8 wired, a pale ale with sauvignon blanc flavours...

I've recently tried a craft beer called 8 Wired, the Indian Pale Ale from Marlborough, 100% hops grown in Nelson. Really hopy on the nose, and then came the surprise of a beer that actually had all the aromas of a typical Marlborough Sauvignon blanc!
That sort of gooseberry, and green leaf tomatoes and sweat, all with a kind of tropical fruit flavour. The whole of typical sauvignon blanc from the region, and all the characteristics of each valley from the Wairau to the Awatere. It was actually very appealing and fresh, i'm not sure I would drink more than 330ml, for it might become a bit sickly because very rich in flavour, but it was very enjoyable. That's a serious and complexe beer.
Interesting to find these similarities...

Defining a style, a question of patience, commitment and passion

The winery i work for has produced its first vintage in 2003, and i arrived in NZ with the 2004 vintage being bottled. Although my role is in sales and marketing, I worked with the winemaker in 2005 and was bottling the wine, which got me to understand about the bottling process, without touching the wine in the cellar though. In 2006 we changed winemaker, and from there i stopped bottlings, and have been part of the blend tastings, and diverse experimentation tastings with the winemaker, his assistant and the viticulturist. I have been lucky enough to have tasted quite a bit before i started working with this winery, and that the winemaking team welcomed me in their tastings and blending decisions. I am sure it is something not so obvious in lots of wineries, but here my opinion was taken into account for both what it was in terms of pure tasting and what it needed to be from a commercial point of view as well.

Therefore, it's been now 5 vintages that we work on understanding the characteristics given to both our sauvignon blanc and our pinot noir by first the different soil types of the estate, and then different other components such as different coopers (which we now have defined which ones suit better our wines and styles), different finings, different closures (cork, screwcap, which degree of sealing etc.) etc.
The second important point for us was to determine 3 styles, corresponding to our 3 labels, which also correspond to 3 price points, and in the end 3 different terroirs (or almost). Starting from scratch, to succeed in determining these 3 labels is a fantastic story we write vintage after vintage, for we have to understand what we get from nature first, and then try to integrate the different components listed above (and more indeed), and finally define 3 different profiles. We wanted 3 wines showing one identity but with 3 syles that we defined through natural differences. To be more precise, the clays would give a sort of richer wine, while the gravels would be generally finer. That was the base of our styles.

It is now very exciting to see that after trying different blends from different soil types, or at different proportions, we finally defined our 3 styles. Today we were tasting the final blends of pinot noir 2009, the objective of the tasting was to see the wines before and after fining.
But finally it is rewarding to realise that we have defined these 3 styles, and that they show the identity, the philosophy of that one winery and its terroir. It is obvious on the nose and in the mouth that each wine corresponds to its label, and that it is in the continuity of last vintage. Blind, you can classify them per label. The identity is generally elegance, subtle fruit rather explosive fruit bombs, rounded mouth, femininity rather than big extracted wines - and it is true for our both varieties. But we managed to decline this identity in 3 styles, 3 labels, 3 different price points - and this with the same work in the vineyard (same yielding, same ripeness). It is a question of precision on the tastings, and blending propositions back and forth, and it is above all a question of time... patience has a good reward though. I have of course to add that this was possible because the vineyard is worked to show natural characteristics (or terroir), and that the style of wine we wanted to produce was first defined in the vineyard.

This winery brings its new lots of joy to me, everyday, not one excepted - since 6 years. It is for me such a beautiful story to be part of, this story is being written right now and i love being part of drawing these lines one by one.

Raw Nature savours

I have experienced a savour i never particularly paid attention to today - rosemary sap. I add some simple pasta with herbs, and just went in the garden to pick up some fresh rosemary and cut it as is on the pasta, without any cooking of the herbs.
The flavour of the rosemary is well-known to everyone, but thist ime as the herb was really fresh and raw-uncooked, the flavour of the sap was present. It is a lovely feeling to taste nature, to taste these raw flavours that are not specifically savours of traditional cooking but precisely of raw nature.
One of these i would love to experience is earthiness. Not as you find it in a wine, which shows earthy savoury characters, not raw forest floor, this lovely aromas you smell when you walk in a forest after the rain. Not mushroom, no, that complexe forest floor after the rain full aroma.
I hear your sarcastic thoughts: the best way is maybe to put my nose in the forest floor and eat whatever dirt comes to hand. Wouldn't that be too simple and actually not enjoyable? Not what i'm after.
But i'm sure they would be a way to produce these kind of 'raw nature' savours in an real food experience (or experimentation). Let me know if you come close to something like that...