Terry Theise and yeasts

Isn't this all so much drawing of imaginary lines? Terroir stops here. No, wait, it stops here. What about over there? If a producer builds a new cellar does that invalidate terroir, even if he moves all of his equipment from place to place?

It's quite easy (and sometimes even fun) to start lisitng all the various factors that might or might not be considered part of terroir. Given that producers come and go (even within the same family) weather changes & myriad other factors are different from year to year, I prefer to go with the soil of a particular place & how it is set upon the earth (exposure) as my personal limits. When I taste wines from the Zeltinger Sonnenuhr and Zeltinger Schlossberg from the same producer (Selbach-Oster) I can note the differences, and the wines are consistent in those differences. Grab a bottle of the parcel bottlings (Schmitt and Rotlay from Schlossberg and Sonnenuhr respectively), and the differences are again clear with the same regimen beyond that of site.

(Of course the indigenous yeast populations of those 2 sites are likely very similar, so we can start going round the discussion again.)

Fun discussion.
 
Good points. There's no doubt that terroir is manifested in the plant, and the definition could certainly stop there, be it for the tee-totaler grape farmer or for two adjacent vineyards. I find it more useful to include other aspects of place, even with the tremendous variety of deviations mentioned.
 
originally posted by MLipton:
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
Yes; the fungi capture aglae and set up small markets in water-carbohydrate exchange, as I understand it. But it's striking to see such similar forms on both the micro-and macro-scale.

Paging doctor Thomas! Paging Dr. Thomas!
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As I understand it, the fungi recruit a photosynthetic organism for symbiotic purposes. You may be saying essentially the same thing, but I can't be sure.

Mark Lipton
(I'll bet Yixin has been transported to new levels of ecstasy with this exchange)
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Yes, I am. The alga photosynthesizes to make carbs, the fungus, iirc, excels at capturing moisture, even water vapor, I think. They set up shop together. Lichen, like mycorrhizae, are very interesting.
 
originally posted by Don Rice:
Cute little critters. This from 1941. Two wines, six yeasts each.

(RENAUD Jean. Les levures des vins du val de Loire : Recherches morphologiques, biologiques et cytologiques)

levures2b.jpg
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Cool. They really do look like tiny mushrooms.
 
In 1989, authorities bowed to pressure from certain quarters and relocated Richard Serras Tilted Arc (1981) from Federal Plaza in downtown Manhattan. Serra sued, claiming they had destroyed his work. Underlying the claim of destruction was the concept of site-specificity, one of the most important buzzwords in contemporary art. Since the relationship with surrounding space was one of the hallmarks of Minimal Art and Serra had conceived Tilted Arc for that space, and no other, its relocation to any other space was tantamount, the artist claimed, to destruction.

Ive been trying to understand what definition of terroir might be the most useful to me, and the concept of site-specificity came to mind as a potential illuminator. If its reasonable to suggest that any* element that contributes to the site specific quotient of a wines expression is a component of terroir expression and any element that does not contribute or detracts from such is not part of terroir expression, then we can work back a definition as the sum total of all factors that contribute to the site-specific component of a wines expression. Yeasts would be part of terroir only in proportion to how native they are (be they spontaneous or inoculated) and not part of it to the extent that they are not native. If they are from the same vineyard, more so; from the same appellation, less so; from another place, not at all. Even the soil, to take something everyone always considers part of terroir, would contribute more if organic and less if treated with chemicals that inhibit microbial life. This notion of terroir has the advantage of not being rigidly binary (X is part of terroir and Y isnt), but dependent on the extent to which the factor in question contributes to site-specificity. Ultimately, the concept of terroir, not being scientific, has to be at least useful, and I don't find it useful to establish rigid borders.

* even the undesirable ones, like mildew or pests, which would have to be judiciously fought for the benefit of other, competing site-specific factors
 
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
In 1989, authorities bowed to pressure from certain quarters and relocated Richard Serras Tilted Arc (1981) from Federal Plaza in downtown Manhattan. Serra sued, claiming they had destroyed his work. Underlying the claim of destruction was the concept of site-specificity, one of the most important buzzwords in contemporary art. Since the relationship with surrounding space was one of the hallmarks of Minimal Art and Serra had conceived Tilted Arc for that space, and no other, its relocation to any other space was tantamount, the artist claimed, to destruction.

Ive been trying to understand what definition of terroir might be the most useful to me, and the concept of site-specificity came to mind as a potential illuminator. If its reasonable to suggest that any* element that contributes to the site specific quotient of a wines expression is a component of terroir expression and any element that does not contribute or detracts from such is not part of terroir expression, then we can work back a definition as the sum total of all factors that contribute to the site-specific component of a wines expression. Yeasts would be part of terroir only in proportion to how native they are (be they spontaneous or inoculated) and not part of it to the extent that they are not native. If they are from the same vineyard, more so; from the same appellation, less so; from another place, not at all. Even the soil, to take something everyone always considers part of terroir, would contribute more if organic and less if treated with chemicals that inhibit microbial life. This notion of terroir has the advantage of not being rigidly binary (X is part of terroir and Y isnt), but dependent on the extent to which the factor in question contributes to site-specificity. Ultimately, the concept of terroir, not being scientific, has to be at least useful, and I don't find it useful to establish rigid borders.

* even the undesirable ones, like mildew or pests, which would have to be judiciously fought for the benefit of other, competing site-specific factors
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As another aesthete, I hereby subscribe to Oswaldo's definition. It lacks the French word's addition of cultural elements, but it would extend to even those. If all we meant were agricultural elements, we could use the word "dirt" instead of coopting the French word.
 
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
Yes; the fungi capture aglae and set up small markets in water-carbohydrate exchange, as I understand it. But it's striking to see such similar forms on both the micro-and macro-scale.

Paging doctor Thomas! Paging Dr. Thomas!
Click to expand...

It just occurred to me, Ian, that you may be mistaking Don's images for micrographs. In 1941, only visual field microscopy was available, so what you're seeing in Don's images are yeast cultures, definitely of the macroscopic sort. So it's really not that surprising that they show the same radial growth patterns of lichens, is it?

Mark Lipton
Internet Spoilsport
 
originally posted by Florida Jim:
Perhaps, a silly question but I will ask it anyway:
Why is this important?
Best, Jim
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Since being reflective of its terroir is one criterion by which numbers of people on this board and elsewhere judge wine, knowing the meaning of the criterion one is using seems minimally relevant to me.
 
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
In 1989, authorities bowed to pressure from certain quarters and relocated Richard Serras Tilted Arc (1981) from Federal Plaza in downtown Manhattan. Serra sued, claiming they had destroyed his work. Underlying the claim of destruction was the concept of site-specificity, one of the most important buzzwords in contemporary art. Since the relationship with surrounding space was one of the hallmarks of Minimal Art and Serra had conceived Tilted Arc for that space, and no other, its relocation to any other space was tantamount, the artist claimed, to destruction.

Ive been trying to understand what definition of terroir might be the most useful to me, and the concept of site-specificity came to mind as a potential illuminator. If its reasonable to suggest that any* element that contributes to the site specific quotient of a wines expression is a component of terroir expression and any element that does not contribute or detracts from such is not part of terroir expression, then we can work back a definition as the sum total of all factors that contribute to the site-specific component of a wines expression. Yeasts would be part of terroir only in proportion to how native they are (be they spontaneous or inoculated) and not part of it to the extent that they are not native. If they are from the same vineyard, more so; from the same appellation, less so; from another place, not at all. Even the soil, to take something everyone always considers part of terroir, would contribute more if organic and less if treated with chemicals that inhibit microbial life. This notion of terroir has the advantage of not being rigidly binary (X is part of terroir and Y isnt), but dependent on the extent to which the factor in question contributes to site-specificity. Ultimately, the concept of terroir, not being scientific, has to be at least useful, and I don't find it useful to establish rigid borders.

* even the undesirable ones, like mildew or pests, which would have to be judiciously fought for the benefit of other, competing site-specific factors
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My mental faculties have been considerably eroded by the regular consumption of wine over the past decade or two. What's the 'elevator' version of this definition?

FWIW, I think of terroir simply as the identity of a place as it is relevant to wine-making - no doubt, too simply.
 
p.s. A certain critic of German wines (initials DS) e-mailed me this morning, and said that as far as he knew Donnhoff still used a couple of different strains of cultured yeasts for his Rieslings.
 
Since being reflective of its terroir is one criterion by which numbers of people on this board and elsewhere judge wine, knowing the meaning of the criterion one is using seems minimally relevant to me.
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Jonathan,
The definition offered is intrinsically a continuum ("This notion of terroir has the advantage of not being rigidly binary (X is part of terroir and Y isn't), but dependent on the extent to which the factor in question contributes to site-specificity. ").
That people make a subjective judgment about a wine being reflective of its terroir is, by the very nature of its subjectivity, impossible to communicate with precision.
Hence, it seems to me that these sliding scales, at their best, create a Venn diagram that is virtually unique to each individual.
'Minimal' certainly seems a proper qualifier to 'relevance.'

Or, as an old professor of mine might say, 'to get it right down where the hogs eat, trying to define terroir for anyone other then yourself is like herding cats.'

I know it when we see it.
But trying to define it - I don't know . . .
Best, Jim
 
Jim, I don't see any relation between people making a subjective judgment about a wine being reflective of its terroir and the definition of terroir being binary or on a continuum.
 
Oswaldo, is weather (not climate) part of terroir? If hail obliterates one vineyard but not the next one, and it only does it this vintage and no other, it's still site-specific, and by your definition would have to be included, even though the hail vintage and the next would bear no similarities whatsoever, either in terms of the fruit produced or the resultant wine.

You said that, for you, terroir has to be useful. On this we agree, though I don't think everyone who cares about terroir would. Where we part, I guess, is that I'd prefer it also be reasonably scientific, because that increases its utility (as I see it). Which is, at its heart, why I can't include transient effects like weather, pests, and yeasts unless they can be shown to be inseparable from the site.

I think there's a certain coherence to your definition, even though it's not mine and you already know my objections (I feel the same about some of Texier's version, though his loses me when he starts using terroir as a qualitative descriptor), but I do want to question your footnote:

even the undesirable ones, like mildew or pests, which would have to be judiciously fought for the benefit of other, competing site-specific factors
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Why? You're destroying site-specific characters, by your definition. If you accept a definition of terroir that includes transient effects, I think you get into trouble if you start evaluating the desirability of those effects and choosing among them to suit your preferences, but still claim you're serving terroir. You're not. By your definition, you're damaging or even obliterating it. If the terroir of a site can include Pierce's Disease, or vineyard-native brettanomyces (I don't know if that's possible or not), or grey rot, and the result is that your terroir gives you a shitty wine...or no wine at all...shouldn't you accept it as the essential, native character of the site? Or if you can't, and you meddle so you have wine to sell (which, unless you were some ultra-naturalist ideologue or a blogger, you would), where's your terroir?

You wrote, earlier, that what you care about is that we can identify terroir. Well, you're unlikely to if you're eliminating major contributors to it (and by your definition, grey rot or Pierce's would be major contributors, as would a hailstorm or a hungry pack of wild boar that set up camp on your site, raised a family, and so forth). It's possible you're forcing yourself into a choice: destroy some of the terroir and thus be unable to say you're expressing it, or let the wine be so inconsistent that there's not any way you could identify the terroir.

The latter seems, to me, to be the opposite of a "useful" concept as both you and I are defining it. And the former allows an awful lot of meddling in what you would, I think, still like to call a terroir wine; meddling I doubt you'd embrace if it came from a more traditional set of winemaking interventions.
 
Jim, while I think it would be nice if everyone used my definition (especially since I think it's way closer to being rigorous than Oswaldo's, or Texier's...which isn't the same as being right, of course, though maybe that's arguable from a scientific standpoint (and here's where I'd want you to assume an emoticon)), I don't expect that to happen. I think the discussion matters for the reason Jonathan gave, and also because it's a helpful reminder that some factor that seems obvious to me (terroir vs. not-terroir) is not, necessarily, that clear-cut to someone else. But it doesn't mean they haven't given the matter their own measure of thought.

Sometimes, we come to accord on these issues, and the conversation is useful because we do. Here, I don't think we will, but then it's useful for a different reason. I compare it to the discussion of "spoof[u/i]lation," which also didn't lead to accord, but certainly led me to a personal conclusion: it's a sloppy formulation and, though enjoyable to use as a cudgel, not very useful. Absent the discussion, I'd probably still be using the word, and would still subjected to arguments about that usage. Whereas now, I have all that free time available to defend the word "natural"...
 
originally posted by Florida Jim:
Since being reflective of its terroir is one criterion by which numbers of people on this board and elsewhere judge wine, knowing the meaning of the criterion one is using seems minimally relevant to me.
Click to expand...
Jonathan,
The definition offered is intrinsically a continuum ("This notion of terroir has the advantage of not being rigidly binary (X is part of terroir and Y isn't), but dependent on the extent to which the factor in question contributes to site-specificity. ").
That people make a subjective judgment about a wine being reflective of its terroir is, by the very nature of its subjectivity, impossible to communicate with precision.
Hence, it seems to me that these sliding scales, at their best, create a Venn diagram that is virtually unique to each individual.
'Minimal' certainly seems a proper qualifier to 'relevance.'

Or, as an old professor of mine might say, 'to get it right down where the hogs eat, trying to define terroir for anyone other then yourself is like herding cats.'

I know it when we see it.
But trying to define it - I don't know . . .
Best, Jim
Click to expand...

you go away for a couple of days, and this happens...

jim's right.

for the rest of you, remedial wittgenstein. there is no tooth fairy.

fb.
 
originally posted by .sasha:
98 norheimer kirschheck spaetlese totally singing last week

but i didn't buy yours, so who knows
Click to expand...

ditto 93 brucke spaet.

fwiw, i'd keep the 98s longer, and lay waste to the 99s, if you have any. they have lost their persistent lumpen youthfulness (as doubtless the monkey will too, one day).

and for those who follow these things, the 96 o-l kab is much less weird than it was. much less. now that i've nearly finished mine.

fb.
 
originally posted by Florida Jim:
Since being reflective of its terroir is one criterion by which numbers of people on this board and elsewhere judge wine, knowing the meaning of the criterion one is using seems minimally relevant to me.
Click to expand...
Jonathan,
The definition offered is intrinsically a continuum ("This notion of terroir has the advantage of not being rigidly binary (X is part of terroir and Y isn't), but dependent on the extent to which the factor in question contributes to site-specificity. ").
That people make a subjective judgment about a wine being reflective of its terroir is, by the very nature of its subjectivity, impossible to communicate with precision.
Hence, it seems to me that these sliding scales, at their best, create a Venn diagram that is virtually unique to each individual.
'Minimal' certainly seems a proper qualifier to 'relevance.'

Or, as an old professor of mine might say, 'to get it right down where the hogs eat, trying to define terroir for anyone other then yourself is like herding cats.'

I know it when we see it.
But trying to define it - I don't know . . .
Best, Jim
Click to expand...

I think subjectivity is a snare here. In an obvious sense, it is redundant to call a judgment subjective since we make them within our mind. I expect you mean that the judgment, though, doesn't have any objective criteria to which it makes reference. I don't think this is correct. Taste is subjective in this sense. I like what I like because I like it and there's not much else to say. If those who want to judge by terroir are right, it is actually out there. And I'd have to have a form of metaphysical certainty for which I think I have no warrant to say that I know it isn't out there. Of course, you may mean that, with regard to terroir, we are regularly mistaken and don't have sufficient common ground in our ability to communicate taste to make reasonably warranted judgments and we should properly acknowledge that. I would certainly agree with that. But none of that proves that there's not something real out there that we are doing our level best to refer to. And that is even true with an intolerably floating definition of terroir. Our inability to understand something precisely and to fall back on vague definitions that we think capture the phenomenon we are discussing does not disprove its existence. Accepting uncertainty is the responsibility of discourse within most fields. That's not the same as not thinking one is saying anything.

As to fatboy's response, I would claim that this response is well within Wittgenstein's sense that ordinary language is all right. But perhaps he meant early Wittgenstein.
 
One of the other reasons I personally prefer a more outlined and bordered-within-the-vineyard definition of terroir is that if it exists in the way I'm suggesting, it would be -- subjected to the right and sufficient science -- objective. That is, if there's a measurable and repeatable site effect on a vineyard, it would submit to and be revealed by chemical analysis (I don't know if it could now or not, but I presume it could at some point), and we could point to it as The Terroir of Site X©™®. And then we could have all the more difficult but more fun arguments about subjectivity of taste, and the skill level of tasters, and whether or not any of it matters, in a more bounded context of its own.
 
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