The Cru View

Fortification for transportation

2006-07-24T21:02:00.000-07:00

In response to my (now six-month-old) post, "The Place of Sherry": I was reading the transcript and notes for Acquerello Italiano, a useful and often interesting audio magazine for students of Italian. In an article about Marsala wine, the notes point out that John Woodhouse, a Liverpudlian, developed the fortification "recipe" for Marsala after having done the same for Port.

As far as I know, all of the great fortified wines - Spain's Sherry, Italy's Marsala, and Portugal's Port and Madeira - were developed by and for the English. And of course they had to ship the stuff back to England or one of its colonies for consumption by Englishmen. It being the 18th century, there weren't a lot of refrigerated container ships tied to the docks of Sanlúcar de Barrameda, Porto, or Marsala. So they shipped wine on sun-beaten, wave-tossed sailing ships. Heat and vibration are two of the major enemies of wine, so one can imagine that at least some of the barrels that arrived in London would contain wine that was in pretty sad shape. But add fortification with a little bit of neutral brandy (i.e., distilled wine), and what do you get? A sturdier wine that resists the rigors of shipping better (the additional alcohol makes the wine more tolerant of heat and vibration), a wine that ages tremendously well (because of the same sturdiness), and Englishmen who get drunk more quickly (higher-alcohol hooch!).

(You also often get a sweet wine, because alcohol added before fermentation is complete kills the yeast and thus leaves some unfermented sugar in the wine. But of course Fino-style Sherry is fortified and dry, so sweetness is not a necessary outcome of fortification. I add this caveat in order to avoid fortifying the prejudices of the "ooh, I don't like Sherry; it's sweeeet!" set. Not that sweetness per se is a bad thing in wine, but all of these digressions are fodder for another post.)

Anyway, if fortification came about as a way to protect wine during hot, heaving sea voyages, then it isn't as surprising that Sherry isn't a particularly apt beverage for an August afternoon in Jerez de la Frontera. But in foggy, frigid London - or the frequently foggy, frigid summer in the San Francisco Bay Area - what could be better?

The place of Sherry

2006-01-04T22:40:00.000-08:00

I've been a fan of Sherry ever since my first visit to Andalucía in 1998. But my first visit to a Sherry bodega (Lustau) came only last fall.

I came away from that visit with the notion that, although Sherry is very much a product from its relatively small region of production, it's not especially suited to consumption there. It's true that Fino Sherry goes well with many of the tapas from Andalucía, including fried fish and olives. But the climate is too damned hot for a fortified wine. What's needed is a light, refreshing, fairly low-alcohol beverage - in other words, beer. Unfortunately, all of the Spanish beer that I've tasted ranges from insipid to awful. (I was actually happy to find Amstel on tap at a bar in Cádiz!)

Another conundrum: This blog claims to be about "site-specific (i.e., terroir-driven)" wine and food. All of the other wine loves of my life - Burgundy, Piemontese nebbiolo (Barolo, Barbaresco, and Roero), German riesling... - are all about vineyard specificity. Sherry is all about blending of multiple sites and multiple vintages. Sure, the albariza soils in the Sherry Triangle have something to do with the character of the best Fino-style Sherries. But have you ever seen a single vineyard Sherry? I haven't.

I'm still chewing on these questions - and still drinking Sherry.

Bah, humturkey

2005-11-29T21:59:00.000-08:00

Not all traditions are worth preserving - or revering. For example, I'm not a fan of the traditional Thanksgiving meal. The problems include the lack of flavor in commercial turkey (no matter what heroic efforts one makes to counteract that blandness, including brining), piling a lot of orange/brown food on one plate all at one time, and uninteresting or inappropriate wines.

So what did we do instead? No turkey - instead, guinea hens stuffed with chestnuts, pancetta, and dolcetto and draped in prosciutto. Not a particularly American preparation, perhaps, but it tasted great. We served the meal in courses and it lasted five hours. In between courses, several guests took the dogs for a walk. Now that's civilized. The same guests brought a wonderful mushroom gallette - seasonal and local.

Just for fun, and in the spirit of the holiday, we decided to drink all-American. My favorites: Elk Cove 2002 Pinot Noir 'Willamette Valley' and Chalone 1981 Pinot Noir. These wines demonstrated how new world producers who eschew the fetish for over-ripeness can make excellent wines that express their terroir - and in the case of the Chalone, wines that age well.

Modern traditionalists and traditional modernists

2005-10-25T17:31:00.000-07:00

After spending two weeks working harvest with four Roero producers, I question the labels "modernist" and "traditionalist" that we often slap on producers in winegrowing regions like Piemonte.

I picked grapes and worked in the cellar with Mario Roagna of Cascina Val del Prete, a well-regarded "modernist" who ages most of his wines, including his Roero Arneis 'Luet', in barrique. And yet, his cellar methods are among the simplest that I've seen in Piemonte. The photo shows him using a plastic bucket and pasta strainer to do pump-overs. He has no special fermentation vessels and rarely uses the temperature controls that he paid extra for when he bought his steel tanks.

(Mario and I talked at length about what constitutes "technology". I argued that stainless steel definitely is technology, or the result of it anyway - not to mention pumps and plastic tubing. But his basic point is that all of the cellar gear and computerization that help automate winemaking for many other producers aren't necessary to make good wine.)

I also picked and helped a bit in the cellar with Mario's close friend, Angelo Ferrio of Cascina Ca' Rossa. Angelo puts a much smaller percentage of his wines in barrique. He's even stopped using barrique entirely for his Roero 'Mompissano', because he's decided that the nebbiolo from that vineyard is better-suited to aging in large, traditional oak botti. But Angelo's cellar is larger and more technologically advanced than Mario's, with specialized fermentation vessels and other technological innovations. (Not that Angelo and his crew aren't very hands-on in the cellar - we spent plenty of time moving grapes and hoses around!)

So who is the more "modern" producer? After drinking the wines of both producers many times over the course of two weeks, I'm not sure that I could say. I'm not sure that the question makes much sense, and I am sure that the answer is unimportant. Tasting and drinking the wines is what's important. And crashing through the forest on a rainy Sunday morning with Mario, Angelo, and Angelo's dog in search of truffles - now that's important!

In praise of California moderation

2005-09-09T22:32:00.000-07:00

Dan Berger published a fine, plain-spoken, and very true article in the San Francisco Chronicle's wine section a week ago: "Cabernet the Corison way: Longtime Napa winemaker bucks trend of making higher-alcohol, blockbuster wines".

We've sold Cathy Corison's wines at Paul Marcus Wines for many years, and they're among my favorite California cabernet sauvigons for all the reasons that the article makes clear - their balance, elegance, complexity, and food-friendliness. After reading the article, I had the impression that Ms. Corison's wines are a natural extension of her personality - understated, devoted, thoughtful, and utterly unconcerned about the modern wine hype machine.

But what the article makes even more abundantly clear is the problem with most current California cabernet - and that it wasn't always this way. To summarize:

The most influential reviewers dislike even the faintest hint of cabernet sauvignon's naturally herbal character. Thus, many winemakers insist on leaving grapes on the vine until they become overripe, which masks the herbal notes - as well as terroir, complexity, and any possibility of balance in the wine.

Partly as a result of this effect, freakish overripeness has become a desideratum in California winemaking.

These lamentable fetishes are relatively new. Up until the early 1980s, many California winemakers made balanced, complex, age-worthy wines that showed moderate ripeness and alcohol. All hale the few - like Cathy Corison - who still do.

Coda: Last week, my friend Diane brought by a bottle of 1980 Simi Mendocino County Chardonnay that a friend had given her. We had corresponded by e-mail about it, and I warned her that the wine was in all probability completely dead. It turned out otherwise. The wine's nose was not great, but on the palate, it was still lively and pleasant, with good fruit and refreshing acidity. How many of today's California ultra-ripe, ultra-oaked chardonnays will be able to say the same 25 years from now?

Un-Parkerized wines

2005-08-31T23:50:00.000-07:00

My CruForge colleague, Dave Halsted, directed my attention to Mike Steinberger's Slate article, "The Wino in Winter: Robert Parker's influence is on the decline". It's a good, balanced article, but once again, I think there are much more interesting things to discuss than Robert Parker's influence. This quotation near the end of the article admirably sums up why:

While the number of 'Parkerized' wines (lavishly fruited, lavishly oaked) has unquestionably exploded, there are still plenty of winemakers unwilling to cater to one man's palate, and I still find plenty of subtle, distinctive reds and whites on my local retail shelves.

Me too, and not just at Paul Marcus Wines, the Oakland wine shop where I work part-time. The San Francisco Bay Area, at least, is blessed with lots of restaurants and wine stores that offer a wide range of interesting, distinct, food-friendly, not overblown wines. For example, Bodegas Luberri Rioja 'Albiker' 2004 (just to mention one bottle that I've enjoyed frequently in recent weeks).

Plums and cherries, tar and roses

2005-08-23T23:27:00.000-07:00

More on the question of tasting notes and the modern tendency to recite a litany of fruit flavors: In issue #58 (Summer 2001) of The Art of Eating, Edward Behr writes: "The flavors that have been noted most often in Barolo in the past have been violets, tar, faded roses, and perhaps, leather. Curiously, fruit isn't on the list, but fruit is very much present, often including plums or cherries."

(An aside - I've always thought that someone in Barolo should start a heavy metal band named "Tar and Roses".)

Behr is right on both counts. How fascinating that fruit isn't on the list, despite the fact that fruit is very much present in the wines. The classic descriptions seem to studiously ignore the fruit associations in favor of other aroma and flavor analogies. It would be interesting to know how and when the classic descriptions developed.

Joe Dressner, in his blog entry Wine Tasting, expresses the skepticism that I'm feeling about modern wine tasting notes. He suggests instead:

Why not just sit down with one great bottle. Learn everything you can about the region and producer. Go visit them on a vacation. Immerse yourself. Learn to enjoy wine.

Bravo.

Bold and ultraripe

2005-08-11T23:47:00.000-07:00

While everyone else in the wine world chatters about the new Robert Parker biography, The Emperor of Wine, and Tony Hendra's review [registration required] of same in the New York Times August 17 Book Review, I'm going to harken back to a little article in the May 19 San Francisco Chronicle: High-end buyers like their wines 'bold and ultraripe'. These kinds of articles are low-hanging fruit, but here goes anyway.

"Consumers said darker wines were more appealing than lighter-colored ones."

The current color fetish is silly. There is no reliable correlation between flavor intensity and color. And it's not necessarily the case that more intense flavor is better. As importer Terry Theise points out, "More is not better; better is better." The second part of this formulation is of course a tautology, though of the koanic kind. The first part is simply true.

"The descriptor 'tangy with crisp acidity,' ... drew more negative reactions than positives among all respondents."

This is probably the most depressing part of the article for me. "Tangy with crisp acidity" practically defines a good white wine (and rosé), and it's a positive attribute in most red wines. I have no quarrel with people who like to drink ripe, jammy wines - as one particular style of wine. To quote Terry Theise again, "Happiness is discovering that you're ticklish in more than one place."

But more generally, I find it depressing when people react negatively to acidity. This is my main quarrel with Robert Parker. That he praises big, ripe wines is fine with me. That he thinks low acidity is a positive characteristic in wine is screwed up! (If you need to be convinced, read Acidity Is Your Friend.)

It seems to me that "tangy with crisp acidity" is exactly the characteristic of many successful new world wines - for example, many of the wines from California's Central Coast. They're rich and high in alcohol, and I don't particularly want to drink them with dinner, but their acidity keeps them from seeming ponderous.

Some 55 percent of high-end wine drinkers were 'very interested' in purchasing a wine described as 'bold and ultraripe.' 'Rich and opulent' didn't have the resonance of 'bold and ultraripe.'"

This part is simply puzzling to me. Why exactly doesn't "rich and opulent" have the resonance of "bold and ultraripe"? I guess it's another facet of "more is better"?

Then again, there are all kinds of problems with this kinds of study. 307 people isn't a large sample, and 79 "high-end consumers" is a particularly dinky group. The article says that the study defines a "high-end consumer" is someone who frequently buys red wines priced more than $15 per bottle. There is of course nothing wrong with drinking under-$15 bottles of wine - red or otherwise - but this seems like a weird definition of "high-end consumer".

Thankfully, most of my CruForge clients, Paul Marcus Wines customers, friends, and dinner guests comprise a much more varied and open-minded group.

Yet another wine blog

2005-08-04T23:57:00.000-07:00

How about some real comments about real wines? I've created MarkM@PMW, a separate blog to talk about the wines that I sell, taste, and drink at Paul Marcus Wines. First up: The Quixotic terroirs of Nierstein, La Mancha, and Ribera del Duero.

Nota bene / nota male

2005-08-03T22:15:00.000-07:00

In the summer 2005 issue (#69) of The Art of Eating, Patrick Matthews argues in his article "The Revolution in Wine Is Not That Simple" that the current form of most published wine tasting notes - essentially a string of aroma and flavor analogies, many of them referring to fruits - influences what people look for in wine:

"Consumers started to expect wine to be filled with readily identifiable fruit aromas, so winemakers learned to make highly aromatic wines. Wines in less fruity styles - such as sherry and the other traditional 'rancio' or 'maderized' wines from around the Mediterranean, or mineral wines such as the best Chenin Blanc - fell by the wayside." (page 38)

This is an intriguing argument, and it got me thinking about tasting notes. Matthews writes that the very notion of articulating a sensory experience in a tasting note is a fairly recent thing. Assuming that this open Pandora's bottle is not likely to be recorked any time soon, I suggest that there are three ways of going about writing the sensory experience tasting note: the scientific, the solipsistic, and the poetic.

The scientific approach probably is best exemplified by Dr. Ann Noble's Aroma Wheel. Dr. Noble developed not only a standardized set of terms for describing wine aromas, but recipes for creating the reference standard aromas to which the terms refer (e.g., to find out what "Black olive" on the Aroma Wheel refers to, put 4-6 mL brine from canned black olives in 25 mL white or red base wine). There are all kinds of methodological and philosophical problems with this approach, but the intent is clear - to create a more-or-less common and reproducible vocabulary for what people (or scientists, anyway) smell in various wines. How such a vocabulary, even if it's achievable, might help me understand, buy, or enjoy wine isn't clear, but that's probably not its intent.

The solipsistic approach eschews all pretense of objectivity and instead proclaims the taster's own experience of the wine during the moment of tasting. This approach is a curious assemblage of humility ("it's just my experience...") and arrogance ("...and all of my adoring readers are dying to hear about it!"). From the pen of a talented writer, solipsism can be entertaining, but it's seldom informative.

Thus we are left with the poetic approach. My friend and wine industry colleague Chad Arnold is fond of describing Loire Valley chenin blanc as smelling like "wet concrete in November" (or October - depending on the wine). It so happens that Chad is a poet as well as a wine nerd. Is his description better than "wet minerals, honeycomb, and ultra-ripe pears"? I don't know. I do know that when I taste Loire chenin now, wet sidewalks after a late fall rain often are what I think of first.

Forge

2005-08-02T23:20:00.000-07:00

"Forge" - a less mysterious word, but still one with a whiff of ambiguity. It's the fiery fount of creation and the act of creating. But it's also the act of fake creation, of making things that pretend to be what they are not. Winegrowing and winemaking exist in this same land of ambiguity. How to create in a way that respects and expresses the materials at hand, be they this particular iron or these particular grapes grown in this particular patch of ground?

There is as well a pleasingly utilitarian ring to "forge". It's where useful things begin to be shaped. Of course, there's no reason that useful things can't also be beautful. Just down the street from my house is Clausen Sculptural Iron, where Eric Clausen fashions lots of beautifully useful things.

Here at CruForge, we try to do the same.

Cru

2005-08-01T23:45:00.000-07:00

"Cru" - an odd, tiny word. In the wine world, we usually translate it as "growth", referring to a place where vines have grown particularly well for a particularly long time. Thus crus are vineyards capable of producing wines excellent and distinctive enough to merit having particular names attached to them.

And yet, my French-English dictionary lists a melange of other meanings for "cru": raw, unpasteurized, harsh, blunt, uncompromising. Context is everything in figuring out what words mean, of course - few would find harshness or bluntness in a Burgundy from Chambertin or a Barolo from Cannubi. But in the winegrowing notion of cru there is something uncomprising and even raw (in the sense of pure and untransformed - think steak tartare or carne cruda alla piemontese). It's the desire to maintain vineyards and wines of distinct personalities - sometimes subtly distinct personalities - even when it would be easier and maybe more economically advantageous to do otherwise.

Some words show their muscle by being adopted in other languages - schadenfreude, aficionado, OK.... The Italians at least have adopted cru as their own. I don't know whether to marvel more at the lack of such a word in most languages or at the realization that such a word is necessary (and readily borrowable from French). I'm inclined towards the latter.