Yves Gras on the 2008 Vintage.

I was surfing the internet last night, and checked out what was new on the Vin Parleur site. For those unfamiliar with it, Vin Parleur is a wine blog that's maintained by a handful of European vintners.

Lo and behold there's a post from Sebastian Nickel on Yves Gras' take on the 2008 vintage. Yves is the winemaker/proprietor of Domaine Santa Duc, and a true rockstar in the wine world. We also happen to have been the proud wholesalers for Mr. Gras wines for 20 some years. His 2007 Cotes-du-Rhne Vieilles Vignes (item # 71074) is an amazing value, and the Santa Duc 2007 Gigondas Les Garancieres (item # 71554) is one of the best Gigondas I've had in a years...and I drink a lot of Gigondas.

Here's Nickel's blog on Yves Gras and the 2008 vintage:

"Like every year, Robert Parker has visited the Domaine Santa Duc at the end of august, to taste the wines of the last two vintages. An occasion for Yves to review 2008, a vintage that has been hastily denounced by the press. Although the biggest default of this year simply might be its position between 2007 and 2009.

“Monsieur Parker”, I’ve told him,” 2008 is good! Some people did a great job…”

A reminder: Springtime in the Rhone Valley first was dominated by cool and wet conditions. Around flowering, though, weather was rather dry and warm, and after a hot and summerly month of July it turned cool again in August. Frequent rainfalls allowed slow and regular ripening of the grapes. Some heavy local thunderstorms at the end of summer caused some damage on tender grape varieties, such as Syrah or Cinsault.

"Watch out, as the 2008 vintage might bewitch you, even if it looked like the weather conditions would condemn the harvest in advance: a difficult, cool year, sometimes even with hail and heavy rain storms. (…) Positive effects of those climatic variations were concentrated juices due to low yields, interesting acidities preserved by low temperatures. Fresh northern mistral winds also led to well adjusted alcohol contents because of the slow ripening of the grapes. (…)" Antoine Gebelle and Roberto Petronio wrote those words in the renowned Revue du Vin de France June 2009. And a lot of wines from 2008 nowadays confirm their judgement.

“Concentrations were not sufficient for the Grand Grenache”, Yves explains,”but I made a Haut Garrigues this year, and it was a very good wine. However, the press did not support the 2008 vintage and one may call it “autodestructif” to edit a grand cuvee under this circumstances. I like the wines of 2008 very much. They are well balanced and fresh but also show maturity and power. Just taste it, and you will find quit a lot of wine in your glass."

Well, you got the message, best you taste the wines of 2008 yourself and judge them. Like every year, it is a question of taste."

Check out Vin Parleur for yourself by clicking on here.

THE WINTER CATALOG IS HERE!

The latest edition of our FWD catalog is now available, and is chock-full of great new additions! To get your very own copy, please reach out to your QWS rep today.

THEY'RE UP TO SOMETHING...

Our friends Brian and Kimberly at Loring Wine Company have certainly been busy. If the demands of harvest were not enough, the two released two exciting new wine projects and a new website!

Check out what they've been up to by checking out their site. It makes us thirsty just reading about it. Looks like there's some new LWC wines in our future!

Perfect Wines for Turkey Day!

Wondering what to serve at your Thanksgiving day meal? Here are ten great wines guaranteed to

CHATEAU LASCAUX RED: Spectator's Wine of the Day!

Nov. 06, 2010: CHÂTEAU DE LASCAUX Rouge Coteaux du Languedoc 2008 (91 points, $16)

Very suave, with effusive spicy notes on the aroma and lush, fresh flavors of raspberry and red plum that turn quite creamy. The luscious finish features plenty of snap to its ginger and white pepper notes. Drink now through 2014. 3,330 cases made.

Item # 52154 – 14.6cs remaining

This is a sumptuous red, perfect for the winter…displaying perfect proportions of 60% Syrah, 35% Grenache and 5% Mourvedre.

2007 Gros Nore is Spectator's Wine of the Day!

Nov. 05, 2010: DOMAINE DU GROS NORÉ Bandol 2007 (91 points, $39)

Very plush, with rich dark plum, cherry and kirsch flavors. Elegant violet and black licorice notes come to the fore, and this finishes with dark chocolate and spice notes. Drink now through 2017. 2,250 cases made.

Item # 52034

A Harvest Update from Siduri & Novy

Our friends Adam and Dianna Lee of Siduri/Novy just sent us a great harvest update. I thought you'd be interested in reading it, too:

“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.”
-- Marcus Aurelius

Harvest is a moving target, and one that we are so intimately involved with, that putting any proper perspective on it, while in the midst of it, is tremendously difficult. Having said that, sometimes it is important for us to take a step back, even while in the eye of the maelstrom, and make certain that we are charting what we believe to be the correct course. We hope you don’t mind our sharing these reflections on where the 2010 Harvest has taken us thus far.

Much Has Already Been Written About the Weather in 2010:
Various wine writers have already weighed in so thoroughly about the unusual weather in 2010 that we don’t know if there is much to add. You can read Jim Laube’s comments here, while Steve Heimoff has shared his perspective here.

The only area that seems to have been overlooked is Oregon, where California’s cooler-than normal summer seems downright balmy compared to the weather in the Willamette Valley.
Some Commentators Have Speculated that there will be a “Before the September Heat-Spike” vs. “After the September Heat Spike” dichotomy in the wines from 2010: This is a distinction which we will buy into….somewhat. Certainly the grapes we picked before the mid-to-late September heat were generally ripe at lower levels of sugar. And the fruit after the heat was at higher levels of sugar. But, like most things in life, there is more complexity to the situation. Picking grapes before the heat might have assured you lower sugars and lower alcohols, but if the fruit wasn’t ready….then it wasn’t ready. Waiting until after the heat was good for those grapes. But waiting too long had its downsides as well as, in some cases, the vines themselves gave up and stopped providing the grapes with the nutrients necessary to continue maturing. The real answer, as is almost always the case, is that there is no substitute to spending time in the vineyards and examining the health of the vines and the condition of the fruit.

The Grapes Tell A Story that Is All Their Own:
While the weather provides the formative environment for the fruit, grapes – much like some people – can break away from their upbringing and become something quite distinct. While the 2010 growing season was tumultuous, the Pinot Noir grapes that we have brought in thus far look shockingly good. Almost uniformly, the colors on the juice and wine are dark, black even. The sugars at times ended up high, but the acids also stayed high, and the nutrient levels in the must stayed quite high – which has led to some rocket-like fermentations. And the wines that we have pressed to barrel thus far are rich and intense, reminding us a bit of the 2004 Pinot Noirs.

Oregon Grapes May Tell A Different Story:
We are picking all of our Oregon fruit this week. We visited the vineyards last week and the grape juice tasted good, the fruit (what little of it there is) was in good shape (surprisingly little botrytis but lots of bird damage which will not even be picked), the acids had fallen, but there just wasn’t much sugar. Count on the Oregon-California difference being particularly pronounced in 2010.

Syrah – Sorry We’re Not There Yet:
But we will be soon. This week, in fact, all of our North Coast Syrah is scheduled to be picked – leaving us with only Syrah from the Santa Lucia Highlands and Nebbiolo from Santa Ynez (and a touch of late harvest Viognier) waiting to be picked. Not coincidentally, the weather looks like it is going down the tubes this weekend, at least for the North Bay, and we want to get the fruit in during the pre-deluvian period. Dianna is going to be checking on the fruit down south on Thursday and will be making any picking decisions on it shortly thereafter.

What’s New?
Oh, there are some new things this year – exciting things, we think. Things such as, a Russian River Valley Sauvignon Blanc that is already downright tasty. A new Pinot Noir Vineyard (Soberanes) from the famed Gary and Gary duo (you can check it out at www.soberanesvineyard.com). A new source in the Santa Rita Hills called the John Sebastiano Vineyard. A new Russian River Valley Zinfandel. And a really interesting (at least to us winedweebs) experiment taking fruit from the Van der Kamp Vineyard and fermenting some of it according to the tenants espoused by one-time famed Burgundian consultant Guy Accad. You can read more about his work here.

Finally:
It is time to get back to the fruit – a busy week awaits. But we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention to work of our fantastic harvest crew – Ryan Zepaltas, our Assistant Winemaker, Luke Henderson, our Cellarmaster, and our incredible group of harvest interns: Mike, Ross, Troy, and Jason. Without these guys we wouldn’t be doing what we are doing – or at the very least we’d be doing it very poorly.

Cheers,
Adam & Dianna Lee