Lummi Island Wine Tasting June 8 ’13
Software Can Drive You Crazy
For the last three weeks (I SO hope you have noticed!) each Thursday night (as usual) I have posted the latest installment of this blog. What is supposed to happen after that is that around 5am on Friday, each of our dear subscribers should receive that latest blog post via email. But for each of those weeks, although I have done everything the same, the expected notification emails have not been sent, which means that, OMD (ohmidog!), no one received that blog post I just slaved over for hours!
I have spent an embarrassing number of hours trying to fix this little problem, including asking my various WordPress gurus for help, all to no avail. Of course, you may not get this post, either, for all I know, though I had some promising results an hour or two ago. Also, of course, I have no idea at all if anyone actually views these posts online, where they exist, or meta-exist, or whatever kind of existence happens in cyberspace, in some kind of insubstantial perpetuity. All of this adds up to a sort of metaphysical, blog-angst-driven sense of futility and irrelevance. So……….if you write a blog in the forest, and no one ever reads it, was there ever really a blog???
La Rocaliere Revisited
One of the highlights of our October 2011 France trip was our visit to La Rocaliere, a small winery in Lirac, the somewhat overlooked wine region just across the Rhone River from the very famous (and expensive) appellation of Chateauneuf-du-Pape. Just to put things in context, let’s say Lirac is to Chateauneuf-du-Pape as Lummi Island is to, say, Napa; the forces of commerce have rarified one and ignored the other. The blends are similar, the regions are just across the river from one another, the climate is the same. Yet you drive through Lirac and you feel you are in the country; you drive through CdP and you feel you are somehow Not Worthy.
(from Nov 2011) We tasted a lot of delicious wines on our trip to France, and these (from La Rocaliere) were our favorites. Sisters Melanie and Severine took over the winery from their father and are putting their own fingerprints on the wines. Melanie (left) runs the business, and Severine (right) is the winemaker; her style is to interfere as little as possible with the natural development of the wines. She uses no oak at all; the red wines are fermented and aged in cement tanks, which, as we learned in Italy, iosolate the wines from noise, vibration, and temperature variation, and this gives the wines a noticeable stability and integration. Each of these wines, while unique to itself, clearly is made by the same hand; this sense of a particular winemaker’s style is one of the most fascinating characteristics of wine, and this Domaine has a definite and very appealing style. All of Rocaliere’s wines share the common characteristics of balance, naturalness, integration, and elegance. These wines really strike a chord for me, and I am delighted to find that they are available again! You gotta come by and try them!
Little James Basket Press
I first came upon this wine about seven years ago. I bought a case for the shop, and it took a year or two to sell it all. During that time, the wine became an icon for the difference between Old World and New World wines. This wine was truly unruly, with strange notes of earthy mushrooms, truffle, and dark red fruits. “Gamy” would have been an appropriate expression…interesting, and not to everyone’s taste. It took well over a year to sell just the one case, and usually the buyer was a young man intrigued by the challenge of a “wild wine”…Arrrrrr!
LJBP is made by a top French producer in the Southern Rhone (St. Cosme) which makes wines from several top regions, including CdP and Gigondas (we visited them in October 2011). As another blogger reports, “two minutes after cracking the screw cap, this 2011 bottling of St. Cosme Little James’ Basket Press is already the most interesting red wine under $10 I’ve tasted in all searchable memory.” LJBP is made from the solera method, like sherry or sourdough. Each year the juice from the latest harvest is added in a small proportion to a solera “mother” that has been “cooking” since “1999.
As I write this I have not yet tasted this wine, but I am seriously looking forward to it! It represents an important and elusive measure of regional terroir, traditional style, and organic process. Don’t miss it!
This Week’s Tasting
Chateau L’Ermitage Blanc ’12 France $10
An old favorite here, this vintage is even better– Light gold in color with aromas of peach, flowers, and honey; the Grenache Blanc, Viognier, and Roussanne, a heavenly blend!
La Rocaliere Lirac Blanc ’11 France $16
The nose is subtle and elegant with beautiful floral aromas of jasmine, honeysuckle, and verbena. On the palate, the wine is rich and round with wonderful notes of fresh citrus.
La Rocaliere Lirac Rose ’10 France $14
From sandy and clayish slopes with round pebbles; Grenache brings its fruitiness and richness; cinsault, its finesse and length; mourvèdre and syrah, red fruit aromas and aging potential.
St. Cosme Little James Basket Press ’12 France $11
Precise, aromatic nose of cassis, cherry and lavender. Tightly wound on the palate, with a firm mineral spine giving clarity and lift to the dark berry and bitter cherry flavors. Finishes with gentle tannins and good focus.
La Rocaliere Lirac Rouge ’10 France $16
Equal parts grenache, mourvedre, and syrah. Clay hillsides with round pebbles yield this
inky purple, with deeply pitched aromas and flavors of cherry-cola, licorice and violets. Youthful and firm, with a powerful finishing punch and lingering tannins.
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