Gascogne Blanc

The Gascogne region south of Bordeaux is overwhelmingly agricultural with both an oceanic influence and hot dry summers that are perfect for growing wine grapes.  In the past when we've posted about Gascogne we got intrigued by the neat geology of the region and went off on that tangent.  Since wine industries everywhere cling to river valleys, that's where we'll start this one.  Gascogne is segmented by several rivers and since our highly successful Domaine Pajot white blend and the similarly hoped-for success of the soon to arrive Domaine de Ballade Blanc are what prompted this post, the river we're talking about now is the Gers.

The Gers River flows north from the Pyranees Mountains through the Armagnac region ultimately emptying into the Garonne River and then into Bordeaux.  The region around the local Armagnac capitol city of Eauze is called the commune of Gers.  It is there that both whites mentioned above have their vineyards.

The native grape of the region is Colombard with the secondary grape being Ugni Blanc.  Historically both grapes have had an acidic character with more or less neutral flavors which make them great for distilling into brandy.

Wait a minute.  Acidic wine with neutral flavors?  So why are the white wines of the region so pleasant?

Although we haven't seen it written anywhere, we suspect technological improvements in winemaking make these grapes desirable now.  Whatever else can be coaxed out of Colombard and Ugni Blanc, they bring structure and acidity to a blend.

The third historic white grape of the region is Gros-Manseng, another lesser type.  The fourth white grape of the region is an import, the fine Sauvignon Blanc of Bordeaux to the north.  Now with Sauvignon Blanc as its calling card, the white blend becomes clear.  Sauvignon Blanc offers both elegance and prestige to the blend.  Colombard gives the blend citric and tropical fruit flavors.  Ugni Blanc is floral and Gros Manseng brings a soft round body with quince and apricot flavors.  And this is key - Leaving the wine on the lees for months as these winemakers do, brings out the latent flavors of the lesser grapes.

The finished product is a light-bodied white suitable for seafood, salads and summer afternoons.

Bastide Miraflors

We've had this one on our shelves for the better part of a year.  Doesn't sell worth a hoot.  What's the problem?  It must be the packaging because it sure isn't what's in the bottle.  

Bastide Miraflors (BM?) is a blend of 75% Syrah with 25% Grenache sourced from fifty-five year old organically farmed vines in a region historically known for that fine blend.  That region, Cotes du Roussillon, is the southernmost part of France adjacent to the Spanish border with flatland vineyards closer to the Mediterranean Sea and higher altitude vineyards nearer to the Pyranees Mountains.  Bastide utilizes soils of granite, schist and alluvial gravel at altitudes ranging from 35 meters to 150 meters.

Bastide is made by the very modern winery of Domaine Lafage of Peripignan.  It is an Indication Geographique Protegee (IGP) level wine, not rising to appellation status (AOP) but not vin d'table either.  The IGP Cotes Catalanes, as it is called, is the same geographical region as used in the earlier term, Pyranese-Orientales.  That region is hot and dry with poor soils and garrigue covered hills that force vine taproots deep into the earth for sustenance.  The resultant wines are known for their concentrated flavors.  All of the governmental wine legalese, by the way, is courtesy of the European Union in 2009 when they replaced the previous legal mumbo-jumbo in place since 1968.

What makes this wine so good?  

Three things: 

The grapes are hand harvested.  That means quality control.  Harvesting machines don't descriminate.  Hands do.  

The grapes receive a total of six weeks in maceration before three quarters of the young wine sees a year in concrete.  The remainder is put in oak.  That's winemaking.

Remember the garrigue mentioned earlier?  We've written about it before.  It is low lying vegetation that exudes a heady complex herbaceousness.  Think - Herbs de Provence.  Lavendar and mint.  Winemakers in southern France believe that airborne herbaceousness becomes part of a wine's flavor profile.  Want more?  It is further believed that garrigue soils can transmit that same herbaceousness to vine roots for a furtherance of the same phenomena.  Hmmm.  

Bernardus

 ...to create wines that "flatter the palate and stimulate the imagination."  So says the mission statement of Bernardus Winery of Monterey County.  We like it.  What more could you ask for?

We've known Bernardus since the early 1980's.  Back then we were taken by their white wines.  Both the Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc had a sweet spiciness that made them ideal as cocktail wines.  The wines weren't actually sweet, at least no more than most from California; they just had maybe a nutmeg-like flavor that your mind associates with sweeter holiday fare.  Maybe it's that quality that made you not want to mess these up by having them with a meal.

Whatever reds Bernardus marketed must not have impressed us back then or else those thoroughly enjoyable whites just overshadowed them.  In the last twenty years though, it's the Bernardus reds that have come to the fore with the critics.  We have sold them successfully for the past twenty years, including their luxury label, Marinus Estate Blend.

At their website Bernardus markets ten wines, four whites and six reds.  A rose is pictured there but is apparently unavailable.  During the holiday season we sold their Monterey Chardonnay, Griva Vineyard Monterey Sauvignon Blanc and Santa Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir.  We wholeheartedly recommended them all; the whites based on our history with them and the red, because of the critical acclaim.  

The Marinus Vineyard is a thirty-six acre hillside expanse over the Carmel Valley.  It was established in 1990 at an elevation of 1,200 feet in soils of sand and clay.  Twenty-five acres are planted in Cabernet Sauvignon, nine in Merlot, and one each in Cabernet Franc and Malbec.  The goal here is obviously to make Bordeaux in California.  We will be stocking Marinus shortly.

So here's the Bernardus backstory: Bernardus Marinus Pons came to Carmel Valley from the Netherlands in the late 1970's.  After purchasing what he thought would be a second home there, he became quite taken with the area and foresaw a Bordeaux-like wine industry for the region.  His wealth came from his father who designed the Volkswagen Microbus and imported the first Beetles into this country.  Relatedly, Pons' hobbies at the time included racing Porsches and skeet shooting, which he excelled at enough to be competitive in the 1972 Olympics.

Pons now owns only half of his winemaking operation with other Dutch interests buying in for the other half. His twenty-five year old winemaking team is led by chief wine maker Dean Dekorth who hails from Burgundy, France.

Gruet

We've been selling Gruet sparkling wines since they first became available here in the late 1980's.  Always exemplary in their elegance and practical in their pricing, Gruet, nonetheless suffered in the marketplace.  Even if it was qualitatively better than similar sparklers, being from New Mexico meant it wasn't California wine and it had to compete with the California stuff.

The Gruet Winery was founded by the Gilbert Gruet family of Champagne, France.  What they found in north-central New Mexico in 1983 were old vineyards planted in Mission variety grapes, holdovers from four hundred years of monastic caretaking.  If you missed it just now, the existence of those sacramental wine grapes point to an unexpected truth - These were some of the oldest vineyards in America. 

So what did the Gruets see in this place that prompted their investment?   They saw a plateau 4-5,000 feet above sea level with sandy, loamy soils and beneficial winds to combat pests and diseases.  They may have also noted the diurnal effect of hot days with cool nights, perfect for grape ripening during the day and preserving freshness and acidity at night.  

Much has changed in the forty+ years that have elapsed since their beginning.  The family now has four hundred acres of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay contracted to them (with a little Pinot Meunier) and they market ten different wines.  Their current winemaker, Cyril Tanazaco, not only hails from the Champagne district of France but spent the last fourteen years in Verzenay making Grand Cru Champagne.  Champagne vineyards are rated on a 100 percent quality scale with Grand Cru vineyards being the top one percent in quality!  So with the Gruets themselves having their own roots in Champagne, they now have a winemaker with the talent to make the very best.  All in New Mexico!

Stop in and pick up a bottle for New Years Eve!

Unlitro Ampeleia Toscana Rosso

Don't you love it when a wine knowledgeable friend recommends one to you?  I don't mean just one of the gang who all like the same kind of old standbys.  I mean someone with a real palate.  Someone who is blessed with an ability to taste what ninety percent of us can't and then has educated his palate to the point of expertise.  I'm not talking about snobbery.  Who needs that!  I'm just talking about intimately knowing what you're talking about.

So recently I got a recommendation from just that kind of expert.  He's a supplier in the trade but he is so much more.  On this occasion he was talking about a Tuscan red that he was quite taken with  - and here's the clincher - it was not his wine.  It was a competitor's wine he was crowing about.  Instantly my ears perk up.  This wine was so good he was vocalizing its attributes, probably not even thinking about it, and then ruing the fact that it's not in his portfolio.  What a guy!

So I went to the competitor and bought all they had, about eight bottles.  

Unlitro Ampeleia is a Tuscan red from the Ampeleia region of Maremma on the coast of Tuscany.  That region is about a hundred twenty hectares in size with only about forty set in vines.  Ampeleia is rugged territory with elevations varying from 200 to 600 meters.  Fifty-four vineyards are scattered there at different elevations, probably wherever the land is reasonably flat.  The other eighty+ hectares are left wild.

The typical blend from this region might be 40% Alicante Nero (Grenache), 25% Mourvedre, 15% each Sangiovese and Cargnano and 5% Alicante Bouchet.  This kind of blend displays a character most similar to Barbera, Pinot Noir, Gamay or Sangiovese.  But it looks like it might be a Rhone-style wine.  What gives?

The answer is in the winemaking.  Elisabetta Foradori is a white wine maker from Alto Adige.  She is known for her organic, biodynamic and low-sulfite winemaking.  In 2002 she teamed up with a couple others in Maremma to make this clean, fresh, elegant and silky red wine.  It has a dark ruby red color; aromas of black cherry, blueberry and fig; flavors to include bright red fruit, flowers, spices and minerality.  The finish is said to be memorable.

And just like the name implies, it comes in a liter bottle!

Ewephoria

When a cheese is as memorable as this Gouda-style Dutch cheese, you can't pretend it doesn't matter when it's not available.  The stuff is t-o-o-o good.  Covid was certainly part of the problem but I'm not sure there wasn't more going on here.  Since it's made on a smallish farm maybe they just can't keep up with demand.  Anyway, it's back now and everyone needs to try it.  Like I said, it's really quite memorable.

The sheep farm responsible for Ewephoria is located in the Friesland region of north central Netherlands.  This region fronts the Wadden Sea and abuts a nature preserve and has pastures so rich the owners say the sheep eat better than their kids.  It all sounds so idyllic.

CheeseLand is the Seattle-based importer responsible for us having the cheese at all and that may be more true than just what seems apparent.  The name "Ewephoria" is an English language-only pun.  That and its indelibly American-style sweetness has lead some to think the creation of this one began in Seattle.    

Aged for twelve months before its release, Euphoria is a firm sheep cheese.  It has lengthy flavors of butterscotch, caramel and nuts and may be melted on suitable desserts.  It would also serve well with nuts, honey, jams or fresh fruit.

Beverage pairings might start with sherries or perhaps a rich porter...or for counterpoint, perhaps something like a Rhone-style white might be interesting.

New Domestic Wines

One of our better suppliers specializes in some particularly tasty organically-farmed European wines.  That supplier recently sent us three domestics that fit their European paradigm.  Here's what we got:

2019 Bow & Arrow Johan Vineyard Melon.  Melon (me-LON) is shorthand for Melon de Bourgogne and that grape finds its fame in the coastal Muscadet district in the Loire Valley.  There it produces a light, sort of summery, shellfish-targeted dinner wine.  This Bow & Arrow Melon from Willamette Valley Oregon diverges from that type by being left on the fermentation lees for an extended time.  It is also left unfiltered.  The makers compare the wine to Burgundian Chardonnay and think it may hold for fifteen years!

2020 Broc Cellars "Love Red."  This is a North Coast blend of 52% Carignan, 42% Zinfandel and 6% Grenache.  The grapes are sourced from seventy year old dry farmed vineyards in Solano and Mendocino Counties and harvested early for acidity.  Following a carbonic fermentation the wine sees eight months in neutral French oak and concrete.  Its primary fruit character is blueberry.

2019 Ultraviolet California Cabernet Sauvignon.  This one is made by Poe Vineyards of Napa but 95% of it is Cabernet Sauvignon sourced from the Red Hills (Lake County) AVA.  The remaining 5% is Napa Cabernet Franc.  It is made at the winery and aged in neutral oak.  Winemaker notes include flavors/aromas of blueberries, plums, currants, blackberry brambles, black pepper and violets.  The wine has a bright acidity, earthiness and persistent velvety tannins.

All three of these stress their organic bonafides including natural yeasts.  Poe concedes the use of some sulfur.  Broc says their yeasts and bacteria are in the grapes themselves and nothing else is added.