Merlokay

I had a chance last week to watch a screener copy of the documentary Merlove with Sean from Washington Wine Report (thanks again for hosting, Lindy). The movie was a little muddled (to be fair, the version we watched was not the final edit), but I think the point of the film was to rebut Miles’ now-famous “I am NOT drinking any f***ing Merlot!” line from Sideways and rescue this noble grape. The filmmakers certainly managed to get access to a wide variety of wine-world luminaries, and taken as a series of interviews, there were compelling moments. Taken as a film, the piece doesn’t entirely hang together, but it does touch on interesting issues: Parkerization, Merlot in California vs Washington, and wine culture in America vs Europe, to name a few. And for lovers of Washington wine, there are lots of chances to hear some of our brightest stars share their insights.

You would be incorrect if you think we watched this movie without drinking Merlot (or to put a finer point on it, Merlot-dominant blends). Here are tasting notes from the bottles opened:

2003 Baer Ursa – Rating 4

Drinking beautifully right now, this had a minty, herbal nose hovering over deep, sweet scents of blue fruit. Incredible mouthfeel: grainy, chalky, muddy texture and brilliant acids. Fresh blue fruit. Delicious.

2005 Soos Creek Sundance – Rating 3(?)

This improved with time open, and I think it has the potential for improvement. On this night, the oak was a little too prominent for my taste. Still, this is technically-excellent wine, with red raspberry and brown spices on the nose and rich red fruit on the palate. With time, the oak flavors integrated, and the palate shifted to caramel, coffee, and Dr. Pepper.

2005 Long Shadows Syrah Sequel – $30 @ Winebid.com

Earlier this week, I had one final evening class to finish up my grad program, and I was looking for a wine that would be waiting for me when I got home, ready to envelop me in its warm embrace. After perusing my CellarTracker inventory, I settled on the Sequel. Other tasting notes made it sound like the kind of rich, celebratory wine I was looking for, and at 14.7% alcohol, it looked like more of a cocktail wine than a dinner wine. In my case, it served as a digestif.

Rating: 4

Beautiful, evolving nose: first blackberry liqueur and grilled bread with butter; then bacon and smoke; then cocoa and funk, moving towards briney olives. Moderate acid and medium-low tannins. This is what a well-made, well-integrated, high-octane Syrah smells and tastes like, with oak as a supporting actor and not playing the lead role.

Long Shadows is a project brought to life by Allen Shoup, former CEO of Ste Michelle Estates. His vision has been to bring established, world-class winemakers to the northwest, to make wine with the best fruit Washington has to offer. Sequel is the Syrah project, and the consulting winemaker is John Duval. Duval made his name in Australia with Penfolds, but after stepping down in 2002, he was looking for his next great challenge. The “sequel” to his life’s work has been his collaboration with Long Shadows, and he has made Sequel since the 2003 vintage.

This normally retails in the $55 range, so when it showed up on Winebid for $30, I pounced. That, as it turns out, was a good decision.

2005 Beresan Stone River – $35 @ Cellar 46

Rating: 4

Fresh and compelling nose of dark fruit and soy, with background notes of coffee and purple flowers. Wonderfully plush mouthfeel, and the fruit here is so bright and fresh: loads of cranberries and pomegranate along with cedar notes. Long, mouthwatering finish of cinnamon and red fruit.

I picked this up after reading about it at Washington Wine Report, and I was not disappointed. This delicious blend of 35% Cabernet Sauvignon, 25% Syrah, 25% Merlot, and 15% Cabernet Franc is mostly estate fruit, with a dash of Pepper Bridge Syrah added to the mix.

Report from an All-Too-Brief Stop in Walla Walla

In between dodging rattlesnakes and climbing Palouse buttes over the long weekend, I managed to sneak in a few hours of wine-tasting in Walla Walla. If you want a more comprehensive report on the Walla Walla, check out Sean Sullivan’s sneak preview of his Spring Release report, the full version of which should come out soon. If you want to hear about the three wineries we had time to visit, read on.

JLC

For my money, this is the best under-the-radar winery in Washington. Every wine coming out of Spofford Station (the estate vineyards) the last few years seems to be outstanding, and the Syrahs are especially mind-boggling. The 2005 Syrah Spofford Station was recently released and was the highlight of the tasting for me. Smelling this wine is like walking into a diner at 9 AM on a Saturday; just waves of breakfast meats rolling out of the glass. At $32, this is very good quality-price-ratio territory.

Tamarack Cellars

After loving their 2006 DuBrul Vineyard Reserve at Taste Washington, I was intrigued to visit this winery, and I wasn’t disappointed. They were pouring an impressive lineup of wines, with the 2006 Merlot (pure, focused red fruit; $28), 2005 Syrah (peppered bacon, dark fruit; $28), and the DuBrul Reserve (the dark lord; black fruit and smoke; $50) as the standouts.

K Vintners

Charles Smith was alternately pouring and prepping for a visit from Jay Miller of Wine Advocate. The heavy hitters from this lineup were the 2007 The Boy Grenache (tons of earth and red fruit; $45), 2006 Guido (80% Sangiovese, 20% Syrah; massively tannic; needs time, but fascinating enough right now; $40), and 2007 Syrah Pheasant Vineyard ($35).

The Pheasant Syrah was a real show-stopper: an incredibly generous wine, with waves of blue and purple fruit. Pheasant Vineyard is one of the Wahluke Slope sites farmed by the Milbrandt brothers, and the quality of the fruit blew me away completely. This is actually one of K’s cheaper Syrahs, and I highly recommend it.

2005 Morrison Lane Cinsault – $27 @ Winery

Rating: 3

Loads of cherry licorice on the nose, and those aromas carried through on a fairly linear palate. A variety of brown spices and slight green notes also appeared on the palate: cumin, nutmeg, coriander. This was a palate-expander that is definitely worth trying, but I found it to be a little flat, and a little one-note.

Cinsault is a grape best known for its use as a blending varietal, especially in the Languedoc-Roussillon region in south-central France. Browsing CellarTracker, it looks like maybe 15-20 producers in the US and another 15-20 in France have tried bottling this grape varietally. I can see the attraction as a blender, because it would put some of those licorice and spice notes into the background instead of in the foreground.

Morrison Lane is a Walla Walla winery (and vineyard) that seems to have a soft-spot for grapes that are a bit on the fringes in Washington, including Roussanne, Nebbiolo, Carmenère, Cinsault, Counoise, Dolcetto, and Sangiovese. If you’re a bit bored with Cabs, Merlots, and Chardonnays, Morrison Lane would be a good place to check out!

1 Room, 2 Bloggers, 3 Wines

I had the pleasure last week of tasting through some wines with the sharp-palated Sean Sullivan of Washington Wine Report. Kelli and Sean’s friend Lindy rounded out our foursome, and Lindy was kind enough to host us. As per the usual routine, I won’t give numerical ratings to wines that were provided free of charge, but all three of these wines were great, each in its own way.

We started by drinking two wines side-by-side: NV Ensemble Cellars Release Two and 2005 Pomum Cellars Shya Red. Both are gorgeous Bordeaux blends. The Ensemble had a monstrous nose that exploded out of the glass with earth, tobacco, coffee, and dark fruit aromas. The palate was elegant, with everything in balance: good acid, more dark fruit, and a spicy cocoa finish. Ensemble makes just one wine, and it is a stunningly complicated blend of three vintages (2003-05), three grapes, and seven vineyards. I can only assume that blending trials require 762 glasses, 72 hours, and 1 Oracle database.

I didn’t take detailed notes on the Pomum since this was my second tasting of that wine, but whereas the Ensemble’s strengths were subtlety, finesse, and elegance, the Pomum exulted in its exuberance; in its big acids, its bright red fruits, its spice-cabinet finish.

We finished up with the 2006 Va Piano Syrah Estate Grown, a wine that I believe is only available to mailing list members. This had a crazy nose of charcoal, mushrooms, and flowers. The palate seemed a little disjointed, but we popped-and-poured and had to leave before this really had time to open up. It has the potential to evolve in some very interesting directions.

All told, a great night of tasting.

http://wawinereport.blogspot.com/

2007 Pacific Rim Riesling Wallula Vineyard – $19 @ McCarthy & Schiering

Rating: 4

Note: this is not the biodynamic version of the Wallula Riesling, which generally retails at more than $30.

Decadent nose of peaches that have just begun their noble decline towards rotting. On top of all that fruit and funk, there is a fresh, saline character to the nose that is gorgeous. On the palate, the fruit is in the background, and it’s the minerals and acid that shine. This is dry Riesling, and it’s awfully good.

2008 Syncline Rosé – $16 @ McCarthy & Schiering

Rating: 3

On the nose, strawberries and oregano, with hints of earth and caramel. Great juicy palate, with loads of bright red fruits and pineapple. A crowd-pleaser for sure.

My first rosé of the summer, and I picked a good one! This is a Southern Rhone blend – primarily Cinsault and Grenache, but with some Mourvedre and Counoise in the mix as well.

For some other perspectives on this wine, check out Thad’s review at Beyond the Bottle and Paul Gregutt’s take on his new blog. Not sure where my caramel note and Thad’s yeast note are coming from; this is all stainless steel with no malolactic fermentation. Any guesses?

2008 Sineann Gewürztraminer Celilo Vineyard – $20 @ McCarthy & Schiering

Rating: 3

Fresh, clean, nose with flowers, peaches, and cantaloupe. A fine steeliness on the palate and a prickly little finish that lingers. This is close to very good, but it’s a bit light on acid and hits a flat spot in the mid-palate. This showed better after 45 minutes open, which makes me think a few more months in the bottle would help.

With warm(er) weather hitting Seattle, it’s time to start exploring some of the whites and roses of the 2008 vintage. Sineann is a producer located in Oregon, but all these grapes come from Columbia Gorge AVA, on the Washington side of the border. Celilo Vineyard is a mini-Alsace in Washington, planted to Pinot Gris and Gewurtz, among others.

I consider this to be a Washington wine. What do others think? Oregon? Washegon? Oreington?

2006 Soos Creek Ciel du Cheval Vineyard – $35 @ Retail

Rating: 4

On the nose, purple fruit, mint, hints of tobacco and oak. Gorgeous acid and moderate tannins make for a lovely mouthfeel. Flavors are plummy, but there is also a persistently lovely orange peel note. Absolutely delicious. Two-thirds Cabernet Sauvignon, with the rest evenly split between Cabernet Franc and Merlot; all from Ciel du Cheval Vineyard on Red Mountain.

I tasted this during the winery-less wines seminar at Taste Washington, which had a panel that included David Larsen, who is the owner/winemaker at Soos Creek. He also has my father’s first name and my father-in-law’s last name, so maybe I was predisposed to like him and his wines. David came out of the Boeing Winemakers Club, which launched a number of Washington wineries. He mentioned during the panel that his wines tend to be food-friendly and relatively low on oak. His vineyard sources are impeccable, and I will definitely be seeking out more of his wines.