wine Archives - Page 27 of 34 - Wojciech BońkowskiWojciech Bońkowski

On the Etna (2)

My second day on the Etna was at Vinimilo, a wine tasting event that’s been organised in Milo, a somewhat seedy town on the eastern slope of the volcano, for no less than 26 years. This edition is dedicated to the alberello – the bush vine that is the classic vineyard cultivation method around the Mediterranean. It doesn’t sound earth-shakingly interesting to the wine novice but some of the wines on show were very exciting. Bush vine cultivation requires a lot of manual work and so is usually embraced by high-end producers that often have an organic approach.

No wonder many wines were very individual. Some excessively so (the unsulphured Sardinians from the Pane Vino estate failed to thrill me), and some controversial (the Primitivos from La Morella have more than 15.5% alcohol and despite their expressive fruit, are inevitably very heady). But there were gems, too, such as the sweet Passito 2005 from the tiny island of Pantelleria made by Salvatore Ferrandes, bursting with candied orange and mineral freshness at the same time, or the serious, nocturnal, powerful Olevano Romano Cesanese Cirsium 2005 from micro-producer Damiano Ciolli south of Rome. I also liked the unsophisticated but distinctive and delicious duo of Rossese wines from Maixei, a mini-coop in Dolceacqua in western Liguria, near the French border. Rossese is an ancient grape that only grows on some 100 ha, all on high-perched terraces with bush vines. The viticulture here is so labour-intensive that Rossese as a whole is an endangered species; I just wish it can survive as its profile is really distinctive.

There were also some brilliant non-Mediterranean wines, such as the bush vine-trained Sangioveses from Fattoria Zerbina in Romagna (the 2006 Pietramora is a monster that will live at least two decades) and the amazingly mineral (and surprisingly unalcoholic) Vitovskas from eastern Friuli’s Vodopivec, including a clay amphora-macerated 2005 that is a masterpiece of balance.

In the end I tried to concentrate on Sicilian wines and especially those from Etna. (This included a tasting of local bottlings for the wider public that took place the following day). It’s not so obvious to find really good wine on the volcano. While the reds generally have the crisp, crunchingly tannic signature of the local grape – Nerello Mascalese – and terroir, there’s a lot of excessive yields and poor winemaking around, resulting in unbalanced, over-tannic wines that lack fruit. Stuff from Michele & Mario Grasso and Terre Grasso Salina is simply disastrous while Don Saro, Cantine del Regno, Maria Di Bella, Barone di Villagrande are generally uninspiring.

Good Etna wines come in a variety of styles: the red from Il Cantante (an estate belonging to the Simply Red frontman, Mick Hucknall) sees a lot of wood and a long ageing in bottle; the 2002 is rich, brooding, evolved but with plenty of power left, and an interesting wine. Fierce tannins are also the hallmark of Tenute Romeo del Castello whose Etna Rosso In Attesa d’Artista 2007 is overextracted but shows good minerality. Agostino Sangiorgi makes a few thousand bottles of a single wine, Granaccio, on the southern outskirts of the appellation; it’s a very pale wine (there are some white grapes in the blend) that is really elegant but also fiercely acidic, and will need time in the bottle too. I liked the unexaggerated fruit and distinctive spice of the Etna Rosso Valcerasa 2005 from Alice Bonaccorsi, though it’s hardly very complex. The red Etna DOC from Aítala is a bit heavy-handed but the IGT Nerello Mascalese 2007 is one of the more succulent interpretations of the Etna grape.

With top estates such as Tenuta delle Terre Nere and Passopisciaro missing, the memorable wines came from Ciro Biondi (as much the ambitious single-vineyard MI 2007 as the cheaper Outis 2006, a stylish wine with a sense of digestness and classicism that I would gladly drink anytime) and the ubiquitous Benanti, Etna’s major player, whose top bottlings both in white (Pietramarina 2005: very shy, deep, half-mineral, saline) and red (Serra della Contessa 2004: serious concentration, good minerality, calm, a little soft perhaps) I have enjoyed more in other circumstances but even here they showed obvious substance and dimension that put them above the bunch.

We tasted more Etna wines from a group of estates originated by Salvo Foti, a viticulturalist that is one of Etna’s major characters – more on these tomorrow.

On the Etna (1)

I’m on Etna in Sicily to participate in the Vinimilo event, where 26 producers from Italy, France and Spain will present wines made from bush vines (alberello). There are some great names on the roll of honour, and it promises to be an interesting tasting.

Yesterday I visited Frank Cornelissen, who is producing some of the most remarkable ‘natural’ wines anywhere. A Belgian who decided to find a terroir suitable for his ideas of making wine with no chemicals whatsoever (not only herbicides, yeast or enzymes as in organic viticulture, but also without any copper or sulphur, which is very unusual and really rather bold), Frank settled on Etna in late 2000. Since its first vintages, his flagship wine, called Magma, has attracted a lot of attention. Frank now works on 10 hectares of land in several plots on the northern slopes of Etna (where the very dry, disease-free climate makes it viable to grow vines without chemical interventions) and only produces around 15,000 bottles.

The viticulture and vinification are unusual (wines are fermented in clay amphorae on their skins, including the white Magma which stays on skins for three months!) but how the wines taste is even more remarkable. Very often, ‘natural’ wines are challenging, showing some rustic, at times unclean aromas and flavours which are often considered the price to pay for increased mineral expression and grape-generated ‘naturality’. With Cornelissen’s wines, we have none of that. After several vintages with bacterial deviations and high volatile acidity, the range of wines I tasted from 2007 and 2008 is incredibly clean and pure. The Munjebel Bianco 4 (all the wines are bottled as table wines which until this year, were not allowed to show the vintage on the label; this is from 2007) was one of the very best skin-contact whites I’ve ever tried. Partly because it shows no notes of skin contact! An amazingly expressive wine with intense notes of citrusy, tangeriney fruit, it has a powerful saline minerality but stays very clean: no lifted notes, no macerative aromas.

Frank’s inexpensive bottling Contadino 6 [2008] blends Etna’s leading grape variety Nerello Mascalese with some other grapes; it has a spicey, pomegrenatey nose typical of ‘natural’ reds with wonderful purity and natural freshness. The Munjebel Rosso 5 (a blend of 2007 and 2008) is even more engaging. It’s a 100% Nerello with a light colour and one of the most hauntingly pure fruity noses I’ve encountered: like biting into a freshly picked strawberry. Clean, mineral, refreshingly tannic (those crisp tannins reminded me of the Terre Nere 2007 I blogged on yesterday); the directness of fruit is really unique. The main wine here, Magma 6, is a 2007 single vineyard bottling from ~100-year-old vines. Much different in style, it introduces evolved, spicy, meaty notes into the bouquet, and is less direct than the other reds here. Lots of anise and coriander spice in this one, it is a complex wine that really needs some time in the glass to develop.

Cornelissen’s work is ground-breaking and shows nothing is impossible in the world of wine. The flavour of his wines is really unique. Though the production is small, the estate’s fame has started to spread, and the wines are available e.g. in the UK through Les Caves de Pyrène, and Denmark through Atomwine. If you’re interested in ‘natural’ wines you owe it to yourself to try these.

Stay tuned for more Etna reports tomorrow.

Tenuta delle Terre Nere Etna 2007

I’m off to Etna in a few minutes. I love volcanic wines, and the prospect of exploring the vineyards on Europe’s highest volcano is exciting. I’ll also be meeting with Frank Cornelissen, one of this planet’s craziest winemakers, which is even more exciting.

As per my habit of gauging my palate to the forthcoming bunch of wines I opened the Tenuta delle Terre Nere Etna Rosso 2007. Terre Nere is the Etna venture of Marc De Grazia, an influential importer of Italian wines into the US that has been one of the architects of Italian wine’s success on the American market. Interestingly, while much of De Grazia’s original catalogue represented some of the most modern trends in Italian wine (including some new French oak-aged Barolos and Barbarescos), the wines of Terre Nere show quite some respect for tradition. It’s evident by the light bricky colour of this red and also its bouquet: showing lots of finesse and a subdued minerality, it isn’t overly fruity or upfront. The red wines of Etna are often compared to burgundies (and the local grape, Nerello, is yet another ‘Pinot Noir of the Mediterranean’), and while it’s often an abused comparison, here it’s really right. The ripe, fleshy, gently spicy, hauntingly flowery aroma of this 2007 could well be that of a warm-vintage Volnay or Chambolle.

The flavour of this wine is really interesting. The balance is quite unique. Acidity is not very high but there is a mineral coolness and restraint at the core; the fruity notes echo the nose with fleshy cherries and ripe currants, and there is a perfumed flowery undertone. Surprisingly for a wine with such light body and flowery finesse, the tannins on the finish are quite sturdy. Finesse, minerality and tannins: these elements do not often go together in a red wine. This 2007, Terre Nere’s basic cuvée (they also make several single-vineyard bottlings), is really overdelivering for the price, developing very well in the glass. It’s boding well for my Etna excursion – read more about it soon on this blog.

Georg Breuer’s 2008s

It is a tradition of my Erste Lage Sneak Preview visits to finish the second day of the tasting with a visit to the Georg Breuer estate in Rüdesheim. Breuer is not a member of the VDP association and so cannot participate in the Erste Lage tasting, but quality-wise he belongs to the very top flight of German wineries, so it is de rigueur to come here and have a look at the latest vintages. From Wiesbaden it’s only a 30-minute hop by train (with all the classified vineyards to be admired from the train’s window on the way).

Sunrise over Rüdesheim (photo quality courtesy of Sony Ericsson).

I’ve recently sung the praise of Breuer’s 2007s (see here and here), and it was obvious that this new vintage (see here for a full overview) would have a hard time living up to that level. But the 2008s here turned out very enjoyable. In fact, they were stunningly good if you consider the average level of the vintage in the Rheingau. There was none of the green unripe acidity, and even the simplest dry Riesling here – the 9€ 2008 Sauvage – was not far away qualitatively from the Grosse Gewächse we tried a couple of hours earlier in Wiesbaden.

Mind you, these Rieslings are acidic. The 2008 Rüdesheim Estate (a village-level wine from various crus) has no less than 9.6g of acidity (and 6.9g of residual sugar) and yet it’s a wine of ripe mineral aromas and of engaging purity on the palate. Theresa Breuer says they were concerned by the very high analytical figures and even tried some deacidification but the damage to the wine’s balance was huge. This bottling, like its slightly more powerful sibling of the 2008 Terra Montosa (made from declassified lots of Breuer’s grands crus) shows a warm sea salinity that reminded me of Chablis.

Berg Rottland and Berg Schlossberg are to your left.

Looking at the top bottlings here, the 2008 Berg Rottland Riesling was, as usually, the most open and approachable with lovely balance, bone dry, finely crafted, precise, mineral and really impressive for the vintage; a wine I find quite enjoyable today, with no challenging acidity. The 2008 Berg Schlossberg Riesling comes from a more exposed, more consistently dark-slatey vineyard and is, as usually, a very backward wine, with a bit more power and punch than the Rottland; in some vintages it can lack the acidic vivacity of the latter but in 2008, that extra ripeness from the sun-absorbing dark slate soil was definitely an advantage. Develops really well in the glass (becoming almost flowery); this will be drinkable sooner than Schlossberg usually is. The 2008 Nonnenberg Riesling is a cru I drink more rarely than the two above; from the village of Rauenthal farther east, the soil here is less slatey, more loamy. This is also a rather shy wine but less tight texturally than the Schlossberg, leaner, though not less mineral. All three are very pure wines with impressively ripe acidity; they really seem to come from a different vintage than the very lemony Rieslings from the Rheingau tasted at the Erste Lage Preview. Of course, tasting at a producer’s cellar with more time to dedicate to each wine does change your perception by a margin. But not such a wide margin. So why this difference? Theresa Breuer indicates record-low yields (going down to 25 hl/ha in the Schlossberg, and that’s at a density of 8000 vines/ha…) as responsible for the riper acidity.

We finished the evening at Breuer’s crowded Schloss Rüdesheim Weinstube, starting with a wine taster’s best friend – cold beer, and rounding off the session with a bottle of Breuer’s enjoyable Riesling Brut. Come here really hungry as the portions are huge, and be prepared for Japanese parties and a lot of singing…

Erste Lage Sneak Preview 2009 (full report)

My extensive report from the largest tasting of top German Rieslings. All regions comprehensively reviewed.

Erste Lage Sneak Preview 2009

Greetings from Wiesbaden where I’m tasting through 250 Erste Lage wines before they are released on the market on September 1st. Organised by VDP association of estates, this yearly event is one of the best in a taster’s calendar. First, because it’s so well organised, and despite there being around 100 tasters the team of sommeliers who are pouring the wines is incredibly efficient. Second, because all the wines are good. It’s no exaggeration: these are all grand cru level wines that are the result of a stringent selection, meaning that the qualitative threshold is really quite high (translating into a numerical scale all these wines would generally score 85/100 or higher). Together with the fact that they’re predominantly white Rieslings with ripe acidity and no oak, it allows to taste a record-high amount of wines without really getting tired. (Last year, I did 160 in one day, with pretty consistent notes).

The modest edifice of the Kurhaus in Wiesbaden that hosts this annual event.

Other than to pick up a few bottles I will myself attempt to buy (this stuff sells out quickly) this tasting is really useful to examine the style of the latest vintage – in our case, 2008 for the white wines – in detail.

In short, 2008 in Germany is really rather average. It’s got mixed reviews – some producers saying it was dismal, others that it was good+ – but while it’s certainly no disaster, it’s the least interesting year since at least 2000. The weather conditions posed no great threat to the grapes but ripening was delayed, so that few vineyards ever reached a satisfactory phenolic ripeness to make great dry wines. In the long harvest period that stretched from late September through mid-November, the exact picking time was crucial. Too early and there was a streak of unpleasantly green, bitterish acidity in your wines (a frequent problem); too late and alcohol soared to 13.5% or more while phenolically the grapes were still not totally ripe, making for unbalanced wines that have no sufficient concentration or texture to support the alcohol.

Tasters at work.

Here are some bullet points about the vintage:

1. Low concentration: the wines are not exactly diluted but they lack the natural density of 2007 or 2006.

2. Green acidity: As mentioned, it’s what effectively differentiates the vintage from other cool ones such as 2004. Many wines have a vegetal, stemmy, tannic, bitterish impression on the finish. This might integrate with ageing, although it will never go away. In many wines it’s a major sensory problem.

3. Noticeable alcohol: Although the objective figures are lower than in 2007 or 2006 (most wine are at 13–13.5%, some have 12.5%, one single wine shows 14% on the label), the lack of natural concentration and fruit intensity makes these moderate amounts noticeable, and many wines display alcoholic heat on the finish.

4. Disappointing progression: Some Rieslings actually have a nice attack on the palate, filled with smacky fruit but quickly weaken from mid-palate on, leading to a diluted, fruitless, acid-driven finish that is very much an anti-climax. Winemakers will know it’s not so difficult to add interest to a wine’s bouquet or initial impact but the persistence is impossible to counterfeit.

5. Low fruit: I’m not so hostile to acidity (when it’s ripe), and can even take a bit of greenness when the wine has substance and expression of fruit. Few German 2008s have that, though. The incomplete phenolic ripeness of the grapes affected the fruit aromas and flavours, and often they haven’t at all developed. Too many wines can be described as ‘naked’, ‘hollow’, fruitless etc.

6. Terroir presence: This is the trickiest point. Minerality in itself is elusive. While high levels of acids together with some SO2 reduction can give an impression of minerality, this will never make up for lack of real terroir presence that can only be generated by ripe grapes and good concentration. While many secondary cru wines are showing what I call ‘nominal minerality’, only the greatest German terroirs – Scharzhofberger in the Saar, Pechstein in the Pfalz – are really expressing their full potential.

Erste Lage and Grosses Gewächs is a system that for the few years of its existence, has worked fairly well. It has simplified German wine, and put the best terroirs and best wines in the limelight. But it’s in hard times that you recognised the quality of an institution like this. In a substandard vintage like 2008, it was the good sense of the VDP association and the single growers to reduce the number and amoung of Erste Lage wines made, and release many wines in a lower category like Spätlese trocken or just Riesling trocken with a vineyard name. That hasn’t been done, and although I’ve heard a number of explanations from German producers and writers that ranged from viticultural to political, it will really be hard to justify the expense of 25–35€ (which is the price range for most Grosses Gewächs wines) on 80% of these bottles.

This article continues tomorrow with a full assessment of the different regions and the best recommended wines.

My workstation.

Emilio Lustau Oloroso Pata de Gallina 1/38

There are two types of wines that could hardly be held in higher esteem by wine journos, and yet are quite unpopular with the wider drinking ‘public’: dry sherry and dry Riesling. I can recall the names of at least a hundred colleagues who have sung the praise of Jerez seco and Riesling trocken. ‘The wine world’s best-kept secret’, ‘ridiculously good value’, ‘when will humanity open its eyes to the greatness of these wines’ etc.

While dry Riesling in the last few years has made significant inroads and now can hardly be said to be ‘unpopular’ (although it still loses to sweet Riesling on such markets as the US and the UK, I think), dry sherry remains a commercial disaster that’s only surviving thanks to sales of the lightest style, fino sherry in Spain and abroad. The longer-aged, more complex styles like amontillado, palo cortado and especially oloroso are an acquired taste and have been relegated to a shrinking niche.

I don’t drink enough of these (supply in Poland is non-existent), and every time I do, I’m reminded how much I’m missing. These wines belong to the most compelling anywhere. But I’m also reminded how difficult it is to appreciate them from time to time. Delving into these deeply oxidised, unfruity, nutty, at times challengingly acidic and salty flavours requires a complete reset. If you open a bottle of oloroso between a Chardonnay and a Rioja, chances are you’ll find it repulsive. It really needs to be a regular exercise. There’s also no way to forget their alcoholic strength: while the 20% in an oloroso are as balanced as you’ll ever find, it’s not a wine you can drink in quantity, also because it’s so intense and mouth-filling.

The bottle I’m having today is among the very best sherries available on the market. From the négociant house of Emilio Lustau comes this Oloroso Pata de Gallina 1/38, matured by Juan García Jarana. I’ll spare you the technicalities (it’s basically a micro-production from a single grower, which is a very unusual thing in the world of sherry, normally a classic blended and branded wine) and will just say it’s a mindblowingly complex wine. I could write page after page of aroma descriptors and wouldn’t be exhaustive. There’s a unique combination of almondy, nutty, marzipanny, wafery, pâtisserie notes with nuanced fruits ranging from orange and lemon to raspberry, heavier spicy notes of mulled wine, bitter chocolate and caramel, a raisiney richness but also lots of lifted, sandalwoody, varnishy, almost vinegarish scents. But it’s all in balance. It’s a wine that keeps changing in the glass: over half an hour it’s really like an aromatic journey over an amazingly complex landscape. I sit in silence and awe as the wine tells its epic story.

The other remarkable thing is that I’m finishing this bottle that was opened on 30th December 2007. That’s no joke. December 2007, not 2008. That’s 596 days! And I must say the wine is still very much alive. I can’t say it’s unchanged – it has surely lost some complexity – but is still offering more than a fair bit of impact, and length is as staggering as usually in a good oloroso. The wine was completely oxidised in oak barrels over something like twenty years (it’s hard to give a precise period of ageing, as the barrels were regularly refreshed with new wine) and it really couldn’t care less about being exposed to oxygen now. Only madeira can approach this durability. It’s making this wine even more unique. Please drink more dry sherry!

Two big wines from Clos du Gravillas

To Minervois or not to Minervois?

Two interesting bottles from the Clos du Gravillas estate in the Languedoc. Vintners Nicole and John Bojanowski (as you can see from the name, there’s even a Polish connection) are known to wine geeks as patient champions of the Carignan grape. They even established the Carignan Renaissance association to help the rebirth of this quintessential Mediterranean grape.

It’ll be a tough job. No other grape has been denigrated so much in the last few decades. In France, authorities to their utmost to get rid of Carignan wherever they can. You can cash in thousands of €€ just by uprooting Carignan vineyards, no matter how good the wine they produce. In the variety’s traditional stronghold, the Languedoc, every single AOC appellation has a maximum limit of this grape in the blend (usually 40%; 50% in Corbières; the backwater AOC of Fitou is an honourable exception in requiring a minimum of 30% Carignan).

Until recently, Carignan was charged with all possible crimes. It was deemed responsible for the major wine glut of the Languedoc – whereas the real culprit were the heroic yields to which this flexible grape was harnessed (300 hl/ha was, apparently, far from being the record). Carignan was alleged to be a ‘rustic’ grape, unsuitable for ‘modern’ viticulture (read: mechanical harvesting) and its wines unappealing to ‘contemporary’ tastes (read: too acidic). It was also judged a ‘clonal disaster’ (but why did you ask nurseries for high-yielding clones back in the 1970s?).

The slow change in Carignan appreciation we currently witness is partly the merit of growers like the Bojanowskis who show the potential of the grape with low yields and old vines (these can run up to a 120 years in places), and partly that of the wine zone of Priorat in Catalonia. Here, schistous soils, high elevations and a semi-Mediterranean climate results in some stunningly rich wines that have been making the headlines for a decade now. While the early successes of Priorat were based on the Garnatxa (Grenache) grape, there’s an increasing interest in the local Carinyena (Carignan), which helps to balanced Garnatxa’s sexiness with some meaty spice and minerality; Carinyena-dominated wines such as Cims de Porrera, Clos Martinet and Vall-Llach are among the most exciting not only of Catalonia but of entire southern Europe. With such stunning wines being made with Carignan, it’s no wonder producers all around the huge crescent of Mediterranean land that was once ruled by Aragon (from Valencia to Sardinia) where Carignan was the dominating variety are starting to pay much more attention to its potential.

If you look at it, Carignan is remarkably well-adapted to the various terroirs of southern France and north-eastern Spain. It ripens late so can be cultivated even in the hottest vineyards of Priorat and Collioure, yet buds late too so you can plant it fairly high without fearing for spring frosts (Priorat has plantings up to 900 m). While the new clones can yield generously resulting in pale diluted wines, with a bit of discipline and well-drained soils the grape is capable of great concentration (more so than Grenache, I think). It has a very deep colour (even more so than Syrah; in fact, it’s been used for years as a colouring ingredient in blends) that is very stable over time (unlike Cinsault, the ‘other’ traditional variety of the Languedoc that loses colours quickly). It’s also usefully high in acidity and very resistant to oxidation (unlike Grenache); it actually has a tendency towards reduction, producing (courtesy of brett, more often than note) the meaty, barnyardy bouquets that earned it the adjective of ‘rustic’.

Clos du Gravillas’ best expression of Carignan is Lo Vièlh from vines planted in 1911, 1952 and 1970. In the 2005 vintage it’s a wine of considerable density and concentration. There’s an obvious whiff of sausagey animality but this easily blows off with 15 minutes’ airing (always recommended with Carignan, at any price level). Apart from decanting, I also recommend chilling slightly (16C is a good idea), as this tends to help the fruit on which this wine is not particularly high. It’s hardly a very deep or elegant red, but has a sense of natural power and vigour about it. The old vines are also showing in a crisp, perfectly integrated acidity and juicy, earthy tannins (there’s been some oak here but thankfully, it hasn’t obliterated this natural tannic expression). Good minerality, too. I don’t think it’s a wine most drinkers would qualify of ‘great’ (whatever your definition of the term is), but it’s authentic and has a story to tell. I’d be curious to see how it ages: it has plenty of content but not so much fruit.

Lo Vièlh is Clos du Gravillas’ top red (they also make a great job in the lighter bottlings); the top white is L’Inattendu. This wine, produced since 1999, was one of the first varietal versions (now there are far more) of Grenache Gris, one of several natural clones of the Grenache family: a pink-skinned version that’s traditionally been used to add fruit to oxidative sweet wines like Banyuls, or finesse to dry reds. It packs in a lot of punch and the 14% alcohol here can be considered a relatively light rendition.

If you’re thinking of Languedoc as a land of bland apéritif whites made from Clairette or, worse, Chardonnay, the L’Inattendu 2007 will come as a shock. It’s a very structured, brutally mineral wine that’s positively anti-aperitifey. Aromatically a bit challenging (ranging from fallen apple through onion to white pepper), it explodes on the palate with saline sappiness and rocky austerity. I think this sees new oak but there’s so much power to these grapes that they’ve eaten it all. It’s bone-dry, broad-shouldered but not exactly rich; a sort of sturdy, no-nonsense, caloric white wine that makes me think of lonely shepherds in the mountains having a cup of wine on a chilly August evening. If you’re not up in the mountains lonely, I’d serve this with food, although finding a good match will not be easy: the Bojanowskis suggest anchovies (notoriously difficult to pair with), I’d try salted cod or perhaps, simply, a slab of hearty pain de campagne with salted goat butter… It’s another wine I’d love to try at age 10 but with a few thousand bottles made each year, my chances are low.

It’s sadly representative of the French appellation system’s absurdities that L’Inattendu is now an AOC Minervois (before, Grenache Gris was not recognised so it was a Côtes de Brian vin de pays) while Lo Vièlh is denied the AOC (which apart from the 40% Carignan cap, requires a minimum of two grapes to be used) even though the vines were producing Minervois wine some decades before the AOC was born in the brains of technocrats. But that’s a parenthesis. If anything with the Gravillas name makes it your way, be sure to check it out: these are very interesting and engagingly authentic wines.

New releases from Ampeleia

I took advantage of a spell of cooler weather to taste the new releases from the Ampeleia winery in coastal Tuscany. This interesting project operates since 2002 in, well, almost the middle of nowhere: it’s located a bit outside the zone of Morellino di Scansano, in ancient Etruscan territory. It’s really remote here, with the first town of any importance more than 20 km away. There are more wild boars and hare than humans; vines grow alongside olive trees (the local oil belongs, in my humble opinion, to the very best in Italy) on poor, rocky, volcanic soils.

The mind behind the project is Elisabetta Foradori, outstanding vigneronne from Trentino in northern Italy. So it’s no wonder the wines show a technical mastery, especially in their balanced extraction and deft use of oak. More importantly, however, the estate itself is really interesting. It consists of three blocks with an altitude ranging from 150 to 600 m. Combined with a fairly complex varietal composition – Sangiovese and Cabernet Franc dominate but there are bits of Mourvèdre, Grenache, Carignan, Marselan and Alicante (an ancient vine from the Maremma, usually associated with Grenache, and probably brought to these coasts during the Aragon rule of the western Mediterranean) – this allows for a balanced estate wine, avoiding the extremes of high-acid austerity (a danger in the higher-grown Sangioveses) and unstructured high-alcohol fruitiness (when Languedoc varieties are grown on low altitudes). It’s an example of reinterpreted (or man-made, if you prefer) terroir. Italians have a very good term: vino d’autore.

I’ve followed this project since inception, and have been impressed by how quickly it reached an excellent cruising speed. The third vintage of Ampeleia – 2004 – already is a brilliant wine, deep, mineral, brooding, fruity and structured at the same time, with plenty of interest. (It’s an excellent vintage to breech now). Here I’ve had a look at the Ampeleia 2005. Dominated by 50% Cabernet Franc and aged in 40% new oak, it’s currently going through a dumb phase (in fact it was more expressive a year ago upon release) but there’s no denying the excellent quality of fruit. Although Sangiovese makes up only 30% of the blend, it’s quite present with a bitter cherry profile, and good sustaining minerality. There’s also quite some richness and concentration, and a distinctive pink-flowery scent that I find Ampeleia’s true hallmark. Tannins are ripe and acidity is not very high, confirming the Mediterranean architecture of this. My bottles will remain in the cellar for a few more years while I finish the 2004s. At around 25€, Ampeleia is really affordable compared to some more famous labels from the Maremma.

I’ve also tasted the second vintage of Ampeleia’s new ‘second-label’ wine, Kepos 2007. Upon release, I didn’t quite like the 2006, finding it excessively rich, a little flabby and macerative. This vintage is considerably better. It’s medium-bodied with a lovely transparent colour and a blissful nose of tulips and peonies, followed by impeccably clean raspberries and a juicy, clean, vibrant palate. Very good length, too. It’s best slightly chilled and enjoyed straight after opening with no excessive airing. I’ve also opened a bottle of the 2006 vintage to see its evolution, which I must say is for the better. I’ve been a little harsh to this wine in its youth. It’s not all that overripe today, if less flowery, more peppery and alcoholic than the 2007, and also more tannic. It’s ripe but not overripe, oaky but not overoaked, fruity but not ridiculous, soft but not flabby, and another well-vinified wine with plenty of content and seriousness. Kepos is also reasonably priced at around 16€. Based on the five ‘Mediterranean’ varieties (with no Sangiovese or Cabernet Franc), I wonder how its introduction will influence the blend of the main Ampeleia label.

1976 Baozhong

1 year = 1 minute?

After my entry on the gargantuan anniversary wine tasting it’s time to report on the tea that was served. I’m sure all tea lovers know the headache: how do you serve tea to a party of 10? Unless people are interested in seeing a proper tea session (not here), it’s practical to make a single large pot of tea.

But in my case, the tea had to be special. With so many old wine vintages being poured, I wanted a tea with several decades on it. Old puer was best avoided, though, as the taste could be challenging to some diners. So I went for this 1976 Baozhong from Tea Masters (see description here; the tea is out of stock at the moment, although Stéphane says it might be available again in the autumn).

I tasted this tea several times upon arrival in November 2008, with the usual gongfu procedure of high dosage (4–5g / 150ml) and short infusions, both in porcelain gaiwan and yixing pots. While an obviously good tea, it left be a bit underwhelmed. The leaves are of a very good grade and quality (there’s very little breakage) as you can see on the photo above. This tea has been roasted to a medium-high degree (likely several times) with obvious skill: the roasted notes are well integrated into the whole. But the aromas are unremarkable, dominated by prunes and roast, and somewhat short-lived in the aroma cup. On the palate, it’s balanced and rather smooth but offers little complexity. In subsequent infusions there’s a pleasurable firmness on the finish from the roast, but not a lot of mid-palate presence and the flavours are again rather vague. It’s a comfortable but rather absent-minded tea and my notes say ‘forgettable’.

Last week’s anniversary dinner was an eye-opener for this Baozhong, after circumstances forced me to change my brewing style. To accommodate so many people, I had to choose a really large pot. My choice went for this glass pot which contains roughly a liter:

It’s the equivalent of what is called ‘glass brewing’ or ‘bowl brewing’ (see discussions here, here, and a variation here). You use, in proportion, very little leaf (I used 8g for a liter of water! I often put as much puer into a 120ml clay pot) but very long infusion times. You get only one brew that will obviously be lighter in body than a gongfu infusion, but not necessarily in flavour: the long infusion concentrates the extraction and you get a kind of summary of your tea, instead of fractioning its aromas into a progression in time (as you do in gongfu when a series of different-tasting infusions follow one another).
The surprise with this Baozhong was how much time was needed to get the best results. 10 minutes was really too little! It’s best after around 20. And I got similar results with a much smaller glass pot (150 ml – then only using 1g of leaf). After such a long steeping, we get a lovely ruby-brown colour and a delightfully rich aroma. Roast is now very much in the background, as the lighter, fruitier aromas have developed: dried prunes, candied cherries, dried apricots, dark honey, a hint of bitter chocolate. Taste-wise, there is a bit of the tannic dryness I observed in gongfucha, but the texture is totally different: there is a lot more sweetness from the dried red fruit notes, and overtones of Christmas spices.
Looking at the wet leaves, it’s no surprise this tea is so good. The roast has been really virtuosic as many leaves are still dark green in colour (have a closer look at the twisted leaf to the far right of the photo below). And for their age, they are really impressively intact. On top of it, it’s a really inexpensive tea for its age (40€ / 100g). Dear Stéphane, I truly hope you can source some more!