There is no white Madiran…
…because white wines from the AOC are called Pacherenc du Vic-Bihl. What’s more, if they don’t have sec appended to the AOC name, they are moelleux or liquoreux.
Pacherenc du Vic-Bihl 2009, Château Aydie ($18.70/500 ml, 00857193)
100% Petit Manseng. The partially dehydrated grapes were manually harvested in December. Spent 12 months in oak and acacia barrels.
If apricot were a citrus fruit, it would taste like this: honeyed apricot on the attack, quickly followed by burnt sugar flavours and a lemon-like acidity. Yellow apples and minerals on the finish. Rich texture. Not sugary: sweeter than off-dry – though not by much – and seemingly less sweet as it progresses through the mouth, an impression strengthened by the high acid and the sour-bitter/medicinal note that creeps in on the finish. The estate’s suggested food pairings are right on target: smoked fish, fish in sauce, blue cheeses, foie gras or minimally sweetened fruit-based desserts.
The world’s most drinkable Xinomavro
Thirty-something Macedonian winemaker Apostolo Thymiopoulos is a rising star in Greece. Wines like this young vine cuvée – unique, full of character, food-friendly and so pound-backable – make it clear why.
Naoussa 2009, Jeunes vignes de Xinomavro, Domaine Thymiopoulos ($17.90, 11607617)
100% organically farmed Xinomavro from five to ten-year-old vines. Fermented with ambient yeasts. Bottled unfiltered (not that you’d guess from its crystalline clarity). Gem-like in the glass: limpid pale maroon with ruby glints. Beguiling nose of candied cherry, sun-baked stone and earth, garrigue-ish scents of dried oregano. Sits lightly on the palate. Sweet fruit intertwines with savoury herbs and spice (unmistakable cinnamon), is buoyed by bright acid and carried along by astringent tannins that run from start to finish. Fair length. A real treat.
The 100-odd cases of the current allocation went on sale at the SAQ earlier this week, and the bottles are flying off the shelves. If you want some, run – don’t walk – to an outlet near you.
MWG January 12th tasting: report
In reaction to the excesses of the holiday season, the Mo’ Wine Group’s January tasting traditionally focuses on affordable wines. This year was no exception. All bottles but one were purchased at the SAQ, and most are still available.
THE WHITES
Vinho Verde 2009, Loureiro, Quinta do Ameal ($18.30, 11459992)
100% organically farmed Loureiro. Floral and grapey in a Muscat kind of way; chalky, too. Light and fruity in the mouth, the slight residual sugar balanced by high acidity. Faint tingle, though whether from carbon dioxide or acid I can’t say. Minerally finish. (Buy again? Probably not, when the more compelling Deu La Deu is available at about the same price.)
Rueda 2009, Nosis, Buil&Giné ($18.95, 10860928)
100% Verdejo. Muted nose of dried lemon peel, wax and gooseberry. Fairly dense and oily though with enough acid to keep it from feeling heavy. Lemony, quartzy flavours and some residual sugar up front, dries and turns minerally as it progresses through the mouth. Lingers long. (Buy again? Maybe.)
Bourgogne Vézelay 2010, La Châtelaine, Domaine la Cadette ($22.05, 11094621)
100% organically farmed Chardonnay. 80% spends time in vats, 20% in barrels. Lemon, green apple and ashes on the nose. Green apple and oats on the palate. Bright acid. Seems disjointed and turns unpleasantly sour and lactic on the mid-palate. In view of the wine’s previous vintages and the embrace of the 2010 by the city’s more clued-in restaurateurs and wine advisors (it was reportedly the third biggest seller during the holidays at the Jean Talon Market SAQ), ours was probably an off bottle. (Buy again? To see what gives, yes.)
Alto Adige 2010, Kerner, Abbazia di Novacella ($22.95, 11451974)
100% Kerner. Fermented using natural yeasts. Sees only stainless steel. Floral, green grape, spice, quartz dust. Weighty in the mouth. Initial residual sugar. Fruity attack fades by mid-palate. High acid. A bit short and alcoholic (13.9% ABV). (Buy again? Maybe.)
Pacherenc du Vic-Bilh sec 2008, Château Montus ($23.55, 11017625)
100% Petit Courbu from 15-year-old vines. Honeyed pear. Dense, rich, quite dry. Strong acid. Lemon zest on very long finish. Tasty. (Buy again? Yes.)
Saumur 2010, Château Yvonne ($25.55, 10689665)
100% organically farmed Chenin Blanc. Fermented with native yeasts, matured in new barrels, unfiltered and unfined. Quince, quinine, chestnut honey. Medium-bodied and very acidic. Complex but giving the impression that there’s more in store. Long mineral-packed finish. Not as memorably out-there as some earlier vintages but still a fine bottle of Chenin. (Buy again? Yes.)
THE REDS
Burgenland Qualitätswein 2009, Zweigelt, Zantho ($15.90, 10790384)
100% Blauer Zweigelt. Fermented in stainless steel tanks; matured 95% in stainless steel tanks, 5% in used barriques. Farty, candied red fruit, graphite, dried herbs. Rustic, a bit jammy and one-noteish, despite some coffee and slate undertones. Drinkable but not delivering much excitement. (Buy again? Probably not.)
IGP Pays de l’Hérault 2010, Exorde, Clos Mathélisse ($21.30, La QV)
100% organically farmed Cinsault. Fermented with indigenous yeasts. Bottled unfiltered and unfined with very little added sulphur. Nearly the entire (very small) production is exported to Switzerland and Canada. A first bottle seemed out of character: Red fruit, herbal, hint of rubber. Light rustic tannins. Bright acid but moody, a bit red-vermouthy, not recognizably the same wine as from earlier bottles. A second bottle showed much better: a gush of bright fruit and raspy tannins, with earthy herbal overtones and a pomegranate-like tang – the proverbial “wine that puts a smile on your face.” Surprisingly, three or four hours after being uncorked, the tail-end of the first bottle had righted itself and was drinking beautifully. Such are the vagaries of natural wines… (Buy again? For sure.)
Menetou-Salon 2010, Domaine Philippe Gilbert ($26.50, 11154988)
100% biodynamically farmed Pinot Noir from 20-year-old vines. Natural winemaking. Bottled unfiltered with minimal sulphur. Exuberant red berries: ça pinote. Light but richening as it breathes. Ripe fruit, bright acid, fine, supple tannins. Good balance and length. A rectilinear but very pure expression of the grape variety. (Buy again? Yes.)
Toro 2009, Crianza, Bodega Viña Bajoz ($13.35, 10856195)
100% Tinta de Toro (aka Tempranillo). Crianzas must be aged for 24 months, with no less than 6 months barrel-aging. Plum, stinky feet, spice, a whiff of alcohol. Rich, ripe, fluid. Raspberry, cocoa, a hint of “high” meat. Some structure. A little alcohol and tannic astringency on the dried herby finish. Good, especially at the price, though not a wine for contemplation. (Buy again? Sure.)
Nemea 2008, Agiorgitiko, Driopi, Domaine Tselepos ($19.75, 10701311)
100% Agiorgitiko from 40-year-old vines. Manually harvested. Fermented in stainless steel vats with selected yeasts. Matured in 40% new oak barrels. Menthol, plum, tobacco. Fresh and juicy in the mouth, with leather and spice deepening the sweet fruit flavours. Good acid, plump tannins and a slatey finish. The ripe, round fruit speaks of a southern wine. (Buy again? Yes, especially when it’s grilling season again.)
Douro 2008, Quinta de la Rosa ($20.30, 00928473)
Traditional port varieties, mainly Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Tinta Barroca and Tinta Roriz from 20- to 30-year-old vines. Manually harvested. Fermented in small stainless steel vats, then matured in French oak casks for 12 months before being minimally filtered and bottled. Volatile, spicy nose. Rich, vaporous, alcoholic (14.2% ABV). A mass of spicy/herby fruit. Good acid and plump tannins. Long, flowing finish. Intense but also a little plodding. (Buy again? Not sure.)
IGT Maremma Toscana 2009, Sinarra, La Fattoria di Magliano ($21.65, 11191447)
95% Sangiovese, 5% Petit Verdot. Manually harvested. Sees no oak. Bottled unfiltered. Typical Tuscan nose: leather, dust, dried cherry. Rich yet supple and fluid. The drying tannins are also true to the Tuscan type. Balanced, structured, long. Modern but quite enjoyable. (Buy again? Yes.)
Coteaux d’Aix-en-Provence 2009, Château Revelette ($18.45, 10259737)
Organically farmed Syrah (55%), Cabernet Sauvignon (34%) and Grenache (11%) from 25-year-old vines. The constituent grape varieties are vinified separately. A fraction of the Grenache and Cabernet are aged in fifth-year barrels. Leather upfront. Spice, black fruit in background. Rich, dense and strucutred but not heavy. Lots of acid. Tarry tannins. Long, savoury, posh. (Buy again? Definitely.)
Fronton 2008, Cuvée Don Quichotte, Domaine Le Roc ($18.80, 10675327)
Négrette (60%) and Syrah (40%). Varieties are vinified separately. The grapes are crushed, as the winemakers feel this enhances the bouquet and softens the tannins. Matured in vats and barrels. Bottled unfiltered and unfined. Wild red and black fruit with floral and animale notes. Dense fruit but fluid and bright. Supple tannins. Hints of licorice and dark chocolate on the longish finish. Perhaps showing less personality than in earlier vintages but still delivering good QPR. (Buy again? Yes.)
Montsant 2007, Vall del Calas, Celler de Capçanes ($22.75, 10858297)
65% Merlot, 30% Garnacha, 5% Tempranillo. All three varieties are vinified separately. Fermented with native yeasts. Spends 13 months with new, one- and two-year French oak barrels. Bottled unfined and lightly filtered. Blackberry and black cherry, pepper and gravel. A silky texture and open structure. Rich, ripe fruit along with some wood and chocolate. Fairly long, inky/minerally finish. Seemed quite young. (Buy again? Maybe.)
A sweet suite of Burgs from oenopole
oenopole‘s Theo Diamantis recently led a tasting of the agency’s new arrivals from Burgundy – mostly from Domaine Naudin-Ferrand – plus a red ringer from Alsace. All the wines are made from organically farmed grapes; the Naudin-Ferrands with the nature moniker have next to no added sulphur. They proved to be Burgundies of remarkable finesse, the best 2009s from the region that I’ve tasted and the kinds of wine that really float my boat.
The first four wines are available at the SAQ. The others are private imports and can be ordered by the case from oenopole.
FIVE WHITES
Bourgogne Aligoté 2009, Domaine Naudin-Ferrand ($17.25, 11589703)
Light lemon, wax, chalk and eventually fennel. Relatively soft for an Aligoté but by no means acid-deficient. Builds to a mouth-watering, crystalline finish. Pure and tonic if a little less characterful than the Chardonnays.
Bourgogne 2010, Soeur Cadette, Domaine de la Cadette ($18.65, 11460660)
Minerals, green grape, a hint of lime. Zingy acid balanced by ripe fruit. Long minerally finish that turns a bit buttery as the wine warms. “Simple but not facile,” someone commented. Clean and delicious, I’d add.
Bourgogne-Véselay 2010, La Châtelaine, Domaine de la Cadette ($22.10, 11094621)
Lemon-lime with hints of toast, tropical fruit and eventually orange. Rich on entry, sweet-fruity on the mid-palate, puckery on the finish. Bright, bracing and clean as a whistle: quite the contrast to the bottle opened at the January MWG tasting.
Chablis 1er cru Beauregard 2009, Domaine Pattes Loup ($35.00, 11349072)
Classy nose: lemon, puff pastry, gun flint. Plush texture. Layers of flavour though more about minerals than fruit. Excellent balance and length. Lots of bang for the buck. Probably not a long keeper.
Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Beaune 2009, Nature, Domaine Naudin-Ferrand ($36,25, 12 btls/case)
Astounding nose: pineapple, brioche dough and, unbelievably, menthol. Buttery and hazelnutty attack, turning minerally and lemon curdy. Pulsing with fruit and acidity. Long, herb-tinged finish. Special.
SIX REDS
Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Nuits 2009, Nature, Domaine Naudin-Ferrand ($39.75, 12 btls/case)
Initial cherry and spice with hints of hay, gaining mineral, beet and red meat notes. Ça pinote. Delicate. Fruit starts sweet, turns sourer. Light, firm tannins and some oak emerge on the finish. Give it a few years and it’ll be a sleek and silky beaut.
Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Beaune 2009, Domaine Naudin-Ferrand ($25.35, 12 btls/case)
Forest floor, mushroom, red berries, less exuberantly Pinot Noir than its nature siblings. Fine and delicate but showing lots of structure. Woody undertones and tight (but ripe) tannins. Needs a couple of years to knit together.
Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Beaune 2009, Nature, Domaine Naudin-Ferrand ($37.75, 12 btls/case)
Lovely. Red berries, leaf mould, hints of beet and cola: once again, ça pinote. Supple and fluid. Pure, ripe fruit, fine tannins, a sheen of acidity. Long. Complete and surprisingly approachable.
Alsace Pinot Noir 2009, LN012, Domaine Gérard Schueller ($48.00, 6 btls/case)
Only 680 bottles made. Aromatic, complex, funky nose: dark berries, spice, game, straw, cola, “dill pickle chips,” dried pine needles and more. Medium-bodied. Dry. Spicy red fruit mixed with, beets, game, leather, dried wood. Complex and layered. Long “savoury, salty, tamari” finish. Lots of umami going on but not everybody’s cup of tea (though those of us who liked it, loved it).
Aloxe-Corton 2009, Domaine Naudin-Ferrand ($50.25, 6 btls/case, NLA)
Strawberry pastry, turned earth, forest floor and a hint of oak. Rich but supple. Oak and tannins need time to integrate. Long. Pure, elegant and delicious. A favourite of just about everyone around the table.
Nuits-Saint-Georges 1er Cru Les Damodes 2009, Domaine Naudin-Ferrand ($99.50, 6 blts/case)
Class in a glass. Closed but glorious nose: mineral and berries, fields and forests. Primary but elegant. Layered deep cherry fruit. Very structured and tight yet so fine and balanced. Long, long finish. Full of potential: not peaking for another ten or 20 years.
Todos sobre mi bobal
The vineyards of southeast Spain are rife with Bobal – in 2004, 89,000 ha (220,000 acres) were under cultivation, mainly in Valencia, Alicante and Utiel-Requena – though most of the harvest is made into bulk wine (industrially produced, shipped in tankers, sold anonymously in jugs and boxes). Rightly convinced that the grape deserves a less lowly fate, some winemakers have begun producing blended and mono-varietal red and rosé Bobal cuvées. This one is from Castilla-La Mancha, whose weather locals describe as nine months of winter and three months of hell and where Bobal’s tolerance of climatic extremes and tendency to produce relatively high acid, low alcohol wines are a boon.
Vino de la tierra de Castilla 2010, Bobal, Pedro Calabuig/Bodegas de Levante ($16.20, La QV)
Organically farmed old-vine Bobal. Dusty red berries, hints of spice, pepper and fresh mint. More silky than velvety, more acidic than tannic. Bright sweet fruit upfront, turning darker and drier as it passes through the mouth. Tart, slatey finish. As wapiti says, “simple and beautiful.” I’d also add that it’s refreshing, food-friendly and delivers great QPR, the very model of an easy-drinking weeknight red. 13% ABV. All that and a cool label, too.
Speaking of food, if you’ve ever scratched your head at red wine as a suggested pairing for seafood paella, grab a bottle of this: the tart fruit, low tannins and reasonable alcohol level make it a near perfect match.
Plug bobal into the saq.com search engine and you’ll get two wines back: a Bobal/Shiraz (!) blend and a rosé. Am also pretty sure I’ve seen Mustiguillo’s Mestizaje (60% Bobal) on the monopoly’s shelves. Have yet to try any of them but now I’m curious.
A star(t)ling Pinot Noir
Renowned for its Sauvignon Blancs, Sancerre is also the source of the Loire’s best Pinot Noirs.
Sancerre 2006, L’Étourneau, Domaine Fouassier ($29.75, La QV)
100% biodynamically farmed Pinot Noir from 25- to 45-year-old vines. Manually harvested, fermented with indigenous yeasts, aged in oak barrels for 12 months. Nose of beet and red berries but also surprising baked earth, leather and dried herbs. Pure, fluid, medium-bodied (13% ABV) yet substantial. Initial sweet fruit submarines under the fine, tight tannins, racy acidity and minerals, then partially resurfaces, adding berry and cola notes to the faintly sour and astringent, flinty finish. Delicious now but – as the tail-end revisited the next day implies – smoother, suaver, more Pinoty with another two to four years in the bottle.
Hat tip to wapiti for the find and the flinty.
Tami’s 2010 Grillo
A white grape variety indigenous to Sicily, Grillo is best known as the main component of Marsala. In recent years, it’s been made into table wines, often blends (frequently with Chardonnay). Tami, the négociant firm owned and operated by Arianna Occhipinti and friends, have gone the mono-varietal route and with good reason: their 2010 Grillo is a gem.
IGT Sicilia 2010, Grillo, Tami ($18.50, oenopole)
100% Grillo. Made from purchased organically farmed grapes, fermented with native yeasts, lightly filtered before bottling. Rich gold in the glass. Lemons, chalk and whiffs of hay and flowers on the nose, gaining some dusky spice as it warms and breathes. Quite dry. Round and a little weighty, though far from heavy. Soft-spoken fruit and just enough acidity to keep things fresh. Lingering, bitter-edged, mineral-tinged, come-back-for-another-sip finish. 12.5% ABV.
In Quebec, Tami wines are available on a private import basis and sell out within days of arrival (restaurateurs know a QPR winner when they see one). The shipment this bottle came from is long gone. Until the SAQ gets its head screwed on right and starts listing all three wines, if you want to feel the Tami love, you’ll have to keep checking the oenopole website.
A very dull virtue?
Impressed by the 2002 Équilibre opened to ring in the new year, I picked up a bottle of the same producer’s rosé to share with another champagne aficionado on an evening that began with dinner at KanBai and ended with a screening of the new DVD of Lully’s Atys. The restaurant impressed; the opera blew us away (lovers of the French baroque shouldn’t hesitate); the champagne…
Champagne Brut Rosé, Tolérance, Franck Pascal ($61.50, 11552839)
Medium salmon pink. Only a single stream of bubbles, albeit an active one, in each glass. Briochy and a bit farty on opening, segues to faint red berries and turned earth. Round texture. Soft nectarine with a butterscotchy bitter note emerging on the mid-palate. The fruit fades leaving a long, minerally finish. Improves – becomes more complex and better integrated, gains strawberry and anise flavours – as it warms and breathes. Clean, pure and enjoyable, though a little more depth and dazzle would be welcome.
Based on what I’ve been able to glean from the Web, this is essentially a blanc de noirs made from a 60-40 blend of organically farmed Pinot Meunier and Pinot Noir with a dollop of Chardonnay, to which a little more than 5% of still red Coteaux Champenois is added. Fermented with native yeasts, bottled unfiltered and unfined.
Clos d’Albizzi’s 2010 Cassis
Besides being the French word for blackcurrant, Cassis is a fishing port on the Mediterranean coast between Marseille and Bandol and an appellation d’origine contrôlée, three quarters of whose production is white. Most of the wine is consumed locally and little is exported.
Cassis 2010, Clos d’Albizzi ($18.10, 11095797)
Marsanne 30%, Clairette 40%, Ugni Blanc 30%. Vineyard practices include mechanical weed control and avoidance of synthetic insecticides and pesticides. The grapes are manually harvested and fermented with native yeasts. Undergoes malo. 12.5% abv.
Peach giving way to almond, acacia blossom and a hint of anise. Texture bordering on unctuous, kept fresh by the ephemeral fruitiness and brisk acidity. Initial quince and honey segue to minerals and a lingering sour bitterness. Ends on a briny note.
Intriguing and, in its way, delicious but a food wine more than an apertif wine. Worked well enough with a garlic- and anchovy-scented sauté of rapinni and scallops. Would be a natural for Provençal seafood dishes including, of course, bouillabaisse.
Double blind
This evening the friendly wine advisors at my regular SAQ outlet were offering small, double blind tastes of a wine – the leftovers of a bottle they’d opened for a staff tasting earlier in the day – to geeks they thought might be interested. Apparently I fall into that category. With the glass came a series of questions: (1) Is it New World or Old? (2) What country is it from? (3) What grape varieties are involved? (4) How much does a bottle cost?
My tasting note (from memory): Dark, nearly opaque maroon. Nose of red and purple fruit, a little spice and a good dose of oak. Quite rich and round on the palate, though not heavy, with good acidity, ripe tannins, supple fruit and noticeable but not overwhelming oak. A bitter note appears on the longish finish.
I was at the store about ten minutes before closing and had wines to pick up for tomorrow’s tasting, so I didn’t have time for extended reflection. My answers: (1) Because it was fruit- and oak-driven but not gallumphing, either a New World wine made in an Old World style or an Old World wine made in a New World style. (2) Italy, maybe the Veneto, due to the medium weight and that lingering bitterness. (3) No idea. Merlot? Bonarda? (4) Guessing high because of the oak treatment, around $30. (The advisors said several others had guessed Italian and almost everyone had pegged it as costing $25 to $30.)
The wine? Double Barrel 2009, Carone Wines ($55.00, 11506630), a blend of Cabernet Severnyi (92%) and Sangiovese (8%) grown in Quebec’s Lanaudière region. The wine’s name refers to the oak regime: 12 months in new American oak barrels followed by four months in new French oak barrels. Cabernet Severnyi (aka Cabernet Severny) is a Russian-developed red grape variety that, according to The Oxford Companion to Wine, “was created by pollination of a hybrid of Galan × Vitis amurensis with a pollen mixture of other hybrid forms involving both the European vine species Vitis vinifera and the famously cold-hardy Mongolian vine species Vitis amurensis.” According to the wine’s data sheet, the grapes are manually harvested as late as possible, sorted and crushed, then cold-soaked for 24 hours. Fermentation is at controlled temperatures and uses Saccharomyces cerevisiae yeast “isolated from the Montalcino region of Tuscany, Italy.” The fermented must is given prolonged maceration on the skins.
I’d actually noticed the wine on the shelf a few days earlier when scouring the outlet for wines for the tasting. I’d rolled my eyes at the massive bottle, the corny name (and in English – talk about adding insult to injury), the implied oak regime and the price, and guessed it would be undrinkable. Well, I was wrong. It’s still pretentiously and unecologically packaged, badly named and oakier than I like, but undrinkable it’s not. And if I and others valuated it at about half its MSRP, only the market will say whether it’s overpriced. Certainly it’s rare (only 1,000 bottles made) and unique (Quebec-grown Sangiovese?!). While I’d never buy a bottle for myself, if the theme of tomorrow’s tasting weren’t affordable wines, a bottle would probably have made its way into the lineup.
Brett happens 