huevos con vino

I don’t get out much these days.  I mean, I have gift certificates to two Seattle-area wine stores.  At this rate, I’ll have those gift certificates for a while longer.  I rarely get to wine stores anymore, which is good in some ways because it reduces the temptation to buy stuff.  But it’s bad because I love wine and I want to see what’s new.

So, when I found myself at a wine store today over my lunch hour, I decided to make a purchase for the upcoming Wine Blogging Wednesday: #36, unoaked Chardonnay.  After careful deliberation, I decided on the 2005 Mer Soleil Santa Lucia Highlands Silver Unoaked Chardonnay.  This wine rated a 92 in Wine Spectator, placing it at the top of their “unoaked Chardonnay” list in the July 2007 issue.  Robert Parker gave it a 90-point score.  Clearly, it’s worth tracking down, if you believe in the cult of the 100-point rating system.  I almost do.

You can still buy this wine for about $28 online if you know where to look.  I paid $34.21 with tax and a 15% discount, courtesy of my friend.  The maddening thing is the official Mer Soleil Web site has not been updated in a while, so the 2005 is unlisted as of 7/19/07.  In fact, none of the unoaked “Silver” line of Chardonnay is listed at all.  I’m sure that will change soon given the amount of publicity this wine seems to be receiving.

The lineage of this wine is quite potent, so to speak.  Charlie Wagner founded the Caymus winery in 1971; his son Chuck took over the winemaking duties there in 1984.  Chuck, in turn, had two sons, and one of them (Charlie II) runs Mer Soleil.  His winery is named after the Mer Soleil vineyard in Monterey, California, in the Santa Lucia Highlands.  I love the wines that come from this region of California, so I look forward to tasting the 2005 Silver Chardonnay in a couple of weeks!

So, the theme for Wine Blogging Wednesday #36 is “naked” Chardonnay.  That is to say, the theme is for everyone to go out and find some unoaked Chardonnay from any part of the world, taste it, and report back to the wine blogging community.  Awesome!  I’m excited about this one.

Happily for me, my mother gave me a subscription to Wine Spectator for my birthday.  And, as luck would have it, the July issue features a review of the 2004 and 2005 California Chardonnay releases!  Nice.  On page 76, they delve into more detail on the unoaked Chardonnay phenomenon, and a few wineries stand out as possibilities for WBW #36 as a result:

• Mer Soleil Vineyard - Their 2005 Santa Lucia Highlands Silver Unoaked Chardonnay has a long name and a score of 92 besides.
• Diatom - Greg Brewer makes a few different Chardonnays under a couple of different labels, but the 2005 Diatom Santa Rita Hills Huber Chardonnay rates the highest in the realm of Wine Spectator scores (91 points).
• Iron Hose - The 2005 UnOaked Chardonnay comes from the Sonoma region rather than the Santa Barbara region, which makes this wine tempting.

These three wines intrigue me, assuming I can find them in Seattle for less than $30-$40/bottle.  “What, no Kongsgaard?”  Yes, I know you’re wondering about that, but they use oak barrels for their Chardonnays.  Sorry.

If you take a step north from California, you’ll find yourself in Oregon wine country, where they love their oak as much as the Californians do, gosh darn it.  The Oregon Chardonnay Alliance (ORCA) lists seven Oregon wineries in its member list, and all of them mainly stick with Chardonnay bottlings that have been, at least in part, aged in oak.  Some wineries, such as Domaine Drouhin, blend their Chardonnay after aging some of the juice in stainless steel and the rest in oak barrels.  Others, such as Adelsheim, make some Chardonnay that sometimes ages only in stainless steel tanks and not in oak barrels.  I say “sometimes” because their 2006 CH release does have some oak contact, but their 2005 release did not.  Interesting.

I noticed a trend among some of the West Coast wineries: The more expensive Chardonnay releases spend some time resting in barrels, while the cheaper, “entry-level” Chardonnays never touch any oak.  Chehalem is a good example of this phenomenon.  They offer Ian’s Reserve Chardonnay at $32/bottle and their INOX™ Chardonnay at $19/bottle.  The production level of the INOX is also much larger.  I guess the unoaked wines will not age as well, perhaps?  Interesting.

Another point that the Wine Spectator article makes about unoaked Chardonnay is how those wines typically avoid malolactic fermentation, whereby the malic acid becomes lactic acid.  In terms of the difference on your palate, we’re talking about green apples vs. butter, roughly speaking.  I wonder whether the malolactic fermentation process creates Chardonnay that has come, in the US, to be associated with “expensive” Chardonnay or “high-class” Chardonnay, whereas the unoaked stuff has sharper acidity and, therefore, tastes “cheaper” to people.  This article points to the trend toward oaky Chardonnay, confirming some of what I was wondering about the link between expense and oak treatment of wine.  Hmm…

Perhaps I need to find a good unoaked Chablis.  I am still looking for a good reference for such wines, though.  Same with Australian and New Zealand Chardonnays.  Ahh, this is getting too difficult.  Perhaps I’ll just drink some of Wayne Gretzky’s unoaked Chardonnay.  How can someone so great go wrong?

I was very happy to learn today that the Wine Blogging Wednesday effort has its own Web site now.  That’s great news as it consolidates all of the posts and topics into one blog.  Very nice work!

I was also happy to see that WBW #36 has been announced, and the topic is a good one: unoaked (”naked”) Chardonnay.  So-called naked Chardonnay is becoming quite popular lately, as people seem to be refining the “anything but Chardonnay” approach into “anything but oaked Chardonnay.”  Personally, I like oaky Chardonnay, but it does get tiring after a while.

This means, of course, I need to go find a suitable Chardonnay.  I’ve got some Domaine Drouhin, some Radio-Coteau, and some DuMOL at home, and all of them spent some time in contact with oak.  Darn it!  I’ve been looking for a reason to try one of these wines, but I guess I’ll need to keep waiting.  Fair enough.

Luckily, WBW #36 has no constraints on the national origin or price of the Chardonnay.  So if I want to seek out something unAmerican, I can do that.  An unoaked Oregon Chardonnay would also be fun, but I want to find something a little strange this time.  Not as strange, perhaps, as a Prieto Picudo wine, but something different would be a delight.  Stay tuned for my choice!

My nom de plume on this blog is “huevos con vino.”  Therefore, it seems only fitting that Wine Blogging Wednesday #35 should cover Spanish wines and that I should, therefore, review a Spanish wine.  I rarely get to review Spanish wines because, well, I live in the Seattle area and I am awash in delicious local wines that offer a good bargain.  But it’s time to stretch my palate a bit and try something new!

That something new is the 2004 Group Galiciano Dehesa de Rubiales “Alaia.”  That’s a mouthful, so I’ll simply call this wine Alaia for the duration.  The Alaia comes from Toro, the Spanish region east of the town of Zamora.  Here’s a long article on Toro and why this little “denominación de origen” (or DO) is an increasingly popular place for wineries to put down roots, so to speak.  Here’s a helpful map of the different wine-growing regions in Spain.  Depending on where I look online, I see different information regarding specific DO names, DOCa names, and so forth.  So I’ll just say that Alaia comes from the Toro DO.  That’s good enough.

I chose the Alaia on the strength of a recommendation from the wonderful wine expert at The Spanish Table (TST) in Seattle.  She spent a good 20 minutes with me answering all of my rather silly questions, making good suggestions, and generally being patient as I stared at all of the wines.  Rather foolishly, I forgot to ask her name, but I think she was Catherine Reynolds since that’s the name of their Wine Manager.  She also writes their Wine Newsletters.

In terms of selection, TST is incredibly diverse.  Their selection of Spanish and Portugese red wines is amazing, particularly if you are looking for a good bargain (under $10).  Of course, if you want to spend $50, you can do that too.  But the range of value was exceptional, and they taste most (if not all) of the wines they stock.

So, Catherine recommended the Alaia to me in part for its uniqueness.  This wine is a blend of 50% Prieto Picudo, 45% Tempranillo, and 5% Merlot.  Yes, you read that right: Prieto Picudo.  What is this varietal, you might wonder?  I had the same question.  Prieto Picudo is a varietal unique to the León region of Spain, apparently.  As a wine grape, it is known to produce intensely smoky, fruity wines.  Catherine told me that this particular wine, with 50% Prieto Picudo in the mix, is as smoky as it gets for a wine. 

Now that sounds cool to me.  I like smoky Spanish and Mexican flavors in general (chipotle, mescal, tobacco, etc.).  Catherine also told me that whenever she gets this wine in stock, it sells out quickly as people rush back to buy more with their friends.  Nice.

Alaia is imported by Boutique Wine Collection of Philadelphia, PA.  Their info page on this wine is available here.  Apparently the 2004 Alaia spent 4 months in new French oak barrels, a quick hibernation for sure.  The alcohol content is rated as 12.5% on the Web site and 13.5% on the bottle, so I’ll assume it falls somewhere in between.

It is worth noting that Wine Advocate gave this wine a rating of 89, which is quite a good rating for a $7-$10 wine.  You can find Alaia for under $7/bottle at winelibrary.com; I picked up my bottle at TST in Seattle for $9.99.  Plus tax, of course.  Still, that’s a heck of a good deal for such a highly regarded wine.

Ahh, finally…the meat of the blog entry.  How does this wine taste?  And smell?  Good questions.  Read on:

• Aroma: Hmm…somewhat vegetal, like freshly cut blackberry vines, with an herbal spice on top. 
• Flavor: An expressive combination of blackberries, black figs, and nettles.  That herbal quality comes through in the finish, where the spicy nettle flavor shines through the fruit.  Somewhat tannic and acidic at first, but these elements fade after the wine has been exposed to the air for a while.
• General impression: A strange wine, not quite my taste as it is too vegetal and brackish.  Some smoky qualities but not as much as I was made to expect.

Overall, I can see how some people would like this wine, but the bramble and nettle flavors combined to make a really bizarre taste profile that just isn’t something I care for.  I fail to see how this wine could score an 89 anywhere, but that’s the beauty of aesthetic pleasures: They are all subjective.  Ultimately, however, this wine is a good value because, for $7, you can do far worse than the Alaia.  Perhaps it would taste better when paired with, say, smoked pork ribs or chipotle mayonnaise and French fries, both of which sound quite good right now.

In conclusion, I did appreciate this chance to stretch my palate and go somewhere new for a change.  Oregon is a terrific wine region but it’s good to branch out a little, and I look forward to trying other Prieto Picudo wines from Toro in the future!

A great theme once again: “Passionate” Spanish wines.  Nice!  I love Spanish wines and I am looking forward to seeking out a worthy bottle for this tasting.  This time the host is Wine-Girl.net, a good blog with a great wine rating system.  Head over there and check it out!

The stipulations for WBW #35 are few but noteworthy:

• Less than $10/bottle is a primary goal, and I will do my best to adhere to this goal
• Wine from a region other than Rioja is a secondary goal (lesser-known regions deserve attention too!)
• Red or white, it doesn’t matter…or perhaps a rosé is just the thing

I am leaning toward an Albarino such as the one from Serra da Estrela, which I already know I like quite a lot.  But I need to pick something new, and I know just the place in Seattle to look for a good Spanish wine: The Spanish Table.  This place has a great selection of Spanish wines, red and white, many at budget-conscious prices too.  Plus, I need some more Matiz smoked sea salt, and TST has the stuff at a decent price.  Talk about a secret weapon in the kitchen….

Anyway, I think I’ll pay a visit to TST on my way home tonight to see what sort of selection they have for strange Spanish white wines.  A rosé is tempting too.  We’ll see what they have.

The deadline is July 11, which is also my wife’s birthday.  I guess I had better get that review done early…again.