To dump or not to dump, that is the question…
The day before yesterday, I decided to pull out a bottle from my less-than-perfectly-stored stash. Now I’m not keeping these bottles on top of the fridge, or in the cabinet right in front of that radiator. No, these are in my semi-underground basement, laying flat of course, and for the most part away from vibrations and light, but I’ve long ago outgrown my 30 and 60 bottle wine fridges, and clearly I’m not going to stop buying wine (perish the thought), even for mid- to long-term drinking. So with little recourse, I buy, and try to manage what I’ve got in these less than optimal conditions in the most intelligent matter to minimize losses.
So with some Chicken Cordon Bleu leftover from my wife’s sister-in-law’s baby shower, I decided to take a sort of “core sample” of what was on the shelf. After a few minutes of yanking and clinking bottles, I selected a 1999 Grand Cru Chablis that I’d been eyeing and wondering about for some months. ANd thinking that it might make a good match for the chicken, I pulled the bottle and chilled it down.
And so my wife and I sat down to eat. I screwed the cork, and unfortunately, the cork returned the favor and screwed me…in a very strange way by the way…I sunk the augur shaft-deep in the cork as usual. I set the lever (it’s a “Pulltaps”) and began the extraction. With the cork about half way out, I heard a marked “POP!”…as the cork came free from glass, I noticed that the bottom third or so of the cork had compeletely broken off, and was literally “sucked” into the bottle (that was the source of the popping sound). This was not a good sign…
Pouring out the wine was no problem (the cork floated free of the neck allowing the wine to pass it by freely), but the second the wine hit the glass, I was concerned. The color. Now while Chardonnay (Chablis is 100% Chardonnay) is known for it’s fairly deep golden color, this one was decidely tawny gold color. Oh oh. And then the first sniff. There was defintely some fruit left there - lemon peel and apricot predominantly, but there was more than a little of that characteristic nutty/twangy/moldy melange of aromas that points to only one thing - OXIDATION! (a.k.a. “Madeirized”).
Now here’s the point of all this verbiage…what’s a wine boy to do? Drink or pitch? In certain cases, the call is easy to make. When wines have been exposed to more than X amount of oxygen for more than Y amount of time, the wine is irretrievably shot. There is no (expected) pleasure to be derived from such a wine - I write “expected” because if one likes actual Madeira, there is often little to actually dislike in an oxidized wine, but clearly, Pinot Gris or Verdicchio is not supposed to taste like a Sercial or Bual. The case here was the very definition of “borderline” - the wine was obviously oxidized, but not so much so that it was utterly undrinkable.
So what did we do? We drank it. We looked at it as a learning experience. It’s not often that one encounters a wine on such a cusp, so for me, and especially my wife, it was an opportunity to drink what some might euphemistically call “highly evolved”. What’s a bit funny is that the wine actually paired quite well with the chicken, picking up quite nicely on the cheese component…
Unfortunately, I cannot give anyone an ironclad guide to “To dump or not to dump”, but as with so may things, let common sense rule - if the wine is still enjoyable to some degree, drink it (it won’t make you sick). If however, with each sniff and sip, you’re pulling the glass away from your face, or wrinkling up your nose, or just plain, old gagging, dump it. If however you’re more nonplussed than displeased, take such a situation to make lemonade from the lemon you’ve uncorked.
TOM CIOCCO
The added costs of bubbles
Upon scanning the shelves of any given wine shop in anytown, anywhere, the question “Why are sparkling wines so expensive?” surely has come to the minds of many patrons. Let me clarify - not ALL sparklers - there are indeed some really cheap, bad sparkling wines on the market, in fact probably percentually more than for still wines, but that’s another post…But really, seeing $30, $40, $50 and up bottles are commonplace amongst the ranks of bubblies. Now to be fair, most of these examples are true Champagnes, and to some degree, the prices of Champagnes are inflated due to large degree of “sizzle” that come with actual “steak” (i.e. you are, to one degree or another, paying for the wine’s reputation).
But setting Champagnes aside for now, there is actually a real, economically-based reason for these extra dollars (or Euros, Yen, etc.) and despite the fact that all of these elements are there to be seen by any drinker, most never notice, or at least never make the connection. Let’s start from the “top”…Both still and sparkling wines come packed with capsules (the material that covers the neck and cork), but there is frequently a BIG difference between the two. Still wine capsules are usually about two to three inches long, and even on fairly expensive wines, can be made from some pretty flimsy plastic material. Now have a look at the sparkler’s capsule. More often than not it is made from metal, not plastic, it is ornately printed, and includes a “apron” than reach halfway to the middle of the bottle.
And so we go ahead and remove the respective capsules. With the still wine we find a cork sunken into a glass neck, nothing more. With the sparkler, we encounter a little colored metal medallion with the winery’s name and logo. This little doodad is being clamped to the top of the cork by a twisted steel “cage” which is most properly called a “muzzle”. This apparatus is mandated by law for any wine that contains more than X amount of CO2 dissolves therein.
And speaking of corks…the still wine’s cork, once we’ve intoduced augur to plug, is revealed to be about “this” long, and is usually cut from one single piece of cork. Once we’ve removed the muzzle and the medallion from the sparkler we encounter a bulbous cork that once it is removed, reveals itself to be about twice the size and weight. Looking more closely, one then sees that the cork might be made from as many as three separate “glued” together pieces - the mushroom “cap”, the “stem”, and where the wine comes into contact with the cork, a 5 or 6 millimeter-thick disc of different quality cork material…
We lift the bottle on the left, and pour ourselves a glass of the still wine (it’s very good by the way, just in case you’re imagining along at home). Now you pick up the bottle of the sparkling wine to do the same, and immediately notice that the bottle is noticeably fatter and heavier (this extra thick glass is mandated for safety reasons)…(this wine is also quite delicious, by the way…).
I think it’s pretty clear where I’m going with this - EVERYTHING about at least the packaging of sparkling wines is more expensive than it is for the packaging of still wines: bigger, fancier, capsule; the addition of a medallion and a muzzle; the bigger, compound cork; the thicker, fatter, heavier bottle…all of these things add up to one thing: $$$! And these are just the obvious extra costs…If you’ve got bigger fatter bottles, that means that the boxes in which you ship those bottles have to just that much bigger and more rubust…this also = more $$$. OK, now you’ve got these bigger, heavier packages - shipping that added weight does not come without a price - added product weight also = more $$$. Then to all of this, at least here in the good old U.S. of A., add extra taxes to the equation. For whatever reason, there probably is, or at least was, a good reason to tax sparkling wines at a higher rate, and I’ll admit that I don’t really know precisely why it is done, but the fact still remains that sparkling wines are assessed at a higher taxation rate.
So without further belaboring of the point, the reasons for the extra dollars on the price tags of sparkling wines are there to be seen for those who will but look…some of the more prestigious appellations may indeed be tacking on a Euro or ten in reaction to both the demand and cache` of their products, but the REAL added costs of producing, bottling, and shipping sparkling wines have EVRYTHING to do with what is quantifiable, not what is intangible.
TOM CIOCCO
Groppello - a warmth from the north
…and the “RARE GRAPE SERIES” continues…
Today we take a short look at GROPPELLO. The Groppello variety is found in several pockets in north-central Italy, specifically in the provinces of Vicenza, Verona, and Treviso in Veneto, the provinces of Brescia and Bergamo in Lombardia, and various dispersed areas in the region of Trentino. Though fairly well-diffused, the variety’s original homeland seems to be at or around Lake Garda which straddles the border of the regions of Lombardia and Veneto.
The name “Groppello” seems to be derived from the local dialect word “grop” or “groppo” meaning “knot” or “node” which is a clear reference to the tightness of the berries in the bunches. As is the case with many varieties, there are a couple of distinct branches in the Gropello family. One of these is named Groppello Gentile. This sub-variety is used primarily in the production of rose` wines. The other side of the family is called Groppello di Mocasina. This vine yields wines with greater intensity and weight, and consequently is most often used in the production of red wines. Neither of the branches is more prevalent in one geographical zone than another, and in fact, both sub-varieties are cultivated in all of the grape’s growing zones, and at times, they are planted cheek by jowl, and are even blended together by some growers.
Groppello plays a role in three northern Italian DOCs: Riviera del Garda Bresciano in Lombardia, Breganze Rosso in Veneto, a varietal bottling called Garda Classico Gropello DOC, as well as a component in the Garda Rosso red blends that can also include Marzemino, Barbera and Sangiovese This wine is also produced in Veneto.
In the vineyard, Groppello is quite hardy with good resistence to both cold temperatures and most of the common vine diseases. Due to the variety’s very tight berry bunches however, Gropello can be somewhat prone to contracting molds in wetter years.
In the glass Groppello has quite a “warm”, rich, and round character a with medium acidity and good weight. The variety most often displays flavors and aromas of strawberries and spice.
Currently, we’re stocking just one Groppello (and I must admit, it’s the only pure Gropello I’ve ever tasted, or even know of - though I have encountered it before in the Garda Rosso blend), but this wine arrived at our doorstep TODAY, so I haven’t yet had the chance to make formal tasting notes…I’m planning however on getting them written over the weekend, so check back Monday for my impressions…in the meantime, I encourage everyone out there to pick up a bottle and beat me to the punch by posting YOUR tasting notes here in the comments field.
TOM CIOCCO
The joys of the “vertical”
By “vertical”, I don’t mean standing upright on ones own two feet (though this position does allow for such useful actions as walking to go get another bottle of wine), but rather having in one’s possession 3 or more bottles of consecutive vintages of a particular wine. Obviously this assumes that one “collects” or stores fair amounts of wine in one place or another, but in these days, that includes more and more people, so the “vertical” is a reality for greater numbers of “serious” wine drinkers, and in my mind, it is one of the hallmarks of the “advanced” oenophile…
Many of the following points may be old news for the old hands out there, but for some, it might not be, and so we go…Most drinkers who lay down verticals are doing so with “culty” labels. The tacit assumption with these cult wines is that they will increase in value due not only to the supposed quality of the wine in the bottle, but to the “certain unquantifiable something” that makes the wine a cult wine in the first place. There is certainly some consideration taken in how well these wines might be DRINKING in X number of years, and the wines more than likely will get drunk up eventually, but just like the folks who take family heirlooms onto THE ANTIQUES ROAD SHOW claiming that they don’t care what an item is worth because it would never be for sale, but stick around for the monetary evaluation nonetheless, many vertical collectors are just as much in the game for the estimated dollar value of their portfolios as they are for the same collection’s sensory value.
As always, you should collect what you like, but for me, it’s more about what you like to DRINK than the profit you can turn from selling what you might be drinking (perhaps even to someone else who won’t drink the wine either, and so on…). Hey, wine is not a bad investment, but real estate, or just a good, steady string of deposits into a good mutual fund is MUCH better, and Cabernet frankly, safer too. No, to me the return on your investment of TIME is the luxury of experiencing what can only be experienced via the proper aging of fine wine, namely the most sublime flavors and aromas accessible to the human palate.
A few words on what verticals “mean”. There’s more than a little bit of the scientific method at work in the nature of what verticals “mean”, and by that I mean that woven into the very fabric of what verticals are is the notion that there is one and ONLY one variable: VINTAGE. All other potentially variable factors - producer, site, grape blend (if applicale), etc. are IDENTICAL. This clearly gives the drinker LOADS of insight into the vagaries of vintage, and how a producer handles those variables. People who are skeptical that great variances exist amongst any given set of wines become instant converts at vertical tastings. I know of no clearer method to show the skeptics just how real (not to mention obvious) all of these supposed non-existant differences between wines really are. Hallelujah!
Now here’s the other part of verticals that even some die-hard verticalizers don’t utilize, and this I’m going to call it the “parallel vertical” (the poop’s really flowin’ today)…ready? You’ve got multiple bottles of every 21st century vintage from your favorite high-end Greek producer, Attic Cellars (i.e. 2000 through 2005). Just down the road from Attic lies Metropolis Farms, another of your favorites from the region. You’ve got multiple examples of their 2000-2005 releases as well. With these two holdings, you now have control over almost every possible variable within a single wine region: vintage and producer. The only other potential problem that one could encounter in the “parallel vertical” would be in regions like Bordeaux or Chianti - essentially wines that are almost always blends, and which allow for variation in permissable varieites as well as the minimum/maximum percentages of those varieties. In wine regions that produce variably blended wines, the potential comparisons are not quite as black and white, but in places like Barolo and Burgundy and Ribera del Duero where one and only one grape is permitted, the potential for great insight becomes clear.
And I think that you can pretty clearly see what those possibilities are, but a couple of examples might be in order…One fascinating comparison might be selecting a “lesser” vintages as a focus. Open bottles of the same vintage form the two different producers and try to judge who handled his challenges better…one could then do the same experiment with multiple lesser vintages, using for example, two vintages that were cold and wet and two that are from exceedingly hot and dry vintages, and see if there are patterns that develop. Another great little exercise is an attempt to make an assessment of the relative ageworthiness of two different producer’s wines, starting let’s say with some of the “middle-aged” vintages and working backwards in time to see who “cracks” first, i.e. are is there a rough number of years from the vintage date at which a producer’s wines begin to “slide”…is the decline for the other producer similar in character or different?
As I intimated in beginning this piece, building verticals takes time, money, and space, but if one has a bit of all three, there is little else in wine that I know that so deftly points up the “analyzable” aspects of wine appreciation. So if you’ve got some greenbacks burning a hole in your Haband slacks, and haven’t yet gotten into the vertical game, identify your champions, and make your move. Once you get a taste of drinking and comparing verticals, you’ll be glad that you discovered this “advanced” wine drinking activity.
TOM CIOCCO
Falernum - the oldest appellation in the world?
Not “officially” of course, but “Falernum” may indeed be the oldest (semi-)demarcated wine zone known to humankind. Sure, there are some ancient Greek designations - like Monemvasia, Pramnian, and Bibline, but there is a great deal of controversy as to just what these names actually referred to. Some assert that these names were indeed the names for particular growing areas, but other scholars demur saying that they often refer to multiple locations, to types, styles, or even colors of wines.
Falernum was, and still is, right where it always was/is, and that place is just south of the present-day border of Lazio and Campania (in Campania), just inland from Italy’s western coast. The earliest references to Falernum pre-date the birth of Christ and all writings about the place refer to it as one of, if not THE “finest” wines in the Roman empire. So great was the reputation of these wines that the Roman historian Pliny railed in his Natural History, written in the second half of the 1st century A.D., about the emphasis of quantity over quality in the region, and that in his opinion this exigency was ruining the wine’s reputation (some things never change, right?). And despite these complaints, history tells us that Falernum’s reputation as a fine wine persisted well into the middle of the 4th century A.D.
Ancient Falernum wines were exclusively white, though the modern appellation allows for the production of both red and white wines with Falanghina being the only permissable white variety, with Aglianico and Piedirosso being the principal red varieties, with Primitivo and Barbera bringing up the rear. Though there is no known evidence of precisely which grape or grapes went into making ancient Falernum, Falanghina is a very old cultivar, and it is entirely possible that it was indeed THE grape for the region. One aspect about Falernum’s production that we DO know for sure is that its vines, whatever they were, were trained to grow up trees, or alternately up long poles of willow wood…Before I forget, let me amend the statement that ancient Falernum wines were “white” to “they were produced from exclusively white grapes”. There is one reference to “dark” Falernian in at least one source, and several others desribe the wine as amber in color which is almost surely the result of oxidative (opposite of “reductive”) winemaking.
One fascinating feature of ancient Falernian is that the zone itself was uncharacteristically subdivided into three “crus”. The fruit harvested from the hilltop sites were called Caucinian wines. Those from the hill’s slopes were named Faustian, while the grapes sourced from the plains approaching the sea were called Falernian proper. The comtemporary literature also refers to two different styles of the day, one being fairly dry, and the other, quite sweet.
So what did this most famous of Roman wines taste like? Well, clearly we’ll never know for sure, but once again, contemporary writings refer to Falernum’s “strength” and “heat”, and one account even claims that the wine could be relatively easily set alight (!). Though this last claim is an impossible one to support scientifically, all the descriptions of ancient Falernum point to the wine’s great alcoholic power.
Today, Falerno del Massico, as the region is named in Italian, does not enjoy the reputation it had under the Caesars, but it is nonetheless a important and improving wine region.
TOM CIOCCO
