Love that Clark Smith

[Marc Hanes]

I feel myself lucky as a consumer; to know enough about how wine is made and the folks who make it to be able to pick-out wines I enjoy, that will pair with food and that will age.

But that's sort of the crux of the matter, you *do* know how wine is made and more so how some specific wines are made. For most customers this is and will always be a black box, never to be opened. And, no doubt, most of this majority doesn't care so no harm, no foul. Winemaking is a for-profit venture, after all. However, it's for the knowledgeable wine consumer that there's most "peril" because...

having a choice is huge.

...And how does a consumer know when things have been mucked about if the producer does not hew to a *consistent* model of winemaking? Let's say I like Winery A and they make their 2002 as virginal as the fallen snow, their 2003 as virginal as the fallen snow, their 2004 manipulated, their 2005 as virginal as the fallen snow, their 2006 as virginal as the fallen snow, their 2007 manipulated. It's not like they are going to *say* on the label anything was different in 2004 and 2007. Am I to guess based on prior experience and/or suspicions? If the producer does not stay close to a consistent winemaking process we're back to guessing games and black boxes. As a consumer I'd rather have a subpar offering in the bottle that represents the vintage characteristics than something which better approximates the results of a stellar vintage.

It's nice that the winery was able to make money off of their 2004 and 2007 vintages but one might argue that there is now less trust in the producer-customer relationship because the customer is in the dark about what happened when.

So, the winemaker has a choice? But at what final cost?

In this day and age of marketing wines as natural, organic, blah, blah, blah, the issue of consistency and trust is likely to become more acute. To the 27 people in the world who really give a shit. Like I said before, it's a business waaaaay before any other aspect so no sense making mountains out of molehills.

 

[Clarke B.]

This little Zen koan comes at you from at least ten different overlapping, at times contradictory, unintentionally hilarious, angles:

"My Faux Chablis has needed de-alc five years out of six, because we seldom have the rain they get in France to dilute sugar to a good balance."

How can one even begin to unpack that?

 

[Florida Jim]

originally posted by Marc Hanes:
It's nice that the winery was able to make money off of their 2004 and 2007 vintages but one might argue that there is now less trust in the producer-customer relationship because the customer is in the dark about what happened when.

So, the winemaker has a choice? But at what final cost?

Hopefully, a final cost that all can live with.
Best, Jim

 

[Thor]

"My Faux Chablis has needed de-alc five years out of six, because we seldom have the rain they get in France to dilute sugar to a good balance."

How can one even begin to unpack that?

I think Coad said it best: "Buy again? No."

 

[slaton]

originally posted by Clarke B.:
"My Faux Chablis has needed de-alc five years out of six, because we seldom have the rain they get in France to dilute sugar to a good balance."

Diatom?

 

[Lee Short]

originally posted by Clarke B.:
This little Zen koan comes at you from at least ten different overlapping, at times contradictory, unintentionally hilarious, angles:

"My Faux Chablis has needed de-alc five years out of six, because we seldom have the rain they get in France to dilute sugar to a good balance."

How can one even begin to unpack that?

I think it pretty much translates to

"I'm growing Chardonnay in the wrong place."

EDIT: Along with a little dose of "and I don't mind deliberately mischaracterizing the products of my competitors. Just a little 'creative marketing', doncha know."

 

[Jeff Grossman]

originally posted by Lee Short:
I think it pretty much translates to

"I'm growing Chardonnay in the wrong place."

Heh. I was thinking it meant, "I'm going to mention a famous French wine and apply the stolen glamor to my plonk."

 

[Brian Loring]

originally posted by Marc Hanes:
As a consumer I'd rather have a subpar offering in the bottle that represents the vintage characteristics than something which better approximates the results of a stellar vintage.

Really? This just baffles me. The only way I can make sense of this is to assume that you don't think that any technological process can actually correct or improve a wine. Because if it really does work, why would you settle for something "less than" when you could fix a problem?

This also leads me to infer another assumption - that any technological process will diminish vintage characteristics. Once again, if it does work, couldn't it just as well remove a flaw or shortcoming that is hiding vintage characteristics?

It seems to me that there are so many things that a winemaker can do to mask vintage characteristics via traditional processes (saignee, picking earlier/later, cold soak, fermentation temperature, new/used oak percentage, type of oak, time in oak, etc) that dropping the alcohol a percentage point doesn't seem like that big a deal. Provided it makes a better wine. And by that, I mean better in the winemker's opinion. Afterall, it's the winemaker who's making lots of decisions that drive the final taste of the wine. And sometimes he fails in those decisions. But separating out alcohol reduction, or any other tech process, as the reason for not representing vintage characteristics seems somewhat arbitrary.

We've used both spinning cone alc reduction and RO to correct problems. Not often, but when we had issuea, it was nice to be able to correct them. And the technology worked. We felt the resulting wines were not only better than they had been, but that they turned out to be of a quality level consistent with what we normally produce. And the wines still show vintage characteristics.

Even given those successes, we wouldn't use technology as part of our normal process. Why? Partly because it's expensive and a pain in the ass. No winemaker wants to do more than they have to to make wine. While there are mobile units that come to your winery to do VA or 4ep/4eg (brett flavor) removal, you have to take wine to a licensed (distillery) facility to do alcohol removal. The other part is that in my gut, I still feel that some of these processes have the potential to strip the wine a bit. While we've had success in the past, I'm not sure that guarntees success everytime in the future. So we use technology only when we have to, and we carefully monitor the results.

I think Clark's point is that a lot of people do exactly what we do, but don't ever talk about. And often, not only do they deny it, but market against other people who do admit to using technology now and then. That leads to a distorted "data set" for the consumer, which can lead to incorrect conclusions.

 

[SFJoe]

Brian,

How do you choose between spinning cone and R/O?

 

[MLipton]

originally posted by Brian Loring:

It seems to me that there are so many things that a winemaker can do to mask vintage characteristics via traditional processes (saignee, picking earlier/later, cold soak, fermentation temperature, new/used oak percentage, type of oak, time in oak, etc) that dropping the alcohol a percentage point doesn't seem like that big a deal.

Brian,
Don't you think that extensive aging en foudre (or in any other barrel, for that matter) amounts to a traditional reduction in alcohol? Given the loss of liquid, I'd assume that it's lost as a 95:5 EtOH:H2O azeotrope and so results in a gradual reduction in the alcohol content. Is that correct?

Mark Lipton

 

[SFJoe]

originally posted by MLipton:

originally posted by Brian Loring:

It seems to me that there are so many things that a winemaker can do to mask vintage characteristics via traditional processes (saignee, picking earlier/later, cold soak, fermentation temperature, new/used oak percentage, type of oak, time in oak, etc) that dropping the alcohol a percentage point doesn't seem like that big a deal.

Brian,
Don't you think that extensive aging en foudre (or in any other barrel, for that matter) amounts to a traditional reduction in alcohol? Given the loss of liquid, I'd assume that it's lost as a 95:5 EtOH:H2O azeotrope and so results in a gradual reduction in the alcohol content. Is that correct?

Mark Lipton

I'm not Brian, but my understanding is that the balance of what's lost depends quite a bit on the humidity of the cellar/surroundings, and perhaps on temperature.

 

[Clarke B.]

originally posted by MLipton:

originally posted by Brian Loring:

It seems to me that there are so many things that a winemaker can do to mask vintage characteristics via traditional processes (saignee, picking earlier/later, cold soak, fermentation temperature, new/used oak percentage, type of oak, time in oak, etc) that dropping the alcohol a percentage point doesn't seem like that big a deal.

Brian,
Don't you think that extensive aging en foudre (or in any other barrel, for that matter) amounts to a traditional reduction in alcohol? Given the loss of liquid, I'd assume that it's lost as a 95:5 EtOH:H2O azeotrope and so results in a gradual reduction in the alcohol content. Is that correct?

Mark Lipton

Brian,

I wouldn't necessarily categorize the "traditional processes" you mention as "masking" vintage characteristics. I think of those sorts of things as ways to work with what the vintage presents you, accentuating its pluses and de-emphasizing its negatives, but without fundamentally altering the wine.

A short guy who wears vertical stripes isn't masking the fact that he's a short guy, he's just de-emphasizing his shortness. And if, say, he's got a nice jawline, he might go clean-shaven to accentuate it--and I wouldn't say he's masking anything by doing that, either.

If, however, he cut his legs off at the knee, attached six-inch extensions, and re-affixed his lower legs, that could more strongly be considered "masking" his shortness. That's how I think many of us think of processes such as de-alc and reverse osmosis.

To further stretch this tortured analogy, short guy basically has to wear SOME sort of clothing and have SOME sort of facial hair ethos--just as winemakers have to have some sort of picking date and age in some sort of vessel. It's all the endless tweaking that feels more like masking.

 

[Brian Loring]

originally posted by SFJoe:
Brian,

How do you choose between spinning cone and R/O?

As I undertstand it, the spinning cone is used exclusively to remove alcohol. RO is mostly used to remove VA and 4ep/4eg, although it can remove alcohol as well, but not as efficiently as spinning cone. That's my understanding - I could be wrong. I think it's really just a matter of the right tech for the job.

 

[Brian Loring]

originally posted by SFJoe:
I'm not Brian, but my understanding is that the balance of what's lost depends quite a bit on the humidity of the cellar/surroundings, and perhaps on temperature.

Exactly. I think you have to have a fairly high humidity level (90% or higher?) to evaporate alcohol. And that brings into play a lot of issues with things like mold.

Of course, you can always add water to the fermenter to reduce alcohol levels. That's the path we take if necessary, as well as just living with higher alcohols sometimes. Alcohol levels don't scare me since the associated bigger fruit profile that comes with higher alcs often balances things out. Per my palate - your mileage may vary.

 

[Brian Loring]

originally posted by Clarke B.:
If, however, he cut his legs off at the knee, attached six-inch extensions, and re-affixed his lower legs, that could more strongly be considered "masking" his shortness. That's how I think many of us think of processes such as de-alc and reverse osmosis.

And I think this illustrates what Clark Smith was saying. You've assigned a very negative association with de-alcing and reverse osmosis. But what's that based upon? Do you know which wines you've consumed did or didn't utilize one of these processes? You might be surprised :)

Based upon my limited experience, using technology to adjust/correct a wine is an effective way to preserve normal vineyard characteristics (dare I say terroir) in off years or when winemaking errors occur. Whereas IMHO there's no more intrusive process in altering wines flavors than the use of new oak. Traditional, yes. Minimalistic or non-invasive, no. It always seems to me that adding something foreign (ie oak) is way more intrusive than adding naturally occuring components (water, acid) or lowering existing concentrations (ie de-alcing).

I understand that many wine drinkers think differently. And truthfully, I did too until I started making wine and seeing the results firsthand in the cellar.

 

[SFJoe]

I wish Thierry Puzelat had de-alked some of his 2006 whites.

Only half kidding.

 

[Sharon Bowman]

Pssh. You still haven't re-road-tested the 06 Romo, I would imagine?

 

[Bruce G.]

originally posted by Brian Loring:
Whereas IMHO there's no more intrusive process in altering wines flavors than the use of new oak. Traditional, yes. Minimalistic or non-invasive, no. It always seems to me that adding something foreign (ie oak) is way more intrusive than adding naturally occuring components (water, acid) or lowering existing concentrations (ie de-alcing).

I understand that many wine drinkers think differently. And truthfully, I did too until I started making wine and seeing the results firsthand in the cellar.

Hi, Brian.
I think that characterizing the use of new oak as "traditional" might be a stretch. Best to avoid using the t-word ("traditional", not that other t-word) given that its pretty context dependent.

I'm no fan of new oak. Not by a long stretch. But the use of oak, even new oak, strikes me as fundamentally different from the other manipulations you've mentioned in one big way. The others--watering back, acidifying, and de-alcoholizing--are all remedial measures taken to supply what that site does not, or to remove that which the site provides in excess. As such, they are inherently "anti-terroir" (in my opinion, of course).
The use of oak is not typically considered in that way: it doesn't address (by enhancing or nullifying) specific aspects of the site. I guess you could argue that the structure and sweetness provided by a new barrel does something along these lines, but it seems more that barrels add something alien to the wine and are not used to ameliorate directly short-comings of the site.

Won't argue this point too hard, though... I think 25+ year old puncheons make a spiffy container for ageing most reds.

 

[Cory Cartwright]

originally posted by Brian Loring:

originally posted by Clarke B.:
If, however, he cut his legs off at the knee, attached six-inch extensions, and re-affixed his lower legs, that could more strongly be considered "masking" his shortness. That's how I think many of us think of processes such as de-alc and reverse osmosis.

Based upon my limited experience, using technology to adjust/correct a wine is an effective way to preserve normal vineyard characteristics (dare I say terroir) in off years or when winemaking errors occur. Whereas IMHO there's no more intrusive process in altering wines flavors than the use of new oak. Traditional, yes. Minimalistic or non-invasive, no. It always seems to me that adding something foreign (ie oak) is way more intrusive than adding naturally occuring components (water, acid) or lowering existing concentrations (ie de-alcing).

Except in Clark's case he is trying to erase "normal" vineyard characteristics in pursuit of an "off" year. But of course you knew that.

 

[Cory Cartwright]

originally posted by Cory Cartwright:

originally posted by Brian Loring:

originally posted by Clarke B.:
If, however, he cut his legs off at the knee, attached six-inch extensions, and re-affixed his lower legs, that could more strongly be considered "masking" his shortness. That's how I think many of us think of processes such as de-alc and reverse osmosis.

Based upon my limited experience, using technology to adjust/correct a wine is an effective way to preserve normal vineyard characteristics (dare I say terroir) in off years or when winemaking errors occur. Whereas IMHO there's no more intrusive process in altering wines flavors than the use of new oak. Traditional, yes. Minimalistic or non-invasive, no. It always seems to me that adding something foreign (ie oak) is way more intrusive than adding naturally occuring components (water, acid) or lowering existing concentrations (ie de-alcing).

Except in Clark's case he is trying to erase "normal" vineyard characteristics in pursuit of an "off" year characteristic. But of course you knew that.