The Vintners Voice

In my last post I tried to point out the problems with determining the 'ripeness' of  grapes for the purpose of making harvest decisions.  My primary point was that the indicators of 'ripeness'; sugar accumulation, acidity and pH, flavor/phenolic development are not all that closely linked thus making 'ripe' a relative term.  I also hoped to convey that a sites mesoclimate, a regions macroclimate as well as  the climactic characteristics of a specific vintage influence, profoundly, the degree to which these indicators vary.  I also eluded to winemakers having a relative sense of what 'ripe' is.  Why have I done so?  What is the point?

In Part 1 I mentioned the two mortally opposed camps of wine lovers.  One camp likes rich wines, which tend to be high in alcohol and 'ripe' in nature.  The other more traditional camp prefers wines lower in alcohol and less ripe.  The reality is that these camps are not really separate but occupy a continuum of extremes in terms of wine styles ( and thus ripeness ).

 In terms of commentary, the traditionalists are the ones out there in the Community of Wine writing letters, standing on soap boxes and making the most noise.  They claim that wine styles that rely on a greater degree of 'ripeness' are destroying terrior, impairing ageability and decreasing food affinity.  They claim wine is dead and that the world's wines are becoming a pool of homogenous plonk.  They want wines that are distinctive and interesting.  They have genuine intellectual curiosity regarding the subtleties of a wines relationship to place and season.  They are trying hard to turn the tides of the wine industry away from homogenization to individualism.

The lovers of Big Wine tend to be more hedonistic.  They are more interested in a wines flavors and textures and less interested in how these relate to places, climates or the whims of craftspeople who toil over the product.  Often times these consumers pursue a 'bigger is better' course of purchasing.  I tend to suspect that they are less aware or at least less 'burdened' by the notion of regional and varietal standards.  They know what they like and they are going to buy it.  And buy it they have.  Many of the worlds top wine critics espouse the virtues of Big Wines and, along with consumers, have pushed production towards the bigger end of the style spectrum.

In my opinion Big Wines are boring, homogenous, short lived and dominating over food.  I also realize that they receive higher scores and are easier to sell.  Big Wine consumers are easy to please, just give them more; concentration, fruit, oak.  Traditionalist want less and less and therefore have laid out unclear criteria for wine to meet their approval.  They want less oak but how much less, they want less ripe but how much less etc.  They seem to me to be a moving target.  This provides headaches for all winemakers but I think more so for those of us that grow and make wine in less predictable climates.

Here in Oregon I have made both Big Wines and Traditional wines ( above and under 14% ABV ).  Am I some sort of wavering vintner that can't seem to make up his mind?  Am I flip flopping based on some predicted trend?  I don't think I am either.  What I do believe is that, more so than my colleagues in CA and Washington, I am at the mercy of the season.

I like the character of wine under 14% ABV and I also like the lower taxes we pay for making them instead of Big Wines.  More importantly I believe there is an optimum degree of 'ripeness', in terms of phenolic/flavor development that makes the best wines.  I believe that at this point I get the best balance of fruit to earth/spice flavors, the right structure and texture and the best expression of place.  Some years I get it at 14.5% ABV others I get it at 13.2%.  Some years I get it with high acids other years I get it with low acids.  The point is; that for me I know there is a point of physiological maturity that makes for the best balanced most expressive wines and this is the point where I pick. 

I take some offense, to a degree, to traditionalists making statements like Tom Wark did at Fermentation ( http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/terrior/index.html )  " The defense of these absurdly high alcohol wines is amusing at best, particularly when you get to the point when the defender gets to the point of using the phrase "physiologically mature".  Start stepping away slowly, never turning your back on them, when you hear a defense put up with these words as the basis for the defense."   It somehow suggests that because I am picking on flavor or a point of physiological maturity I am not to be trusted.  What bothers me most is that this is coming from people who taste the wine years after we have made our decision to pick.  They do not know our vineyard, they don't know our regions, they don't even make wine, they only have the supernatural ability to decide years later that you made a wrong decision.   The traditionalists suggest solutions that do not reflect the reality of grape growing or fail to take into consideration the differences in region, vintage and site.  They continue to propose solutions based on linear thinking ( ie. just pick earlier ) when we actually live in a curve linear world.

 I once worked with a Chef that used to say " the easiest people to please are the ones that tell you what they want".  Big Wine consumers have done just that, they tell us what they want instead of telling us what they don't want.  They ask for richer, foreword and fat wines.  While the traditionalists are waging a War of Words the Big Wine people have voted with their dollars.  Clark Smith, likely the most controversial voice in the trad vs big war because of his firm positioning on both sides of the issue put it this way in an article on Appellation America ( http://www.appellationamerica.com/wine-review/515/Spoofulated.html ) 

     " You would think what all that web-kvetching about terrior would show up in the marketplace in a way a guy could use to build a brand.  In your dreams, maybe."

This suggests that Clark, like may other producers of small production individual wines, is having a hard time finding a market for his traditional wines while his consulting clients producing Big Wines cannot make enough.  It seems to me that the trad camp it either to lazy to seek out the wines it claims to want, is too cheap to pay for them or just wants to spend it's time telling Big Wine drinkers that they are wrong. 

Luckily there is a middle ground.  Most consumers just want wines they like, big or traditional.  They fail to be easily categorized because they can judge a wine by it's merits without being fixated on % ABV or how much new oak the wine was aged in.  A few of these embrace site, regional and vintage variations and seek wines out that speak of these things regardless of what the alcohol level is. 

There are alot of wines out there and almost as many winemakers.  I  think a vast majority of winemakers view their work as honest and are trying to make a product that they can be proud of and that can be enjoyed by consumers.  Each year they are given a crop ( sometimes not much of one ) and with it a challenge.  In more marginal and less predictable climates such as Oregon's Willamette Valley these challenges can vary greatly from year to year.  Winegrowers everywhere must make decisions in the vineyard based on nothing more than a guess about what the weather will be like in Autumn.  In September a winemaker must live with  decisions made in June and react to the condition of the fruit.  They consider their experiences in previous vintages and their knowledge of their vineyard sites. 

Every winemaker I know has a sense of what they think a wine should be.  We all have opinions about the virtues of a great wine and how they should be grown and vinified.   We make our decisions based on this ideal and react to the conditions of the site and season in a way that we hope will allow a given wine become what we think it should be.  No two of us share a value system or a notion of exactly what a wine should be or how it should specifically be made.  No two of us ever make the same wine, even from the same fruit.  There is no objective level of 'ripe'.  It is a subjective as every other decision a winemaker makes. 

Some winemakers produce elegant wines of finesse, subtlety on lithe frames with light strawberry and cherry flavors.  Others make wines of tremendous concentration, raisin and prune fruit with voluminous mouthfeel.  The rest of us make everything in between.  We make the wines based on a subjective truth that we hold onto, this is the birth place of Style.  The only thing we have in common is a commitment to make the best wines we can, keeping the specifics to ourselves. 

The diversity of wine styles is the result of the diversity of winemakers' ideals and principals.  I know of no winemaker that given a 'poor' vintage or vineyard site resigns themselves to making 'poor' wines.  Any decisions we make or actions we take are done with wine quality and thus the consumers best interests in mind.  We want to give you the best product we can and we have to trust our own senses as to what 'best' means.  I would never ask someone to abandon their own truth, ideals or principals and would lose respect for myself if I were to do so under pressure from consumers be they Big Wine lovers or traditionalists.   The answer, from my point of view, is to seek out wine made in styles you enjoy instead of asking winemakers to change the way we make wines.

Winemakers cannot control the season.  Often times, especially in marginal climates, Mother nature limits our ability to create wine in a specific style.  In my next post I will discuss some of the tools winemakers have to overcome the limits created by Mother nature and discuss what I think is the Community of Wines greatest paradox.