SPME GC-MS and Steam Distillation

Lettie Teague gives us our jumping off point again in a Wall Street Journal article dated September 12-13, 2015.  Her article was about cork, both natural and synthetic, along with the other modern alternative bottle closures.  The well-known problem with cork (since 1980) is TCA or 2,4,6-trichloroanisole, the musty/moldy off-odor affecting 6% of all wines with natural corks.  In her article Teagues reports that the cork industry has spent more than two hundred million dollars in the last twelve years improving the cork-making process in order to remedy the TCA problem.

In the Teague article what caught my eye was the concept of "steam distillation" as a treatment for TCA in cork.  On September 15th of '12 we wrote here about Flash Detente which is modern winery technology which flash steams grapes in order to reduce methoxypyrazine, the vegetal odor and taste in certain wines.  Using the water in the juice of the grapes themselves in a vacuum chamber, the machine flash steams the berries to 160 degrees expelling the methoxypyrazine and other contaminants in the process.

In the steam distillation process, temperature sensitive aromatic compounds are removed from organic material.  Cork, of course, is dry material so its "juice" couldn't be used like grapes in Detente but the question remains, could steam distillation be a corollary to Flash Detente applied to cork treatment?

SPME GC-MS stands for solid-phase microextraction for gas chromatography-mass spectometry. Whereas cork used to be cleansed with a chlorine bath, a treatment which is now believed to increase TCA, SPME GC-MS is a high tech wash that causes impurities to exit the cork and adhere to attractant material in the treatment.  It draws TCA and other impurities away from the cork and to the treated material in the bath.

Advocates for SPME GC-MS and Steam Distillation believe TCA and other contaminants are reduced by 80%.  Other treatments in use include supercritical carbon dioxide, microwave radiation, ozone treatment, and hydrogen peroxide washes, all of which will  probably never be taken up here in the V&C blog.

Cork is still the closure of choice for the vast majority of winemakers around the world as it has been since the sixth century BC.  It is also "green", releasing a quarter of the carbon dioxide in its production that screw cap production does.  Cork also supports working families in a half dozen countries in Europe, Asia, and Africa.  It is also frankly an everyday cultural touchstone for us in this industry so bully for the cork industry for tackling TCA!

This Thursday, October 8th between 5 and 7pm, Dmitry Paladino joins us with a tasting of fine wines from Argentina, California, Spain, and Italy.  Dmitry brings an extensive wine knowledge packed into his ten year career to our tasting table so please join us for the event.  We ask for a ten dollar donation which is applicable to a fifty dollar purchase.

Berkeley 1978

As a student I lived in northern California for most of 1976-1979.  Berkeley was where I spent most of that time although I also lived briefly in Sacramento and San Francisco.  Overall it was a turbulent time for that area which began innocently enough with the 1976 bicentennial, a giddy event that turned out to be an innocent departure from what was to follow.  In 1978 the Peoples Temple cult massacre took place in Guyana as did the assassinations of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk in San Francisco.  The Bay Area was reeling by 1979 when I left to return to Chicago.

The Peoples Temple was a cultural institution in San Francisco, at least one could conclude that from their newspaper press.  In reality it was unlike any church I had ever seen.  Whenever I would walk by the place it was shrouded in darkness with windows and doors covered so no one could look inside.  It was downright spooky. Cult leader Jim Jones was apparently both charismatic and politically savvy.  His charisma attracted a multitude of needy forlorn followers whose strict allegiance could be used for Jones' often political purposes.  Self-promotion was actually always Jones' primary motivation even to the end.  The San Francisco Democratic party machine with Mayor Moscone at its head inadvertently facilitated Jones' aims by using his minions regularly for cause du jour photo ops.

While I don't remember much about Moscone I do remember how much he modeled the blow dried politician of the times.  Because of who he was, Harvey Milk seemed to be more prominent than the mayor in San Francisco, both in the local press and on the streets.  Such a nice man.  Dan White, the assassin, also seemed like a nice man.  Looks.  Family.  Church.  Now almost forty years after the killings, in our own time of political polarity, maybe some sympathy for him is in order.  Dan White couldn't rein in his rage over issues that divide us.  For those of us who are so conflicted today, there is at least hope we can moderate our anger lest we kill the one who is different than us.

So why this downer of a post?  As I said earlier I lived in Berkeley for a couple of years.  Down in the flats with the salt of the earth types as opposed to the hills with the elites.  Down the street from my little cabin was a wine making shop called Wine and the People.  It was there at that time that a group of young guys my age were taking their first big step into the wine business.  They had been buying grapes and making wine in their Taft Street garage for a few years before the authorities informed them they weren't exactly home wine makers any more so now they were stepping out commercially with their own appropriately named wine, Taft Street.  It was in the conflicted socio-political environment described above that this garage wine company began.

Now we proudly announce the arrival of Taft Street wines at V&C.  While we  have sold the Taft Street wines in the past we were recently pleasantly surprised to learn they were still around and still privately held by the original owners!  We tasted four from Taft Street recently and all were exceptional!   After our little store completes the move to the new location we expect to carry the rest of the line but in the meantime come and taste Taft Street Merlot and Sauvignon Blanc here on Friday at the weekly event.  Bellula French Chardonnay and Broadside Paso Robles Cabernet Sauvignon will also be in the lineup as will  Harlow Ridge California Zinfandel and Aveleda Follies Red from Portugal.  Please join us!

The Paradigm Shift

Watching Ken Burns' 2001 PBS Jazz series back in the day turned out to be a major game changer for me. Without the paradigm shift in musical taste I got from tuning into that singular series, I wouldn't be the jazz fanatic I am today.  But Burns, as good as he is at what he does, sometimes relies unduly upon certain points of view for constructing his narratives.  In the jazz series, recurring feature performer Wynton Marsalis colorfully makes Burns' case for Louis Armstrong being the central figure of twentieth century jazz.  That's a stretch-too-far for me.  It does, however, serve as an  example for my own assertion that Bordeaux Clairet is the central wine in the overall history of wine.  The paradigm shift brought about by that wine forever changed the way we appreciate the product today.

Courtesy of modern archeology we now know a lot about wine in ancient times.  Written references in scripture and elsewhere date the beginnings of wine consumption conservatively to around 10,000 BC and that wine whether red, white, or rose, was always sweet.  Comparing all early middle eastern cultures, sweetness was consistently the common denominator for ancient wine lovers and that focus lasted for millennia.  If the truth be known, for most of the chronological history of wine, the stuff has been sweet.

Now to keep things in perspective, the dry wines we love today are purely the product of industrialization as applied to this industry.  Ancient wine presses (foot stomping?) could not begin to extract all of the grape skin qualities we so cherish in the modern era much less control for everything else modern science now regulates.  If the truth be known, excluding the modern era, wine history is really a history of white and rose wines, which brings us to Bordeaux Clairet.

Historically Bordeaux Clairet was a middle ages red wine rock star.  Not only did the French love the stuff but more importantly the economic powerhouse to the North, Britain, adored it.  International trade, of course, was nothing new to Europe since the existence of the vineyards themselves was the result of trade, but this new kind of enthusiasm was of the degree that would kindle large-scale investment in the industry in Europe and then later in the new world and the wines would be decidedly drier than what came before.

Bordeaux Clairet is a Merlot-based Cabernet blend that has its origins in Quinsac in southeast Bordeaux.  Today Clairet is one of seven Bordeaux AOCs and it is sourced from all over the region.  Clairet is its own category also, being neither red, as it was considered to be pre-industrialization, nor rose.  In this modern era its dark hue is the result of an extended maceration (up to 72  hours) followed by a cool fermentation (15 degrees centigrade).  The wine is then bled off (Saignee) leaving the must to be used to further deepen another modern red wine.

The 50% Merlot/50% Cabernet Sauvignon 2014 Chateau Maison Noble is the Clairet example we have in the store at this time.  With a deeply tinged red currant/raspberry color, this wine is rich, soft, and round in the mouth with aromas and flavors of strawberry and spice.  There is no astringency or tannin in Bordeaux Clairet.  Expect it to go with everything from salads and picnics to barbecue and grilled meats.


Please join us this Friday after 5pm when David Hobbs of Prime Wines joins us with a tasting of reds, whites, and roses from France, Spain, Chile, and Napa Valley.

White Wine Grapes, Part 10: Godello

Once again the dilemma, whether to title the post according to the summer "white wine grapes" theme or to call it what it is, a report on a particular white wine from Spain, Castelo do Papa Godello.  This time we'll go with the theme.

Godello (go-DAY-oh) is another European grape that is mostly obscure historically but has now become quite fashionable.  Indeed this one was almost extinct in the 1970's when bulk wine producers saw the more prolific but low quality Palomino grape as the order of the day.  The 1980's saw the beginning of a Godello resurgence followed by decades of refinement as viticulturalists strove to compete with the then "best white grape of Spain", Albarino.

Godello is planted primarily in the Galicia district of northwestern Spain which is also where Albarino finds its fame.  The primary Albarino DO is Rias Baixas on the Atlantic coast.  Godello finds its finest expression in the Valdeorras DO, a hundred miles to the east.  Twenty-five miles east of Valdeorras in the beginnings of Duero River Valley lies the Bierzo DO where Godello is also highly acclaimed.  In northwestern Spain the locals pair their Godello with seafood, pork sausage, veal, tapas, herb pesto, pasta with cream sauces and aged cheeses.

Chardonnay is considered by many to be the finest white wine of all.  In specific venues like Burgundy and Sonoma the claim seems to be justified.  Chardonnay, however, is essentially a neutral but versatile wine making grape that can be manipulated by the skillful wine maker to achieve its utmost potential.  Godello has been compared to Chardonnay in its essential pliable character but has yet to demonstrate the huge profile Chardonnay has.

Valdeorras means "valley of gold" and two thousand years ago Romans mined the stuff there.  Today those same soils retain a high mineral content while being composed mostly of granite, slate, and clay.  The Godello that comes from these soils surpasses Chardonnay in minerality and that component eclipses the fruit and spice in the wine's flavor profile.

The 2013 Castelo do Papa Godello in the store at this time is probably our best white wine under twenty dollars.  The wine is made from the finest 20% of Godello grapes in the Ladera Sagrada estate vineyards in Valdeorras.  The vineyards are organically farmed; the grapes are handpicked; and after an eight to twelve hour maceration, the wine is fermented in stainless steel tanks using indigenous yeasts.  The resulting wine has aromas of rosemary, thyme, and oregano and flavors of lime zest, quinine, ginger, nuts, and apple and citrus, along with the overriding minerality.      

Sauvignon Blanc & Viognier

I didn't know whether to entitle this one varietally to conform with this summer's theme or to call it "Little James' Basket Press White" which is actually what we're writing about here.  Little James is a negotiant wine from Chateau de Saint Cosme, one of the great Cotes du Rhone houses of Gigondas.  At their website they delineate the ownership of their vineyards beginning with its planting in 109 AD through its 1590 purchase by Barruol ancestors unto the 1992 advent of the Louis Barruol era, the fourteenth generation of family ownership.  Saint Cosme markets fourteen different Rhone reds and whites with Gigondas being their only actual estate wine.  In addition to their Rhone wines they make red and white versions of Little James from grapes grown in the western Languedoc in Minervois.

Sometimes it's hard to tell how seriously negotiant wines are taken by their owners.  Obviously the focus of Saint Cosme is Rhone fruit and, of course, Gigondas fruit in particular.  But if a second label is good, finds an audience, and sells well, then there is money to be made exploiting that product too.  Louis Barruol is all about terroir both in the Rhone and apparently in cool climate mountainous Minervois where he feels his Sauvignon Blanc and Viognier were meant to be.

Barruol thinks Sauvignon Blanc in particular is terroir-driven and Minervois facilitates the light fresh raciness along with acidity that Sauvignon Blanc needs.  The wine also features tropical fruit and citrus fruit aromas and flavors, grassiness, and minerality.  He thinks Viognier is rather predictable by comparison and will always deliver apricot and other stone fruit aromas and flavors along with body and an oily texture.  That said, Barruol's Viognier is a "selection massale", an ancient version from Condrieu rootstocks and cuttings planted in Minervois in 1982.

The 2013 St. James in the store is 55% Sauvignon Blanc and 45% Viognier.  It sees no time in oak which enhances it's aromatically intense raciness and is intended to be drunk young.  One review cites its "orange peel, grapefruit, ripe citrus, and fennel" character.  The wine works well as an apertif and pairs well with all white meats, Asian foods, veggies, and also for your summer picnics.

As we said above, negotiant wines can be tricky, either they are just a commodity for exploitation or they may represent something more.  Given all that we have set forth here, taking a chance on Barruol's Little James makes all the sense in the world.


Please join us this Friday the 31st of July after 5pm as David Rimmer once again de-mystifies European wines for us here at the store.  The lineup will include French and Italian reds and whites that 40 year wine veteran David will carefully guide us through leaving no pertinent questions unanswered.  There might be a few cheeses and crackers too!

White Wine Grapes, Part 9: Coda di Volpe

This post is another slight detour from the white blending grapes theme here this summer.  While Coda di Volpe is most certainly an Italian white blending grape, it is notable, if it's notable at all, for just one historically mediocre white wine, Lacryma Christi del Vesuvio.  We're writing about it here because we will soon be stocking a new and exceptional Lacryma Christi, another example of what can result when a private capital infusion meets traditional European wine making.

Lacryma Christi del Vesuvio is best known as a light dry white wine from the Campania region of southern Italy.  There are also red and rose Lacryma Christis as well as sparkling and fortified dessert wines made from these vineyards.  Naples is the largest city within the appellation and that would ordinarily be the go-to for recognizable place names there were it not for Mount Vesuvius and its horrific volcanic legacy.  It is on those lava-enriched Vesuvian slopes that Lacryma Christi grapes take root.

Written references for Campania wines date back to the twelfth century BC and Coda di Volpe may have been around at that early date. Coda di Volpe, by the way, means "tail of the fox" and refers to the shape of the grape bunch as it hangs on the vine.  The Vesuvian soils benefit Coda di Volpi vines in two prominent ways: they impart acidity to this low-acid grape type and they thwart the phylloxera aphid which apparently doesn't care for acidic soils.  The breezes from the Bay of Naples also facilitate the acidity and freshness of the wines.

The Vesuvio appellation received its DOC in 1983 when interest in Lacryma Christi promised a revival of these ancient wines.  By Italian wine law, Lacryma Christi must be 30-80% Coda di Volpe with the remainder being some combination of Verdeca along with an allowance for smaller portions of Falanghina, Caprettone, and Greco di Tufo.  With its current popularity, some Lacryma Christi is actually 100% Coda as are other varietally named local wines.

Lacryma Christi and those other varietal Coda di Volpe wines marry well with seafood in any form, pasta, and appetizers.  Coda wines feature a pale yellow color, pear aromas, and flavors of pineapple, white peach, and licorice.  These wines offer moderate body, minerality, and the aforementioned pronounced acidity.  They should be drunk young, within two years of bottling.

Lacryma Christi means "the tears of Christ" and any article on the subject would be remiss not to explore the meaning of the name.  The two most common explanations feature Christ shedding tears either in joy during the ascension when he looks down and sees the beauty of the Neopolitan countryside and bay or in sadness when during the fall Satan snatches a piece of heaven which then becomes that same beautiful bay and countryside of Campania.  Either way, where Christ's tears fall, vines begin to grow.        

White Wine Grapes, Part 8: Auxerrois

We first became acquainted with this obscure white grape years ago when we were told it was an archaic name for Chardonnay, which was close but not quite.  Auxerrois (oh-sehr-WAH) is actually a full sibling of Chardonnay, sharing the same parentage of Gounais Blanc and Pinot Noir but apparently not the exact same DNA.  When Chardonnay was the global rage thirty years ago, Auxerrois vines were conveniently mistaken for Chardonnay in northern Italy and South Africa with resulting wines being marketed as Chardonnay.  In parts of France Auxerrois is a synonym for Chardonnay so those places may legally market their product as such and within its home in Alsace, Auxerrois may be sold as Pinot Blanc.  It's no wonder the grape has an identity problem!

Pinot Blanc is the most widely planted grape in Alsace and the most common blending partner for Auxerrois.  Pinot Blanc, or Pinot Bianco in Italy, is one of the family of pinot grapes that have resulted from mutations in the vineyards over centuries.  Pinot Noir, with its unstable genome, has parented all of these mutations.  In Alsace, when a label says Pinot Blanc, the region recognizes the wine to be some mixture of white pinot grapes, so it may include Pinot Blanc, Pinot Gris (Grigio), Auxerrois, and even free-run Pinot Noir.  Or it may be 100% of any of them, including Auxerrois.

Auxerrois is the third most widely planted grape in Alsace and because it is the quintessential Alsatian blending grape it is by default the least well known in the region.  At its most common, Auxerrois is the base wine for Edelzwicker, the white jug wine of the northern Alsace.  It is also prominently blended with Pinot Blanc in the sparkling Cremants d'Alsace.

As a blender, when blended with other pinot-family types, Auxerrois adds rich musky spicy aromas in a low-acid full-bodied oily format with moderate honey flavor.  In the Pinot Blanc blend, the Pinot Blanc adds the light fresh crispness.  In the hands of lesser winemaking talents, Auxerrois alone tends toward cabbagy aromas, lacking mid-palate flavors, and flabbiness in body.  Only when yields are limited in the vineyard and modern super-clean winemaking facilities are utilized do the racy concentrated citrussy aromas and flavors dominate.

There are sixty+ names in existence for Auxerrois with Pinot Auxerrois and Auxerrois Blanc leading the pack.  Auxerrois is a cold weather grape and has performed well in Canada.  It is also planted in Oregon and Michigan and would seem to have a fine future in select vineyards across northern America.  The fresh citrussy/spicy Auxerrois blends complement all kinds of seafood, soups and salads, veggies, and Asian cuisine making Auxerrois a fine new selection for American wine lovers.


The Friday, July 10th, at our weekly After 5 wine tasting we'll be featuring examples of Cabernet Sauvignon and Sauvignon Blanc.  Please join us!