TN: Rhone Ringers

Notes from a blind tasting with an interesting theme – the wines were all Rhone varietals, but were from other areas of the world.

2020 Terravista Roussanne – a bright wine from a BC winery, showing a lightly citrus nose, good fruit and a long clean crisp finish.

2014 Tablas Creek Esprit Blanc de Tablas – a tad darker than the previous wine and with a very nice nose of sweet apple, with good length – made from 72% Roussanne, 23% Grenache blanc, and 5% picpoul. Nice balance and smooth finish.

1997 Ojai Syrah Roll Ranch Vineyard – my wine and opened an hour before. Excellent nose of sweet dark cherry fruit and some spice and pepper and a smooth long finish. This could have passed in a Rhone tasting.

2004 Mas Doix Priorat Salanques – nose slow to open, but then showed some good fruit and a long slightly tannic finish. It qualified for the tasting as it is made from garnacha.

2019 Pasxa Syrah SJR Vineyard – from the Walla Walla valley, this was a dark wine with sweet jammy fruit nose with pepper hints that followed through on palate in the long smooth finish. Excellent wine.

2019 Epoch Estate Wines Veracity – mourvedre, grenache and syrah in this one, an obviously hot country wine, quite dark in colour and not very Rhone-like but good nonetheless. It continued to open up when left in the glass so should be decanted a while before tasting.

2018 Vinadores de Gredos Garnacha Dale – sweet ripe fruit nose, a dark wine with lots of acidity and tannin. Nice but needs some age to really show what it has.

A very interesting tasting and the first one of the year that we have been able to hold outside on the patio, watching the river going by.

[David M. Bueker]

Where is the Epoch from?

Templeton CA

[Jenise]

Yes, I really enjoyed this line-up. And what a splendid day on the Mighty Seymour!

Some thoughts: loved the Terravista. As I said at the time, it's the white grape I would probably prefer to all others if there were more of it around. It's a Rhone grape that does very well in other places, including Washington state and that little enclave between France and Switzerland whose name fails me at the moment--but one of the best Roussannes I ever had came from there. The Tablas Creek, only 13.5%, made me look at the label as the wine was strong and concentrated enough to make me suspect more alcohol. I did not love it.

Your Ojai was exquisite. I picked up notes of tobacco and old tires on the sweet cherry fruit. The Selanques was rather candied with sweet red licorice notes and herbs. Interesting to mentally compare this to domestic grenaches I've been tasting lately where the fruit's more pomegranate with a lot of spice; one would not guess your wine and my WA grenaches to be the same grape. My notes mention a bit of "Stormy Daniels on the finish."

2019 Pasxa Syrah SJR Vineyard My wine, and what might be my favorite Washington Syrah ever. I wouldn't call anything about this wine jammy, but cherry-plummy fruit with a touch of green olive, white pepper and some tire store. This would easily pass for a Northern Rhone--in my cellar, a Gonon would be its closest relative.

2019 Epoch Estate Wines Veracity – My first guess was mourvedre because it had a bit of horse blanket and blood, and Paso was an easy guess because we know it's bringer has spent some time there in the past two winters. Agreed, not Rhone like, but balanced and interesting for a 15.1% from this location--easily the most sophisticated Paso wine I've ever had.

2018 Vinadores de Gredos Garnacha Dale – Light fruit and peppery with high acidity and firm tannins. I did not love this at this moment in its life--as you suggest, it needs more bottle age.

that little enclave between France and Switzerland whose name fails me at the moment--but one of the best Roussannes I ever had came from there.

You mean Savoie? (for a second I thought you meant an indepedent country, but Luxembourg and Liechtenstein aren't there. Not the biggest Rhone white variety fan, though.

Obviously 2018 Vinadores de Gredos Garnacha Dale is best wine, from name alone, even though Grenache is not my favorite grape!

[Jenise]

LOL, Dale, yes of course!

And yes re Savoie. I just looked it up and Roussanne there is known as Bergeron. At higher elevations, it's spectacular.