner. No insecticides have been used in the past 20 years and herbicides were last used 15 years ago. Instead, the team regularly works the soils. Harvests are conducted entirely by hand and the grapes are sorted both at the vine and on the sorting table. In the winery, the bunches are entirely destemmed, and the grapes are left to macerate for a few days before fermentation. Alcoholic fermentation is started naturally by indigenous yeast and the cap undergoes daily punch down and pumping over. A pneumatic press gently releases the juice from the grapes and maturation is started in new French oak barrels that come from three coopers.