Many decades ago, I put on a tasting of Pedroncelli wines with one of the brothers and Robert Parker. A vertical of Cabernets was very good. Then they opened a Pinot Noir. It was a barely adequate wine and tasted like dilute Zinfandel. Bingo! That was back when legal labeling requirements were 51% and the wine was 51% Pinot Noir and 49% Zinfandel.
I am sure that hard core geeks can bring up examples of Pinot Noir blended with other grapes that are good or better, but IMO Pinot Noir should never be blended. My only exception is white wines made from Pinot Noir blended with Chardonnay and/or Pinot Blanc.
If I could find the images on this new, unimproved (for me) site, I would insert the bricks piling on.
I think if it’s fifty-fifty it might be interesting, with the Pinot lightening out the Syrah. As to bottlings labeled Pinot Noir, it is not unheard of for California Pinot to contain a soupçon of Syrah to add fruit and texture. Heck, it was a regular practice in Burgundy not that long ago…
I’ve had Domaine Serene’s Rock Block Syrah from Rocks District W2. It tasted to me like someone attempting to make a Pinot with Syrah grapes (not only time I’ve experienced this w OR producer). There is nothing “wrong” imo w blending Pinot and Syrah, but I’d think you should understand each variety alone before you try to create synergy.
In my earlier days of exploring wine, I did like the Rubaiyat by Cakebread, which was a mid priced blend of mostly pinot with something like 10-20% Syrah.
I think the blend varied from year to year and sometimes bits of other varieties are thrown in.
I recall liking it as an easy drinking, spicy red that was good pairing for the grill. But I haven’t had it in a very long time.
A decade plus ago, when the talk was about the weight of California Pinot Noir, etc., I was accused often enough of blending Syrah in with Pinot Noir that I played with some blends in the lab. One thing I figured out was that it took really uninteresting Syrah for it to even have a chance of working. Interesting Syrah simply overwhelmed the wine at much of anything beyond 3 percent. – On the other hand, historically Grenache was often blended into Pinot Noir in France. I think it was Remington Norman’s book that mentions his time in the cellars of CdP and that he discovered that over half the Grenache made there was sold to domaines in Burgundy in the 1950s, 60s and even into the 1970s.
I have had that wine also and not good in my opinion. They need to stick to Pinot and Chardonnay and the prices are right on auction but full boat they are overpriced.
I’ve found this wine to be an acceptable if overpriced wine.
2009 Domaine Serene Grand Cheval - USA, Oregon (3/31/2020)
Pop and pour, and frankly it was fine that way. This wine manages to be a big steak wine without being cloying or annoying. There is a lot of fruit, a bit of tannin. The berry components are quite delicious. This is simply a satisfying wine that won't make you think much, it is soft and tasty and goes great with a steak. (91 points)
Interesting what Adam said. Accusations of Syrah being snuck into Pinot as some supposed regular practice have always seemed ridiculous, as it would usually stick out, and in a bad way. In doing blind brown bag tastings it’s always seemed obvious Grenache would be a good choice, since it’s similar in weight and low in tannin, and not bold. Interesting that it had a historic role. I’d never heard that.
I have to point out that while doctoring up Pinot tends to ruin the Pinosity of a wine, it is a great blending grape. It can play pretty much the same role as Grenache, but better. It doesn’t make a lot of sense financially as a goal, except with rare opportunities. We did it a little.
It seems like a terrible risk at the high end. With the skill involved to make quality wines it wouldn’t be necessary nor an improvement. With grapes that don’t have the concentration a winemaker wants, they just bleed off some juice at crush to get their desired skin-to-juice ratio.
At the low end a lot of producers don’t seem to have a particular interest in it tasting like Pinot.
I don’t think so. There’s never been any real evidence of it.
I think this is just another example of how people need to demonize the “others” in discourse these days, as a way of amplifying their strong feelings.
You see it in politics from both sides. It’s not enough to say you disagree and think a different way would be better; you have to say that the people who think differently are terrible people with nefarious intentions who have a secret agenda to destroy the nation or something like that.
In this case, it’s just not enough to say “I personally prefer pinots that are less ripe and oaked.” You have to accuse them of being score whores, of adding syrah to the pinot in secret, using Mega Purple, adding oak chips, etc.
I think the simple answer is the correct one – you can make pinot into a dark, lush, concentrated wine in many regions of California if you choose to harvest late, maybe water back, and use new oak barrels. There is zero need to sneak syrah and Mega Purple in there and whatever else, and the wine wouldn’t be as good if you did it that way.
I may have just done what I’m decrying others doing? It’s possible.
I’ve mistaken pinots for syrah and vice versa but they were similar styles from the same winery. That being said, as much as I’ve never been a fan of Pinot blends, it makes me curious to open a style like Melville Estate syrah and one of their single vineyard pinots, mix them at various %'s and sample. I’d probably like it. I probably wouldn’t feel the same about an opposite end of the spectrum style PN/syrah blend.
As already pointed out, what about traditional three grape Champagne blends? And there is Passetoutgrain, which can be quite tasty. There are also some N. Italian field blends that include Pinot Nero.
Except in Champagne, in the most traditional home of chardonnay and pinot, those grapes are not blended. Whereas in the most traditional homes of cabernet, merlot and syrah, they are usually blended.
Is our opinion about, and willingness to experiment with, those varieties partly or mostly a result of the history from those regions in France? Or are they that way in France because of which varieties do and don’t blend well? Interesting question.
