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- The crew shares a laugh while bottling wine at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard during bottling week to get ready for the season opening on 4/3/25, L-R: Sarah Gustafsen placing labels on bottles, Andrea Charbonneau operating the bottle corker, Angel Castriano filling bottles. Photo by Beth David.
By Beth David, Editor
It’s springtime at the winery! And that means bottling up, cutting vines, and burning vines (cane).
The crew at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard in Fairhaven is busy getting ready for the season. One of those tasks is bottling the wine for sale.
Last fall the grapes were picked and crushed. Then they were added to the barrels with some yeast and left alone for awhile to ferment. The precious material, aka, “must” is fermented in oak barrels for primary fermentation, and then the precious liquid is siphoned off to finis fermenting in large tanks.
In the next phase, the yeast dies off, the liquid is removed, the tanks cleaned, and the liquid returned.
Most of the wine gets filtered before it is bottled, but some, the Tempranillo, is not, to preserve those beautiful tannins.
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- Oak barrels are tapped one at a time for bottling Tempranillo, a red wine that is new to the vineyard this year, on 3/21/25 at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard during bottling week to get ready for the season opening on 4/3/25. Photo by Beth David.
That wine is a new one this year, said Angel Castriano, Marketing and Events Manager. It is a red wine, aged in oak barrels. It’s the one wine that they buy the grapes for instead of growing their own. Tempranillo is a Spanish grape, known as “Tinta Roriz” in Portugal.
This year has some other changes, too. It’s the first year with the big steel tanks, which makes the work a lot easier. Last year, it was small plastic barrels and oak barrels.
The winery made four times as much wine this year as last year. Which is good, because they had to start rationing it last year, as they started to run low at the end of the season.
The winery has four acres of grapevines, and a small orchard in front with apples, pears, peaches, plums, and cherries. The fruit can be used for mash for distilling liquor (not to be confused with must), which is something Nasketucket may do in the future.
But, first things first.
This is opening weekend and Saturday, 4/5, at 3 p.m., the winery will host a Burning of the Canes Party, when they will burn all the clippings from the grapevines that they cut in February.
Ms. Castriano said they used to burn them as one of the chores of the business, but then saw that in Europe they make a big bonfire and make it a celebration.
So they said, “Let’s do it,” and have a big party.
“It’s also very symbolic,” said Ms. Castriano. “To shed last year, renewal, spring. It’s how we will kick off every year now.”
Nasketucket Bay Winery is at 237 New Boston Road, Fairhaven. Visit https://www.peacelovevino.net/ to learn more and find upcoming events.
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- Andrea Charbonneau concentrates as she tops off the bottles on 3/21/25 at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard during bottling week to get ready for the season opening on 4/3/25. Photo by Beth David.
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- L-R: Sarah Gustafsen labels a box for bottles of wine, while Andrea Charbonneau puts labels on wine bottles that have just been filled by Angel Castriano (RIGHT) on 3/21/25 at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard during bottling week to get ready for the season opening on 4/3/25. Photo by Beth David.
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- Sarah Gustafsen places a label on a wine bottle, while Andrea Charbonneau operates the bottle corker on 3/21/25 at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard during bottling week to get ready for the season opening on 4/3/25. Photo by Beth David.
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- Andrea Charbonneau places a cork in the bottle corker on 3/21/25 at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard during bottling week to get ready for the season opening on 4/3/25. Photo by Beth David.
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- Bottles get filled with Tempranillo, a red wine that is new to the vineyard this year, on 3/21/25 at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard during bottling week to get ready for the season opening on 4/3/25. Photo by Beth David.
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- Sarah Gustafsen places a label on a wine bottle, while Andrea Charbonneau operates the bottle corker, and Angel Castriano places just-filled bottles of Tampranillo, a red wine that is new to the vineyard this year, on the counter to be corked, labeled, and boxed, on 3/21/25 at Nasketucket Bay Vineyard during bottling week to get ready for the season opening on 4/3/25. Photo by Beth David.
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