Black Chalk - an exciting newcomer to English sparkling wines!

Black Chalk Wines, near Stockbridge in Hampshire and in GB’s Wessex wine region, was on our target list to visit - not because it’s well established and in every wine guide, but because they’re a relative newcomer to English wines - and getting noticed by those who know a thing or two about wine! We were intrigued and so attended a webinar by the Wine society back in early Spring about English Sparkling Wine, which Zoë Driver, assistant winemaker for Black Chalk was participating in. From that webinar we knew exciting things were happening at Black Chalk Wines and having tasted their sparkling wines, we were keen to find out more!

What and who is Black Chalk Wines?

Black Chalk was born just a few short years ago, when Jacob Leadley, who at the time was making wine at Hattingley Valley, having only entered the wine industry back in 2009, decided to make his dream reality. He set about taking on 30 acres of amazing vineyards on the River Test in Hampshire, building his own winery and making top-class English wines from his own grapes.

Black Chalk is a small, family-run business, with passion and creativity in spades! Because they are a small team, with investors who are also passionate about wine and very much involved in the business - and because they manage and farm top-class vineyards in a prime South England site, they are able to almost hand-craft and experiment to produce stunningly authentic wines, true to the terroir and each growing season.

Black Chalk vineyards in Hampshire

The 12 hectares (30 acres) of Black Chalk vineyards lie in the rolling Hampshire chalk lands, in the beautiful Test valley, surrounded by the River Test and some stunning countryside. These southern chalklands are known to produce some of the finest Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier grapes, the fruit which goes to make English sparkling wine. Black Chalk can get 90 tonnes of fruit from these vineyards in a good year. The grapes are all hand-picked and carefully selected to make the finest wines.

The name ‘Black Chalk’ obviously reflects the fact that the vines grow in this wonderful chalky soil, but it refers specifically to what the ‘Old Masters’ used to sketch ideas onto canvas before painstakingly creating a masterpiece. And this is exactly how Black Chalk Wines are made today - slowly, carefully crafted and aged to produce the absolute best.

Black Chalk are fully committed to sustainable winemaking with minimum intervention in the vineyard and in the winery. They are a committed member of Sustainable Wines of Great Britain.

Black Chalk’s winery

Having secured the farming of these top vineyards, with additional private investment and EU funding, Jacob set about building a state-of-the-art winery right next to the vineyards. Being next to the vineyards was important, to ensure the grapes didn’t have far to travel to the press. The winery was barely finished when the 2020 grape harvest was being loaded into the French Coquard press and it will be a few more years before this vintage is available for sale. Up until this point the grapes were taken to the Hattingley Valley winery to produce the wine, where Jacob was still working. Jacob was joined at Black Chalk by fellow Hattingley winemaker Zoë Driver in 2019 to help him fulfil his dream for his fledgling, family-run boutique wine business.

Black Chalk don’t just make their own wines from their grapes, they also sell some of their harvest and make wines in their winery for other brands. With expert winemakers and their own winery they have the ability to experiment with their grape varieties and blending to create very unique wines - the focus is all about creativity and authenticity and this is what makes Black Chalk so exciting!

Black Chalk wines

At the heart of Black Chalk are two English sparkling wines, made by the traditional method, with a second fermentation in the bottle resting on the yeast (lees). Black Chalk only makes ‘vintage’ wines, i.e. all of the grapes come from the same harvest each year. They are not blended with reserve wines to achieve a certain, consistent style and each vintage is unique, reflecting that specific growing year. If the growing season is bad, then not much wine would be made. This is what being authentic is all about.

The Black Chalk Classic is made from a blend of the 3 grapes, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier and the 2016 vintage went on to win impressive awards in 2020, including Gold in the International Wine and Spirits Competition. 

The Wild Rose sparkling rosé is again a blend of the 3 ‘champagne’ grapes and is also very highly rated.

Black Chalk was very excited to release its very first still wine in early August 2021, called ‘Dancer in Pink’, it’s a beautiful rosé made from Pinot Noir, Pinot Précoce and Pinot Gris. This is a great example of Black Chalk experimenting in the vineyard and in the winery to produce something very special - I’m sure we can expect lots more of this in the future!

Our wine tour to Black Chalk Wines

This was an unusual wine tour for us, because we actually visited twice! We joined a wine tour in June, where we visited the winery and had a wine tasting, but the weather was so atrocious we decided we would come back to discover more about the vineyards at a later date! This worked well for us as we also had the chance to meet and catch up with winemaker Zoë.

Winery tour and wine tasting

During both visits we had the opportunity to walk around the new winery, with its wine press, stainless steel tanks and oak barrels. 

We were very fortunate to be able to see the team bottling wine during our tour and running the disgorging process, where the yeast is extracted from the bottles after fermentation. This involved a production line of people and machinery freezing the neck of the bottles, ejecting the frozen plug of dead yeast, then topping the bottles up with grape juice and a select dosage of sugar, before processing through to corking and then labelling. 

We were taken to the dedicated tasting room and enjoyed sampling both of the English sparkling wines - the Classic 2017 and the Wild Rose sparkling rosé. Both were absolutely delicious and we can’t wait to see what future vintages and wines will be like. We suspect, just as good!

New wine bar and facilities

Building work is underway to extend the facilities at Black Chalk to welcome visitors and promote wine tourism. A new wine bar and outside patio will be ready later in 2021, as well as a pathway through a flower meadow to the ‘Circle’ - a fabulous events area amongst the vines. We will definitely be returning when this new area opens!

Where to buy Black Chalk wines:

You can purchase Black Chalk wines via their own website and direct from the shop at the ‘cellar door’, but they are also available in selected independent wine shops and The Wine Society. Black Chalk wines are also offered in some of England’s top restaurants.

Useful information for your Black Chalk visit

Wine tours and wine tasting options

Black Chalk offers two tours including a vineyard tour, winery visit and tasting for £20pp and for an additional £12pp you can opt to have a tour and tasting with lunch included. See details here.

What to see and do in the area

There is certainly no shortage of things to see and do in Hampshire - with the coastal resorts of Portsmouth and Southampton not too far away, the beautiful city of Winchester with its cathedral just a 20 minutes drive and the South Downs and New Forest national parks within striking distance! See here for lots of ideas!

We really enjoyed visiting the nearby town of Stockbridge in the beautiful Test Valley - its main street is full of local, independent shops and great pubs and restaurants. 

We would also recommend taking the time to explore the Test Valley - there are some really lovely ‘chocolate-box’ villages and if you like your trout/fly fishing - this is the place to be! 

Where to stay and where to eat near Black Chalk

A very attractive accommodation option and if you fancy a really authentic wine experience, is to rent one of four tree houses, located right in the vineyards! These are managed by a company called Wild Escapes and Black Chalk then offer a  wine tasting and vineyard and winery tour. We’re definitely going to try this out one day! 

If tree houses aren’t your thing then we would recommend staying at The Greyhound and the Grosvenor  Hotel, both in Stockbridge.

See here for other good accommodation options in Hampshire.

We had lunch at The Greyhound in Stockbridge which was excellent - quite pricey but great food and superb location on the high street and on the River Test.

Also try the Mayflower pub for lunch which lies between Black Chalk and Stockbridge.

Transport

Black Chalk is located near the lovely town of Stockbridge, just 20 minutes car drive from Winchester, 40 minutes from Southampton and 1hour 20 minutes from London.

You could also get a train from Waterloo station in London to Andover, then a taxi to the winery (just 4 miles away). 

Address: The Old Dairy, Fullerton Road, SP11 7JX

Other UK vineyards to visit in the area:

Hampshire is home to some notable wineries. If you wish to combine two or more winery or vineyard tours we would highly recommend:

• Hattingley Valley Wines (see our blog about our wine tour to Hattingley here)

• Hambledon Vineyard (see our blog about our wine tour to Hambledon here)

Conclusion

After tasting Black Chalk wines and visiting the vineyards and winery we could understand why the English wine industry is excited about this newcomer! 

The ingredients for a great wine include great grapes, which one of the best vineyard sites in England provides, but it also includes skilled winemakers, the best equipment and also, crucially, the liberty and luxury to experiment, to be creative, to explore, to try new things and to take the time to get the product just right. Black Chalk have all of this and they also have bags of passion and commitment - we can’t wait to see how the future develops for this exciting new English wine producer!

Why don’t you check it out for yourselves?

Visit Black Chalk’s website for information and to book your visit.

Refer to our web pages for more information about UK wines and the Wessex wine region of the UK

We hope you get to visit Black Chalk and taste their fabulous wines!

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