Red Wines

            Red grapes are all sorted on the sorting table and pass through the destemer  who separates the stems from the berries. The berries are all gathered in a special basket and moved through an elevator to small 20 to 50 hl open stainless steel tanks. There is no crusher in the winery so only whole berries are used. When the fermentation starts, the pigeage method is applied to open the skins and extract all the color, flavor and body to the wine during the alcoholic fermentation. The extraction of all these favorable substances happens slowly when the cup us plunged down with a special stick, manually. This procedure starts the day the fermentation begins, it happens twice everyday until the winemaker decides through tasting that all the substances needed passed to the wine.

            Red Domaine Kikones wines mature in french oak barrels for approximately one year. The barrels are only used for a maximum of three years. One third of the production is kept in new barrels, one third is kept in barrels that have been used for one year, and one third is kept in barrels that have been used for two years. During that time, the malolactic fermentation is carried out which occurs from the natural grape bacteria. After twelve months in oak, the red wines are transferred back to the tanks for four to seven months in order to get clarified by the winter cold.

            Red Kikones wines are never fined nor filtered so as not to lose their organoleptic characteristics. Red wine bottling takes place  at the end of spring, a year and a half after this vintage is picked.