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I watched a programme on the Wine Channel, which was explaining why Port Producers still persist in Foot Treading to this day. It went off to the adverts, and I realised I wasn't sure of the answer to this basic question. The adverts passed, and the explanation was mostly colour! Which surprised me.
The suggestion was that Port, due to its limited fermentation, prior to fortification, would suffer if not traditionally tread. As it was the complete 'squashing' of the grapes that released the full colour, we know and love. They went on to say how 'black' the treaders legs were, which reinforced the point. As well as probably knowing the full situation/explanation, I know some of you have indulged in treading, in situ.
What is the full explanation as to the relevance of treading, which eventually culminates in Liquid Sunshine?

Alan

Here are the basics :

What you want for quality is the longer skin contact with juice to get the most extract you can from the grapes in 3 days.

By crushing the grapes in lagares, the skins will stick in the bottom, the pips will float on top. So you get more skin contact and less unwanted flavours from pips.

As well as the points that Fred raises, foot treading was - for many years - the easiest way in which the grapes could be crushed without also breaking the pips and releasing all those bitter tannins that are inside a grape seed.

However, with the improvement in robo-treading techniques, this reason is now less important than it used to be.

Alex

And after all, Port-drinkers are at least a little bit old fashioned and treading in a lagar does belong to port the same way the imagination of a dust covered cellar does.

And treading is good fun and gives you the oppinion that you did something for the Vintage personally.

Axel

Plus the toe-jam adds a nice bit of flavor not found in mechanical treaded ports

I would love to beieve that foot treading makes better VP, which it may well do, but I think most of the reason why it continues is tradition. Having done it, I can say that it is very hard work and the efficiency of the operation must be extremely low.

However, this is one ineffecient process that I think is well worth the investment of maintaining for no other reason than because we can.

I for one will be happy to go to the Douro each year to tread grapes just because someone thinks the tradition is justification enough to keep doing so.

Derek

I would go to the Douro ever year for a couple weeks to tread grapes. All I ask is a cot to sleep on and plenty of port to drink between shifts

Seriously, I do think treading makes a difference. There are lots of producers who have gone from treading to mechanical treading, and now back to human treading again because it makes a better VP.

There is something about the soft pressing and warmth of the human foot/leg that cannot be duplicated by a machine....at least not yet.

ADV wrote:I would go to the Douro ever year for a couple weeks to tread grapes. All I ask is a cot to sleep on and plenty of port to drink between shifts

Seriously, I do think treading makes a difference. There are lots of producers who have gone from treading to mechanical treading, and now back to human treading again because it makes a better VP.

There is something about the soft pressing and warmth of the human foot/leg that cannot be duplicated by a machine....at least not yet.

I totally agree!

A lot of producers are doing the first 4 hours by human and the remaining by mechanise process which give good results. But I've never been conviced with the 100% sillicone feet machine.

By the way, at the moment there is no lack the workers in the Douro and it does not look that there will be. To quote someone " The most interesting part with robots working is that they are never a pain in the AS*"

For your information, I doubt one company would have to invest more than 100 000$ euros per harvest on men for threading. One robotic lagares cost a few millions plus all the millions they invested in research, it will take a life time to get the money back from your investment.

Tradition is certainly a big part of it, and having done it myself last year, one I would hate to see go away.

I think the main argument against robotic treading though, is in the pips. My understanding is that (at least in the past) robotic treading has been known to lead to crushing the pips, which leads to more tannins and sometimes a bitter taste. Apparently the human foot is soft enough that the pips do not end up being crushed. Hence the recent addittion of soft silicone "feet" to the robots.

Jay

If warmed silicon feet with a ~80kg effective press weight can’t do the job, then there’s something else going on. Is the human sweat what makes it better? (I hate to suggest adding salt water to port.)

100% robotic lagares are operating in stainless steel environment, could the granite make the difference?

Frederick Blais wrote:100% robotic lagares are operating in stainless steel environment, could the granite make the difference?

many Quintas use the robotics in granite lagars, so not sure that has much bearing on it...but I will add this to my list of questions to ask next week, as I'd love to see what the producers have to say about it, thanks.

ADV wrote:

Frederick Blais wrote:100% robotic lagares are operating in stainless steel environment, could the granite make the difference?

many Quintas use the robotics in granite lagars, so not sure that has much bearing on it...but I will add this to my list of questions to ask next week, as I'd love to see what the producers have to say about it, thanks.

Those using it in granite are not 100% mecanical troden grapes, as far as I know. Like at Noval, the first part is done by foot and the remaining with robot that does not crush grapes but mainly blend everything again and again to increase skin contacts stopping a few centimeters before the floor to avoid having any contacts with pips.

As far as I know the granite lagar does not exclude solely human treading, if I got you right, Frederic.

For example La Rosa has a granite lagar and they do not have machines to do the treading. Either Im misunderstanding something or I dont know why one and the other dont match.

Greetings to Canada,

Axel

Axel P wrote:As far as I know the granite lagar does not exclude solely human treading, if I got you right, Frederic.

For example La Rosa has a granite lagar and they do not have machines to do the treading. Either Im misunderstanding something or I dont know why one and the other dont match.

Greetings to Canada,

Axel

You got me right. Some still use 100% foot treading method for making port in Lagares.

After I`ve been visting many Quintas Im convinced, If you will make a Top product , 100 % quality. You will use foot treading.

The small quintas who will make a serius Port is foot treading, And the big names, Grahams, Taylors and more, are also using footing for there top products.

When i was at Grahams we had a tasting, 3 bootles whitout label, blind tasting, 3 diffrents methods of making port. foot, mashine, and a new kind of squize method. And there wae no doubt. The winner was foot treading.