Posted by Neil Brody Miller on May 10, 2010
TasteCamp East 2010 participants enjoying Keuka Lake and Canandaigua Lake wines at Heron Hill Winery.
Here are some photos I took this past weekend at TasteCamp East 2010. I’m still reflecting on the experience, and will post an essay on this memorable event in the next day or two. In the mean time, please enjoy the photos!
Morgen McLaughlin and Lenn Thompson with George DiTomasso of Dr. Konstantin Frank Vinifera Wine Cellars at TasteCamp East 2010
Morten Hallgren of Ravines Wine Cellars, preaching the gospel of dry, vinifera table wines.
Seneca Lake Wine Mafia, from Left to Right: Tricia Renshaw of Fox Run, Peter Becraft of Anthony Road, Brandon Seager of Red Newt, Johannes Reinhardt of Anthony Road, and Peter Bell of Fox Run, at Red Newt Cellars.
A first taste of the 2007 Tierce before dinner at Red Newt Cellars.
Anthony Road winemaker Johannes Reinhardt, who clearly is more comfortable making great wines than talking about them.
Peter Bell, winemaker at Fox Run Vineyards, leads a tasting of Fox Run's library Rieslings.
Fred Merwarth, winemaker at Herman J. Wiemer Vineyard, leads a tasting of Wiemer's Reserve and vineyard-designated Rieslings.
The BYOB wines start flowing at the Stone Cat Cafe. The wines were great, the camaraderie was terrific, but the dinner menu was uninspired and overpriced.
Posted by Neil Brody Miller on June 22, 2009
One of the problems with reviewing wines is the “so much wine, so little time” syndrome (in truth, the problem is as much “so little money” as “so little time.”) Since I moved to Central New York last summer, I have wanted to try the many blends produced by Finger Lakes wineries, as well as the unique French-American hybrids grown in the region, like Seyval Blanc, Cayuga White, and Baco Noir. For reasons that I think are justifiable, however, I mostly have purchased and drank Rieslings and Gewurztraminers. So I was very happy when Andrew Bowman of Andrew’s Wine Cellar in Oswego (an obsessively over-stocked shop the size of a large walk-in closet), recommended the 2007 Red Newt Cellars Yellow Jail, which is a blend of 56% Pinot Gris, 24% Riesling, and 20% Gewurztraminer.
Red Newt took their inspiration for the Yellow Jail from wines like the Alsatian producer Hugel’s Gentil, an inexpensive white wine blended from Pinot Gris, Riesling, Gewurztraminer and less well known varietals like Muscat and Sylvaner. I had high hopes, accordingly, for the Yellow Jail, which I assumed would be a fragrant and exuberantly fruity wine, meant to be drunk young, that combined the aromatic qualities and exotic spiciness of Gewurztraminer with the creamy, full-bodied texture of Pinot Gris and the citrusy flavors and minerality of Riesling.
To my surprise and disappointment, the wine was neither fragrant nor particularly fruity. There was almost no aroma on the nose, so little in fact that I thought perhaps the wine was too cold, so I allowed it to warm up in the glass, and then poured another glass and repeated the process. I finally was able to get some faint apple and pear aromas, but nothing that indicated the presence of Gewurztraminer. On the palate, the wine was medium-bodied, with simple apple and pear flavors and the creamy texture and satisfying mouthfeel of Pinot Gris. I caught some citrusy notes and minerality from the Riesling on the slightly bitter finish. My overall impression of the wine, however, was that there was very little to comment on, and even less to get excited about. In such cases, it is often tempting to describe this as a “food friendly” wine, which is one of the wine trade’s most hackneyed phrases for a wine that doesn’t stand out on its own merits. No amount of well-prepared food, however, was going to compensate for this wine’s lack of personality.
Several possible explanations come to mind. First, it is possible that the wine was going through a “dumb” period. Wine after all is a living, organic beverage that changes continually over time, and it is possible that I caught this particular bottle at an awkward moment in its life cycle, in between the exuberant freshness of its youth and a more mature later stage. If so, this would help to explain the almost entire absence of aromas as well as the lack of personality. Gentil-style wines are meant to be drank young, however, and as this bottle was from the 2007 vintage, it seems unlikely either that it was “shocked,” the term used for recently bottled wines that are closed up and inaccessible, or that it was already experiencing a mid-life crisis.
A more reasonable explanation may be that the wine was blended from barrels left over from the selection process used for Red Newt’s other white wines. Red Newt acquires all of its grapes through contracts with neighboring vineyards. The best of these locally sourced grapes find their way into their highly rated, single vineyard Curry Creek Vineyards Pinot Gris and Curry Creek Vineyards and Sawmill Creek Vineyards Gewurztraminers, or into one of several bottlings of Riesling. Presumably, many barrels of wine were left over from the selection process for these wines, and I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that the best of the remaining barrels, “best” here being a relative term, found their way into the Yellow Jail. A third, less palatable possibility is that some of the wine used in the Yellow Jail, particularly the Gewurztraminer, whose presence in the wine was most notable by the absence of any tell-tale aromas or flavors, was over fined or filtered in the winery, and stripped of much of its varietal character.
Whatever the explanation, I wasn’t thrilled with this wine, which bore little resemblance to the fragrant, tasty, and reliably inexpensive Hugel Gentil, which year in, year out remains Alsace’s best bargain-value wine. At $14.99, however, the Yellow Jail was as expensive as some very good Finger Lakes Rieslings and Gewurztraminers that in my opinion deliver a lot more pleasure and varietal character for the buck. In addition to their single vineyard white wines, Red Newt produces outstanding Cabernet Francs and other red wines, as well as Tierce, the highly acclaimed Riesling co-produced with the Fox Run and Anthony Road wineries (I have heard that the 2007 Tierce will be a red wine). Red Newt also recently released a very good, reasonably priced “Circle” Riesling. Which is to say that I don’t think this particular bottling of the Yellow Jail is representative of the overall quality of Red Newt’s wines. It’s just a clean, non-descript wine that left me unimpressed.
Posted by Neil Brody Miller on June 19, 2009
One of the biggest surprises of the “World Riesling Smackdown” held last month at the Savvy Wine Cellar was how much our customers liked Australian Rieslings. As noted in my previous entry, our customers seem to prefer off-dry to totally dry Rieslings. Over the course of Riesling week, however, customers consistently voted the 2008 Leasingham Magnus Riesling their favorite wine, even when tasted alongside local favorites like the 2007 Dr. Frank Dry Riesling and the 2007 Herman J. Wiemer Johannisburg Riesling Dry. In comparison, the 2008 Leasingham Magnus was noticeably drier than either the Dr. Frank or Wiemer Rieslings, as was the other Australian wine tasted that week, the 2008 Marquis Philips Baby Roogle Riesling. The unexpected popularity of the Leasingham Magnus piqued my interest in Australian Rieslings, which have received a lot of attention from the wine media, and led me to look further into what makes these wines unique.
The 2008 Leasingham Magnus Riesling is sourced from grapes grown in Australia’s Clare Valley, a cool, dry, hilly region of South Australia northwest of the Barossa Valley that produces many of Australia’s finest Rieslings. Data on the 2008 Magnus Riesling is unavailable on-line and Leasingham failed to respond to two requests for information, but based on other recent vintages, the Leasingham Magnus Riesling averages around 0.3% or 3g/l of residual sugar (RS), which is significantly lower than the 2007 Dr. Frank and Wiemer Dry Rieslings, both of which contain 0.9% or 9g/l RS. As is typical of Australian Rieslings, the Leasingham Magnus also averages a higher alcohol level than Finger Lakes Rieslings of around 13.0%, with roughly similar acidity and pH levels.
All of these factors – RS, alcohol level, acidity and pH – impact how a wine tastes, and therefore the perception of a wine’s sweetness or dryness. As I understand it, sweetness is attributable to both a wine’s sugar and alcohol levels, while acidity, which is measurable in terms of a wine’s total acidity (TA) and pH, along with the level of bitter compounds called polyphenols, are responsible for the perception of dryness. According to this formula, therefore, the higher alcohol level in the Leasingham Magnus ought at least partially to balance out the lower sugar level. Yet in my tasting, and in the opinion of many customers I spoke with at the wine shop, the Leasingham Magnus tasted significantly drier than the Dr. Frank or Wiemer Rieslings.
This perceived difference is all the more interesting given the fact that Australian and Finger Lakes Rieslings share many common taste characteristics. Like Finger Lakes Riesling, Australian Rieslings, especially wines produced in the Clare Valley, are characterized by lemon-lime flavors, crisp acidity and a distinctive minerality. As is often the case with Finger Lakes Rieslings, it is similarly difficult to describe Australian Rieslings without having frequent recourse to descriptive terms like “tart,” “tangy,” “intense,” “lively,” “lean” or “bracing.” My tasting notes for the Leasingham Magnus and Baby Roogle Rieslings are a case in point.
2008 Leasingham Magnus Clare Valley Riesling
Pale straw. Subdued nose of grapefruit, pear, wet stone, and floral notes. Tangy green apple and lemon-lime flavors, grapefruit pith, with a wave of astringent minerality towards the finish. Medium bodied, lively, and crisp; moderately long finish; well balanced except for the intense burst of minerality.
2008 Marquis Philips Baby Roogle Riesling
Pale lemon color. Strong lemon and grapefruit rind/zest aromas; slate/chalk on the nose with some creamy/yeasty notes. Light-bodied, tart citrus with some rounder tropical guava flavors; balanced fruit and acidity. Slight hint of sweetness towards the finish. Overall, clean, not terribly complex, a bit lacking in personality. Would probably go better with food.
Personally, I found both wines drier than I prefer. I tasted them again, however, with a meal of chicken sausage with thyme and sun-dried tomato, pan fried with Vidalia onion, red and green bell peppers, and garlic, and both wines tasted fruitier than they did on their own, the Leasingham Magnus more so than the Roogle Riesling.
This still leaves unanswered the question of why customers best liked the Leasingham Magnus Riesling. There is no simple answer to this question, I suspect, although it may have something to do with the wine’s 12.5% alcohol level. The tart citrus flavors, intense minerality, and crisp acidity were recognizably similar to Finger Lakes Riesling, with which customers were already familiar. The 12.5% alcohol level of the Leasingham Magnus, however, especially in comparison to the 11.7% alcohol level of the Dr. Frank Dry Riesling, may have given the Leasingham Magnus a bigger, fuller mouthfeel, which customers perceived as a more flavorful wine. I am speculating here, but it doesn’t seem overly farfetched to assume that a wine’s alcohol level interacts with its other constituent elements in ways that may be difficult to describe and perhaps impossible to quantify, but which nevertheless influence customers’ taste experiences and perceptions of a wine. Although it may seem like common sense that a wine is more than the sum of its parts, no one, as far as I know, has yet unpacked the dynamic, synergistic interrelationship of a wine’s key components.
Comparing Australian and Finger Lakes wines, finally, led me to reflect on why I find semi-dry Rieslings more appealing than dry Rieslings. The short answer, I believe, is botrytis. Although botrytis is most closely associated with late harvest dessert wines, which depend on noble rot to concentrate flavors and create the unctuous texture of BAs and TBAs, botrytized grapes also impart honeyed aromas and flavors to semi-dry and semi-sweet table wines that significantly offset the overly tart flavors and biting acidity of many dry Rieslings, more so perhaps than high levels of residual sugar or alcohol. Botrytized grapes, I believe, are largely responsible for the enchantingly delicious aromas and flavors of semi-dry and semi-sweet Finger Lakes and German Rieslings. In fact, according to the Oxford Companion to Wine, botrytis (also known as botrytis bunch rot) causes a series of complex chemical transformations in grapes, reducing acid levels, breaking down bitter tasting polyphenols, and increasing the sugar to acid ratio, all of which dramatically alter a wine’s taste.
The key factor that distinguishes Australian Rieslings, then, especially wines from the Clare Valley, from Finger Lakes Rieslings, appears to be climatic conditions that promote or hinder the formation of botrytis. The Finger Lakes do more than provide the surrounding vineyards with a moderating warmth that prolongs hangtime and allows the grapes to ripen more fully. They also generate a lot of humidity, most visibly in the low-lying morning fog that often rolls off the Lakes into the surrounding fields and countryside. For winemakers, this ambient moisture can be either a curse or a blessing, as too much humidity, like too much rain, promotes grey rot, which can quickly destroy a crop. Under favorable conditions, however, this ambient moisture aids in the growth and spread of noble rot, and allows winemakers to produce extraordinary wines like the 2008 BA and TBA dessert wines I tasted recently at Anthony Road Wine Company.
The key climatic conditions of the Clare Valley, alternately, seem to be the threat of excessive heat rather than cold, and dryness rather than wetness, both of which hinder the formation of botrytis. Rains in the region occur primarily in the winter months, when the vines are dormant. Australian winemakers accordingly seem more concerned with prolonged or excessive heat or drought during the growing season, which necessitates irrigation of the vineyard, then with unwelcome rains before or during the harvest. Another key issue seems to be whether the evenings will be cool enough to moderate hot daytime temperatures and allow the grapes to achieve high enough levels of natural acidity. Local conditions in the Clare Valley, therefore, appear to be nearly the opposite of the Finger Lakes, with heat and dryness, rather than cold and wetness, causing the greatest concern. These same climatic conditions, moreover, seem best suited to produce the tartly citric, relatively alcoholic dry Rieslings for which the region is famous. For my money, I still prefer a nicely honeyed, semi-dry Finger Lakes Riesling.
Admittedly, I know even less about viticulture than I do of enology, which isn’t much, so I may be completely wrong about all of this. At the very least, however, the questions prompted by tasting and comparing Australian and Finger Lakes Rieslings are further evidence of Riesling’s unique ability to reward philosophical speculation, and to stimulate intellectual activity alongside the simple, carnal pleasure of drinking wine.
Posted by Neil Brody Miller on June 1, 2009
I promised that my next entry would be a review of the 2005 Heron Hill Ingle Vineyard Riesling, and in part I am going to keep that promise. My thoughts for the past week, however, have turned largely to the topic of residual sugar in Rieslings, due in part to a couple of reviews of Finger Lakes wines by David Schildknecht, originally published in the Wine Advocate #178 (August, 2008), that I recently came across on eRobertParker.com. In his review of the 2007 Herman J. Wiemer Johannisberg Riesling Dry, Schildknecht writes, “As usual in the region, I found myself drawn to the 2007 Riesling Dry rather than its ‘semi-dry’ counterpart. Finger Lakes Riesling cannot support residual sugar in the manner of German Riesling.” Again, of the 2007 Anthony Road Semi-Dry Riesling, Schildknecht writes, “I generally find Finger Lakes Riesling to be extremely sensitive to residual sugar, and certainly this genre is incapable of the ‘disappearing act’ at high levels of residual sugar for which it [sic] German counterparts are justly renowned.”
Schildknecht is a very good wine writer, and I always look forward to his annual reviews of German wines. In this instance, however, I beg to differ with him. In the last couple of months I have tasted a lot of Finger Lakes Rieslings, at the Rendezvous with Riesling event, at The Savvy Wine Cellar, where this past week I taught a wine class on Rieslings and held a “World Riesling Smackdown” as part of our week-long contribution to the Finger Lakes “May is Riesling Month” celebration, and at home, both for personal pleasure and for Stressing the Vine. All this Riesling tasting, along with Schildknecht’s comments, got me thinking generally about residual sugar, and more specifically about its role in Finger Lakes Rieslings.
First, I suspect that wines from the 2008 vintage may alter Schildknecht’s opinion on the subject. I recently tasted the 2008 Anthony Road Semi-Dry Riesling and their 2008 Semi-Sweet Riesling at the winery, and both wines were outstanding, with rich, ripe fruit flavors and high enough acidity levels to balance out the residual sugar, which was listed respectively at 2.6% and 3.8%. The most extraordinary wines I tasted, however, were barrel samples of several 2008 Riesling, Pinot Gris and Vignoles BAs and TBAs (Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese), which rank as the finest dessert wines from an American producer that I have ever tasted. Johannes Reinhardt, the head winemaker at Anthony Road, stated that the residual sugar levels for the BAs and TBAs came in, respectively, at around 150 grams/liter and 240 grams/liter. Despite these high sugar levels, which could easily produce treacly, cloying wines, the acidity was high enough to balance out the sugar and provide the sense of structure and palate-cleansing finish that Schildknecht, if I understand him correctly, finds lacking in sweet Finger Lakes Rieslings.
Anthony Road BAs and TBAs in cold storage.
In contrast to Schildknecht, my general impression of dry Finger Lakes Rieslings is that they often seem less well structured, less balanced, and less pleasurable than semi-dry or semi-sweet wines from the same producer. The most typical characteristics of Finger Lakes Rieslings are their pronounced lemon-lime flavors, high acidity, and intense minerality. Without sufficient residual sugar to counterbalance these elements, the driest Finger Lakes Rieslings often come across as light-bodied, tart and lean, and overly pithy and flinty on the finish. It’s been some time since I’ve tasted a good, dry Alsatian Riesling, but I have no similar recollections of the bone-dry wines I used to enjoy from Trimbach or Domaine Ostertag. Many of the overseas Rieslings I served this past week, moreover, such as the 2007 Leasingham Magnus Riesling (Clare Valley, Australia), the 2007 Marquis Philips Roogle Riesling (Southeastern Australia), and the 2007 Schloss Gobelsburg Gobelsburger Riesling (Kamptal, Austria), came across as totally or near totally dry, but with a fuller, more satisfying mouthfeel, a broader range of stone, pit, and tropical fruit flavors, better integrated minerality, and a less astringent finish. The 2007 Herman J. Wiemer Johannisberg Riesling Dry and the 2007 Dr. Frank Dry Riesling fared comparatively well against these wines, but I found both wines to be rounder and more full bodied than is typical of dry Finger Lakes Rieslings.
Part of the problem, I believe, is that the popular focus on residual sugar oversimplifies the subject. From the winemaker’s perspective dryness and sweetness are technical issues that boil down to Brix units, the number of grams per liter of sugar, the levels of different types of acidity, the ratio of residual sugar to total acidity, a wine’s pH, etc., all of which are further complicated by a range of oenological issues, such as whether to chaptalize a wine or to add additional acidity. For wine drinkers, however, dryness and sweetness are primarily if not entirely matters of perception, of what the wine actually tastes like in the glass, which may or may not correspond neatly or accurately to a wine’s technical specifications. And this, I think, is the key point. The perception of dryness and sweetness involves more factors than a wine’s level of residual sugar or the ratio of residual sugar to total acidity. The presence and predominance of certain fruit flavors, the perceived level and type of a wine’s minerality, and the overall mouthfeel, just to name a few obvious factors, also influence the perception of dryness or sweetness.
As far as I know, the closest anyone has come to addressing the perception of dryness or sweetness is the Riesling Taste Profile recently proposed by the International Riesling Foundation (IRF), which establishes a sliding scale to be used by winemakers for classifying their wines as Dry-Medium Dry-Medium Sweet-Sweet. The strength of the Taste Profile is that it standardizes criteria for determining “the approximate perceived sweetness level of Rieslings.” The drawback, as I see it, is that the Taste Profile remains fundamentally technical and quantitative, involving the measurement by winemakers of “sugar-to-acid ratios” and “pH adjustments.” The IRF also acknowledges that additional factors like alcohol level and the forms of sugar present in a wine (glucose, fructose, etc.), influence the perception of sweetness and may need to be included in a revised formulation of the Tasting Profile. More complex formulations will be meaningless, however, and of no more practical benefit than German wine classifications, if they do not correspond to wine drinkers’ qualitative perceptions of sweetness. And to do that, I believe, a way will have to be found to incorporate factors like fruitiness, minerality, and weight or mouthfeel into the determination of a wine’s sweetness.
Bottle Labeling for the IRF Riesling Taste Profile.
Which brings me, finally, to my review of the 2005 Heron Hill Ingle Vineyard Riesling. Straw yellow in the glass with occasional yellow-green glints, the wine began with floral notes and aromas of honeyed apple and pear, which were followed by flavors of candied orange and lemon rind and white melon. Light bodied, fragrant, and flavorful, the finish was long and clean with a hint of citrus pith, and a touch of sweetness nicely balanced against the wine’s stony minerality and crisp acidity. I noticed a bit of creaminess on the finish, which I first detected on the nose, which makes me wonder whether the wine was left on the lees during fermentation. In terms of sweetness, however, the wine’s residual sugar seemed to be a moot point. As with many Finger Lakes Rieslings, including wines labeled Dry or Semi-Dry, the level of residual sugar was barely perceptible. Clearly the wine was off-dry, but the sweetness was neither pronounced nor dominant. Rather, it served primarily to enhance the wine’s other characteristics, rounding out and balancing the tart citrus flavors and stony minerality, and providing a fuller and more satisfying weight and mouthfeel. My overall impression, which is true generally of Finger Lakes Rieslings, is that residual sugar most often becomes an issue when it is noticeably lacking. In the 2005 Ingle Vineyard Riesling, it plays a critical, supporting role that, were it absent, would otherwise have resulted in a far less enjoyable wine .
The key issue for Finger Lakes Rieslings, then, is not the amount of residual sugar, but the quality and dominant characteristics of a wine’s fruit flavors, the intensity of its minerality, and the nature and level of its acidity. In the wine shop, it is the customers’ perceptions that count. And most wine drinkers it appears, myself included, find well-made, off-dry Finger Lakes Rieslings more pleasurable, and ultimately more memorable, than their lean, dry siblings.
Nothing beats a sunny afternoon on the back porch with a nice glass of Riesling.
Posted by Neil Brody Miller on May 17, 2009
The New York Wine and Culinary Center hosted its third annual Rendezvous with Riesling celebration this past Friday evening, May 15, 2009, at its facility in Canandaigua, NY. About 40 New York State wineries were on hand to sample recent vintages of their Rieslings and other wines, including most Finger Lakes wineries and several winemakers from Long Island, Lake Erie, and the Hudson River region, along with a handful of New York State cheesemakers and food producers. Entertainment was provided by the Brad Batz Group, a jazz ensemble that performed on the second floor balcony.
Before arriving, I decided to forego tasting wines with which I was already familiar, or that we carry at The Savvy Wine Cellar, in order to conserve my palate for less familiar wineries and for the Finger Lakes Library Rieslings tasting. This strategy worked well overall, although I later sadly realized that I neglected to check out the 2006 Tierce at the Fox Run table, which was my only regret of the evening. Of the wines I sampled, I was most impressed with the dry and semi-dry Rieslings of Anthony Road Wine Co. The 2007 Martini-Reinhart Selection Riesling displayed classic Finger Lakes aromas and flavors of citrus and stone fruits, a big, satisfying mouthfeel, crisp minerality, and a long, clean finish. The Anthony Road 2007 Dry Riesling and 2008 Semi-Dry Riesling were also both outstanding, and confirmed for me the very good reviews these wines recently received from the Wine Spectator as well as their top honors at several international wine competitions. I also particularly enjoyed the 2007 and 2008 Rieslings from Standing Stone Vineyards, which were well made, nicely balanced wines that displayed rich, ripe aromas and fruit flavors. The biggest surprise, however, turned out to be the 2007 Keuka Spring Vineyards Gewürtraminer, which delivered a pungent Alsatian-style bouquet of lychee nut and rose petals, backed up with ripe mango and pineapple flavors.
Anthony Road Wine Co. poured my favorite wines of the evening.
The highpoint of the evening was the Finger Lakes Library Rieslings tasting, held in the NYWCC theater, which featured three flights of older Rieslings from Dr. Frank, Herman J. Wiemer, Glenora, Ravines, Fox Run, and Red Newt, along with a panel discussion moderated by Lorraine Hems, a certified Sommelier and full-time instructor in the Hospitality and Service Management Department at the Rochester Institute of Technology. Other panel participants included Evan Dawson, a Finger Lakes correspondent for LENNDEVOURS, the well known weblog on New York State wines; Morten Hallgren, winemaker at Ravines Wine Cellars; and Jason Wentworth of Northside Wine & Spirits in Ithaca.
The Library wines were arranged in three flights, with the oldest wines served first. The first flight consisted of the 1997 Dr. Frank Dry Johannisberg Riesling, and the 2000 and 2001 Glenora Dry Riesling. The 1997 Frank Dry Johannisberg Riesling started off with petrol, caramel, and guava on the nose, before displaying good citrus/tropical fruit flavors with a bit of creme brulee, an unctuous texture balanced nicely against a still bracing acidity, and a long, steely finish. Despite a decade of bottle age, the wine tasted surprisingly youthful. In contrast, the 2000 and 2001 Glenora Dry Rieslings were fast approaching the limits of their maturity. Both wines revealed complex floral bouquets, with the 2000 Dry Riesling offering a softer texture and flavors of apricots and orange pith, while the 2001 Dry Riesling displayed a bit better structure and acidity.
Lorraine Hems leads the panel discussion of Finger Lakes Library Rieslings.
Tasting consecutive vintages of the Glenora Dry Riesling back-to-back engendered a fascinating discussion between Evan Dawson and Morten Hallgren about seasonal variation, viticulture, and winemaking that continued into the second flight, which began with the 2002 and 2003 Red Newt Cellars Riesling Reserve. Although both wines offered floral notes and classic, if somewhat tart lemon-lime flavors, the discussion quickly turned to the noticeable differences between the warm 2002 and the cooler 2003 growing seasons. Even more so than comparison of the wines themselves, the panel discussion, which by now included Red Newt winemaker Dave Whiting, Tricia Renshaw and Peter Bell of Fox Run, and other members of the audience, reinforced my appreciation of Riesling’s unparalleled ability to manifest the circumstances of its production. With the possible exception of Pinot Noir, no other varietal so transparently reveals the complex interrelationship between climate, location, and winemaking style, or more fully rewards intellectual effort and understanding as a condition of its enjoyment.
After the two Red Newt Reserve Rieslings, the second flight concluded with the 2003 Herman J. Wiemer Reserve Dry Johannisberg Riesling. Not surprisingly, the wine was delicious, with a nice balance between its tropical fruit flavors, flinty minerality, and crisp acidity. The final flight consisted of two wines, the 2004 Ravines Dry Riesling, and the 2004 Fox Run Riesling. The 2004 Ravines Dry Riesling already was showing its age, with molasses/burnt sugar on the nose, tart citrus fruit, and some interesting white pepper, ginger, and yeasty notes on the finish (Morten Hallgren later revealed that the wine had been fermented sur lie, which explains the yeastiness). With an enticing bouquet of honeyed apple, lilac, and petrol, and a nice balance between its citrus flavors and stony minerality, the 2004 Fox Run Riesling turned out to be my favorite wine of the Library Rieslings tasting.
NYWCC Executive Chef Carlo Peretti dishes up one of several delicious risottos.
A final word about the evening’s food. Throughout the gala, NYWCC Executive Chef Carlo Peretti and another hardworking, talented young chef served up a series of delicious risottos, the best of which, at least of the dishes I sampled, was a risotto prepared with roasted cauliflower and zucchini. Their efforts, however, constituted the only real effort by the NYWCC to provide “delicious hors d’oeuvres” for the guests’ enjoyment, as per the promotional literature. The rest of the evening’s victuals, which were provided by local and New York State vendors, consisted primarily of pretzels and dips, quarter-sized slices of grilled sausage, and Cheddar cheese, lots and lots of Cheddar cheese. While McCadam, Yancey’s Fancy, and Muranda produce award-winning cheeses, their products may all be found at the local supermarket. Garlic flavored and Extra Sharp Cheddars, moreover, are not the first cheeses that come to mind when pairing cheese with Rieslings, which makes it all the more surprising that none of New York State’s artisanal producers like Old Chatham were present. I, presumably like most of the attendees, came for the Rieslings. The food, however, the excellent risottos notwithstanding, was a disappointment. Certainly, the New York Wine and Culinary Center can and should make a better effort than this for future celebrations of New York State’s outstanding wine and food culture.
Next: Review of the 2005 Heron Hill Ingle Vineyard Riesling
Posted by Neil Brody Miller on May 12, 2009
I thought it would be appropriate to kick off my blog with a wine from the Mosel Valley, the gold standard for world-class Rieslings. By all accounts Germany produced spectacular wines in 2007, so I was doubly excited that my first wine from this vintage came from the Wehlener Sonnenuhr vineyard, famous for producing elegant wines with great balance and finesse. Although Studert-Prüm is not generally regarded as the equal of J. J. Prüm, Heribert Kerpen, or other top German winemakers, the quality of their 2007 Wehlener Sonnenuhr Kabinett more than confirmed the greatness of the vintage, and left me anxious to sample other 2007s from the Middle Mosel.
In the glass, Studert-Prüm’s 2007 Wehlener Sonnenuhr Kabinett is a shimmering, pale straw yellow. The nose offers up a pronounced bouquet of candied ginger, honeysuckle, and peach skin, with aromas of dried apricot, freshly picked Golden Delicious apples, and lemon zest. On the palate the wine is medium-bodied, with flavors of ripe Anjou pear and honeyed figs, an unctuous texture more typical of a Spätlese than a Kabinett, and a hint of steely minerality and grapefruit rind on the moderately short finish.
Most memorably, the wine displays a remarkable balance between its ripe fruit flavors, residual sugar, and surprisingly soft acidity. It is all sensuous curves rather than elbows and knees, with no trace of the acidic bite often found in lesser quality Kabinetts or Q.b.A. wines. This is most likely what Terry Theise had in mind when he wrote of the 2007 vintage, the “Fruit runs malic, but ripe-malic. Not Granny Smith apples, but Cox-Orange Pippins.” The lasting impression is of extraordinary harmony and gracefulness, with each flavor and textural component remaining recognizably distinct while collectively achieving a near perfect integration. I love and intend to continue enjoying Rieslings from the Finger Lakes and other regions, but one rarely finds such a seductive or compelling instance of harmony and balance from anywhere other than the Mosel, and only then in an exceptional vintage like 2007.
The 2007 Studert-Prüm Wehlener Sonnenuhr Kabinett Riesling is most likely widely available in the larger cities. Here in Central New York, however, German and Alsatian wines, especially from the better producers, are somewhat scarce. Props are due, therefore, to Tim Buckles of The Wine House in Manlius, who recommended this wine from his small but well chosen selection of German Rieslings. Tim, along with his wife Sarah, are the friendly and knowledgeable co-proprietors of this well stocked, boutique wine shop.
I want to sign off of this, my inaugural blog entry, with a visual cue of things to come. “May is Riesling Month” here in the Finger Lakes region, and I intend to make the most of it.
