The national hero Yue Fei once wrote a magnificent poem "Manjianghong", which contains the words "drive a long car and step through the Helan Mountain", expressing Yue Fei's desire to go straight to the enemy's cave Huanglong and serve the country loyally.
Helan Mountain, affectionately known as "Father Mountain" in Ningxia. Helan Mountain is an important climatic dividing line in northwest China, resisting eastward winds and sands. At its eastern foothills, the fertile Ningxia Plain was born.
The towering Helan Mountain, like a resolute father, under his protection, the Ningxia Plain has become a paradise for agriculture and animal husbandry. "The orchard at the foot of Helan Mountain is formed, and the north and south of the Yangtze River are famous." Without Helan Mountain, China probably wouldn't have reaped one of the best wine regions.
The eastern foothills of Helan Mountain are located at 38 degrees north latitude, with abundant sunshine, abundant heat, good soil permeability, and large temperature difference between day and night.
Huangkou Winery, located in the core production area of the eastern foothills of Helan Mountain in Ningxia - Qingtongxia Ganchengzi production area, the wine grape base is just in the wind valley of Helan Mountain. According to Li Peng, a former scholar of literature and history in Qingtongxia City, the "lack of Helan Mountain" in Yue Fei's words refers to this valley. The wind blows here all the year round, and the unique geographical location has created a microclimate of Huangkou Winery's own grape planting base, forming a unique excellent quality, and it is the most high-quality core small production area at the eastern foot of Helan Mountain in Ningxia.
Zhang Xueyan, the person in charge of the Winery Royal Vineyard, said that the grapes planted in the winery's vineyard have the natural advantages of complete aroma development, good pigment formation, high sugar content, moderate acid content, no diseases and pests, no pollution, and excellent quality. ”
Located in such an excellent terroir, Château Royal has always been committed to the cultivation, production, vinification, aging and promotion of organic grapes. In accordance with the international first-class standards, the winery has spent a huge amount of money to comprehensively upgrade and transform the 2,000 acres of base, built in accordance with organic standards, modern and mechanized boutique gardens, and introduced excellent wine grape varieties such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Marselan, Petit Manseng, Little Verdot, Malbec, and Merlot.
In July 2020, as a young winery that had just been put into production, Huangkou was a blockbuster at the 14th G100 International Wine and Spirits Competition held that year - Huangkou 2018 "Petit Manseng" sweet white wine won the Grand Gold Award with the highest score of 95 points, becoming the only Grand Gold Award in the eastern foothills of Helan Mountain in Ningxia that year, making Huangkou Winery famous since then.
Petit Manssen is a white grape variety from southwestern France that ripens in late October and early November. At that time, the preferred grape variety planted by Château Royale was "Taste and More", but due to the mistake of the other party's workers, the imported grape seedlings were mistakenly sent to Petit Manseng. The eastern foothills of Helan Mountain have little understanding of the Mangsen variety. When the fruit set in the first year, it was the peak harvest season for other varieties, but Little Manson was still turquoise. One day near the end of October, at noon, the growers went to see Manseng Kleine again, and the green grapes turned white and ripe overnight.
The winery's Petit Manseng had just been produced, and the wine label had not been designed. At that time, an international competition organizing committee called and asked if the winery wanted to participate. The winery casually labeled it and sent two boxes over. Little Mangson lived up to expectations and became famous in the first battle, and Huangkou Winery also started at the eastern foot of Helan Mountain with Little Mangson.
Château Royale uses a new vine-trellis structure called the "Sloped Single-Arm Fence". This sloping frame is more suitable for the natural environment of strong sunlight and gravel, which ensures the amount of cover of the leaves on the grapes, so that the phenolic substances of the grapes can slowly precipitate, and the wine is rich in aroma and flavor.
Château Royal Colony insists on using organic fertilizers to ensure that the grape fruit is organic and pollution-free. In terms of irrigation, the Israeli integrated intelligent irrigation system of water and fertilizer has been introduced, and the vineyard has been built into a water-saving, green and efficient raw material base, so that it can maintain organic integrity and naturalness, and improve product quality from the source. At the same time, the winery has also introduced the world's top grape pretreatment equipment, brewing equipment and filling production line to achieve the ultimate quality.
In terms of raw material control, it not only manages plots according to different varieties and carries out yield control, insists on manual picking, adopts a rare domestic sugar liquid specific gravity sorting machine to select the best of the raw materials, and uses natural gravity winemaking method to reduce human intervention in grapes. In terms of fermentation, a combination of low-temperature impregnation and temperature-controlled fermentation is adopted. The introduction of the world's most advanced automatic cross-flow filtration system and aseptic membrane filtration technology greatly reduces the loss of aroma, flavor and cheese substances, so that the wine has higher clarity, more harmonious taste and more stable quality.
Royal Colonial Winery grows, produces, processes and sells in strict accordance with national, industry, enterprise standards and green organic food standards, and vigorously develops green food. In 2020, it obtained the quality management system certification and HACCP hazard analysis and critical control point system certification, in October 2020, the organic conversion certification in October 2020, the organic wine grape planting and organic wine product certification in November 2022, and the geographical indication certificate and use right in the eastern foothills of Helan Mountain in July 2022.
In recent years, the winery has cooperated with Tianjin University of Science and Technology, Northwest A&F University, Ningxia University, etc., and has obtained 21 technical patents and important scientific research achievements, filling the gap in the industry in wine varieties, fermentation and other technologies.
Adhering to the concept of "not making a bottle of bad wine", Huangkou Winery has deeply cultivated the rich soil of the eastern foothills of Helan Mountain, and strived to present excellent terroir and taste in each bottle of wine, and has won more than 20 international awards, becoming one of the boutique theme wineries in the eastern foothills of Helan Mountain.