Posts Tagged ‘Under 13 percent’
Best yet
Muscadet-Sèvre et Maine 2014, Granite, Domaine de l’Écu ($23.55, 10282873)
100% Melon de Bourgogne from organically and biodynamically farmed vines 45 to 55 years old growing in stony topsoil and mica granite subsoil. Manually harvested. The winery is gravity fed, so no pumping occurs. Pneumatically pressed. The unclarified must is fermented with indigenous yeasts. Sulphuring is limited to 25 mg added between alcoholic and malolactic fermentation. Matured on the lees in underground concrete tanks for 15 to 18 months. Reducing sugar: 1.4 g/l. 12% ABV. Quebec agent: Raisonnance.
Outgoing nose for a young Écu: lemon fruit and pith, chamomile, minerals, faintest hints of wax, honey and almond essence. In the mouth, it’s fruitier than usual: silky, complex and wonderfully pure, acid bright and bone dry, with real mineral depth and overtones of peach and fresh herbs. The long, long flinty, iodiney finish leaves a white peppery afterbite. This will only improve with a few years in the cellar but, in contrast to most vintages, is beguiling young. Perfect, of course, with raw oysters and moules marinières but has the wherewithal to accompany fine fish and, even, sushi and stinky cheeses. Or see what the winemaker has to say about possible pairings. (Buy again? Imperatively.)
Mönch on this!
Mosel 2015, Ürzig Würzgarten Riesling Kabinett, Mönchhof ($25.90, 11034804)
100% Riesling from ungrafted, dry-farmed vines between 60 and 100 years old in the original part of the Würzgarten vineyard (red slate) in the municipality of Ürzig. Manually harvested. Fermentation with selected yeasts in stainless steel and neutral German oak vats lasts four weeks. Matured four to six months in stainless steel tanks and neutral German oak barrels. Filtered before bottling. Screwcapped. Reducing sugar: > 60 g/l. 8.5% ABV. Quebec agent: Valmonti.
Green apple, lime/grapefruit, mown meadow, slate, lemon yogurt, hints of yellow stone fruit. Sweet on the attack, then the acidity kicks in. Chockablock with pure, ripe fruit. Endowed with a mineral backbone. Shows fair depth and some spice at the back of the palate. Finish is subdued but quite long. Well balanced despite the hot vintage. Ageable at least a decade, maybe two, during which time it will deepen, gain complexity and lose sweetness. For now, while almost too sweet to drink as an aperitif, it comes into its own alongside food, in my case a fairly faithful replica of Nigel Slater’s apples, potatoes and bacon recipe finished with crème fraîche, mustard and tarragon, a dish I’ll be making – and pairing with German Riesling – again. (Buy again? Yes.)
Bargain Jurançon
Jurançon Sec 2014, Domaine Laguilhon ($16.95, 13028651)
The estate is reportedly owned by viticulturalist Henri Estreboou Suberbie but, though the wine isn’t listed on its website, the producer is the Cave de Gan, a cooperative which M. Estreboou Suberie appears to chair. In any case, this is a 50-50 blend of Gros Manseng and Petit Manseng from sustainably farmed vines in Monein. Manually harvested. Fermented in temperature-controlled stainless steel tanks. Matured on its lees for six months. Stoppered with a cork (not syncork as SAQ.com has it). Reducing sugar: 3.2 g/l. 12.5% ABV. Quebec agent: Les vins Dupré.
Subtle nose of yellow apple and pear, frangipane, faint chalk and honey. Medium-bodied and round, with a satiny verging on waxy texture. Well chilled, grapefruit seems the dominant fruit; warmer, pear with almond overtones comes to the fore. Dry, especially on the finish, though there’s also a thread of sweetness that’s countered by the streaming acidity, crystalline minerals and lingering touch of pith-like bitterness. Fairly long. Not exactly deep but surprisingly nuanced, complex and pure for a $17 wine. Excellent as an aperitif. Not bad with roasted cod loin under a fines herbes, lemon zest and panko crust. I can also see it working with pan-seared scallops in a delicate sauce. (Buy again? Yes.)
Kung Fu Guy and company
Prince Edward County 2011, Zweigelt, Pasha’s Elixir, Norman Hardie ($23.00 at the winery)
Not a lot of technical info to be found for this wine. May be a special bottling for Fat Pasha restaurant in Toronto. May also be the last vintage. Possibly 100% Zweigelt. Manually harvested. Vinified with minimal intervention, extended maceration and indigenous yeasts. 10.9% ABV.
Clean nose: inky, spicy blackberry, distant mint and wood. Light- to medium-bodied. Dark fruited, with decent acidity, supple tannins and a mineral vein. The cedary overtones were surprising, the vinegary edge off-putting, though the wine did improve somewhat in the glass. I’d been looking forward to tasting this because, earlier this spring, a half bottle of Zweigelt – in all likelihood the County bottling – given by the winery to a friend for his helping with last fall’s harvest was effin’ delicious. But no one around the table was impressed by this and several were downright dismissive, one dubbing it “Kung Fu Guy: the Kung Fu Girl of red wines.” (Buy again? No.)
Niagara Peninsula 2014, Cabernet Franc, Unfiltered, Norman Hardie ($30.00 at the winery)
100% Cabernet Franc. Manually harvested. Given extended maceration on the skins with daily or more frequent pump-overs. Fermented with indigenous yeasts and regular punch-downs. 12.2% ABV.
Volatile acidity on the nose, along with whiffs of green herbs, dehydrated beef and, quoting other tasters, “roasted red peppers,” “beet like borscht” and “cheap makeup.” Medium-bodied, velvety textured. Decent fruit-acid balance but where are the tannins? Fair length. Meh. (Buy again? Only to check whether ours was an off bottle.)
Prince Edward County 2010, Cabernet Franc, Northfield, Grange of Prince Edward ($35.00 at the winery)
100% Cabernet Franc from 10-year-old estate vines. Manually picked and sorted. Primary fermentation in stainless steel tanks lasted 28 days. Matured 24 months in neutral French oak barrels. Residual sugar: 4 g/l. 13.5% ABV.
Odd nose that eventually settled into plum and beef sukiyaki. Medium-bodied with a lush texture. The core of sweet dark fruit is wrapped in wood and minerals, structured by sustained acidity and light but firm tannins. The fairly long finish brings faint spice and vegetal notes. Not only the best of the trio, it also improved considerably in the glass. (Buy again? Maybe.)
I’ve long felt that Cabernet Franc is the red grape Ontario does best but this flight has me reassessing that position. All three reds, especially the Hardie Cab Franc, were a big disappointment – foul-smelling, disjointed, simple – though the Grange did come around as it breathed. Still, as someone noted, why pay $30 or $35 for OK or worse when the Loire delivers juicy/minerallly deliciousness for $10 or $15 less or tremendous depth, complexity and refinement for about the same price.
MWG August 12th tasting: flight 6 of 8
Ganevat caveat
Vin de France 2014, J’en veux encore !!!, Anne & Jean-François Ganevat ($36.75, 12884190)
The original label, an ink sketch of the backside, from the shoulders to the knees, of a seated young woman wearing only a thong, has been replaced for the Quebec market with a text-only label. An 70-30 blend of Gamay from the Beaujolais and Trousseau from very old Jura vines, hence the vin de France designation. All the grapes are organically farmed, manually harvested and destemmed. Whole grape fermentation (old-fashioned carbonic maceration) is with indigenous yeasts. Matured 10 months in tronconic wood tanks. No fining, filtration or added sulphur. Reducing sugar: < 1.2 g/l. 10.9% ABV per the label, 12% per the SAQ. Quebec agent: Rézin.
Strawberries, dog hair, minerals, eventually spice. A mouthful of sweet-tart red fruit and minerals on the lighter side of medium-bodied. Super-supple tannins (the acidity’s carrying the structure here). Not what you’d call long. Pricey but pure, delicious and so very quaffable. (Buy again? Am not returning our backup bottle, so yes, but only that one.)
Vin de France 2014, Libre-K, Anne & Jean-François Ganevat ($42.00, 12884405)
80% Gamay from Morgon blended with old indigenous varieties from Ganevat’s vineyards in the Jura. Naturally vinified: manally harvested, destemmed grapes; whole-grape fermentation (old-fashioned carbonic maceration) with indigenous yeasts in tronconic vats; 12 month’s maturation in old foudres; no fining, filtration or added sulphur. Reducing sugar: 12.5%. Reducing sugar: 1.2 g/l. Quebec agent: Rézin.
Our first bottle was corked. The backup was clean as a whistle. Savoury/funky nose, the fruit plummier and the minerals slatier than the J’en veux encore. In the mouth, it’s darker, richer and deeper though not particularly fruity. Light but persistent tannins and sleek acidity provide structure. Finishes clean and long. Approachable now but will surely benefit from a few years’ ageing. Not without appeal, but is that enough to justify a $42 price tag (which, as one taster pointed out, is almost exactly the same as for Foillard’s excellent 2014 Morgon “Côte de Py”)? (Buy again? Only if feeling flush.)
While the assembled tasters enjoyed these, no one thought they represented good value. Ten dollars too expensive was the general verdict.
MWG August 12th tasting: flight 5 of 8
Fresh, fluent, pure
Another interloper before getting back to the August 12th notes because, at the time of this posting, there appear to be only six bottles of this wine left in the province.
Coteaux du Loir 2014, La Guinguette, Domaine de la Roche Bleue ($26.50, 12856261)
The vintage is shown on the label but, oddly, not on SAQ.com. A blend of Pinot d’Aunis (80%) and Gamay (20%) from organically farmed vines. Manually harvested. The whole grapes undergo semi-carbonic maceration for 10 days and are fermented with indigenous yeasts in third- to sixth-fill oak barrels. Malolactic fermentation then follows. Two-thirds of the wine is transferred to barrels and one-third to tanks for three months’ maturation. Bottled unfiltered and unfined. Total added sulphur dioxide: 50 mg/l. 12.5% ABV. 4,800 bottles made. Quebec agent: Boires.
Cherry preserves, crushed raspberries, sawed wood, leafmould, hints of black pepper and dried rose. Silky-textured and barely medium-bodied. Fruity-sweet on entry but quickly transitioning to a much drier, more peppery mid-palate with sleek acidity, some mineral depth and tannins that, while supple and light, still confer a lingering astringency on the finish. Fresh and fluent and pure, with a quaffability quotient that’s off the charts. Lightly chilled, an ideal accompaniment to herbed sausages, roasted potatoes and sautéed kale with garlic and vinegar. (Buy again? Yep, provided I can find time to schlep out to the Beaubien store again before it sells out.)
The 2015 is reportedly a success. I look forward to tasting it and will keep an eye peeled for Roche Bleue’s old-vine Pinot d’Aunis cuvée, La Belle d’Aunis. Thanks to MWG member Jack for bringing this wine to my attention.
A blessing
While waiting for some technical information on the next wines in the August 12th tasting to land in my inbox, a note on a recent arrival at the SAQ.
Terre Siciliane 2015, Lucido, Marco de Bartoli ($20.00, 12640603)
100% Catarratto Lucido from organically farmed 13-year-old vines. Manually harvested. Gently pressed. Fermented with indigenous yeasts in temperature-controlled stainless steel tanks. Matured on the lees for seven months, also in stainless steel tanks. Reducing sugar: 1.3 g/l. 12% ABV. 20,000 bottles made. Quebec agent: oneopole.
Served too cold, the wine seems shy, even nondescript. But as it warms, the nose blossoms: lemon and a little peach, straw, fired quartz. The flavours echo the nose, the delicate fruit and waxy texture making way for a mineral mid-palate. Soft acidity glows as if from within. The wine’s bone-dryness is apparent only on the finish. Faint notes of dried herbs, pineapple water, white flowers, caramel and citrus pith linger long. As its name suggests, luminous and translucent, sane and coherent. That such quiet beauty can be had for $20 is a blessing. A fine accompaniment to grilled shrimp and squid with olive oil, lemon and parsley; the next bottle is earmarked for Hazan’s mussel and romano bean soup. (Buy again? Naturally.)
Data-free sparklers
Prince Edward County 2011, Blanc de blancs, Culmination, Traditional Method, Lighthall Vineyards ($35.00 at the winery)
Good luck finding technical information about this wine; the winery appears to think only the wines currently available for purchase online deserve mention. 100% Chardonnay. May have been fermented in French oak barrels. May have been matured on the lees in French oak barrels. 12% ABV.
Subdued nose: lemon, “boxwood,” yeast, yellow apple, puff pastry. Assertively fizzy (“almost harsh the bubbles”) but otherwise light, even ethereal. Clean, dry, brightly acidic with just enough fruit and a long tart finish. (Buy again? Sure.)
Canada 2011, Blanc de noirs, À la volée, The Old Third (c. $45.00 at the winery a few years ago)
No mention of this wine is made on the winery’s website. 100% Pinot Noir from the estate’s Prince Edward County vineyard. May have spent 18 months to three years on the lees. May have been manually riddled and disgorged. May be undosed. 12.5% ABV.
Brioche, almond croissant, yellow apple, pear and an oxidized note that one taster termed “rancio.” Rich but not heavy. Softly effervescent with fine bubbles. Rounder, smoother, deeper and better balanced than the Lighthall – technically speaking the better of the two wines – but, oddly, not more interesting. Still, one of the few New World sparklers that can stand comparison with champagne. (Buy again? Sure.)
MWG August 12th tasting: flight 2 of 8
Back in 2012, I wrote:
Trying to find technical information on PEC wines is an exercise in frustration. Want to know if a wine was aged in barrels, what the barrels were made from, who they were made by, what percentage was new? Curious about what grapes in what proportion went into the wine? Wondering what kind of agricultural practices are used? Whether a wine is filtered, fined or sulphured? You probably won’t find many if any answers to those and other technical questions on the winery’s website. Yes, some of these are tiny operations. But others aren’t (looking at you, Norman Hardie). And anyway, winemakers, you have this information. It can be typed up in five minutes. It doesn’t have to be nicely presented; the people interested in it don’t give a damn about formatting. What’s important is that it be available. As things stand now, we’re forced to scour the Web for reviews and reports on winery visits, and even when we find information on blogs or in articles, it’s incomplete and often contradictory.
How discouraging to see the situation remains unchanged.
Maverick Malagousia
Achaia 2014, Malagousia, Domaine Tetramythos ($18.50, 12910335)
100% organically farmed Malagousia from vines grown at just under 1,000 m. Manually harvested. Destemmed. Macerated on the skins for 30 hours. Only the free-run juice is used. Fermented in temperature-controlled (18°C) stainless steel tanks with indigenous yeasts for 100 days. Undergoes full malolactic fermentation. Reducing sugar: 1.8 g/l. 12.5% ABV. Quebec agent: oenopole.
Aromatic but not exaggeratedly so: floral (jasmine, lily), fruity (pineapple, peach, lemon), minerals (chalk, quartz) and a hint of green herbs. Fresh and lively in the mouth. Very dry. Most present on the attack, the fruit quickly gives way to crystalline minerals. The long citric finish has a lingering bitterness and touch of heat that I don’t recall from a bottle tasted at the winery six weeks earlier. A bit more rustic than I remember, too, not that there’s anything wrong with that. Well chilled, an aperitif wine par excellence; slightly warmer, a fine accompaniment to grilled prawns with a herby pineapple salsa. (Buy again? Done!)
More subdued, acidic and minerally than is usual for this grape, a fact the winemaker attributes above all to the vineyard’s altitude.
MWG August 12th tasting: flight 1 of 8
Serious whites
Bourgogne 2013, Les Bigotes, Domaine de Chassorney/Frédéric Cossard ($58.15, private import, 6 bottles/case)
100% Chardonnay from organically farmed vines. The manually harvested whole clusters are sorted and placed directly in a pneumatic press, then slowly and gently pressed. The free-run and pressed juice is transferred to the same vat, then racked into large barrels. Low-temperature (c. 12°C) fermentation with indigenous yeasts lasts three to six months; in some years, malolactic fermentation finishes before alcoholic fermentation does. The wine remains on its lees, with no stirring or racking, until the contents of all barrels are racked into a single vat, allowed to rest one month and then gravity-bottled without filtering or fining. 12.5% ABV. Quebec agent: Rézin.
Surprisingly fresh nose of ripe yellow fruit (“mango skins” per one taster), golden raisins and light brown sugar. Smooth, rich and round in the mouth but in no way heavy, with complex flavours, a mineral matrix and just enough acidity. Good depth and length complete the picture. In short, a textbook white Burgundy whose only downside is its price (Cossard blames it on the cost of grapes and the high overhead associated with his version of natural winemaking), though that’s true for many wines from the region these days. (Buy again? If feeling flush, yes.)
Anjou 2014, Domaine Thibaud Boudignon ($46.64, private import, 6 bottles/case)
Bordeaux native Thibaud Boudignon is head of operations at Château Soucherie. On the side, he makes wine under his own name from two hectares of vineyards in Anjou and Savennières. This 100% organically farmed Chenin Blanc comes from vines averaging a third of a century old and grown in shallow soils on grey schist, ryholite and sand. The grapes are manually harvested and gently pressed. The must is fermented with indigenous yeasts in French and Austrian oak barrels of various volumes. Does not undergo malolactic fermentation. Matured eight to 12 months in second- and third-fill 225-litre barrels and new 500-litre barrels. 13% ABV. Quebec agent: Rézin.
Ashy oak, quince, quartz, chalk dust. Remarkably pure fruit, sleek acidity and crystalline minerality fill the mouth. A saline tang colours the extremely long finish. Quintessential Chenin. A little less dazzling than the 2012, at least for now, but oh, so beautiful and full of potential. (Buy again? Done!)
MWG July 15th tasting: flight 7 of 8
Brett happens 
