KPB
Posts: 4664
Joined: 11/25/2012 From: Ithaca, New York Status: offline
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Here's a puzzle that I've been thinking about. While in Israel as part of my sabbatical, I had this project of trying tons of the boutique wines, and as mentioned on a different thread, realized that in that climate and soil, Carignan and Durif (Petit Sirah) and Chenin Blanc really do much better than pure classical varietals like Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay. The reason, in Israel, is that when you have fairly dry vineyards that sometimes get roasted by mid-day heat, it is easy to end up with grapes that get overripe and even scorched by the sun, and yet have underripe green material (pips and stems). So your cabernet or merlot may end up with aromas and flavors that seem like green peppers, or in some cases even seem like chemicals you might find in a hospital or a pesticide. So you ask yourself: why in the world is everyone so focused on producing cabernet, if they actually do so amazingly well with Carignan and Durif? But the answer is in the price: that cabernet will sell for $50 or even $100, but the Carignan sells for $15 or $20 even if the wines is just ridiculously delicious. Same with Chenin Blanc: this is the basis of the Loire whites, like Vouvray, and in fact I love the dry versions (Huet, in a good year -- wow...). Yet no matter how good these get, they rarely come near the pricing of a well made Chardonnay. Right now I'm in California, in Sonoma, and just for fun picked up a bottle of the Cline 2014 "Very ancient vines" Carignane (he prefers a spelling with an "e" at the end). Amazingly good. $12.75. Then someone posted that question about wine for crab-cakes. The whites I suggested include some of the world's very best wines (Chave's Hermitage), but I would bet anything that those crab cakes will ultimately be served with a Chardonnay. And sure, nothing is wrong with the pairing. Spring $150 and you can get an amazing Chardonnay from Kistler, or go for $300 and you can get a Montrachet... delicious wines. Yet from a pure QPR point of view, there are all these little-known yet amazingly delicious white wine varietals out there. The Chave Hermitage is actually a way better wine for its $250 price than the $600 Montrachet from Sauzet, at least in recent vintages: Montrachet is suffering from the heat and other weather issues, and the wines aren't what they once were. Or at the cheap end of the spectrum, the Greco di Tufo whites are remarkable and cost $20. I've met people who would think that you were making a joke, if you served them such a wine at a fancy dinner. And just from these few experiences, I suddenly started thinking about how even among those of us who post on boards like this, we tend to be very "classical" in our discussion of wines. We rave over the best Bordeaux we've ever opened, or the best white Burgundy, or the top Cabernets and Chardonnay from California. Right now over on the Vinous.com site, there is a vertical tasting of Colgin IX Syrah reds, which I find really unexciting: they cost $150 or $200 and are sort of syrupy and high in alcohol. But Steve Tanzer loves them, apparently, and people are jumping in on the discussion board to share their best experiences of those reds in this climate: a climate made for hot-country wines like Carignan and Durif, in my view, where even Cabernet is often flabby and unbalanced. So why do we all play along with this game? Why aren't we the folks who are hunting down the obscure varietals that are insane overperformers and quality/performance winners? I myself am going to begin to make a real point of this: I'm going to start asking winemakers what wines do best in their region, independent of price and market forces, and to try those varietals, even if it leads me to some really weird, little known Italian white wine that only thrives on the southern-facing slopes of Mt. Vesuvius, or whatever (there is such a wine: Lacryma Christi, and the best examples are absolutely delicious). And as for Chardonnay: honestly, with global warming, we should mostly write the whole varietal off, these days. Unless you like butter with your wine, and plan to drink it on the day you receive the bottle, Chardonnay wines often disappoint these days (premox....) I'm in the land of ripe Cabs, but I plan to drink as many great Carignan and Petit Durif reds as I can find, and some great Zins too...
< Message edited by KPB -- 4/19/2017 11:34:31 AM >
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Ken Birman The Professor of Brettology
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