Red pinot gris. Say what?

WINE TALK
1

Ever had a “red” pinot gris? I hadn’t until I saw one on the list at Giant in Chicago (awesome restaurant, and very fun wine list) and had to bite. 2015 Minimus Disagris, from Willamette Valley, winemaker Chad Stock.

Cloudy color on the deeper side of rose, the nose really reminds me of something along the lines of Lapierre Raisins Gaulois - it shouts “natural wine” with a fruity funk. Apparently (according to the wine guy at Giant), the 2014 harvest had great color and Stock decided to let it sit on the skins. A bit of googling says its unfined, unfiltered, which makes sense. Definitely comes across more as a very light red than a typical pinot gris. And it works!

Curious why more winemakers don’t try this out. Or maybe they have and I just haven’t seen them (or they generally don’t turn out well).

2

While not outrageously common, much more common than you would think. In Italy, typically called Pinot Grigio Ramato.

Binnys stocks 1 or 2 if you want to explore further.

3

Cameron also makes one, called Rouge de Gris. Or rather, started in 2014 and has released one vintage. Really cool stuff as well.

John Paul also makes a more “traditional” rose style with Gris, called “ramato” after the Italian style (which is named after the color of onion skin, to give you a sense of the two different shades of pink/red).

4

The Long Shadows Julia’s Dazzle Rosé is made from Pinot Gris. It is readily available to us locally here in WA and we go through a couple bottles every year.

5

It’s not hard to do, and it doesn’t even have to be in the natural realm; pinot gris can get pretty dark-skinned in the right mesoclimate. Drive through, say, Alsace at harvest and you’ll see a lot of deep red grapes. That’s pinot gris. Even a little skin contact — not enough to make a true orange wine — leads to pigmentation.

6

Yup…Ramato is the name in Friuli for skin-contact PinotGris.
MatRorick/Forlorn-Hope makes a Dragone Ramato from PG that’s quite good.
Ramatos tend to have quite a bit of phenolic character to them.
Tom

7

Donkey and Goat make a Ramato in both still and PetNat styles

8

The only Ramato I’ve seen had very short maceration time. It was more rose winemaking than red winemaking. Are some macerated longer?

Radikon does a PG that’s on the skins for a couple of weeks. It’s about as dark as some Northern Italian reds. Delicious stuff, and definitely a bit wild.