Description

How to make excellent wine on Brabant soil.

In Brabant, you can grow grapes very well and turn them into excellent wine. The Romans knew that and in their footsteps Fons and Tineke van Boxmeer. They have successfully run their wine business in Rooi since 1978. Besides this now beautiful liquor store with tasting room and with two large wine cellars, Fons experimented as early as 1985 with planting a few vines of the Riesling variety on a piece of land on Damianenweg. A few years later, this proved to be a success. With the advice of viticultural engineer Gobel from Valwig a/d Moselle, Fons decided to go big right away.

He had a pond dug out, surrounded by slopes of sand and loam. In this microclimate, he plants vines on the slopes. The sugar content could match that of the grapes on the Moselle. Viticulture in "Rooi" proved possible. With more vines every year, the vineyard grew to about 3,500 bushes of white grapes, good for about five thousand kilos of grapes. Hard work for about twenty men. Dornfelder and Regent grape varieties were also planted, producing rosé and red wine.
Thus, a stone's throw away from the former Damian monastery, the vineyard Domaine les Damianes was created on the former heathland of Sint Oedenrode. Hence the name Rooise heath wine, which now comes in the varieties red Dornfelder/Regent, Rosé, white Riesling, Rooise white and the sparkling Rooise pearl wine, rare for the Netherlands. With enterprise, innovation and after sixteen years, this is now turning a profit.

As the start of the summer, you will enjoy a tour of the vineyard, and a walk along the "romantic path". This will be followed in the wine cellar by a presentation explaining the winemaking techniques used to achieve the success of Rooise heather wine, after which the documentary "from stick to sip" will show the year-round in the vineyard. During the presentation there will be ample opportunity for questions and, of course, for tasting the wines.

SPECIFICATIONS
- Excursion leader: Fons van Boxmeer
- Maximum number of participants: 60

Location

Domaine les Damianes vineyard

Damianenweg 7, 5491 TJ Sint Oedenrode

Organiser

Region South

Name and contact details for information

Further information from Drs.ing Cor van den Bosch, tel: 0499-330044 (p) / 0032- 473955987 (z).