WTN: Illuminating

[Jenise]

2019 Château Mont Thabor Luberon Illumine White Blend
A blend of vermentino and grenache blanc, enticing at the outset for blending a grape that often has too much acidity with another that often has too little. Very pale, almost water-color, with immediate notes of smoke, canned pear, almonds, green banana and lemongrass--it def had acidity but it wasn't lemony. And most unusual but quite interesting is a sherryish flor flavor though I'm aware of nothing about its winemaking to attribute that to. Very different and very good.

Oxidized, Jenise?

(It's funny; I was on the East Coast, in Maine, in the Summer of 2007, just before harvest and had a Luberon white that was also a blend of Vermentino and Grenache Blanc. 2007 would be the first year that the Vermentino and Grenache Blanc vines I'd had planted in the Sierra Foothills would bear fruit, and become the first iteration of the ESJ wine "Heart Of Gold," and the chance to taste a French version of that blend was something I felt I couldn't pass up. But the wine had been smothered with brand new oak, and it was impossible to even imagine what kind of grapes had produced it.)

[Jenise]

No, not oxidation at all. It was Manzanilla-ish in a very mild way. Quite delightful, and Bob who loves sherry was totally smitten. First time I've ever had this blend that I know of. We don't see Luberon wines around here much.