From History to Obscurity
St. Péray may be the most obscure region in the entire Rhone valley. Once as famous as regions like Cornas and Condrieu, it has now dwindled to a near obscurity. Situated directly south of Cornas, St. Péray is the most southerly of all the Northern Rhone appellations, except for a small piece of the large Croze-Hermitage.
Napoleon Bonaparte once described the still wines of St. Péray as his first wine discovery – much like many wine lovers today have that moment that opens their eyes and palates to wine. But since the excitement of the 19th century for the wines of St. Péray wore off, the region has seen a continuing decline in interest. Today there are only a dozen growers and a handful of negociants, with half of the wine being made at the cooperative of Tain L’Hermitage. All the more rare it is, then, to find a wine from the caliber of a producer like Auguste Clape, who is probably the leading producer in Cornas. Accordingly, Clape’s St. Péray vineyards are just south of his Cornas vineyards and comprise a miniscule 0.23 hectares. As a result, Clape only makes 100 cases of this very rare dry white.
Youthful Terroir
Clape’s vineyards are sited on acidic soil, with quartz granite and patches of clay limestone on the lower slopes. The granite tends to produce wines that drink better young. The Marsanne, which comprises 99% of the wine (1% Roussanne), is picked mostly from 55-65 year old vines, with about 1/3 of the fruit from 15 year old vines.
There has also been a trend in St. Péray to increase the use of oak, which tends to cover over the more terroir driven aspects of the wine, which are quite delicate despite the commonly robust alcohol. Clape, on the other hand, ferments in concrete and stainless steel, and allows malo-lactic fermentation to complete naturally before bottling in April. This vinification methodology also reflects that the oaked whites need more time in bottle to come together. With Clape’s terroir favouring younger wines, it makes little sense to produce an oakier style of wine.
St. Péray – its Own Terroir
The pale colour of the wine belies its richness and its luminescent nose of pear, apple and a touch of honey nut. The palate presents tremendous minerality with deep orchard fruits. This has impeccable structure for a 14% ABV wine, and it holds the alcohol extremely well. The richness is outstanding given the complete lack of oak – and this is perhaps why the wine is so balanced. The finish is very persistent given the price point. Overall this is a distinctive terroir based wine that shows more minerals and spice versus the more honeyed and floral tones of its St. Joseph counterparts. The price I paid for the quality is astounding – it is worth four times as much.
Excellent
$17 at K&L Wine Merchants in SF.
Sicily has been an important wine region for thousands of years. Much like Apulia, Sicily was a cultural cross-roads throughout most of European history, and has been controlled by the Greeks, the Romans the Byzantines, the Arabs, and the Catalans from Spain. And, amazingly, the land has been under vine throughout the majority of that history. Perhaps this is why Sicily is now Italy’s largest wine producing region.
The first nero d’avola I tried was the Donnafugata Sedara Nero d’Avola IGT 2007, a wine made in a pretty traditional style (even with obvious modern techniques and cleanliness) by one of Sicily’s oldest producers (going on 150 years). The nose is classic for this variety with meat, black pepper, char, and blackberry. The palate is bright and soft up front with blackberry and red plum. The mid-palate is pretty simple and serves up a peppery side of game. The finish is soft and short and the wine has a very soft and sweet tannin structure. This is a pretty simple wine – it’s not going to wow anyone. And there are certainly much better nero d’avolas around for a bit more money. However, this still beats out a lot of $20 wines for drinkability and overall quality and it is made well, with all the components in balance. Grab this for the traditional pairings of a red meat pasta, pizza or side of game and you will probably be very happy. 
d’avola, is fermented in steel tanks and is aged for 12 months in 2-3 year old French oak. The vines for this nero d’avola are pretty low (although not miniscule) yielding, offering 8.5 tons per hectare.
As anyone who has spent any time reading about wine in the last year likely knows, Robert Parker has declared the 2007 vintage in the Southern Rhone to be the best he has ever tasted. Wines are getting crazy scores from him in this vintage, all the way down to the basic Cotes du Rhone bottlings, like this one. I’ve always been a Rhone fan, particularly for their ability to pair with game, and given the price on this wine I thought it would be worth a try. Robert Parker scored this 90 points. 
This is the antithesis to the Montes wine I wrote up below. Gruner Veltliner is Austria’s most famous grape and definitely one of its greatest. It is also indigenous to Austria and you won’t find Gruners made anywhere else in the world. Gruner produces wines with great acidity, and stark personality. These wines can provide a huge range of experiences, from nutty and oaky to clean, lean, and sharp. Gobelsburg is located in Lower Austria in the region of Kamptal, and this wine is as dry as you would expect of a classic Austrian white. It is also made with purchased fruit, but that doesn’t seem to matter in the hands of wine maker Michi Moosbrugger.
This is the first time I’ve written up sake, and I feel a bit of a fraud doing so as I know so little about it compared to wine. What I do know, however, is interesting, at least to me. There are, in the basic sense, essentially three grades of rice, junmai, junmai-ginjo, and daiginjo. The gradations refer to the level of refinement of the rice, with daiginjo being the highest and retaining the lowest percentage of the rice grain. What refinement wants to accomplish is getting rid of all the proteins and extraneous matter and keeping as much pure starch as possible. The best sakes are fermented with the purest form of rice starch the brewer can get their hands on.
A beer from the brewmaster’s collaboration series, this ale was a joint effort between Dirk Naudis of De Proef and Tomme Arthur from Lost Abbey/Port Brewing. Both of these guys are lauded in the craft beer community, and the idea of a collaboration between them on a crazy hybrid Belgian and American wild ale is pretty exciting. I’ve had and written up the second beer in this series made by De Proef and Jason Perkins of Allagash. It was awesome. This confirms the trend.
Régnié is a Cru village in Beaujolais, and after recently having and being blown away by Marcel Lapierre’s Morgon, I knew that when I saw a shelf of 15-20 Beajolais Crus at Esquin in my recent trip down to Seattle that I would be bringing some of these profound wines home.
Today I stopped by the 100th cask rotation at the Alibi Room here in Vancouver for a special selection of BC microbrewed beers. The place was hopping and filled with both beer geeks and beer industry, including many of the brewers themselves. There were quite a few one off beers being poured, but the one that really stood out to me was this unique “wet hopped” India Pale Ale from BC’s newest brewery Driftwood.
A brief note today for this beer made with peach juice from concentrate. I guess Dogfish Head was going for refreshing, but they got unbalanced muck in the end. This pours a very pale yellow, and smells like a light wheat ale. The palate is pretty much equivalent to canned peaches pureed into a basic wheat beer and a high level of acidity/tartness. It’s a simple beer that just didn’t come together well for me.
This Gueze Lambic is from the legendary Fonteinen of Belgium, who have become even more legendary after a warehouse fire destroyed their entire stock about a year ago. As a result, their beer prices shot up and the beers themselves became rare specialty commodities that collectors now prize highly.
