Anyone know what this means? Anyone want to guess who said it? Hint: It was said about the 2012 Donnhoff Felsenberg Grosses Gewachs.
Sounds like Terry Theise
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As to WTF he means… porphyry is a kind of igneous rock, so perhaps he is alluding to minerality…
I know what your title literally means, but I have no idea how it would relate to wine. Perhaps what David suggests? What’s his exegesis for the flavor of igneous rock?
I still don’t know what exegesis means, but this is definitely my new favorite. My previous favorite was when he described his experience of another Donnhoff as being like a Tantric orgasm.
Well, here is a mention of porphyry in Donnhoff’s vineyards…
Dönnhoff […]The vineyards here include a variety of soils, in the case of Dönnhoff his include decomposed grey slate and volcanic rocks such as porhpyry, and are planted predominantly with Riesling…
I think he just means that this wine is a material lesson in the effect of porphyry soil on a finished wine.
Never use a small word when a diminutive one will suffice, right? Here’s to demystifying wine, one soliloquy at a time.
I, for one, can easily taste the difference between soils of igneous, sedimentary, or metamorphic nature. /sarcasm
Terry has a knack for being over the top with his prose, and this is definitely an example of that. However, there are people who have a lot more experience with such things than I do who say differences in soil type in a single region can give very noticeably different qualities in Rieslings. I don’t think the sentiment is outlandish, as you seem to be saying.
Haven’t heard Terry use ‘porphyr’ since yesterday at a tasting in Boston which included a Hexamer Riesling labeled as such.
As I recall, he started the note (or a similar one) with a funny diatribe against geologists who say that you cannot get minerals into wine.
I would be surprised if the igneous rock (porphyry in this case) does not result in a different soil than does the slate, and that this shows up in some fashion as a slightly different character for the wine.
Big descriptor in Alto Adige too:
Opinion
WINE REVIEW
Theise (++): “A big, smoky and determinedly important wine; still very early days, but this made me think of a Grand Cru Alsace with the fat removed and the mineral intact. But this isn’t just mineral; it’s a swollen dialogue of stones and smoke and exotic flowers. By the way, taste this for an exegesis of porphyry flavor.”
Cripes. I thought you were all talking about the Phoenician philosopher! I mean, you’re talking all exegesis and everything, has to be philosophy.
As far as applying exegesis to rocks, I’m clueless. I thought the word referred to an explanation?
What was he trying to say? That the particular wine explained porphyry flavor?
If all wines grown in that soil exhibited that flavor, he may have a point. But saying that the soil can influence the flavor of a wine is very different from saying that you’re actually tasting the soil itself.
“A swollen dialogue of stones and smoke and exotic flowers” might be even better than an exegesis of porphyry…
(It’s only words, and words are all he has, to take your heart away…)
Somebody sent me this quote from Theise, the source of which I can no longer find (which wine is this??):
Nothing but a jet-blast of manic salty basalt here; neon brilliance and about as much terroir as you can cram into a wine. Sure you’ll find some feckless geologist geek who’ll insist it is “scientifically impossible” for “mineral” to get into wine. I propose to waterboard this person, using this wine…
I don’t know for sure if he really believes that you are tasting the basalt (or slate) directly, but certainly he believes it is influencing (strongly) the wine. Put the same vines on different soils, even if the exposure is similar, and you will not get the same wine (at least to the extent that the winemaking allows for the terroir to show through).