April 2021

AIA VECCHIA: QUIETLY MAKING MAGIC

As one the writeups posted below will mention, this is the 20th Anniversary of this delicious Bolgheri source. It all started with a bang in 1998, kicked of by Hungarian winemaker Tabor Gil who came from nearby Ornellaia to head this new estate. We loved the style of the house from the beginning, with both a very suave top label in Sor Ugo, and a classy and very well priced value bottling Lagone.

As something of a personal interest, we have followed this estate ever since. Admittedly while those earliest efforts were quite seductive, it has been something of a feast or famine kind of label since those early days. One year would be delightful, the next not quite so thrilling. Still, when they were good, they were very good and we always came back to check out the newest edition to see where it landed in the pantheon of this distinctive house. Sadly Tibor Gal’s untimely passing in 2005 ended his development of the project.

The 2016 vintage, created by current winemaker Nicola Scottini, really brought our focus back to this estate although, admittedly, it was a pretty special vintage. We weren’t moved by the 2017s, but the newest versions, from the forward, user-friendly 2018 gave us a golden opportunity to talk about this Tuscan producer again.

The Aia Vecchia Sor Ugo 2018, as blend of 57% Cabernet Sauvignon, 22% Merlot, 18% Cabernet Franc, and 3% Petit Verdot that completes malo-lactic in barrel (50% new, 50% once used) where it remains for 18 months, is a lovely effort that really expresses what whole ‘super-Tuscan’ thing is about. Sweet black fruits, some dusty earth tones, smoke and graphite, when these guys are on they can run with the ‘big dogs’ for a fraction of the price.

Antonio Galloni of Vinous tells the story, “The 2018 Sor Ugo is a superb Bolgheri red. Pliant, succulent and so expressive, the 2018 offers plenty of richness, but with terrific energy, too. Black cherry, mocha, spice, licorice and chocolate all build as the 2018 fills out over time. The purity of the flavors is striking…94 points.” It’s everything the review says and, at under $35, it is one of the steals among the whole Bolgheri set.

Even a more remarkable deal is the Aia Vecchia Lagone 2018, their value red. The blend here is 60% Merlot, 30% Cabernet Sauvignon, and 10% Cabernet Franc. The fruit comes from both within and outside of Bolgheri, but we dare say when this wine is ‘on’ it is one of the classiest ‘little’ wines around. The 2018 is a beauty, sleek and polished, with a round palate of dark red fruits like plum and cherry flecked with notes of spice, wild herbs and meat.

Galloni was very complimentary, particularly for a wine that sells for under $14, “The 2018 Lagone is a gorgeous wine from this estate in its twentieth vintage. Ripe dark cherry, plum, mocha, spice and licorice all meld together in the glass. The 2018 is succulent and racy, with terrific freshness and tons of style. Lagone is not as flamboyant as it was in the early days, but it still offers tons of immediacy and appeal…91 points.”

THREE IN A ROW IN BORDEAUX? OUI!

We’ve just gone through a very complete tasting of the 2020 Bordeaux and we can say with no hesitation that it is another sensational vintage. What defines it in comparison to the prior two vintages is, in a sense, size. The colors are uniformly dark and saturated and a number of the wines, particularly on the Right Bank, have unusually substantial weight and richness. Many of them almost flirt with a California-like ripeness which certainly is not a bad thing.

We aren’t going to get too much into our personal picks but there are some very impressive efforts based on the barrel samples we tasted and a number of them are definitely worthy of consideration for purchases on a pre-arrival basis. There are a few things that might be best-evers when all is said and done. Stay tuned as prices start to surface over the next couple of months beginning in earnest this week.

A big part of the consideration for a futures purchase is, of course, price. It will be interesting from an intellectual standpoint to see how the pricing shakes out. There are two very good vintages already completed and ready to go, so one might presume that such a situation might cause a bit of downward pressure on pricing. To that we must remind you that this is Bordeaux and standard logic does not apply. But there are definitely a number of very impressive wines in 2020, with the Right Bank perhaps the showiest.

It would not be surprising if the Bordelaise used the frost devastation in France to justify higher fares. But Bordeaux, which mainly sits along a series of larger rivers, was not hit particularly hard. In any case, the important message is that 2020 is a fantastic vintage based on what we tasted and Bordeaux aficianados definitely should be paying attention.

Finally, this vintage is somewhat historic. As long as we have been doing this, we don’t ever remember three vintages of this caliber occurring successively. Two, yes, 1961/1962, 1989/1990, 1995/1996, 2005/2006 and, of course, 2009/2010. But three? Not that we can recall.

There could potentially be even four but it is far too early to tell. However understand while that frost in the spring can dramatically reduce crop levels, put a financial strain on producers and gets growers upset, whatever survives can still be successful depending on the rest of the growing season. There just won’t be very much of it.

We can’t stress enough what a special moment it is for Bordeaux right now, maybe by a quirk of fate, maybe just as a function of global warming. But we remember all of the crummy vintages of the ’60s (’63, ’65,’68, ’69), ’70s (‘72,73,74,’77), ’80s (’84, ’87) and ’90s (’91,’93, ’97), and clearly things have changed in the new Millennium. There are three outstanding vintages to consider before. Take a long look at the 2020s. The good times are here…until they aren’t.

PEDRO PARRA: SUPER RARE SUPERSTARS FROM ITATA

As you go down the wine road, you will continue to find stories that are more obscure and more unique. That doesn’t always mean ‘great’ from a wine perspective, but it certainly can as it did here. One has to marvel at the story of Pedro Parra, a minuscule producer in an obscure part of southern Chile who has become something of a cult hero based on his terroir-driven work with, of all things, Cinsault. Truth be told, these are two of the most impressive efforts with Cinsault we have ever run across, though admittedly the book of ‘great Cinsault’ is more of a pamphlet. His international reputation is pretty amazing as well considering he only makes about 100 cases of the two wines we are featuring today.

It all starts in the certainly-not-mainstream areas of Itata and Bio Bio about 500 kilometers south of Concepcion near the ocean. Pedro was born in this area and has returned here to live and create some waves in this obscure corner of Chile. One of Parra’s consistent quotes is, “You cannot grow terroir.” Terroir is a facilitator and Pedro, a specialist in the field, is particularly taken with the various forms of granite and schist here.

This is an area ‘lost in time.’ A difficult place to visit for centuries, with no roads, steep slopes, rain, and forest, that constant isolation was responsible for a strong local commitment to viticulture and wine. It was totally disconnected with the modern wine evolution that happened in Chile over the last 40 years. This isolation is the key factor for this terroir. No Bordeaux varieties invaded and no high yield production with irrigation was installed. That kept the area pure, pristine, and unique.

The two varieties most widely planted in Itata are Cinsault (45-70-year-old vines) and País (60 to 120-year-old vines). Pedro’s showcase wines, named for jazz musicians because they are ‘complex and innovative, are single-vineyard Cinsaults. For space reasons, we’ll defer to Wine Advocate reviews from Luis Gutierrez which cover technical notes as well.

The 2018 Pedro Parra y Familia Monk is “…another single-vineyard Cinsault, the 2018 Monk is also named after a jazz musician, Thelonius Monk…All of these wines had a native fermentation with some 30% full clusters, and in this case, the élevage was in 1,500-liter oak vats for just under one year. To me, this is the most complete of the three single-vineyard bottlings, and in a way, I see some similitude with the Imaginador bottling. It’s also the most elegant and mineral as well as serious, balanced, terribly precise and long. 1,170 bottles were filled in March 2019…94+ points.”

Pedro Parra considers John Coltrane an innovator and creative jazz musician, after whom he named the 2018 Pedro Parra y Familia Trane, a single-vineyard Cinsault from a plot of highly decomposed granite soils. It fermented in concrete with indigenous yeasts and some 30% full clusters and matured in 1,500-liter oak vats for 11 months. It’s extremely chalky and perhaps a little rounder and gentler compared with its siblings. It has a little more concentration and clout, but at the same time, it doesn’t reach the elegance of the other two. There are some similitudes here, because they all come from granite soils that mark all of the wines very much. 1,188 (bottles) were filled in March 2019…93 points.”

Conceptually these are a bit of a walk on the wild side. But they are delicious, distinctive, extremely rare one-of-kind efforts that merit attention. We’ve certainly never seen Cinsault with this kind of flair. Geek alert.

A JUICY VALUE FROM DOWN UNDER

The wine world seems to still be trying to leave Australia for dead on the big stage, but Oz keeps rolling out hits that fly in the face of the standard rumors about the balance, performance and aging potential that seem to effectively counter them. As people who were in at the beginning of the great Australian invasion at the turn of the century, we are still among those that think the category holds too much promise to ignore. Here we are with ‘public enemy number one’, the category most pointed to in facilitating the decline in Australian wine’s fall from grace, Barossa Shiraz and, to that, we say ‘nonsense’.

We’ll give you a short analysis of the main reasons we think Australian wines fell from grace in the marketplace. First was the breakdown of the classic ‘big Shiraz’ wines but, as we have said, a lot of the blame there has to fall on growers with old vines that decided they needed to have their own labels. We have proven on many occasions that ‘the players’ have excellent balance and age just fine (like the older Greenock Creeks we offered recently). Then there was a period where everything that came in seemed to be another leafy, undernourished red that was supposed to show restraint and be food friendly. The problem was that they weren’t very engaging in the first place.

We are doing our best to ‘make Australians great again’ in the minds of consumers because we believe in the wines and have long time relationships with a number of labels. Today’s offer is one of those. The Kalleskes have been working their Greenock farm for longer than anyone we know in California, some 150 years or seven generations. They farm sustainably and not only organically but biodynamically. They were certified back in 1998, long before it was the topic it is today. Winemaker Troy Kalleske has been at the winemaking helm of his family’s winery for almost two decades . It was Troy and his brother Tony that created the Kalleske label back in 2002. They’ve had plenty of time to figure things out.

That same Troy Kalleske makes the Nietschke wines. Johann Nietschke and Johann Kalleske both arrived in Barossa to established vineyards in 1838. Somewhere around 1968 the families came together with the marriage of John Kalleske and Lorraine Nietschke, hence the connection here. A number of years after the establishment of Kalleske Wines, Troy wanted to showcase some of the dedicated high-quality growers from across the Barossa Valley so the Nietschke Shiraz was born, named in honor of his mother Lorraine.

The winery calls the Nietschke Jack Shiraz 2017 (named for ‘great uncle’ Jack) a ‘modern Shiraz with a twist’. There’s a little something extra with a dash of Petite Sirah (5%) blended in for added complexity. All grapes are from the Barossa Valley including the renowned Greenock sub-region where vines are low-yielding and are grown in shallow, sandy loam soil over deep red clay, providing ideal conditions for these varieties. The juice spent a year in a combination of French and American hogsheads (300L barrels), some new and once used. It was bottled unfined and unfiltered.

We know a lot of you will think this an ‘unwieldy red’ when you see Barossa Shiraz. That is the conditioned response that the media has encouraged. Not true. Sure, this wine has some muscle and a ton of dark red fruits. But the weight and richness here present themselves with polish and balance. The Petite Sirah adds a little black pepper to the mix and threads of darker fruits. Full throttle, yes. But under control and packed with character. Nice notes from James Suckling, “Blackberry crumble, elderberry pie, vanilla and baking spices. Full body, some nice juicy tannins and a chewy finish. .. 91 Points.” All that and a sub-$20 price tag.

LAFAGE NARASSA 18: LAFAGE DELIVERS AGAIN

As many times as we have promoted wines from the portfolio of Jean-Marc Lafage, it would be hard to imagine that we haven’t covered every conceivable aspect of the winery’s background. To give you a short synopsis we will pull a few lines from the Wine Advocate, longtime cheerleader for Lafage through multiple writers over the years, and his remarkable value portfolio. From current Advocate Rhone editor Joe Czerwinski, “The dynamic Jean Marc Lafage has rapidly expanded his holdings and production in the past decade, since he began working with American importer Eric Solomon. There’s a huge, state-of-the-art winery and a seemingly endless number of cuvées to taste through… Even if I’m slightly less enthusiastic than the previous WA reviewer about some of the entry-level wines, there are still many screaming values in the lineup…”

Like the man said, there are seemingly endless bottlings to evaluate, but we always make it a point to check out anything from Jean Marc because his ‘hit rate’ over the last decade or so has been amazing, and the ‘value factor’ virtually unmatched. The hits just keep on coming. Today’s subject is one of the more recent additions to the extensive Lafage lineup, kicking off in 2014. We sold a good bit of that 2014 Domaine Lafage Narassa in a very short time back in November of 2016, no surprise, really, given the review (Wine Advocate 93) and the price ($15.98). We had another good run with the 2017 last year, a Jeb Dunnuck 94.

We tasted the newest edition, now called Famille Lafage Cotes Catalanes Narassa 2018, recently and felt that Jean Marc was ‘in the money’ once again. Since that 2014 opening salvo, every wine scored over 91 points and sold for under $20. Broad and ample in the mouth, the 2018 had plenty of round fruit, supple, laid-back tannins, well integrated acidity and a subtle streak of minerality courtesy of the black schist soils around the Roussillon town of Maury. The grapes are sourced from 60+-year-old vines, the old vines sitting in unique, aforementioned black schist soils in a fairly remote area in southern France. This distinct, somewhat ‘wild’ area is an important key to the special character of the wines from this region.

We aren’t surprised that Jeb Dunnuck was on board once again. How can you not cheer for a producer that is making wines that are both ample and nuanced for this kind of price! Jeb’s take on the 2018 Narassa, “ Almost all Grenache yet with 8% Syrah, the deep purple 2018 Narassa gives up a gorgeous bouquet of blueberries, kirsch liqueur, smoked game, violets, and lavender. It’s rich, medium to full-bodied, beautifully concentrated, and has a great finish…93 points.”

If a player is on a hot streak, you want to get the ball in their hands. Lafage definitely is in the ‘zone’ and has been for a while. We have sold a lot of Lafage over the years, and for good reason. But each of the bottlings we have offered, while generally uniform in the sense that they perform well above their stations and provide superb value, are each of distinctive personality as well.

These days many value wines are not ‘created in the vineyard’. The winemaking ‘formula’ overrides everything else. That is the beauty of Lafage. The wines not only deliver quality and value, but retain the character and purity of their region as well. One of importer Eric Solomon’s credos is ‘place over process’. None of his expansive legion of wineries is any better an example of that than Lafage. Once again, as always, it’s a lot of wine for the fare ($19.98).

BRIEFS

Even though we are big fans of the 2019 Beaujolais, we haven’t done a lot of offers. The reason is simple. The boats of course, and a lot of our favorites are from smaller producers that don’t necessarily have a lot of any one bottling that we could get behind in an email. Given the current shipping logjams, things are arriving haphazardly as well. That doesn’t say anything about the quality. The 2019s are right behind the 2015s in our mind, perhaps a little lighter on their feet but gushing with cool, sweet, plush fruit and tender personalities. They are absolutely engaging At the moment we have a number of selections from house favorite Daniel Bouland and we’d suggest you give this proven Beaujolais star a good looking over while they are here. Great notes from Wine Advocate’s William Kelly.
We’ve been following Domaine Olivier Hillaire since he purchased a part of the Domaine de Relagnes estate back in 2006 which included 3 ha. of Chateauneuf and 5 ha of Cotes du Rhone. The estate makes dense, rich, mouth-filling reds and typically gets good reviews, yet for some reason typically doesn’t evoke the same kind of enthusiasm from consumers. The 2019 Hillaire Cotes du Rhone Vieilles Vignes is a knockout. A blend of mainly Grenache (60%) with some Syrah (40%), it explodes in the mouth with authoritative dark cherry and plum fruit, some spice notes, and underpinnings of subtle earthy minerality. We have been impressed with a very high percentage of the 2019s Cotes du Rhones we have tasted thus far, but this one seems to have another gear and surprising length. It’s silly good for this kind of price.
Boats have continued to be a problem as ports are jammed, shipments are backed up, and in some cases it has even been difficult to find a container to put the wines in because of over-the-top demand for shipping. In any case one important boat got in…the one carrying a load of top flight 2016 Brunellos. We’ll try and keep it concise for now, but these words from Antonio Galloni make the salient point about the vintage, “But now the big question is: Do the 2016s live up to our expectations? Oh, yes; they certainly do…Is There Really Any Such Thing as a Perfect Vintage? Many producers throughout Montalcino would say that there is, and the example that they would give you would be the 2016 vintage. To quote Francesco Ripaccioli of Canalicchio di Sopra in the northern eastern part of Montalcino, ‘…if we could control the climate of a vintage artificially, I believe that I would program it to be just like the year 2016.’…I heard many quotes like this one during the course of my conversations with producers. ” Consider this an ‘early bird alert’. There will be much written about the vintage, and we’ll no doubt send offers on items where quantities support it. But there are things that may not last that long so do yourself a favor and have a look. This is a great vintage. Shop the 2016 Brunellos.
We met Gianni Venica Sr. many years ago and, through him, we came to understand the passion and dedication it takes to make brilliant ‘naked’ wines. With top notch Italian whites, they truly are made in the vineyard to show the purity and style of the fruit and the site. If you don’t do everything right, there are no quick winemaking fixes that wouldn’t stick out like the proverbial sore thumb. Wee have been following this producer, now in the hands of Gianni Jr., for decades and would like to point to his newest effort, the Venica & Venica Pinot Grigio Jesera 2019, is stunning. Exotic fruit, crisp acids, surprising substance, and engaging tactile quality, this is Pinot Grigio at another level. This year they employed some extended skin contact, called ramato, which adds to the ‘dazzle’. You’ll note the color is slightly pink as a result (Pinot Grigio has pink skin). A ’92’ from Vinous, this one is special.