The Kölbel family

For three generations the Kölbel family has been growing and processing grapes. Grandfather Arnošt Kölbel grew Grey Portugal, Blue Portugal, White Crisp and Pink in the 1950s and 1960s. His father Miloš Kölbel planted the Bordeaux variety of Cabernet Sauvignon in 1994, despite the opinions of experts to plant only traditional blue varieties in Moravia. Cabernet Sauvignon has proved to be a good choice for the Slovácko region, where it achieves excellent results every year and has started further plantings of unusual varieties grown here in Slovácko. In the late 1990s, Cabernet Sauvignon was joined by Cabernet Franc and Merlot. The cuvées made from these three varieties are among our best rated wines every year. Later we also planted Scheurebe, Kerner, Buvier, Danube, Garanoir, Gamay and many others. In recent years, our son František started to process grapes from Kyjov-Slina and from rented vineyards and in 2013 he started to buy grapes from Přítluky(Mikulov), Strážnice. Our goal is to create wines according to the maturity of the grapes and depending on the quality of the vintage, with an effort to create the character of the variety, so when cutting we make sure that the quality of the grapes is superior to the quantity. In the case of red wine varieties, we cut the grapes at the time of softening so that the load does not exceed 2 kg. In total, we farm 1 ha and total production does not exceed 10 000 bottles. When processing the grapes, we insist that the grapes are processed as quickly as possible.The grapes are destemmed and left to macerate for 12-24 hours, pressed in a pneumatic press. The grapes are then destemmed and fermented with pure yeast cultures. For red wines, apple-milk fermentation and subsequent barrel ageing is a matter of course; since 2009 we have also been using BARRIQUE barrels.