Excellent

Spotlight on Sangiovese: Mauro Vannucci Piaggia Carmignano Riserva 2003

November 27, 2011 By Shea 1 Comment

Sangiovese is la dolce vita of Italy. It is its soul and its face, its bravura and charm and easy loveability. Even the most traditional and profound wines are loveable like a puppy. You don’t need to think to be drawn into these wines, though they reward contemplation. If Nebbiolo is the ivory tower wine representing Italy’s great intellectual tradition, Sangiovese is its art: chiseled but beautiful, opulent but intricate, communal and yet individualistic.

Unlike other great grapes, such as Pinot Noir or Syrah, it is not difficult to isolate Sangiovese’s distinctive voice. Great Sangiovese is always bitter-sweet, always hovering between fruit and savor. But it is structured and robust, with a powerful constitution for oak (much unlike Pinot or Syrah). It is too easy to call Sangiovese Italy’s Cabernet Sauvignon, because great Sangiovese does not travel well. Only Italian vineyards make Sangiovese taste good, and only in recent decades have producers started to truly tap into its potential.

Over this spotlight I have learned that the basic contrast between traditional and modern Sangiovese misses the point. Great Sangiovese simply cannot be overripe or over-manipulated. This is a grape that can stand up to a lot, but in order to be amazing, it must be allowed to sit perfectly poised between over the top and restrained. It must be vinified cleanly, but it cannot be forced into internationalism (When’s the last time you’ve seen an Italian be anything other than Italian?). You may not love Sangiovese, but it is impossible to hate.

Great Sangiovese can also be found at all price points. This cannot be said for some of the world’s, or even Italy’s, other great grapes. Clearly the best wines are being made in Tuscany, but Umbria and Sardegna also represent.

Carmignano the Small and Mighty

This superb wine is from the tiny 300 hectare Carmignano DOCG west of Florence. A Florentine region to the core, this was one of the four original production zones created by the Medici family in 1716. Because these vineyards are fairly northerly, most of the wines from Carmignano are blended in order to soften some of the hard edges of cooler-climate Sangiovese. The DOCG rules only require 50% Sangiovese, allowing many other grapes into the blend.

Piaggia started making a Carmignano Riserva in 1991 and has since vastly improved quality, using guyot trained vines planted in clay soils. The wine sees 18-28 days maceration, is fermented and aged in French Barriques for 18 months, and is unfined and unfiltered. Made from 70% Sangiovese, 20% Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc and 10% Merlot.

The Wine

The nose offers darker fruits of plum and black cherry along with some chocolate and spices from the oak, but also the classic bitter cherry of Sangiovese. This is a rich wine on the palate, but I think it maintains a good amount of traditional styling. The bitter cherry, herbs, and leather make this unmistakably Sangiovese driven. Without knowing if it was oaked, I figured that it probably was but that the oak had integrated very well (turns out I was right). This wine also has surprising clarity and balance for a 2003 and is, ultimately, quite an exceptional wine.

And that concludes the Spotlight on Sangiovese. Next up? Nebbiolo.

Excellent.
~$80 at Kits Wine Cellar

Filed Under: $60+, Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Excellent, Italian Wine, Merlot, Sangiovese, Sangiovese

Spotlight on Sangiovese: Il Palazzone Brunello di Montalcino Riserva 2001

November 13, 2011 By Shea 3 Comments

Another aged wine, and a good comparison to the Castello di Brolio Chianti Classico from the same year. Whereas the Brolio Chianti was quite modern, this is a more traditionally made wine, with long maceration time and four years aging in Slavonian Oak (a minimum of 2 is required by DOCG rules). I find that as a result is has a more complete mouthfeel and better aromatic profile than the Brolio, though it does not quite have the same power and tasty bitterness.

Three Vineyards in One

Palazzone blends three vineyards when making their Brunello. They have a high elevation north facing vineyard with clay soils, a south-facing vineyard with marine fossil soils and a third vineyard with a high mineral content of iron and magnesium in the soil that supposedly lends the grapes there a strong mineral quality.

10 Years of Delicious

Another classic nose: soft cherry, tobacco and licorice root. It is amazing how Sangiovese can change from its brooding slightly awkward self into a far prettier and more elegant creature with the proper age.

The medium body cherry fruit is luscious and yet not rich. The palate is long and highly delicious and the oak adds its two cents but is fully integrated. The texture is velvety but the fine but still grippy tannins represent on the finish. This impressive 2001 is just beginning to show well now and will also do fantastically well with another 5-6 years.

Excellent
~$100 at BCLDB and Kits Wine

Filed Under: $60+, Excellent, Italian Wine, Sangiovese, Sangiovese

Spotlight on Sangiovese: Ricasoli Castello di Brolio Chianti Classico 2001

November 10, 2011 By Shea Leave a Comment

Aged Sangiovese is a rare treat and one that most drinkers have a hard time getting their hands on. Luckily this wine is currently avaiable in the market and is showing very very well right now.

Grape and Soil

Late-ripening Sangiovese is a challenge to grow in a region like Chianti. Less warm (and therefore less reliable) than Montalcino, most Sangiovese in Chianti must be planted on southerly slopes in order to sop up enough sun to ripen effectively. Wines mirror vintage considerably as a result. This has also led to the propensity to blend Sangiovese with other grapes in Chianti, most often Cabernet Sauvignon. But times are a changin’

Soils in Chianti vary, but Chianti Classico is a mix of shale and clay, which tends to produce wines of greater concentration than the soils outside of the Classico zone. Since the 1990’s, Italians have been rediscovering this terroir, amongst others, and are now understanding how to effectively plant Sangiovese without the need for blending. Nonetheless it is possible to find great blended wines along with 100% varietal wines, as this Chianti Classico attests.

One of the Oldest Estates in Europe

Ricasoli is a very large but also respected producer in Chianti with a serious history stretching back to the 12th century. A later iteration of Baron Ricasoli (Bettino) was one of the founders of Chianti Classico in the 19th century and was hugely influential in researching clones and blending, ultimately finding a formula that led to today’s DOCG rules. Amazingly, the estate is still in the hands of the family (if you want a contrast between new and old world wine estates, I can’t think of a better one).

The Wine

The Castello di Brolio is more than just Chianti Classico DOCG, it is rather a single vineyard site that is considered to be one of the best in the region. Made with mostly Sangiovese (usually about 80%) with about 10% each of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, this wine displays all the classic Sangiovese markers of leather, earth, cherry and tobacco leaf.

This is an incredibly delicious wine with superb high acid structure. The oak has now integrated, though the wine could go longer in bottle. The Castello is a great example of oak aging (18 months) that works and integrates well with the grape. I detected some darker chocolate notes along with rich ripe black cherries and an absolute ton of concentration. This will please those who like bigger wines and those who prefer wines with a considerable acid backbone. The intensity of the fruit and the acid meld extremely well. Simply put, the wine has attained uncommon balance. Balance is often the missing key to wines. Most drinkers don’t realize that they will in fact enjoy many styles of wine so long as they are properly balanced, an unfortunately rare phenomenon. And, it works with food. A “prestige” wine that works with food – finally!

The 10 years of age suits this wine well as it is still youthful but very integrated. It could go 5 more.

Excellent
$79 at Kits Wine Cellar (on sale for $59)

Filed Under: $60+, Cabernet Sauvignon, Excellent, Italian Wine, Merlot, Sangiovese, Sangiovese

Spotlight on Portuguese Dry Wine: Quinta do Crasto Vinha da Ponte 2003

August 30, 2011 By Shea Leave a Comment

Probably the best represented of Portugal’s top wineries in British Columbia, Quinta do Crasto has been making wine for almost 400 years. It is now run by the Roquette family whose lineage and relationship with Quinta do Crasto reaches back to the beginning of the 20th century.

A Rare Single Vineyard Bottling

Crasto makes a wide range of table wine, from the cheap and easy drinking Flor de Crasto to single varietal bottlings of Touriga Nacional and Tinta Roriz to its two top bottlings of single vineyard wines: the Vinha Maria Teresa and this, the Vinha da Ponte. All the wine is grown and made in the Douro valley.

It is rare to find single vineyard table wines (and, for the most part, port) from Portugal. It is perhaps the youth of the high end table wine industry that has yet to discover all the possibilities of site and terroir. The Vinha da Ponte is an excellent example of how good single vineyard wine can be from the Douro.

French Structure, Portuguese Character

With vines nearing a century of age, the Vinha da Ponte vineyard is planted in schist soils with a field blend of 22 different grape varieties, which is likely what gives this wine its unique character. As is common in the steep Douro vineyards, the grapes are picked by hand.

An aristocratic, bordeaux-like nose offers cassis, sandalwood, and slate. This is a wine with great balance but also with the unique stamp of Touriga Nacional: firm tannin and a unique richly intense brambly dark berry fruit character. Delicious, lithely integrated oak gives the wine structure and poise and vinification gives it an easy, silky texture.

Thus, a wine with the structure of a French wine, but the flavour and density of a Portuguese wine. I thought it was the best I have yet tasted in this profile and, while it will likely improve with a couple more years, it is clearly within its prime drinking window.

Excellent to Excellent+
$133 at BCLDB

P.S. This is likely to be my last post in several weeks as I head off on vacation to France to visit the vineyards of Alsace and the Rhone.

Filed Under: $60+, Excellent, Portuguese Dry Wine, Portuguese Wine, Tinta Cao, Touriga Franca, Touriga Nacionale

Champalou Cuvee Moelleuse Vouvray 2003

August 1, 2011 By Shea Leave a Comment

Vouvray produces some of my favourite off-dry white wines of any region in the world. These vinous expressions are the pillowy counterpoint to the soaring wines of the Mosel. Equally deft at bringing together lightness, freshness and incredible depth, there is a much waxier quality than anything you’d find from the Rhine Valley and its offshoots.

This “sweet” Vouvray from the top producer Champalou is a perfect example of both top Vouvray and how the 2003 vintage produced some excellent sweet wines in the Loire despite the heat. In Vouvray the grapes saw some noble rot, which added to the wines’ voluptuous intensity even while the lower acid of the vintage perhaps took away from their famous ageability.

A Marshmallow Waterfall

With classic aromas of honey and peaches, this wine turns truly exciting upon drinking. Waxy, dense apricots, peaches and honey glide over the tongue like a marshmallow waterfall. The complexity and length show this to be a top notch wine, even though the acid is just barely at the right level and the wine very well may start declining sooner than expected. This is serious Chenin and is perfect with Thai food, pumpkin ravioli or anything with a hint of sweetness and spiciness.

Excellent
$50 at Liberty Wine Merchants

Filed Under: $40-$60, Chenin Blanc, Excellent, French Wine

Karthauserhof Eitelsbacher Karthauserhofberg Kabinett Riesling 2007

July 28, 2011 By Shea 1 Comment

Let’s start with German wine labels 101. The first word – Karthauserhof – is the producer. Karthauserhof is one of the top producers in the Mosel, located in, yep, Eitelsbach (the second word is the village). This village is located on the Ruwer river, which is a tributary of the Mosel.

This is ancient vine country. Vineyards here were originally planted about a thousand years ago by the Romans and eventually it was Carthusian monks that established the Karthauserhof estate in the 14th century. In the time of Napoleon, the vineyard was taken from the monks and sold to a private owner from Paris. The estate then passed through one of those irritating European noble families for generations, ending up today in some off-shoot branch of the Napoleonic era owner. That said, these are wines both with serious history and of tremendous quality.

The Vineyard

The Karthauserhofberg vineyard (the third word in the label is always the vineyard) is the sole source of fruit for Karthauserhof winery. It is in fact an amalgamation of 5 separate vineyards, but you will only know which vineyard fruit went into which wines if you talk to the winery itself.

Of course, as with all Mosel estates, the terroir is slate and it is this slate that gives the rieslings of the Mosel their unique combination of depth, clarity and precision, despite always hanging on the edge of ripeness.

Poetic Precision

How to describe a wine like this? You can think of precision like an engineer fixated on detail, making no mistakes. There is little to be excited about, but such work is nearly always reliable and we’re all happy to benefit from the meticulousness.

However, there is also a precision that brings to life that which would otherwise remain hidden. This is the type of clarity offered by my favourite writers from John Coetze and James Baldwin to E.M. Forster and Joseph Conrad.

This wine is more like the writer than the engineer – precise but poetic. At first you appreciate the detail and economy, but then you start to see how all the pithy focus reveals something worldly and profound. A 100 page novel you read in 4 hours but remember for the rest of your life. Only ever Riesling can do this.

This is wine with firm acidity but the fruit is all the more expressive because of this lift, and the wine melts easily into food. Enticing, clean, mineral driven, exalted fruit, and as comforting and delicious as it is vaulted and gothic.

Excellent+
$42 at Liberty Wine Merchants

Filed Under: $40-$60, Excellent, German Wine, Riesling

Spotlight on New Zealand: Kumeu River Estate Chardonnay 2007

July 17, 2011 By Shea Leave a Comment

This will be the last post in the New Zealand spotlight. And I feel it is suitable to end with a wine that represents how New Zealand is moving towards it own unique sense of terroir, marrying cool climate viticulture with respect for both old world restraint and new world pleasure. The best wines of New Zealand combine the reflective with the hedonistic so well that I am very excited for the Island’s future.

Methods

I wrote up Kumeu river’s entry level chardonnay earlier in this spotlight, which is made with purchased fruit. The Estate Chardonnay takes things to another level of depth and complexity. Grown on clay and sandstone soils, the vines are trellised in the ‘lyre’ system, which increases the grapes light exposure and helps to ensure greater phenolic ripeness.

The grapes are hand harvested, and once in the cellar they see 100% whole bunch pressing, full malo-lactic and barrel fermentation for 11 months.

Old World, New World

This is a very tasty wine and, despite not reaching the level of stunning complexity of the Pyramid Lion’s Tooth Chardonnay, it is also surprisingly complex and aromatically expressive. Minerals, stones, flowers and lemon make up the excellent bouquet, which would fool many to be Burgundy, though I think the fruit character is decidedly Kiwi. The oak is beautifully integrated and the palate is very bright and fresh with good length and balance. This is a wine with old world style and a new world sensibility and is outstanding chardonnay for the price.

Excellent and Highly Recommended Value
$40 at Kits Wine Cellar and Everything Wine

Filed Under: $40-$60, Chardonnay, Excellent, Highly Recommended Values, New Zealand, New Zealand Wines

Wind Gap Griffin’s Lair Syrah 2007

July 15, 2011 By Shea Leave a Comment

Pax Mahle gained his fame making syrah for Pax winery, which grew from a tiny boutique to one of the hottest Syrah focused cult wineries in California. Prices, of course, shot up with the scores and the wine progressed from fascinating renditions of terroir-driven syrah to, on occasion, very large overbearing wines. Pax Mahle eventually left Pax winery to start his own winery (Wind Gap), which would focus on his desire to make more ‘honest’ wines from grapes grown on the best vineyards in California. Griffin’s Lair is, for Syrah, one such vineyard.

Purely Made Syrah

I’ve been wanting to try these wines for years and am very excited to find them in Vancouver. These wines represent what California can become, particularly with Syrah, which is being pulled out at ever increasing rates in the state. It seems Syrah is one hard grape to sell, which has helped to lower prices. In fact, I think Syrah makes the best value ‘great’ wines in the world.

But this is not just about Syrah, or rather, it is just about Syrah. With 100% whole cluster, natural fermentations, alcohol under 14%, crushed by foot and no clarification, this is amongst the most non-interventionst wines you can get from California.

Naturally Huge Wine

This is fascinating wine, meaty and inky dark, with plums rolling out in its big bold aromatics. There is briar and rich blackberry on this very rich and intense nose. This has classic Syrah flavours of pepper and game along with great full-on dark fruit. An impressively dense wine without being over the top or overtly opulent. This needs some time in the bottle before coming into its own, but this is surprisingly well balanced for its heft. I think this is likely due to the fact that the hugeness of this wine is part of its terroir rather than any attempt to make a monster wine. As such, this is wine with balance and structure despite its hugeness.

Right now I would note that the palate is still a little aggressive compared to how it will be with some age, but I have no doubts this will turn into something special.

Excellent
$90 at Kits Wine Cellar

Filed Under: $60+, Californian Wine, Excellent, Syrah

Spotlight on New Zealand: Pyramid Valley Vineyards – Fanaticism and Perfection

July 9, 2011 By Shea Leave a Comment

New Zealand is a country that is still discovering its vinous identity. While much further along than British Columbia, Kiwi wineries are still experimenting and discovering what works best and where. There are many very good wines available beyond the traditional Sauvignon Blanc, including some stellar Pinot Noirs and Syrahs, and a few Chardonnays. However, there are still few wines that take it to the next level, those wines and wineries that define the greatness of a place.

California, for all its failings, has several of these sorts of wineries and is ahead of most everywhere else in the New World in this respect. While this profile has certainly introduced me to many very good wines that I did not realize were being made in New Zealand, it has also presented to me a country that has yet to discover its defining moment. Or at least so I thought until now.

An American in … New Zealand?

Two Americans, Mike and Claudia Weersing, founded Pyramid Valley in 1996, arriving in New Zealand after Mike studied winemaking in Burgundy and apprenticed with various stints at Hubert de Montille, Domaine de la Pousse d’Or, Nicholas Potel, Jean Michel-Deiss, Ernst Loosen, Randall Graham, Evesham Wood, and James Halliday (at Coldstream Hills). For those not in the know, these represent some of the top winemakers in Burgundy, Alsace, Germany, California, Oregon and Australia. Not only that, but most of these winemakers are proponents of biodynamics and minimalist winemaking.

While searching for the ideal vineyard site on which to found their winery, the Weersings initially started making wines by leasing vineyard land from some top growers across New Zealand. These wines represent their “growers” series of wines, which are interesting in themselves, though clearly represent a voyage of experimentation rather than the realization of a vision.

Mike Weersing is clearly a fanatical man. He spent years looking for his ideal vineyard site and ultimately found it in the middle of nowhere in central New Zealand (Canterburry) where not many (if any?) others are making wine. He has planted 95% of his vines with ungrafted rootstock and claims that the own rooted vines burrow deeper into the limestone soils than the grafted vines. His vineyards are on sites that have never seen the use of chemical pesticides or other human made intrusions on ‘nature’. The wines made from these vineyards are the “Home Vineyard” wines, as opposed to the “Growers Collection” of wines made from other vineyard sources.

Biodynamics, Again

These wines are also fully biodynamic, and the Weersings take this philosophy to its extremes, harvesting in relation to the phases of the moon and even attempting to isolate yeasts that live on the grapes from those that are indigenous to the cellar itself. In fact, Mike is going all out to try to get the saccharomyces yeast that live on the grapes to be the only yeast used in the fermentation. As such, sometimes the fermentations can take over a year to complete (which is why the 2008 Pinot’s were bottled after the 2009’s). Some claim this is lunacy and that yeasts that live in the cellar are not only impossible to exclude but are necessary to complete fermentation as the saccharomyces yeasts will always be insufficient to complete the process. Nonetheless, it is clear that Mike is taking fanatical attention to detail to another level.

This attention to detail reminds me of some conversations I was lucky to have with Allen Meadows where he opined that Biodynamicists produced better wine on average more because they were obsessed with details rather than anything relating to the lunar cycle. I think this must be true with the Pyramid wines as well, because it seems to be that this obsessed with detail and perfection is precisely the reason why the Weersings have avoided all the flaws commonly associated with both biodynamic and ‘natural’ wines, for surely the Home Vineyard wines are from both camps.

Hot Damn

The Home Vineyard wines from Pyramid Valley are unequivocally the best examples of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from New Zealand, and they compete with the absolute best examples from all over the New World. These are wines with unparallelled purity and finesse and with exceptional expression, balance and length.

I tasted both the Pyramid Valley Earth Smoke Pinot Noir 2009, which poured a beautiful cloudy light red (apparently the wine wouldn’t settle and the Weersings do not fine or filter), and the Pyramid Valley Lion’s Tooth Chardonnay 2009, which I had trouble distinguishing from a top notch Corton.

The Pinot had a Burgundian elegance on the nose with spice, light berry fruits, earth and savour. The 10% whole cluster fermentation clearly added spicy and earthy elements from the stems. This is a dense, rich Pinot Noir without heavyness or alcohol (it is 13.8%). Yet this is creamy, rich and very very smooth. Possessing one of the longest finishes I’ve experienced from a New World Pinot, the Earth Smoke completes with an earthy and mineral twist that makes this the most complete Pinot I have tasted in this New Zealand Spotlight.

Ditto for the Chardonnay, which is perhaps a more classic example of pure Burgundian cool-climate Chardonnay than are the Pinot Noirs (which truly are their own entity). The Lion’s Tooth offers mineral, stone and lemon on the nose, but it does so with exceptional expression and purity. In a blind, I would put money on experienced tasters picking this as a Burgundy. I found it similar to Mikulski’s Mersaults, which is an exceptional compliment since Mikulski is one of my favourite winemakers in Burgundy.

On the palate this was very elegant and long with exceptionally pure fruit. This is more balanced in oak, alcohol and acid than many more expensive Burgundy whites. Lemon, apricot, hazlenut and long minerality round out this exciting wine, which is amongst the very best New World Chardonnays I have tasted. This is even more elegant than many many white Burgundies.

Both wines are extremely impressive and both wines deserve:

Excellent+
$70 for the Earth Smoke Pinot Noir at Marquis Wine Cellar
$65 for the Lion’s Tooth Chardonnay at Marquis Wine Cellar

Filed Under: $60+, Chardonnay, Excellent, New Zealand, New Zealand Wines, Pinot Noir

Azienda Agricola Cos Cerasuolo Di Vittoria Classico 2008

July 2, 2011 By Shea 8 Comments

How exciting it is for a wine like this to be in British Columbia. Cos is not only an icon of the ‘natural wine’ movement, but it is an exceptional producer that is making some of the most exciting wines in Sicily.

Natural Wine or Just a Great Producer?

Natural wine has consistently been a galvanizing force for debate about the nature and purpose of wine. Commercial viability, faults, ideology, and ethics all come out to play when a natural wine hits the glass.

Often those in this debate can lose sight of a simple reality for all wine: it is producer more than philosophy or technique that makes great wine. Great grapes and terroir are also necessary, but it is the endless minute decisions made in the vineyard and the cellar that ultimately make a wine what it is. This means that in natural wine, just as with all wine, there will be those producers that make wines far and above what most others are doing. For me, Cos is one of those producers.

COS – So Hot Right Now

Founded in 1980 by three partners – Giambattista Cilia, Cirino Strano and Giusto Occhipinti, whose daughter has started her own much adored eponymous winery – COS set out to challenge what had become ‘conventional’ winemaking in Sicily’s only DO “Cerasuolo Di Vittoria” first by farming completely biodynamically, and second by steadily increasing the use of clay amphora for fermentation of their wines. The amphora fermented wines bear the name “Pithos”.

COS is located on the southeastern tip of Sicily and as such the climate is both hot and dry. Despite this, the wines bear a lightness and elegance that belies their origins in one of the hottest climates in Italy.

Perfect Italian Wine

Alas while we do not yet have access to the amphora fermented wines in the province, this wine, fermented completely in neutral concrete, is still an excellent introduction to the COS style and philosophy. Made from 18 year old Frappato and Nero D’Avola vines grown on limestone-silicaceous and clay soils, this wine is both enticingly aromatic and very fresh and juicy on the palate. Pretty red fruits and flowers flow easily from the glass, and it is this effortlessness that is the wine’s most striking quality.

This is also a wine with a substantial medium body that will balance kindly with a wide variety of food from cured meats to lightly spicy pastas and grilled meats. It also goes great with air, as my friend Sean is fond of saying. This is also the kind of wine I would lovingly buy by the case – so don’t go running out and snapping up the small allocation this province has!

Excellent and Highly Recommended Value
$35 at BCLDB

Filed Under: $30-$40, Excellent, Frappato, Highly Recommended Values, Italian Wine, Nero d'Avola