Je t'aime, Bordeaux! WSET 3.4

I loved this week's class.

This week was all about Bordeaux - and I think Bordeaux is my very favourite wine.

Bordeaux is on the west coast of France and is split into two main regions, the left bank and the right bank.

The right bank is mostly clay soil so Merlot is the primary grape with some support from Cab Sauv and Cab Franc. There are places like Pomerol and St. Emillon that are very famous producers of this style of wine. It is excellent wine, undoubtedly, but my preference is for the other side of the Garonne River.

The left bank, ooh - la - la, is the home of the Cabernet Sauvignon focused blends which grow in more gravelly soils. There is still Cab Franc and Merlot (and, optionally, Malbec and Petit Verdot) but the driving force of these grippy, structured wines is Cabernet Sauvignon. The famous places include St. Estephe, Paulliac, St. Julien, and Margaux in the upper (Medoc) region and Pessac-Leognan, and Graves to the south. These might possibly be my favourite wines to drink in the world.

Courtesy the Wine Cellar Insider

Bordeaux wines can be pretty pricey - there are some that are thousands of dollars - but you can pick up a decent one for $40 to $60 - particularly something like a Cru Bourgeois, which chateaux have to apply for each year based on the quality of their wine. If you were to spend around $100 (definitely special occasion) you could find some exceptional wines. Only thing is, you probably would want to wait five to ten years to drink them!

The ranking system is interesting. In Medoc only, the top wines are called Grand Cru Classé. This category is divided into five 'growths' with first growth being the top wines. All of this ranking came from Napoleon III and the classification he directed in 1855. Little has changed since then. There's also Cru Bourgeois for those wineries that were too small or weren't around 150 years ago. In Graves, the better wines are just called Cru Classé - there are no growths. And in St. Emillon, they have another system with St. Emillon AOC at the bottom, then, St. Emillon Grand Cru Classé, and finally Premier Grand Cru Classé which is divided into A and B. All of these classifications had had their problems over the years.

Courtesy Wander and Wine

The other area we looked at was Alsace, a region of France bordering on Germany, which is home of mostly white wines including Riesling (dry style), Gewürztraminer, Pinot Gris, Muscat and some other grapes (Auxerrois, Pinot Blanc, Sylvaner). It is the only French region that I am aware of that has the varietal of wine on the label. They do have some sweet wines - Vendages Tardine which is basically Late Harvest wine where the grapes have undergone passerillage (drying of grapes on the vine) and Selection de Grains Nobles where wines have undergone Noble Rot.

When buying an Alsace wine, there is the Alsace AOC (must be 100% varietal) and then the Alsace Grand Cru AOC (which must be made from one of the four Noble Grape varieties (Riesling, Pinot Gris, Gewürztraminer, Muscat). Much simpler than Bordeaux!

And now, some tasting....

We started off with wines from Alsace. We were given three and told that each was a different Noble Grape. Our group was able to easily figure out which wine was which.

The 2015 Trimbach Riesling ($60) was a bone dry Riesling with high acid, high alcohol, medium body, medium plus flavour and a medium finish. Definite tastes of apple, lemon, honey, flint and even a bit of petrol. I couldn't decide between Good and Very Good but this one could probably age a bit.

The Pinot Gris was a 2016 Domaine Mersiol ($36) from Alsace, of course. It had some nice fruit flavours including peach, apricot, nectarine and honeysuckle as well as some floral notes. Lynn, our instructor,  felt it was a Very Good wine and had ageing potential although I really like my Pinot Gris wines to be as fruity and floral as possible. I feel that way about most white wines.

The final wine of the three was a 2017 Late Harvest Gewürztraminer from Kuhlmann-Platz ($25). Although youthful, this wine had a complex array of flavours including peach, apricot, pineapple, lychees, roses and ginger. I thought it was high alcohol but Lynn, our instructor, said that it was probably because of the ginger that I was tricked into thinking it was higher than it actually was. I thought it was Outstanding but I think the consensus was Very Good as not everyone felt it had a long enough finish. It was, however, balanced, intense, and complex. A steal for $25!

The next three were from Bordeaux - my faves! One was a white, one was left bank and one was right bank.

The white was a Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon blend (about 80% SB) and was a 2011 Les Hauts de Smith from Pessac Leognan ($83). This wine had some great flavours but I missed a few of them so I will put what the class consensus was - grass, peach, lemon, pear, toast, mushroom, and vanilla. This was aged in barrels on the lees to give it a nice, buttery finish. This is another wine that had ageing potential and was rated Outstanding (although I had only rated it as Very Good).

The right bank wine was a 2012 Chateau Barde-Haut Grand Cru from St. Emillon ($96). There was both red and black fruit on this including cherries and plums as well as toast, leather, and wet leaves. It had less tannins than the next wine, surprising as it is two years younger, and also had a wonderful velvety mouth feel. If all Merlots tasted like this, I would drink it a LOT more often!

The left bank wine was a 2010 Chateau Capbern Gasqueton from St. Estephe ($126). I tasted black cherry, black plum, cedar, tobacco, and green pepper. It was an earthy wine that had some grippy tannins but still had great structure to it. Definitely could age and was rated Outstanding. My favourite wine of the course so far....

We had another Bordeaux and a wine from Cahors to round out the reds.

The Bordeaux wine was a 2010 Cru Bourgeois from Chateau Dasvin-Belair in Haut Medoc ($45). This was a great price and it had some interesting aromas and tastes including red cherry, green paper, pepper, black plum, toast, tobacco and cedar. Although its finish wasn't as long as the previous two, it was balanced, intense, and complex and definitely ready to drink - Very Good!

The wine from Cahors was a 2016 Gouleyant Malbec. It was OK - red berries, red currant, cranberry, and some smoke - but was a bit of a let down after the previous three. It was a Good wine and was ready to drink. 

Finally, we had a sweet wine from Sauternes. Unfortunately, this 2013 Chateau Armajan Des Ormes  ($39) at the end of the class and was a bit rushed. Suffice it to say that it was quite sweet due to noble rot and had oak and vanilla amongst its flavour profile as well as high acid.

A good wine but Bordeaux reds is where my heart is.

This weekend, our provincial liquor stores are having a release of the 2015 Bordeaux wines. I already bought a couple last week at Everything Wine but I have my eye on two or three in the special catalogue that they produced. Looking forward to some grippy, structured, wonderful wines!

Riesling Evening with some Blanc Plonk - WSET Class 5 - Part 1

It was a lovely day on Tuesday.

I was able to combine two of my favourite things - riding my scooter and drinking wine!

It was a nice, sunny day and I hopped on my scooter and headed out to my WSET class in Vancouver. I even got there about a half an hour early and I was able to try a new restaurant, Pokérrito. This restaurant serves Hawaiian poké - sort of a Hawaiian version of sushi - on rice, salad or in a burrito. 

I really enjoyed poké when I was in Maui and was very excited to see it arrive here in recent weeks. When I entered the restaurant - sort of a take out place with a couple of tables - I was a bit concerned about the 12 people in front of me but the line went fast. I ended up gobbling half of the rice and accompanying wonderful ingredients before class started. 

This was class number 5 - time is definitely going far too rapidly! 

We started off with Riesling a wine that can range from bone dry all the way to sugar-sweet. The best ice wine in BC, as a matter of fact, is made from Riesling. Riesling is also one of the few white grapes that lends itself to ageing. 

Most Riesling comes from Germany. There's Mosel that has the lightest and most delicate, somewhat sweet, Rieslings grown on steep slopes in places like Piesport and Bernkastel. Then there's Rheingau which is a smaller region that makes drier wines where all the grapes only grow on the north side of the river to catch the sun. Next up is Pfalz which has off dry, medium body wines in places like Forst and Deidesheim. Finally there's Rheinhessen which is the largest area which is flat and produces the cheaper Rieslings. 

The Germans have Qualitatswein which is the first level of their better wines and then they have Pradikatswein which is their higher quality wine. I have to learn this, so you might as well, too! Within the Pradikatswein category, there are grape quality levels going from almost dry to very sweet. They are kabinett, spätlese, auslese, beerenauslese, trockenbeerenauslese, and eiswien.

In Alsace,  the French label the wines with the grape varietal but also have the better wines from Villages and then from Grand Cru. They are usually dry or sweet wines. Other areas include Austria, New Zealand, and Australia where Riesling smells like a lime popsicle - and petrol!

Our first three wines were all Riesling and we had to blind taste them. 

The first wine we tried was from Alsace and sort of replaced our wine that had cork taint during the first night. It was clear, pale, lemon, with a pronounced nose, lots of stone fruit and apple, a dry wine with high acidity, medium body and a medium minus finish. It was rated Good. It was made by Trimbach and dost $36. 

The second was a Kabintett level German wine that was medium lemon, with medium intensity on the nose and had some stone fruit (nectarine, peach, apricot) as well as petrol and lychee. It was an off dry wine with high acidity and a medium finish It was a 2014 Weingut Max Ferd Richter from Mosel  that was rated Good and cost $40 and had a whopping 9% alcohol. 

The last Riesling was Auslese - so it was pretty sweet!  It was pale lemon, medium intensity on the nose, lots of stone fruit (apricot, peach, pear) as well as a hint of lime. It was medium in sweetness, had high acidity, medium body and a medium finish. This wine was a giant seven and a half percent alcohol and was a 2011 Joh. Jos. Prüm Bernkasteler Badstube Auslese that was rated Good and cost $85.

After the Rieslings, we looked at some different white grapes that are all grown in France. 

First was Chenin Blanc which is the grape grown in Vouvray. It is famous for its 'wet wool' or funky smell and is also South Africa's most planted grape. 

The wine we tried was pale lemon with medium intensity on the nose, a lot of stone fruit, off dry in taste with high acidity and a medium body. It had a bit of a funky taste (apparently - I couldn't sense it, though) and a medium finish. It was a 2015 Vouvray made by Baron Bernard (couldn't find a web site), was rated Very Good, and cost $28.

The next grape was Melon Blanc, grown in Muscadet. It is a neutral grapeshot is not aromatic and lends itself to sur lie - absorbing dead yeast cells - for 6 months to a year.

This Clos de Briords old vines Muscadet was pale lemon, with a medium minus nose, and had apple, peach, floral aromas, and tastes of lemon, peachy and apricot. It's smokiness was complimented by light body and a medium plus finish. This wine was rated at Very Good and cost $30. 

The last was Viognier which is a big sugar, full bodied wine with low acid and none of the spiciness of, say, a Gerwurztraminer. 

 

The Viognier we tried was medium lemon, had pronounced floral, apple and stone fruit aromas, some additional apple and toasty flavours on the palate, and had medium acidity, full body, and a medium plus finish.  This was a Condrieu made by E. Guigal which was rated at Very Good and cost $82. 

Those were the whites that we tried that night - next come the reds!

"I have a dead thing in the middle of my face" or WSET Class 1, Part 1

Last night, I embarked on my wine journey in earnest.

The WSET level 2 course offered by Fine Vintage was held last night in Vancouver. Thinking I had plenty of time, I left home and arrived around 6:15 for the 6:30 class. Damn, I thought, I hate being the first one there. To my surprise, the classroom was packed with only a two seats left! Not your typical school crowd....

I sat down at my table and met my fellow wine aficionados for the evening. Across from me was a woman from White Rock who had just sold one business and I think was getting ready to start another one involving wine. Beside me was a guy that grew as part of the family that owns Desert Hills Winery in the Okanagan and wanted to improve his knowledge of wine. Finally, at the end of the table, was a woman who works at Capilano Golf Course - I think in the restaurant. Everyone was quite friendly at the beginning of the evening but our table was pretty quiet through most of the night - I think that people take this course very seriously and it's probably good that I'm not chatting to someone while the teacher is teaching, so to speak, as I do tend to get distracted.

Speaking of our teacher, his name is Dave Munro and he is did a great job the first night, keeping us interested, using lots of humour, and showing an expert understanding of wine.

Right off, we tasted two fizzy wines. I had come to the course with the intention of spitting out the wine that I tasted but that didn't last past the first glass. I did manage to spit or dump half of most of the wines so I felt fine by the end of the evening.  Interestingly, the wine tastings were all blind. It's a really good way to train the palate and not bias yourself to a particular type of wine, but it's also really difficult!

The first wine in our fancy ISO tasting glasses was a nice bubbly champagne. It had lots of baked apple, even apple crisp and also the smell of toast caused by having the dead yeast cells (lees) being in contact with the wine. This is called autolysis and I think this info will be on the exam.....  It was not too sweet and had a high acidity and was a dry wine. Dave rated it as a very good wine - which is not hard to believe as it is a Grand Cru - the highest rating, I believe, for Champagne.

It was revealed as a Charlemagne Grand Cru Champagne that was a blanc de blanc - all Chardonnay grapes - made in 2010. The price? $96.00.

The comparison wine had an amazing almost perfume nose. There were tropical fruits, melon and even lychee in the nose. It was a sweet wine which, I found out, usually means high acidity to balance the sweetness. This was also a very good wine and Dave noted that it would make a very good breakfast wine!

This was a La Serra Moscato D'Asti from Italy made in 2015. It was only 5% so you could drink it all day! It was also just $32 a bottle.

After covering some more information about tasting, we tried that next two wines.

And this is when I realized that I had a dead thing in the middle of my face.

I thought I was doing pretty well with the tastings of the first two wines, when the third wine was passed around, I couldn't smell a damned thing! The little tasting glasses makes it difficult to jam your nose in the glass but, try as I did, I couldn't smell anything.

Of course, the know-it-alls from the course sagely nodded and pronounced "cork taint" which was so frustrating to me because I had always wanted to find out what it smelled like. And, thanks to my dead thing, it didn't't smell.

Happily, when instructed to drink (and spit) this spoiled wine, it truly tasted hideous! Few things have ever tasted this bad!

This was an Alsace Riesling made by Gustave Lorentz, and it costs $38 for a hopefully unspoiled batch!

The final wine before the break was another Riesling. This was a clear wine that was German so it was rated as a "spatlese" that was medium sweet with high acidity, and a medium finish. The pronounced nose included green apple, apricot and petrol (!). Stone fruits like peach and apricot were also noticeable in the tasting notes.

This was a German Riesling from a Mosel producer called St. Urbans that was 11% and cost $82.

I was interested by the range of people and also the knowledge of wine. One woman said that she only knew the difference between red and white wine while others knew so much, especially about the wine tasting, that I felt as dead as my nose.....

Next time, I will look at the reds we tasted and a special kind of wine that I have never tried before!