WineLovers Discussion Group

Dale Williams wrote:

Brian K Miller wrote:Maybe Coturri should be distributed by Jenny and Francois?

Um, pretty sure at least in NY Coturri IS distributed by Jenny & Francois.
I actually like most of their portfolio.

Mark Lipton wrote:Or the guy (name redacted out of politeness) who brings in Cornelissen.

Who's the importer? I'm 1 for 2 in my tasting of Cornelissen, one great one at a big tasting, another that seemed possibly cooked. I realize (like say Scholium Project) they have heated supporters and detractors. I'd be happy to sample more, just a bit more expensive than my experimentation budget. But a lot of people I respect like the wines. I think Brian and Mark just blindly follow Bettane- natural wine haters!

But Coturri, I'd guess I've had 8-10 bottles. All but 3 undrinkably bretty. One that was actually pretty decent, one zin unflawed but pruney, and one red that actually bubbled/spewed out of the bottle as opened- I've never seen that elsewhere. Ever,

Sounds like a secondary fermentation. If I remember correctly Vieux Telegraphe had this problem many years ago and Kermit had to replace wine or return the purchaser's money. They actually had some bottles go boom and pop their corks I seem to remember.

Dale Williams wrote:But Coturri, I'd guess I've had 8-10 bottles. All but 3 undrinkably bretty. One that was actually pretty decent, one zin unflawed but pruney, and one red that actually bubbled/spewed out of the bottle as opened- I've never seen that elsewhere. Ever,

Hmmmm...slow learner, Dale???

I've had a few just on, or before, release that I liked quite a bit. But in a year or two, they were pretty much shot.
The wines are often harvested pretty late, at high sugars. They are made w/ no SO2 or filtering. They often go into the btl w/ a witch's brew of microbiological
activity. They are pretty erratic in how they age, mostly not into something pleasurable. But Alice worships their wines.
Tom

Dale Williams wrote:. I think Brian and Mark just blindly follow Bettane- natural wine haters!

No. Not at all. I brought a bottle of Loire Valley Gamay that was ummm...undergoing secondary fermentation in the bottle. My sister in law and I thought it made a great Thanksgiving wine. I even liked the one bottle of Cornelison I've had!
I really only like Beaujolais when it is somewhat funky-Dressner or Massale or the like.

I just had a couple of J&F wines that were....really, really stinky.

BUT...there is that common "French Hipster Wine" flavor profile that I pick up. I like it, but it is distinctive to me.

TomHill wrote:Hmmmm...slow learner, Dale???

I AM a slow learner about many things in life, but except for a couple of early bottles, these were all from other people's cellars (and Lou, the spewing bottle didn't blow a cork on it's own, but the guy with the corkscrew was lucky not to lose an eye when it popped as he started opening! I think that tablecloth died, though)

But Alice worships their wines.

Really, dude, you need to talk to someone re this Alice obsession

Brian K Miller wrote:I just had a couple of J&F wines that were....really, really stinky.BUT...there is that common "French Hipster Wine" flavor profile that I pick up. I like it, but it is distinctive to me.

I have some friends who adore the Oliver Cousin Anjou (J&F import) where the "ass in the glass" can exceed my tolerance. Most not so bad.
Unintentional 2ndary fermentation is never a good thing (see Coturri).
But speaking of Loire Gamay (and grapes reflecting terroir) -there's a combo with a distinctive terroir/grape signature that I don't care for. There's something about a lot of Loire Gamay that has a disturbing (to me) aroma - I called potted plant,I think Mark L narrowed me down to geranium. Others don't smell it, or don't mind it. I only usually get from Loire Gamay, only very occasionally from Beaujolais Gamay, or Loire Pineau d'A.

Yes, often I get a primary/grapey note that says "unsulphured/natural" to me, but as long as there's something interesting underneath......

I'd agree with the geranium assessment.

Dale Williams wrote:
I have some friends who adore the Oliver Cousin Anjou (J&F import) where the "ass in the glass" can exceed my tolerance. .

I think THAT is the producer of one of the strangest wines I have ever tasted. Light, fruity Gamay flavor then pow...RANCID PEANUT BUTTER. Not horse barn or typical brett, but rancid peanut butter!

Then I saw a photo of the guy (who looks like he lives under a bridge), heard he has no electricity anywhere on the farm...

I don't get geranium at all in my favorite (when not refermenting) Loire Gamay...the brand new L'Insurge project from shaved-head-should-be-skateboarding Jeremey Quastana. Loved his Cot, also! Which was actually funkier in a traditionally bretty sense than the Gamay.

Dale Williams wrote:I have some friends who adore the Oliver Cousin Anjou (J&F import) where the "ass in the glass" can exceed my tolerance. Most not so bad.
Unintentional 2ndary fermentation is never a good thing (see Coturri).

That comment reminds me of my all time worst wine experience, courtesy of Mike Lawton at a Toledo get-together a few years ago. He'd brought two wines from Dom. du Peyra, one of which was quite nice and the other of which Joe Perry steered me away from, telling me it smelled like shit. He wasn't being metaphorical, either, but quite literal in his description. It was, hands down, the worst case of Brett contamination that it's ever been my misfortune to smell.

Mark Lipton

Geranium odor is often associated with a malo-lactic fermentation that takes place in a wine that has been treated with potassium sorbate, a chemical used to inhibit yeast fermentation. While the sorbate does not kill the yeast, it prevents it from reproducing and is often used in wines that are finished with residual sugar.

Howie Hart wrote:Geranium odor is often associated with a malo-lactic fermentation that takes place in a wine that has been treated with potassium sorbate, a chemical used to inhibit yeast fermentation. While the sorbate does not kill the yeast, it prevents it from reproducing and is often used in wines that are finished with residual sugar.

That does not sound very much like what "natural wine" Loire Valley producers would be doing. Hmmmmm.

Brian K Miller wrote:

Howie Hart wrote:Geranium odor is often associated with a malo-lactic fermentation that takes place in a wine that has been treated with potassium sorbate, a chemical used to inhibit yeast fermentation. While the sorbate does not kill the yeast, it prevents it from reproducing and is often used in wines that are finished with residual sugar.

That does not sound very much like what "natural wine" Loire Valley producers would be doing. Hmmmmm.

Perhaps it (or something similar) is used in the vineyard instead of pesticides?

That would be interesting as I always assumed the vegetal/geranium flavors were part of how gamay expressed itself in Touraine, as it's a different terroir from Beaujolais. But I've never actually visited Beaujolais.

Mark Lipton wrote:

Dale Williams wrote:I have some friends who adore the Oliver Cousin Anjou (J&F import) where the "ass in the glass" can exceed my tolerance. Most not so bad.
Unintentional 2ndary fermentation is never a good thing (see Coturri).

That comment reminds me of my all time worst wine experience, courtesy of Mike Lawton at a Toledo get-together a few years ago. He'd brought two wines from Dom. du Peyra, one of which was quite nice and the other of which Joe Perry steered me away from, telling me it smelled like shit. He wasn't being metaphorical, either, but quite literal in his description. It was, hands down, the worst case of Brett contamination that it's ever been my misfortune to smell.

Mark Lipton

That your all time worst wine experience involved Lawton and Young Joe Perry is understandable. That YJP was the successful steerer away from disaster is in itself strange and unusual, similar to saying Brad Kane is right: it doesn't happen very often.

Besides what Howie wrote, the geranium- like aroma could also be the result of a spoilage problem in the formation of lactic acid by certain strains of bacteria.

Salute

Pineau D'Aunis ? spelling--I always get the smell of pine needles, which I find pleasant.

No-one around (it`s 1am MT) so I can stir the pot!!

http://www.voxeu.org/article/wine-tasti ... ncompetent

I doubt very much that Aramon reflects terroir. It barely reflects being a grape.

-Paul W.

Thanks for posting that provocative link, Bob.

The writers are undoubtedly clever men but the report strikes me as superficial. It contains a number of truisms and partial truisms which don't IMO support the headlined conclusion.

Let me give some examples.

Gergaud and Ginsburgh (2008) show that the differences between natural endowments – region, type of soil and its chemical composition, exposure of vineyards – in the Pauillac, Margaux, Saint-Estèphe, Saint-Julien, and Haut-Médoc regions have no effect on the quality of wines.

When I have more time, I'll search for some rebuttals of this startling conclusion.


In fact, Gergaud and Ginsburgh show that the differences in quality ...... are the result of a well-understood choice of grapes that are adapted to soil qualities and weather conditions, as well as the age of the vine and the technologies used to produce the wine, manual operation such as picking and selecting grapes, de-stemming and crushing, and other production processes that follow the harvest.

Surely the words which I highlight are a good example of the importance of terroir as well as of its optimisation?


“a good wine comes from a good grape, good vats, a good cellar and a gentleman who is able to coordinate the various ingredients”

There is an important terroir component in good grapes.


‘Judgment of Paris’2 changed the traditional view shared by experts that only French wines could be of high quality.

Indeed! It trapped a panel of French "experts" into acknowledging the existence of world class terroirs in California.


This implies that Château Mouton-Rothschild and Château Haut-Brion, two French superstars, cannot be distinguished from New Jersey reds, which cost only 5% of their French counterparts.

It could mean that we have some previously undiscovered quality in New Jersey, that the Princeton panel was not very competent, that the methodology was flawed or a bit of all three. I seem to recall that a recent similar panel tasting resulted in some Chinese Cabs being "beating" some top Bordeaux.


This is not much different from professional musicians who are unable to distinguish by listening between a violin built by Stradivari – which would cost up to $4 million – and a new US-made instrument worth a couple of thousand dollars.

I have read some well reasoned criticism of this Strad study and IIRC someone on this board (was it Dale?) had some hard things to say about it.


As has often been shown, the neural representation of experienced pleasantness is determined by the knowledge of the price of a wine (Plassmann et al. 2007). That is, if we think a wine is expensive we perceive its quality as being superior, all other things being equal. This suggests that, on many occasions, quality is not an objective trait of a commodity, it rather seems to be what we want it to be.

To some extent this is a valid point. We have all met label drinkers. And many of us benefit from the fact that fashion gives high prices to certain wine types, like white Burgundy and Bordeaux grands crus, and lower prices to wines which we often actually prefer, e.g. top Riesling, Loire chenin and Northern Rhône (Guigal's super cuvées excepted). The same exists in other spheres, e.g. in music where, for example, Maria Callas used still to get rapturous applause at performances when her voice was in severe decline.

Nevertheless it is a stretch to conclude that this is a universal truth and in particular that it debunks terroir.

Hi Tim,
(I’m sure this happens to a lot of us). Someone hands you a glass of wine totally blind, and upon tasting it you deem it of “high quality”. If one is knowledgeable enough the grape variety/varieties might be easily recognized. If one is knowledgeable enough about viticulture and vinification (warm climate/hot climate; various viticulture or winemaking) technique might also be easily recognized. If one is knowledgeable enough the country of origin or even the region or village might be easily recognized. But when it comes down too the exact location where the wine was made or its origins things could get quite “fuzzy”. Does this fact alone make the wine less of a “high quality” wine?

Salute

Mark Lipton wrote:

Brian K Miller wrote:

Dale Williams wrote:I can say Coturri, but saying it makes me queasy.

Maybe Coturri should be distributed by Jenny and Francois?

Or the guy (name redacted out of politeness) who brings in Cornelissen.

Mark "My Name Ain't Brett" Lipton

Amen.

http://www.winemule.com/2011/07/susucaru-3-natural-with-vengeance.html