Vergisson

Vergisson

Friday, May 25, 2012

I thought I knew a thing or two about Prosecco

I thought I knew a thing or two about Prosecco.   I was pleased as punch when our Gasparini Venegazzu Brut arrived with it's shiny new Asolo DOCG label.   We're often vying for case stack spots with the Villa Jolanda Prosecco...very cute bottle, but the wine is from the Piedmont.  Prosecco from the Piedmont?  Why?  Because it sells of course.  Prosecco has been getting more and more popular every year and as it does more and more people are trying to get into the game.  So I for one welcomed the new clarification between the original zone of Prosecco producers and everybody else.  I also didn't really understand the argument that this was making too much of Prosecco-that Prosecco isn't complex enough a wine to warrant DOCG status.   But Moscato d'Asti is?   Just look at poor old Moscato...it's long had the DOCG distinction, and sadly this has done nothing to stem the tide of Moscato from everywhere from Australia to California.

Well, if you want to pack your brain with more info than you would have thought there was to know about the classic Italian bubbly, check out this back and forth between two guys that know a lot about Prosecco, Alan Tardi and Jeremy Parzen on Jeremy Parzen's terrific Do Bianchi blog.  A response to a response about Tardi's article in The NY Times,  “Prosecco Growers Act to Guard Its Pedigree”
http://dobianchi.com/2012/05/23/prosecco-polemic-alan-tardi-responds/
there are more interesting little factoids in these three pieces than there are bubbles in a glass of Prosecco.

I will say that it's a little strange to see Parzen refer to the wines of Franco Adami, one of Prosecco's most passionate and devoted advocates who had been fighting for years to obtain the DOCG distinction, described as "an expression of the consumerist hegemony that has choked my beloved trevigiano since the 1990s when Prosecco became a brand in the U.S."   With so many boogeymen "brands" to blame for the bastardizing of Prosecco, Adami seems an odd target.  I mean there's a Santa Margherita Valdobiaddene bottling and that Lunetta Prosecco by Cavit for God's sake!!  Or how about that juice from the Piedmont?  Maybe the real Italian wine guys don't even speak of these names.  But I didn't really mean to get into the fray here, because of the many things I learned reading this back and forth, my main take away was that I have a lot to learn when it comes to Prosecco.  If you feel like me, then this is a great place to start.

Thursday, May 24, 2012

"Three Things They Don't Want You to Know"

Who's "they," you ask? It's restaurants, retailers, wineries and, yes, wine writers
http://www.winespectator.com/webfeature/show/id/46784?icid=em_com

This Blog Post by Wine Spectator Veteran Matt Kramer is in my opinion a little, well...beneath him.    I'm a bit wary of anything that sets up a divide between the consumer and trade and you can't help but feel that the "and yes, wine writers" was thrown in reluctantly at the end to deflect potential fall-out.  Outside of the 'premox' portion about prematurely oxidizing white Burgundy, you can't really find a motive for a wine writer to be complicit in this supposed cover-up.  It almost makes you wonder if some waiter ticked him off by not recognizing him and charging him full price for a glass of Viognier.   There is nothing untrue, new or particularly revelatory in his "outing" of restaurateurs and retailers for being for profit, and his recommendations for diners somehow seem so ten years ago.   Yes you have a better selection by the bottle.  Yes your wine by the bottle will not be oxidized and will be a better deal.  If you don't know these things, where have you been?  It also doesn't really give credit to the many restaurants that have gone to great lengths to address these issues, from  vast  by the glass selections and wine flights to those fancy machines that keep the wine fresh and measure pours (A $70,000 investment for  a state of the art piece of equipment.)   There is a very real cost involved in wine by the glass (even if you didn't spend the $70k on one of those machines)...it's called waste.  Those complaining about the problem of open, oxidized wines are illustrating this point themselves.  If you don't sell any more than that one glass from the bottle quickly, down the drain the remainder of the wine and all your profits go.   What a bunch of robber barons.

How about revealing something useful...like there is no margin in wine compared to most retail businesses to begin with.  The moisturizing cream on your face, the shirt on your back (even if its from Ross!) and the shoes on your feet all fetched a fine return on investment.  When I worked in wine retail we were down the street from a Salon.  I couldn't help but notice the dichotomy of the difficulty many women had spending even $10 on a bottle of wine, while $100 or so of "product" dangled from their wrist in a fancy bag.

The whole Big Box world that we live in promotes this idea that having a margin for profit in your business somehow makes you a crook.  There is a misconception that Big Box stores are Robin Hoods bringing affordable goods to the masses.     Every one of these outfits are making plenty of money.  This doesn't make them crooks either, it makes them businessmen.   They may not be making their money on that bottle of Cliquot you can't believe your local shop would charge you so much for, or those fancy high end bottles Mr. Kramer is encouraging you to buy from them or an online outlet, but they are making it somewhere, and plenty of it.  I won't start talking about loss leaders...but I think as reasonable people in the world we all know these things to be true.  We just like a deal. And we don't want to feel bad about it.  Maybe it would be a little more fair to own that, and stop trying to make independent merchants feel they are immoral profit seekers. 

Of course you can shop around.  The remnants of prohibition and the puritan American approach to alcohol as a controlled substance makes for wildly different import/distribution tiers throughout the US which can translate to sometimes wildly different prices.  Again, this is a fact of laws binding the buying/selling practices of wholesalers, retailers and importers in your State, City and County...not a rape the consumer scheme.  You can seek out online product reviews and make your own selections.  You can find better deals on the internet.  You don't need your local wine shop to do these things for you, you can of course do them yourself.  But that takes a lot of time.  Now you're doing all the work.  Apparently diners have taken to price checking the bottles on wine lists before they order.  The somm makes a recommendation and Joe Q is on his i phone checking Parker reviews and retail prices on Wine Searcher.   So much for the dining experience.   And this gets to the heart of what I really dislike about this- the encouraging the consumer to mistrust the wine professional in front of them.  Don't take the Sommellier's word for it, take Matt Kramer's.

Lastly the they in the title, "Three Things They don't want you to know," also smacks a bit of the "Make them Pay" piece that Ben Gilberti wrote in the Washington Post many years ago (one that became something of a swan song as he departed his duties as bi-weekly wine critic not long after) opining bitterly about the occurrence of corked wines in restaurants and the lack of tastevin wielding Sommelliers to ferret them out before the foul liquid and vapors penetrated the innocent nostrils and taste buds of the all important critic...heh hem...customer.   A crime for which he wanted to "Make Them (the restaurants) Pay."   Gentlemen...get over yourselves.

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

James Molesworth "Stirring the Lees" My Wine Lexicon

If you subscribe to the Wine Spectator...check out this entry on James Molesworth's blog "Stirring the Lees"   A guy that writes a lot of tasting notes, weighs in on tasting notes, striving to make them of value to the consumer, the inevitability of individual perception and how he hones and reinvigorates his wine vocabulary to keep it fresh, thousandth tasting note after thousandth tasting note.   Love it!  (And don't take the critic's critics too personally Mr. Molesworth....I say if you taste fig, you write Fig!!!

http://www.winespectator.com/blogs/home/id/20

Monday, May 21, 2012

Champagne Jean Vesselle Recoltant Manipulant

Delphine and David Lemaire . Vesselle.
Delphine Vesselle and her husband David Lemaire are proud grower producers, Recoltant Manipulant, in the Grand Cru Champagne Villages of Bouzy.  "We wear a lot of hats" says Delphine.  Winemaker, promoter and vineyardist top the list.  Delphine studied for six years at the  lycée viticole de la Champagne.  After working in the wine trade in South Africa, New Zealand and Japan, Delphine returned to work alongside her father Jean in 1993.  In 1994 she assumed the management responsibilities for her ailing father, who passed away in 1996. 

Bouzy is in the heart of Pinot Noir country and the family's 15 hectares of vineyard holdings consist mainly of two parcels in Bouzy planted to roughly 90% Pinot Noir and 10% Chardonnay.  They also own vineyards in the outlying areas of Bouzy and the "villages of Loches sur Ource near Riceys, which is well known for its Rosé."  The house makes several beautiful rosé wines, all in the "true" method of Saignée or by allowing the skins to macerate with the juice.  According to Delphine, while the practice is frowned on in much of the rest of France, it is much more common in Champagne to achieve a rosé wine by blending (close to 80% of rosé.)  Consider that in "the other Cote" (the Cotes de Blanc) most of a growers holdings will be planted to Chardonnay, and the custom especially for the large Negociants, is to purchase still red wine from Bouzy and other villages in the Montagne de Reims to make their Rosé wine.  A grower producer may purchase just 5 % of their grapes.  The "risk" of the Saignée method, aside from being labor intensive, is that you will draw tannins from the skins and unwanted bitterness.  The Jean Vesselle Saignée Brut spends an average of 24 to 48 hours in contact with the skins, depending on the vintage and character of the fruit.  They then collect the free run juice.  After a gentle pressing, the free run and press juices are carefully blended to get just the right blend of power, color and pinot character while maintaining delicacy, elegance and the "basket of fruit" that they are looking for.  The Saignée Brut is full bodied and expressive with loads of raspberry and strawberry.  On average, all of the cuvées will spend 30-36 months on the lees.  They use around 10% of reserve wine in their blending.  The current offerings are mostly representative of the wonderful 2009 vintage.    All fruit is hand harvested as is the law for Champagne....didn't know that.  True artisans, these are hand crafted wines, a mere 10,000 cases are produced annually.  By comparison, Moet and Chandon produce 200,000 cases of Dom Perignon alone, and a whopping 2 million cases total production annually!   Cliquot clocks in at just 1 million.  Unlike those large houses, Delphine and David strive to create a unique and individual house style that expresses both their incredible terroir and the spirit and identity of the family marques and history which stretches over three centuries.

Jean Vesselle produces a full range of styles, but consider two special bottlings to be their "children."   One is the Petit Clos.  There are just 20 clos in Champagne and the house's "petit clos" is the tiniest walled vineyard in Champagne.   Their other child, the Oeil de Perdrix is "The soul of the Pinot Noir."   They describe it as vinous or winey...more like a still wine.  A great aperitif or food wine, that Delphine claims is "not a chauvenist."  In the original meaning of the word chavenism, "an extreme and unreasoning partisanship on behalf of any group to which one belongs, especially when the partisanship includes malice and hatred towards rival groups."  In this regard, Oeil de Perdrix could teach us all a thing or two.  You can, she says, easily transition to a still wine, that it "gives a hand" or passes the baton to the next bottle of white or even red that succeeds it at the table.   

From Harvey Steiman , The Wine Spectator."The Oeil de Perdrix name, which translates to “eye of the partridge,” refers to the wine’s light salmon color, much like that of the bird’s eye. The wine sports Pinot Noir’s strawberry and rhubarb notes, with overtones of wet earth, herbs and toast. But they’re just overtones. It’s the delicate fruit that’s so beguiling. What’s that on the finish? Peach?
The estate, which encompasses two separate parcels in Bouzy, has been in the same family for 300 years. Since 1996, it has been run by Delphine Vesselle, daughter of the man whose name is on the label. I’m not sure I can detect a woman’s touch, but the wine sure has charm. 92 points, non-blind."



                                                          
 To Visit!
                          Champagne Jean Vesselle                    

4, rue Victor Hugo

BP 15

51150 Bouzy

Tel : 03 26 57 01 55

Fax : 03 26 57 06 95

Sunday, May 13, 2012

"Adventures in New Greek Reds" in the New York Times

"MAVROTRAGANO and mandelaria; limnio and vlahiko; and of course, agiorgtiko and xinomavro. I know: it’s all Greek. That’s what is so exciting" Eric Asimov

 

Hooray for native grapes!  Another great look at the diversity and quality of Greek wines on offer today.  This time from Eric Asimov in the New York Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/09/dining/reviews/new-greek-reds-adventure-wine-review.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

"Portugal: the land that the wine buyers forgot"

Portugal: the land that the wine buyers forgot


 This is an interesting piece with some perspective on how Portuguese wines are positioned in the UK market.  Sounds a bit like how they are positioned in the US market.  We have our work cut out for us.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/wine/9246075/Portugal-the-land-that-the-wine-buyers-forgot.html

Monday, May 7, 2012

Highlights from Peter Minakis Greek Food Gazette

Some more interesting reads thanks again to Peter Minakis at Kalofagas.ca
 http://www.kalofagas.ca/2012/05/06/greek-food-gazette-06052012/


Greece Travel: Bargains galore on the Greek mainland
http://www.thestar.com/travel/europe/article/1171394--greece-travel-bargains-galore-on-the-greek-mainland

Culture Clash
A Frenchman, a Greek, and a Turk walk into a conference room to rank New York–made Greek yogurts. Spoons, predictably, fly.

http://nymag.com/restaurants/features/greek-yogurt-2012-5/ 

Friday, May 4, 2012

Shining a little sun on Greece...Twenty Three 90+ Scores for Greece from The Wine Advocate

"In sum, find your chair. Find your porch. Get a corkscrew. Sip the summer evening away. If every now and then, while tasting one of those crisp, transparent whites you begin to see deep blue seas, you’re not alone."

—Mark Squires




You can't say Mark Squires is not doing his part to help promote Greek wines.  His feature "Greece on the Cusp of Summer" is chock full of appreciation, knowledge and enthusiasm...not to mention some great recommendations and the all important 90+scores.  23 wines in all with 90+ratings here.  Would you believe me if I told you there was a Greek wine with a 96 from The Advocate?  Well there is.  The 1990 Vinsanto "20 Years Barrel Aged"  Here's just a little bit of the review...I guess there's a lot to say about a 96 point wine!

"The 1990 Vinsanto “20 Years Barrel Aged” (a blend of 80% Assyrtiko, 10% Aidani and 10% Athiri) is the new release, not a library wine. That’s not a typo. This winery is famed for its fanaticism with its late released, long-aged Vinsanto. If you are not familiar with the style, note that it is naturally sweet and unfortified. It comes in at 13.5% alcohol. With 20 years in barrel and 1 in bottle (their old method was 17 in barrel and 3 in bottle) and grapes sun dried for 12-14 days instead of just 8-10, it is a far, far different wine than the “4 year old” reviewed this issue: far darker in color, with more prominent acidity, a bigger rush of intense aromatics and a more intense grip on the finish, with a touch of tannin. There is a richer, darker flavor, more toffee and dark roast coffee than caramel. The laser beam bursts of acidity common to fine Vinsanto enliven this oldie perfectly, creating an invigorating counterpart to the complex aromatics, particularly after it gets a little air. Luscious, silky and intense, it is simply delicious."

The whites are the focus with Assyrtico from Santorini in the lead, but the reds are slowly winning over as well.  I particularly like the review and description of the Kir Yianni Ramnista here...and someone finally spelled Dionysos correctly!  The Ramnista is a single vineyard or "cru" from Naoussa that is really on a roll in our market right now-especially in restaurants.   I too find myself qualifying at tastings that this is not for fans of international style wines-but I think maybe I shouldn't worry as it has been knocking a lot of socks off despite it's "stern and steely" character.  And of course I love comparisons of Xinomavro with Nebbiolo (a little vindication now and then is always appreciated.)

"The 2008 Ramnista, a Xinomavro, is traditional and chock full of steel, tannin and acidity... It is a good example of the type of Xinomavro that I like to compare to old style Nebbiolo. It certainly requires the right type of food matchup. Indeed, I saved a bit of this as an experiment for a nice red sauce, pasta and meatballs dish – suddenly, it sang, the acidity and tannins absorbed or complemented...this seems to say “take it or leave it.” You decide. If it is in your style, it exceeds expectations in its price category and it should well reward cellaring, becoming more complex and coming together better over the next decade or so. Theoretically approachable, depending on your tolerance for tannins and rusticity, this will most certainly be better around 2015 or so. If you are a modern style wine drinker, with everything soft, sweet, fruity and approachable on release, this isn’t going to be your style of wine. Otherwise, at the anticipated shelf price, this stern and steely wine should be a nice, ageworthy bargain. Drink 2014-2027."  90 Points

Importers: VOS Selections, New York, N.Y.; tel. (212) 967-6948; Dionysos Imports, Manassas, Va; tel. (703) 392-7073.

Boutari Winery also recently garnered a couple of 90+ reviews, with a 91 point rating for it's 2008 Boutari Naoussa. "...Its hallmark is always refinement and balance. It is never a rustic Xinomavro, but at the same time it still preserves its essence and characteristics and expresses its terroir well as time goes on. Caressing in texture, yet increasingly powerful as it fleshes out in the glass to show good depth, it lingers on the palate and grips it. ...It drank beautifully the next day, showing that promised purity and transparency, seeming clean and unadorned. If you like Xinomavro—or Barbaresco--this is a fine overachiever that I liked more and more as it aired out. It is well worth seeking out. While approachable with some air, it is pretty tight. Drink 2013-2025" 

I predict there are some very happy winemakers in Greece right now.  It's nice someone is shining a little sun on them for a change.

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Vinho Verde and UTZ Crab Chips!

My favorite little Vinho Verde, Santola, with the Sand crab on the label is in the Washington Post today.  It certainly does go with crab.  We have even featured it alongside those awesome UTZ crab chips that are seasoned with Old Bay...Big Hit!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/food/bargain-bottles/2012/02/29/gIQAzfA4tT_story_1.html

Crab Chips and Vinho Verde, Yum!


Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Native Grapes at Elloinos

I have said it many times before...but I have to say it again.  Markus Stolz is doing an awesome job telling the story of Greek wines at his blog Elloinos  He has a wonderful index, complete with video, of many of the Greek grape varieties.  His latest post highlights some of the more unusual red varieties. 
http://www.elloinos.com/grape-varieties-from-greece/unsung-heroes-greek-red-wines?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&http://www.elloinos.com/grape-varieties-from-greece/unsung-heroes-greek-red-wines?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Elloinos+%28ELLOINOS%29