Tasting at Le Clos Jordanne

So in early May - what seems like ages ago - we went to Niagara for the day. The sun was shining, birds were chirping, warm and fuzzy all over. That's all over and done now, but I do still have tasting notes from that day. Only one appointment, with Sébastien Jacquey of Le Clos Jordanne. I had met Sébastien, briefly, last year. I had a chance to taste some 2011's from cask, and immediately, I was blown away by the structure. It was like the entire personality of LCJ had changed - it was far more chiselled and well defined than before, when Sébastien was the assistant winemaker under Thomas Bachelder. Now that he was running things, the 2011's looked like the first salvo of what appeared to be a change in the LCJ style.

Sébastien worked with Thomas for a long time, and he's maintaining many of the same philosophies. The influence is clear, especially when Séb says things like:

Thomas says when something is wrong and you don't know what to do with the wine, you do nothing.

The focus on site expression and purity in character is very much being upheld here, but as the wines showed, that character is becoming more chiseled, more muscular, and more impactful. Exciting things happening here, and very much worthy of its reputation as a premium wine producer. The wines remain so pure and expressive, as before, but they now have that muscle and backbone that was missing. Séb keeps pushing the boundaries, keeps experimenting with extraction techniques, with whole clusters, with temperatures; in my opinion, he's exactly what Niagara needs. Young, passionate energy, full of talent and vision. The chardonnays were just bottled the week we went in, and so the winery was a flurry of activity. Many thanks to Sébastien for taking some time to share these with us. We started with the pinot noirs, in bottle and then from barrel, before finishing with the chardonnays.

Pinot Noir

From bottle:

2011 Village Reserve Pinot Noir: Blend of 3 vineyards: 35% Le Clos Jordanne Vineyard, 20% Claystone Terrace, and 20% La Petite. 5% of fruit whole-cluster fermented, a week of cold soak to maintain low extraction; stronger extraction through fermentation. Temperature kept under 28°C. 60% press juice in the blend, malolactic fermentation in barrel (30% new oak). Kept in oak for 16 months, with only periodic topping up and one racking in tank. Shows fabulous juicy fruit, very pure. Some earthiness, needs time to unwind that structure. Grippy and exciting tannins, but still in the LCJ style.

2011 Claystone Terrace Pinot Noir: Unfiltered. Minerality here, pure and so tight. So completely linear, real elegance and strength, the iron fist in a velvet glove.

2011 Le Clos Jordanne Vineyard Pinot Noir: Less clay on this site, more silt and sand. Rounder centre on the palate, very ripe tannins.

2011 Le Grand Clos Pinot Noir: The top cuvée, from the west side of Le Clos Jordanne Vineyard. 3 more days of cold soak, about 40 days of maceration. Ultra elegant and fine in structure, great breeding evident already.

Barrel samples:

2012 Village Reserve Pinot Noir: 15% whole cluster, malolactic fermentation completed in early February, sulfur added in mid-March. Sébastien was careful with the extraction, allowing a long, cold soak. This is from 60% of new plantations. A big wine, a bit uncouth at the moment, but great fruit quality.

2012 Claystone Terrace (West) Pinot Noir: 40 days of maceration. Sulfur odours initially, but they blow off to reveal a great freshness and purity. A very open wine, although slightly coarse on the palate.

2012 Le Clos Jordanne Vineyard Pinot Noir: Long malolactic fermentation, picked slightly sooner. Very tannic here, but some fruit. Sébastien thinks this is a bit disjointed, balance a bit off.

2012 Le Grand Clos Pinot Noir: Earthiness here and fabulous purity. Sébastien thinks it's slightly closed. Refined, tight tannins.

Chardonnay

2011 Village Reserve Chardonnay: Bottled 2 months ago. Aged in 15% new oak, with lees stirring. Sébastien is working on freshness here, picking sooner for lower alcohol. Again that purity, but with great structure and depth. Very focused.

2011 Claystone Terrace Chardonnay: Restrained structure with no perceptible oak on the nose. Ripe citrus here, great juiciness, oak comes up slightly on the palate with some creaminess. Fabulous dry extract.

2011 Le Clos Jordanne Vineyard Chardonnay: This sees 15% new oak. Creamy and round, more subtle here, more acid as well. Great extract on the finish.

2012 Le Grand Clos Chardonnay: Different pressing; Sébastien kept the first press juice and reintegrated 30% of hard press juice. Very expressive, oaky but well integrated. Elegant palate, gorgeous body.

DF

Tasting at Lailey Vineyard Wines

Tasting with Derek again!

I made what I expect to be my last visit to Lailey for a long, long time. It's been over a year since I was last here, which is criminal. These tastings with Derek are always a highlight of my Niagara trips. I feel like I know Derek's style, the Lailey style - but everytime, there's always a surprise. This time was no different. What more can I say about these wines? They remain a paradigm of elegance, soul, class, and above all, harmony. 

2012 Sauvignon Blanc: A bit grassy, lean and fresh. Really extracted here, wonderful texture. Great ripeness. A blend of 3 vineyards - Lailey, Legends, and Wismer fruit, 60% barrel ferment, 40% in tank. 

2012 Unoaked Chardonnay: Good fruit, fresh and tingly acidity, some lemon citrus.

2011 Brickyard Vineyard Chardonnay: Ripe and rich nose but in control, fresh and waxy. Great elegance, a bit of spice, well extracted.

2011 Pinot Noir: Earthy tar, mushroom, rose and cranberry. Classic here, with some weight. Sour cherry on the palate, great tight tannins. Always one of my favourite wines, a true hallmark of what Niagara pinot noir can be.

2011 3.7 Pinot Noir: A one-off. 2011 didn't produce fruit in either quantity or quality to be bottled as single vineyards, so Derek blended the 3 vineyards (read the label above), compromising a total of 7 barrels. More subtle minerality, good cherry fruit, elegant and lean.

2012 Gewurztraminer: 7 days ferment at 46°F for 3 months on skin contact. The second vintage of this varietal for Derek. Floral and aromatic here, but as Derek says, palate is falling off and slightly under-developed. Would be interesting to see this again in 2-3 years. Low alcohol (for the varietal), giving a distinct and very different character than expected.

2011 Merlot: On the aroma, graphite minerality and dark fruit. Good depth and some sweetness on the palate, tight here. 100% estate fruit, bottled recently.

2011 Cabernet Sauvignon: Slight jamminess here, dark fruit, lean but surprisingly round on the palate. Great tightness on the finish. 100% estate fruit.

2011 Syrah: Slight pepper on the nose, jammy with some sweet fruit and oak. Elegant, soft tannins, showing a more rounded, friendlier style of syrah. A character of the vintage.

2011 Petit Verdot: Yet another surprise varietal. Jammy here, ripe and raisin-y. Almost reminds you of port. Picked at 22.7 brix, nearly 15.5% potential alcohol. Big tannins.

2012 Malbec (from cask): Dark and big at the moment, with good sweet fruit. 120 cases total, with 6 barrels used for blending.

DF

Tasting at Pearl Morissette Estate Winery

Last year, I attended an event hosted by ApéroChic to celebrate Beaujolais Nouveau. And yes, today's Nouveau is actually drinkable. Seems so long ago, but time does fly don't it. The event was held at Toronto's Spoke Club, where I met its sommelier, Ludo. Ludo insisted that I needed to visit Pearl Morissette and have a taste. "They are very interesting wines," he said.

After tasting with Wes Lowrey, I made an unannounced stop at Flat Rock Cellars to take a quick look at their latest releases - the wines remain fresh, vibrant, and fun. But the main event was my appointment at Pearl Morissette, to taste with Francois. The history, the beginnings, all that about Pearl Morissette can be found with a Google search, but what you really need to know is that Francois has pretty much free reign to do things his way. And whatever industry you're in, that's an incredibly enviable position to be in. Master of his domain, a fearless leader in full command.

And he's quite a character too. Strong personality, which sensibly enough, also explains his wines - after all, wine is as much a reflection of its maker as the land and climate it was born in. I had no idea what to expect. Ludo of the Spoke Club first brought my attention to these wines - he described them as natural wines but not quite. Having a hard time understanding what that meant, I went into the meeting still thinking that these were biodynamic wines made in that fresh, vibrant style typical of most other producers in the area who make those same claims.

I was so fucking wrong.

The wines are unlike anything I've ever tasted. Yes, they're biodynamic. Yes they follow the principles of natural wine. But at the same time, they're neither - they defy all categorizations, all sorts of tidy groupings of what I thought wines were. They were at once pure and focused, elegant and full of finess; yet suddenly turning wild and untamed, a formidable caged beast. I had a tough time wrapping my head around them. Still not sure exactly how to even describe what I tasted. Francois took me around the property. They also raise cattle and chicken here, although the focus is clearly on pigs - look at those beauties. A litter born just weeks earlier, fed entirely on vegetables and grape pomace, zero animal protein. These are a hearty breed, able to withstand the harsh winter with nothing more than a n open wooden shed for shelter. They live a happy, healthy life.

Also at the tasting was the chef of Toronto's Splendido restaurant, and one of his former cooks. A windy day, we were led inside the geothermic-powered cellar, where we saw a few legs of ham hanging (an experiment at 1 years of age), including some of the equipment brought in. A new cement egg, as well as a 60+ year old oak foudre from Alsace. Once bottled, the wines remain unlabelled, resting in the perfect environment until they have a buyer (the labels are customized for each order). Francois' assistant, Ryan, then began pulling samples for us to taste.

They work with four varietals here: riesling, chardonnay, pinot noir, and cabernet franc. As we tasted each, across multiple vintages, Francois kept a running commentary going as we tasted, and I furiously tried to scribble down every word - as is the case when you're in the presence of an eminently quotable person, the wit and wisdom come at you like machine gun fire. I managed to catch a few - managed to get in a bit of tasting too. Some of the gems Francois dropped included:

Non-doctored wines allow for a level of mobility in the mouthfeel. 

Extended lees aging brings salinity, which with the acid makes it very food friendly.

Since we add no adjuncts, the only thing we can control is temperature.

We are enzymatic beings. If you slept a certain way, if you fucked your girlfriend today, your body will react a different way to the wine.

You never say THE or THE ONLY WAY for anything - there is no #1. There are several #1's!

Your preference is undiscussable.

Francois was adamant that he wasn't trying to be the top wine of Niagara, or the world - he dismisses the very thought of a 'best wine' as folly, since there is no such thing. Wines can only be different from one other, and that difference is what makes wine beautiful. The same goes for personal preferences. We don't need to justify what we find pleasurable, or distinctive. It is simply the wine that shows the best or most noticeable to us that day, in that moment. It may change the next time we taste the wine, because WE change. As Francois says, my mother and my daughter are both alive, but they're clearly very different.

So, the wines.

2012 Riesling: From cask, those Alsatian foudres. Really bright here, lean, slightly leesy. Pinpoint acidity, focus and elegance. Cheesy aroma, great extract. 20% of production kept back to see if they can age.

2011 Riesling (tank ferment): So much citrus fruit, extract like all hell breaking loose on your palate. My goodness, so much focused energy. Ripe lime aromas like you wouldn't believe, stony minerals, tight and linear. This was MY most outstanding of the tasting, and I asked to retaste it at the end. Mind-blowing in texture, energy, tension, and character. Riesling as I've never tasted.

2011 Riesling (barrel ferment): More subtle, some minerality, fresh but slightly closed. Palate is creamy, great acid, good fruit with the citrus coming up big on the finish.

2010 Riesling: Leesy here, bit richer, but acidity and minerality very present. Stainless steel ferment, went through full malolactic fermentation. Really high acid on finish, formidably extracted.

2012 Chardonnay: From cask. Bit closed, creamy but lean; good energy. Citrus and some of that oily citrus peel coming through on the dry extract.

2011 Chardonnay: Bottled 2 months ago. A more classic varietal nose here, creamy and round, lots of citrus. Lean and extracted.

2010 Chardonnay: More subtle, but oaky. Sweet with high acid, slightly less weight on the palate.

2009 Chardonnay: Not released. Elegant and fragrant, very subtle chardonnay, really extracted. As Francois says, a more 'vertical' wine as opposed to the horizontality of the 2010.

2011 Pinot Noir: So sweet and candied in aroma, but paradoxically, fruit is pure and fresh on the palate. Clean, fresh cranberry and rose petal character, finely structured and very tight.

2012 Cabernet Franc: Francois calls this 'a crawling toddler'. Bright fruit, ripe but very balanced. Pepper in the mouth, good fruit and very tight.

2011 Cabernet Franc: Francois calls this 'the best pinot we ever made in Niagara'. Ripe jammy fruit here, sweet and very round, extracted and tight, but fruit is quite open.

2010 Cabernet Franc: Fuller, riper, rounder and with more depth. Great concentration, ripe fruit, very dry and extracted.

So, as you can see from my notes, the hallmarks of the wines are great purity and focus in aroma, extract and structure on the palate. The older vintages have an incredible depth and expressiveness. Some of the wines have noticeable volatile acidity notes. The wines are, in Francois' words, made in a hands-off, non-interventionist way. I think that's actually the best way to describe them. Other than temperature and aging container, they do surprisingly little to the wines. They've built their own library of indigenous yeast cultures, and really let the wines go off on their own - in fact, there's a few barrels of 2012 chardonnay that's still not through with its primary fermentation (after 12 months!!).

Like the man, rule-breakers all around, but the wines have depth, they have soul, they have the spirit and strong will of the man behind them. It's simple to spout your ideals - it's far, far, far more difficult to actually bring them to life. Francois and Ryan make it happen. My mind is blown, my learning expanded - as always, gaining inspiration in Niagara.

DF

Tasting at Five Rows Craft Wine of Lowrey Vineyards

Earlier this month, I went to visit Wes Lowrey of Five Rows Craft Wine, a beautiful little spot in Niagara. A multi-generational wine-growing family, they produce tiny amounts of wine under the Five Rows label. We met in the morning in their charmingly rustic barn along with noted wine writer Rick VanSickle, to taste their lineup of 3 whites and 3 reds. Their website gives a bit more information about their history. Wes is carrying on his family's heritage of grape growing in St. David's Bench, with the family deciding to produce small amounts of their own wine in 2001. The Lowrey's sell their fruit to some fantastic wineries, with Fielding Estate the one I know best.

Wes is doing some very interesting things. They label all their bottles by hand, assigning each a serial number. You can register this number on their website, and provide comments including tasting notes, how long you put it away for, what you drank it with ... truth to the notion that to truly understand how people drink wine, you have to go out and connect with them yourself. Because market research and retail sales figures can only tell you so much. Wes also doesn't like to brand the corks. At the moment, all the wines are bottled under cork, and Wes reports a very low level of TCA-taint. He feels that branding the cork with the Five Rows logo is unnecessary as the logo is already present on the label, and he wants to avoid another level of cork handling.

So, the tasting. I didn't know what to expect at all, but as usual, you try to look for certain things - varietal character, vintage character, regional specificities, overall balance and harmony, and structure. And all the wines showed brilliantly. I was so surprised to see wines that had so much depth and soul ... real complexity here. Very exciting stuff indeed. Wes is a big believer of single varietals over blends - to showcase true each varietals true personality. And while many winemakers give the same speaking points, what a rarity to come across one who's wines actually represent that ideal. Bravo!

2012 Sauvignon Blanc: 156 cases produced, 60% fermented and aged in 5-8 year old French oak barrels, 40% in stainless steel. Wes wants to plan more white varietals. He gets freshness from the stainless steel, tropical notes from the neutral oak. There's a blast of green aromas here, good juicy fruit, ripe citrus. Great acid on the palate, extracted and really dry, and an almost lemony finish clinging to the palate.

2012 Pinot Gris: 70-75% in oak for 6 months. Wes is looking for more weight on the palate to take the edge of the acidity. Lots of lees stirring, with some skin contact before pressing. A bit more tropical fruit here, some creaminess, very round - good fruit. Acid and tension, on an extracted finish. Wes adjusts his proportions of oak and tank depending on how each vintage acts.

2012 Riesling: This is Clone 49 (Alsatian clone), planted on the recommendation of other growers the Lowrey's consulted. Vines with 5-6 years of age. Wes doesn't worry about sugar levels in the whites - he says the challenge is always about managing the acidity. Waxy nose, slight creaminess, but very ripe. Slightly sweet palate, again that really well-extracted finish. 12% abv.

2010 Pinot Noir: Quite rich here, cherry, crushed roses, and almost mushroomy. Lean palate, cranberries, and noticeably hard(er) tannins, high acid on the finish. Two blocks of pinot noir planted - new block produces riper fruit, while old block has more of those "funky pinot notes". Old vine pinot noir goes to Leaning Post Wines.

2010 Shiraz: So the name. Shiraz or syrah? It says shiraz on the label because both clones planted (Clone 100 on sandy/loam soil over clay, Clone 7 on mostly clay soil) are Australian. But the style is clearly anything but, hence the impromptu label rewrite. All reds here get 24 months in French oak. Wes gets 4 new barrels every year, with 2 for pinot noir, and 1 each for cabernet and syrah. End production is about 1/4-1/3 in new oak. Good peppery notes, white pepper in particular, with slightly jammy fruit. Thick and concentrated, but fine tannins - very tight at the moment.

2010 Cabernet Sauvignon: Young block planted is Clone 169, with another block planted across the ravine a mix of 4 clones. Old block gives mid-palate texture and structure. Wes' annual struggle is "Can I get it ripe? We have to really thin it to give people an idea of what cab sauv does on its own in our terroir." Immediately darker, with graphite minerality aromas. Intense, tight and really structured, with almost ashy tannins.

DF