Steve Cuozzo still fears Lee Campbell and natural wines.

originally posted by Gene Vilensky:
There was a bottle of Syrah, Grenache, Carignan, that tasted like those grapes which she claimed was Gamay and that the reason it tasted like those grapes is the terroir. I was amazed and when I looked up the wine at home, saw that it tasted like Carignan not because of the Ardeche terroir shining through the Gamay, but from the fact that it is actually Carignan.
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time was, teh politburo would randomly shoot folks for obsessing about varieties like this.

in other news, i was drinking with a grower in southern swabia (a canton so far south they speak italian) late last year, and in the course of our conversation, he told me that he's moved his cab / merlot blend (there has been cab and merlot in these part for years) more towards merlot.

like 100 % merlot.

he explaine that when he started making wine, many many years ago, he'd acquired a plot of nice old cab franc vines. or so teh experts told him. but he began to have doubts.

to illustrate these doubts, he pulled out a range of vintages of his best cuvee (ahem -- try doing this in a 3 bottle per lot cellar). this impromptu vertical (as we were nearing teh horizontal) was interesting for two reasons.

1. the grower (we can call him marco) has converted to green and then to mainly bio over the past ten or so years, and his wine making is now what teh hipsters call natural. it isn't often one gets to try a line up of the same wine that embraces teh progression from conventional to hipster. it was fascinating.

2. the "cab" in even the older wines was still tough and primary, even after all these years.

see, it wasn't cab. turns out after careful analysis that teh shit was carménère.

truth tends to out in teh end. just be careful what you believe.

fb.
 
fb, I couldn't care less what grape varieties were in the wine. It was delicious. I just didn't need to be told how astonishing it was that a Gamay from the Rhone tastes like that, when it's not actually Gamay.
 
Since it's delicious, what is it? We seem to be withholding the name of the wine for some reason. I like to know about delicious wines.
 
originally posted by Gene Vilensky:
fb, I couldn't care less what grape varieties were in the wine. It was delicious. I just didn't need to be told how astonishing it was that a Gamay from the Rhone tastes like that, when it's not actually Gamay.
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did it taste like gamay from teh rhone?

fb.

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone,"'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less."
 
originally posted by fatboy:

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone,"'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less."
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Rule 2173.01 of US Patent practice--[patent] "applicants are their own lexicographers."
 
I don't know what Gamay from the Rhone tastes like, never having tried it. It did definitely taste like a Syrah, Carignan, Grenache blend from the Rhone! But that's not much of a novelty.
 
originally posted by Gene Vilensky:
I don't know what Gamay from the Rhone tastes like, never having tried it. It did definitely taste like a Syrah, Carignan, Grenache blend from the Rhone! But that's not much of a novelty.
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wait. i thought you said it was delicious.

fb.
 
originally posted by Gene Vilensky:
I don't know what Gamay from the Rhone tastes like, never having tried it.
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Hervé Souhaut La Souteronne is what Gamay from the Rhone tastes like. You can probably find it locally.

To me it tastes more like the Rhone than Gamay. But, you know, I am okay with that.
 
originally posted by Michael Lewis:
originally posted by Gene Vilensky:
I don't know what Gamay from the Rhone tastes like, never having tried it.
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Hervé Souhaut La Souteronne is what Gamay from the Rhone tastes like. You can probably find it locally.

To me it tastes more like the Rhone than Gamay. But, you know, I am okay with that.
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though, at the risk of stepping on toes, i was shocked the first time i tasted these wines in europe. unmolested bottles of what had seemed like rhony C E N S O R E D on either coast of the n. american continent tasted much like gamey in paris, and in teh gentle cantons of swabia.

shit, i even bought some.

fb.
 
originally posted by fatboy:
originally posted by Michael Lewis:
originally posted by Gene Vilensky:
I don't know what Gamay from the Rhone tastes like, never having tried it.
Click to expand...

Hervé Souhaut La Souteronne is what Gamay from the Rhone tastes like. You can probably find it locally.

To me it tastes more like the Rhone than Gamay. But, you know, I am okay with that.
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though, at the risk of stepping on toes, i was shocked the first time i tasted these wines in europe. unmolested bottles of what had seemed like rhony C E N S O R E D on either coast of the n. american continent tasted much like gamey in paris, and in teh gentle cantons of swabia.

shit, i even bought some.

fb.
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A 3-pack, I presume.

But that is an interesting point. It seems I have not tasted any unmolested examples of this wine.
 
originally posted by Michael Lewis:


A 3-pack, I presume.
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nah. i like it, but it isn't 36 bottles worth of like.

But that is an interesting point. It seems I have not tasted any unmolested examples of this wine.
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the observation is not unique to me. and anyway, be thankful. i spend an average of around 3 months a year in a college town in the deep dark american midwest. while the local meat is superb, the question when buying wine is not, "is it damaged," but rather, "how much?"

fb.
 
originally posted by fatboy:
originally posted by Michael Lewis:


A 3-pack, I presume.
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nah. i like it, but it isn't 36 bottles worth of like.

But that is an interesting point. It seems I have not tasted any unmolested examples of this wine.
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the observation is not unique to me.
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Indeed. I came at it from the other angle and stopped buying Souhaut once I was back in the States and no longer tasting the clean bottles.
 
I've tried some Calek wines, but never really dug them. OTOH, I LOVE the Souhaut Souterrone, and find it to be maybe a grown up version of the VdP Rhodadiennes Gamay that you get en pichet all over the Northern Rhone. It's not Beaujolais, to be sure, but I really dig Rhone Gamay. And I've found no marked difference between Souterrone or even Sainte Epine between here and there. I'd rather be drinking it there, because I'd rather BE there, eating some Raclette and Rigottes, but unfortunately, I'll have to make do with pasteurized Mont D'Or and Souterrone for now - no sommelier to complain about though.
 
On a tangent, I miss Sainte-Epine. For a little bit, Patrick Cappiello had it on the list at Pearl & Ash in New York, and one could go in just like that and drink it. Such a wine. It is of a different coat (as one would say of a dog) than Souhaut's St-Jo or the Syrah.

Souteronne seems to me a little more affected by its journey?
 
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
On a tangent, I miss Sainte-Epine. For a little bit, Patrick Cappiello had it on the list at Pearl & Ash in New York, and one could go in just like that and drink it. Such a wine. It is of a different coat (as one would say of a dog) than Souhaut's St-Jo or the eponymous Domaine Romaneaux-Destezet.

Souteronne seems to me a little more affected by its journey?
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I agree with you on the Sainte-Epine.

As for the Souteronne I opened a bottle and it was a bit too messed up for me. I put it aside and forgot about it for a week due to travel. A week later I tested it for cooking wine and it was beautiful so I drank it.

Here is the crazy part it was sitting on my counter uncorked for the entire week.
 
I love stories like this.

I am doing similar right now to a bottle of 2012 Guillot-Broux Mâcon-Cruzille red. It had its cork in, but it had one glass missing from it and has been open for 10 days, waiting in the fridge. I expected vinegar and have crunchity-crunchity.
 
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