Took a trip to San Luis Obispo and the associated wine country for Labor Day Weekend. I don’t have comprehensive notes, but I’ll include a few highlights where appropriate. We hit 9 places (!) in two days, but this was no doubt possible due to sharing, regular dumping and ‘right sized’ pours. (3 per day is more reasonable if you drink the majority of tastes, IMHO.) None of the producers but one gave away glasses–big plus there–and most did not stray from the list and pour extras. Tastes were all in the $5 to $10 range with most closer to $5. Anyway, it was nice that I didn’t come away feeling tipsy due to a marathon tasting at any one place and tastings were fairly priced.
As far as the overall feeling, the Pinots and Chards are good to excellent, but depend on the style of the producer. A fair number are oaked into oblivion which is annoying. Bdx blends (sourced from Paso or warm areas of SB County) ranged from average to poor with most displaying one dimensional roasted, porty, jammy fruit. A few wineries were producing rather rustic wines in the sense they were fruity, unstructured and seemed to have a sweet-sour quality consistent with unevenly ripened fruit.
Day 1
Laetitia: Should have stuck with just the sparklers and Pinots here. The Roussanne was fat and oily with a seeming surfeit of oak. The Pinot Blanc had a fresh nose, but was light on flavor. The '06 Nadia Red, a Bdx blend, smelled like cherry liqueur and was simple and super-ripe. Tasted the Brut Blanc and Cuvee M sparklers and true to form, the BdB was higher in lemony acid while the Cuvee M was a bit rounder in apple and toast flavors. Both were fruit forward in CA fashion. Five Pinots, five impressions. The '08 Reserve was a bit oaky and extracted, but had good typicity and depth for a fair $35 price. The single vineyard Pinots each displayed a specific character; I enjoyed the 2007 La Colline most for its freshness and purity. La Coupelle and Les Galets were both more masculine and extracted, albeit it good in their style. At $60 per bottle, though, they’re about $10-$20 above the competition per my experience. A clone 115 Pinot was also tasted, which seemed more fruit-forward.
Phantom Rivers: This was an underwhelming tasting. I did like their 2007 Larner Vineyard Mourvedre enough to buy it as it had gaminess and dark fruit, but the wines seemed otherwise lackluster. Their Pinot showed a sweet-sour quality with very ripe fruit but all some obvious green aromas and flavors. The Cab and Zin both had that liqueur-like quality and were simple, fruit-forward wines. Whites were typical–oaky Chard, feline Sauvignon Blanc.
Talley: Another disappointing tasting, albeit more due to style. The Chards were uniformly oaked into oblivion. It wasn’t just butter from ML and body from sur lees aging, but overwhelming toast and splintery flavors. One of the higher end SV Chards (Oliver’s, perhaps) was better balanced, albeit by higher acid, better flavored fruit than a reduction in the oak regime. I did like their ‘basic’ Estate Pinot, though it seemed a bit attenuated aromatically to justify the $35 price. The higher end Pinot, '07 Rosemary’s (edit: originally said Rosella’s), was more extracted and oaky, albeit reasonably good for the style. At $70, though, easy pass. I ended up enjoying their $10 '06 Rock Sold Red the best. It smelled like roasted bell peppers, jalapenos, tobacco and more generally a vegetable recycling bin. Quite drinkable, and reminiscent of a cheap Chinon or Bourgueil in the excessive herbaceousness. By far the wine with the most character in Talley’s lineup despite its severe imbalance.
Wolff: Small winery with a fairly large vineyard. Again, a fairly rustic style in general. Chard and Riesling both seemed a bit off-dry despite being listed as dry. The reds were fairly nimble and acidic. Not a ton of depth, but good qualities as tables wines. The $20-ish price point is just within the acceptable range for food wines like this. The Syrah and Pinot were both keepers (and quite light in color for their respective varietals), though the Pinot hinted at an unexpected bell pepper quality. The Petite Sirah is a cool climate one and quite distinctive. It needs years to unwind, though the cigar box quality on the nose is quite intriguing.
A lot of wines dumped along the way here, to be honest, except at Wolff, which had a 100% success rate. Not that the wines were great–they just were not abusive to the mouth as some earlier in the day.
Day 2
Kynsi: Probably the best producer on the trip top to bottom on the trip. The Bien Nacido Pinot Blanc was exotic and refreshing with excellent flavor intensity. The Chard was everything Chard can be–rich, full bodied, but fresh and balanced. At $18, superior to Chards double the price. Then the Pinots, lovely stuff! Some are more leathery ('07 Edna Valley), others are more mushroomy ('06 Stone Corral), while some are more spicy ('07 Bien Nacido). The '07 Stone Corral was the best of all worlds, and well-priced at $48. We left with the '07 Edna Valley at $32 as it was a slightly better value. Both Syrahs, a Bien Nacido and their Edna Ranch, were superb, with the Bien Nacido showing silky dark fruits and peppery spice and the Edna Ranch showing more herbs and red fruit. Bien Nacido only sources to producers that do their fruit justice; it’s a tacit stamp of approval when any winery is allowed to buy Bien Nacido fruit repeatedly. These guys and gals are on the ball.
Claiborne & Churchill: Mostly Alsatian style blends. The Gewurztraminer was exotic and in your face as it should be. The Pinot Gris was more restrained, but just as refreshing and not watery as often seems to be its varietal stamp. The Riesling, which seemed just a hair off-dry, hits with a full dose of petrol and floral aromas. Their Edelzwicker, a blend of Riesling, Gewurz, Pinot Gris and Orange Muscat, gets the best of all worlds in an off-dry package. All nice values under $20 if not $15. The reds were less exciting, though the Pinot was a good value with typicity under $30. Their Rhone blend was simple, fruity and very ripe.
Cerro Caliente: I hate to be hard on these folks who seem like great all around people, but the wines were beyond rustic. The Viognier on the 1st pour was brown and smelled of butterscotch–oxidized beyond recognition. Each red–varietal wines no less–followed suit. All were porty smelling and oxidized. They made a point of stressing they make varietal wines to express the unique qualities of each grape. But you can’t do that if the house style obliterates the grapes’ intrinsic qualities. The proprietor is essentially a hobbyist who makes wine on the weekends when not working as a mechanic, so it’s not some kind of snobby pretentious operation. But it was rather frustrating to visit after seeing an interesting list of varietals and finding every wine to be identical. I was expecting some rustic wines and a hit or miss scenario with each wine. This was a complete miss, unfortunately, though maybe someone likes this style. I dumped nearly every wine after a smell and a sip.
Tolosa: A large scale operation with soundly made varietal wines at typical prices points. Whites $15-$20, reds $25-$30 and some reserve level wines at $40-ish. The tasting room has a view of their fermentation tanks. Some are probably 3 or 4 stories tall! Seeing the scope of the production facility which stretches on and on reminds me of the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Anyway, the wines were sound and showed typical varietal character, but didn’t excite me in particular. I did like the PetS which had insanely powerful vice grip tannins and needed years to unwind despite the dark fruit on the nose. A big plus for a producer not whitewashing the character of the grape!
Stephen Ross: Competing with Kynsi for top producer of the trip. The Chard, sourced from Talley’s Oliver’s Vineyard, hit all the right notes. It’s stainless steel fermented and sur lees aged, but without the ridiculous oak Talley applies to its Chardonnays. It has the tropical, apple and lemon character of the grape, yet also has body and depth from aging on the lees. I have a feeling this producer is friends with Kynsi; aside from the fact they share the Stone Corral Vineyard, they also have similar stylistic approaches. The Pinots are very pleasant, New World, of course, but displaying that earth-funk and Pinot perfume typical of the elegantly styled versions of the grape in this region. The 2006 Aubaine Pinot Noir, from a vineyard in Nipomo in the southern portion of SLO, was especially good compared to their Edna Valley bottling which seemed simple in comparison. The big winner, though, was their '06 Dusi Vineyard Zinfandel. It comes from 60+ year old vines in the Templeton Gap, a cooler section of Paso Robles. While quite ripe and full bodied, it was deliciously peppery instead of porty. The 15.2% ABV was well-integrated. I’d drink much more Zin if I came across Old Vine Zins like this that had a degree of elegance to complement the full bodied fruit. I tend to like Syrah from Pinot producers, and it appears Pinot skills also translate well to Zin.
All in all, a much better day than the previous one. Again, sharing and dumping saved the day! I have to say the variance in quality in this region seems incredibly wide. I guess we hit more places since we weren’t tempted to drink the wine at several wineries, but being prolific isn’t exactly a goal of mine.
Bottom line, Kynsi and Stephen Ross are hitting it out of the park for New World Chard and Pinot. Claiborne & Churchill has a niche, and they’re killing it in that niche, too. The larger producers like Laetitia and Talley seemed a bit obsessed with making what I can only assume are wines meant to please critics judging by the various combinations of oak flavors, very ripe fruit and deeper extraction. Their pricing is a bit ambitious on the upper level as well, though some of their wines hit the right combo of style, price and quality. As for the small rustic places, sometimes I was hoping for a Brett bomb instead of a fruit or oxidation bomb.