Tas Üzüm, 2018

In Turkey, there are about 1435 different types of grapes, of which many more are still undocumented. Güzelyurt, the home of Gelveri Ltd., is situated in Cappadocia near the 3200-meter high volcano Hasan Dag. Our grapes grow at an altitude of 1500 meters in traditional private fruit gardens. A variety of fruit trees and about four to six different types of grapes are cultivated for different use in each of these 0,2- 5 ha large gardens. All fruits grow on volcanic tuff.  A few of our vines are up to 200 years old, if not older and all are phylloxera free on their own rootstock. Every year the freshly planted vines are fertilized 3 years with a shovel of goat dung. The vines are not treated with sulfites or any other addition. We start harvesting the grapes by hand about mid-September. The grapes are not pressed but crashed. . Without removing the skins, pits and stems, the mash is pumped into Anatolian küps (clay jars). Natural, spontaneous fermentation takes up to four weeks. After that we close the free- standing küps. During the following three to six months the wine becomes clear and can then be separated from the grape skins, pits, stems and yeast. Finally, we either bottle the wine or keep it in küps for further aging. With our pilot project in Cappadocia we are pursuing the following goals:  preservation of biodiversity, with particular focus on rare grape varieties  preservation and improvement of simple traditional techniques for the production of natural wines  improvement and safeguarding of economic efficiency of small scale wine producers