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| Onward “Golden Hour” Skin Fermented Pét-nat Suisun Valley, CA 2023 Populis Rosé California 2024 Ser Cabernet Pfeffer Wirz Vineyard 2022 Les Lunes Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma 2023 Arnot-Roberts Syrah Sonoma Coast 2023 |
| This week, we’re tasting five varied wines from California. We’re starting with a sparkling wine from the ever-inventive Faith Armstrong of Onward Wines, made from macerated malvasia bianca grapes: zero sugar, textured, and delicately aromatic. If you’ve met Faith, you might be lulled into thinking that you’re in the presence of a pleasant, New Age sort of hippie (she was raised on a commune in Canada, and I guess the old ways die hard), but behind that genial mien lies a whip smart wine mind, and we always want to see what’s on her mind. Next, a light, dry hybrid of rosé and orange wines from the winemaking team of Shaunt Oungoulian and Diego Roig of Les Lunes, an intriguing mélange of grapes including skin-fermented pinot gris and a tiny dollop of orange muscat, which gives the wine a subtle and seductive aromatic note. Then we transition to red wines for the rest of the tasting with another wine from this team, a cabernet that’s neither oaky nor over the top, one that reminds me of the sort of old school, well-balanced cabernet that we once made in California back in the 60s (if you’ve had the opportunity to try a properly cellared BV Georges Latour Reserve from this era, this is that sort of wine, though of course it’s not 60 years old). Next, an oddball wine from our friend Nicole Walsh, the Santa Cruz winemaker with whom I collaborated on for my vermouth. Nicole makes this wine from old vine cabernet pfeffer. This somewhat mysterious variety has zero genetic connection to cabernet sauvignon, and organoleptically, it diverges considerably from that grape (it turns out to be an old Bordelais variety, mourtaou, which I believe is extinct, or nearly so, in its homeland). To finish, another well-balanced, not over-the-top red wine made from cooler climate, coastal syrah. |