Today I tried a new (for me) California Pinot Noir at the LCBO and wasted no time buying it. The Belle Glos line of Pinots are extremely divisive over on CellarTracker. I don’t think I’ve seen a series of reviews so evenly and vehemently split between total adoration and absolute hatred for the wine style. I’ll give my own notes first and then some thoughts on this division.
BELLE GLOS 2014 CLARK & TELEPHONE SINGLE VINEYARD PINOT NOIR – This distinctive Pinot is a massively dark ruby purple in the glass with absolutely no translucency at all. Extremely strong nose of black cherries, lavender and earth. Full-bodied in the mouth, it has super-strong and surprisingly sweet fruit-forward flavors of ripe red cherries with absolutely no earth flavor to be found and underscored by some vanilla, light but well-integrated tannins and an incredibly smooth texture. It’s like liquid Pinot Noir candy going down. Almost like a Port or Amarone version of a Pinot Noir. RECOMMENDED as long as you know what you’re getting into here.
OK, I can definitely see why the reviews for this wine are so divisive. Right off the bat, anyone who is a Burghound should stay far, far away from this beastie. There is absolutely no Burgundy delicacy or finesse to be found here. This is as far from a Pommard or a Chambertin as you can possibly get and still call the wine Pinot Noir. This wine isn’t just big, it’s HUGE. It’s almost hard to believe you can get Pinot Noir to do this in a wine.
But if you like California big cherry cola flavor, this wine has all the others beaten down by a mile. Whereas many Cali Pinots use large oaking to mask flaws, this one puts the fruit flavor front, center and then right over the top. The oaking is a complement to the huge fruit flavor and thus it is more cherry than cherry cola flavor. It’s definitely a quality wine. Whether the qualities it has are ones that will be enjoyed depends on your own personal tastes.
In fact, this wine is like the exact reverse of the Biali Rocky Ridge Zinfadel I like so much. That wine breaks all expectations of what Zinfadel is like by achieving Burgundy levels of delicacy and intricacy in its flavors to the point where you can’t actually believe it’s made from California grown Zinfadel. This wine proves that the delicate and “feminine” Pinot Noir can become an absolute powerhouse. It’s the California Cab of Pinots. While it obviously appeals to my well-known sweet tooth, it also actually has some appeal to the part of me that has taken a liking to Burgundy Pinot recently as well. Once you get past the bigness and the sweetness, there is some “terroirness” to the wine that can be detected.
I’m fascinated enough to have found that another of their single vineyard bottles, the Altura, is avaiable in Montreal and I will definitely get a bottle of that for comparison.
Tran, thanks for the TN and your detailed comments. These wines will show in a more forward fashion and the few I have had in the past year or so were not for me. I found them heavy, lacking finesse and burly, which is not what I enjoy in pinot noir. I just can’t enjoy nor get past what you call the “bigness and the sweetness”. I do though have friends who love this style and it’s through them that I run into these wines. I will see them tonight, as a matter of fact, but the theme is French so I will indulge with Chinon and Chassagne-Montrachet!
I, too, have only heard strong opinions on the Wagner family’s Pinot Noir wines. My sister-in-law, who can appreciate more subtle wines (ie Gen del Alma “Gene”, last night), considers the “Clarke & Telephone” her favorite wine. However, there are many dissenting opinions on this wine, and all other Caymus wines, on WB.
I have tasted some big ol’ Pinots in the past, so I can visualize the intensity of “sweet” flavors you and Mr III mention. While the debate over typicity of American PN is probably not going to be reconciled today, I am happy to hear from both sides - so long as everyone is happily drinking to his/her own tastes.
Five years ago I’m running out and buying these. Today I’m running far away. Amazing what palate shifts and subjectivity can do. But tasting notes like these are quite helpful in steering me away, so I appreciate the detail.
BG is up there on the “purple drank” scale. A little too far for my tastes. I opened a Two Hands Gnarly Dudes Shiraz last night expecting it to be “purple drank”. It was, but I less than the BGs I have had. pretty amazing for a Pinot to exceed Aussie Shiraz on the drank scale. I’m not going to judge the BG lovers, just disagree with them.
Not sure why this wine is so divisive? Based on Tran’s detailed notes, it sounds like a wine that Jay Hack would be buying by the case to drink along side of his Saxum James Berry
I did some further research on the Belle Glos wines and confirmed a couple of things I suspected and which you guys may have already based upon my notes or previous experience above.
The first is that they do indeed late harvest their Pinot Noir grapes, resulting in them raisining on the vine in the hot California sun. The second is that they do not do a protracted oaking, letting their wines age for a mere 9 months in a mix of 60% new and 40% used French oak versus, say, 1 or 2 years. This definitely explains the strong fruit flavor and sweetness and lighter tannins.
I think it would be great if they also made a wine with regular harvested grapes that would lose the sweetness, but I can see from their point of view that all this would accomplish is just turn them into another Cali Pinot maker without any distinction. If you look at YouTube reviews of the wine, again there is a divide between total adoration and complete contempt for the wine style. I can tell you that the wine is almost completely sold out of the LCBO here in Ontario so someobody other than me definitely enjoys what they are doing.
Lest anyone lose hope in me, I should also mention BTW that my other recent Pinot Noir acquisitions include some Vincent Girardin 1ere Cru Santenay, Siduri Pratt Vineyard - Sexton Road, The Hilt and Twomey from California (I must get me some Kutch as well!), Rockburn and Lownburn Ferry from New Zealand, and Hidden Bench and Tawse from my local Niagara wineries. So my Pinot Noir tastes are quite diversified already. I don’t wanna be socially ostracized, after all, I gotta be able to hang out with Jay Hack AND the Burghounds! I plan on taking a break from wine purchasing in April to save up for a planned trip to Alsace but a few more bottles of Burgundy will be the wrapup for this year. Maybe I’ll do another Pinot Noir world faceoff thread after that.
The first is that they do indeed late harvest their Pinot Noir grapes, resulting in them raisining on the vine in the hot California sun. The second is that they do not do a protracted oaking, letting their wines age for a mere 9 months in a mix of 60% new and 40% used French oak versus, say, 1 or 2 years. This definitely explains the strong fruit flavor and sweetness and lighter tannins.
Great that you found something you like! It is interesting to see how different tastes and preferences lead to variety.
For myself, my notes on this wine expressed great disappointment, since it is labelled as a “single vineyard” Pinot, which led me to unwittingly assume (before I knew better!) that it would have some identifiable character. Instead, it was indistinct syrup, not only without place, but without varietal character. Thus, it’s not only that it did not work for my tastes (Very cool if others enjoy the wine) but that the way it is labeled that was the issue. It does not deliver “single vineyard” or “Pinot Noir” in my opinion, but something akin to “red wine concentrate.” Perhaps there should be a new category for this style, like “Caliarone” or something.
Your research would seem to confirm aspects of this, and at least explains the winemaking choices that I don’t respond positively to.
If all the grapes are late harvested, possibly bled out for additional concentration, etc, why did the Wagner family sell the Meiomi brand* but keep the vineyards? Chuck Wagner was infamous for decrying “terroir”. Were they just hanging on to land for its intrinsic value?
*I understand that Meiomi is not the same as Belle Glos.
I plan on taking a break from wine purchasing in April to save up for a planned trip to Alsace but a few more bottles of Burgundy will be the wrapup for this year. Maybe I’ll do another Pinot Noir world faceoff thread after that. 