I am unable to find actual tasting notes that use ‘sappy’ to mean any of those things. Doesn’t mean they aren’t out there, but I think it does mean that those are not common meanings.
I’m just going off of what’s been mentioned in this thread. I do think Meadows has a different definition, and maybe that should be the ‘standard’ one. But I’m more interested in the breadth of definitions here. If people really into wine have such varying definitions, what is a casual wine consumer thinking when he/she sees ‘sappy’ in a note?
Here’s a note from Bruce Sanderson that is in line with what I’m used to:
“The Gevrey-Chambertin Les Cazetiers is riper, heavier, displaying cassis and wild berry notes, very sappy. It’s all fruit.”
Those examples seem to eliminate under- and over-ripe characteristics. They all seem positive and imply a certain balanced texture and intensity.
I stayed away from the term until recently and haven’t used it much. But did have the impression the term included positive stem characteristics. That made it a good shorthand term. I certainly wouldn’t mask a negative characteristic, I try to make those things clear. But, seeing how most of those examples aren’t redundant, you can’t really conclude that none aren’t encapsulating stem characteristics into their definitions.
This is it - strong notes of pine resin [or “cedar” (juniper) menthol] which are rumored to come from whole cluster fermentation in the Cote de Nuits.
Again, try the 1999 Vincent Girardin Romanee St Vivant if you want to experience it in all its glory.
Edited: Also, try José Michel Pinot Meunier champagnes.
The 2007 Usseglio CDP I am drinking right now!!!
Sticky, rich fruit. Not enough acidity to give the fruit some lift.
This thread shows that people are going to define sappy however they want and assign value according to their own subjective preferences. The same goes for descriptors such as ripe, rich, opulent, and hedonistic – good to some, bad to others.
P.S. I just read a Tanzer review where he described a Barolo as “sappy.” So it must be Pinot and Nebbiolo thing.
See post #16.
Or a Riesling, Chenin Blanc, Mencia, Trebbiano-Malvasia, Cabernet Sauvignon-Merlot-Petit Verdot thing (see post #31). Or a Pinot Meunier thing (see post #45). Or a Chardonnay thing (see posts #5 and #14).
I googled Cellartracker and found the following about 2430 notes using “sappy”, and additional descriptors in these notes:
“Pine” - 214
“Piney” - 118
“Resin” - 212
"Resinous - 328
For those notes that use “sap” rather than “sappy” (1130 notes)
“Pine” - 279
“Piney” - 88
“Resin” - 121
"Resinous - 175
Maybe it’s not the way the “big boys” use the word sappy, but it does appear that there are plenty of us schmucks who use the word to describe a pine/sap/resin quality:)!
Cheers,
Jim
Hmmm. “Sappy” looks like it is quickly going the way of “minerality” – becoming utterly meaningless because it’s applied utterly inconsistently by different people.
Jim, very interesting data and you make a good point. The figures cited would account for a 43% association of sap or sappy with the other terms you cross-referenced if there is no overlap (would seem unlikely), a significant correlation, but at least 57% were therefore not so correlated. I wonder if other terms are even more correlated. Based on the same search strategy, can you estimate a correlation with “fresh, racy, acidity, and/or juicy” or other terms appearing frequently in the thread?
Cheers to all,
Brian
to that end, every word/phrase used to describe a wine is going by the wayside; you could pick any word/phrase and get many different “meanings”. Perhaps “tannic” would have nearly-universal meaning, but it’s not applied to wines consistently from one taster to the next, so even that word loses its meaning. The key to wine TN’s is to know the palate of the taster, as well as their writing style.
Brian-- I think the divergence has a lot to to with people learning about wine on their own. To learn the accepted meanings, you really need to taste in groups with other people who have some experience/training. It’s very hard to correlate terms with sensations without tasting from the same bottle with others and describing it, I think.
Interesting, Jim.
While you were doing that, I was searching Berserkers for ‘sappy.’
Eleven pages of results, including these examples from pages 1 and 2:
- 2005 Comte Leloup Muscadet de Sèvre-et-Maine, Château de Chasseloir: “Rain water and mineral aromas with a touch of grapefruit. Big mineral core with light pear and grapefruit flavors. There is a hint of pepper on the sappy finish. Some leesy characters as it warms up give it some breadth and this lingers on the palate with an almost sappy character. Another great Muscadet. I would have preferred a touch more fruit but I know for some this is perfect and its still a bargain.”
- 2008 Keefer Ranch Pinot Noir, Kosta Brown: “this is why i don’t drink these wines anymore. this isn’t to say it’s a bad wine, as this is not the case. i’m sure it’s fantastic for someone who enjoys the style. palate shift i suppose. sweet red fruits with cola, baking spices, and etoh on the nose. palate filled with sappy, candied red fruits. round but not flabby. etoh again perceptible. finishes long with cola, baking spice, strawberries, and a blast of booze.”
- 2007 Gevrey-Chambertin Vieilles Vignes, Dom. Fourrier: “On the palate, the first taste opens with a pleasing bit of sappy sweetness in the fruit, but this seems to fade or become less noticeable with time. Otherwise, this is tasty, with ample but structured red-purple fruits, and good acidity.”
- 2007 Pinot Noir, Willamette Valley, Dom. Drouhin: “The bouquet is really interesting and rather Old World in tone, featuring aromas of beautifully sappy cherries, sous bois undergrowth, mushroom broth, iron filings and smoky tea. On the palate, though, one is very hard-pressed to find any ripe fruit remaining, and it is the very definition of an earthy pinot noir—profiled by flavors (and maybe even textures) of dirt mound, clay, iron, smoke, ash, dark cranberry and black tea.”
- 1992 Pinot Noir Seven Springs, St. Innocent: “The very appealing nose of this wine features a lovely core of sweet raspberries and sappy strawberries accented by interesting notes of clove, nutmeg, fireplace ash and forest floor. In the mouth, it has a nice sweet berry entry and expands out through the structured mid-palate where there’s more airy tartness to the profile but still plenty of cherry and red berry sweetness.”
- 2008 Pinot Noir Ribbon Ridge, Patricia Green: “This wine is more weedy and murky on the nose than any other wine on the table—with aromas of sappy cherries, forest ferns, tomato leaves and a bit of struck match. The palate is fairly rich and dense, featuring a creamy texture and full-blown flavors of cherry paste, cranberry salad and melted milk chocolate.”
- 2008 Pinot Noir Temperance Hill, St. Innocent: "This wine is really nice to smell, with pretty aromas of sour cherries, blueberries, iodine, forest greens, and clay displaying a lot of character and drawing the taster right in. In the mouth, it is sappy-textured and features a nice combination of sweet red fruits allied to earthy limestone and chalk notes.
- 2003 Oregon Pinot Noir, in general: “In the worst cases pruney, dried out and hollow. In the best cases they are huge, extracted unusual wines that have a high degree of sappy pleasure to offer.”
- 2000 Champagne 1er Cru Special Club, Pierre Gimmonet: “Clean and lean with sappy acids and a spiced citrus character.”
- 2000 Porto, Niepoort: “This was very sweet and syrupy to me. Sappy and thick but really too much right now.”
- 1992 Pinot Noir Willamette Valley, Fiddlehead Cellars: “This is a delight, especially the lovely Burgundian bouquet featuring sappy dark cherry and cranberry fruit, funky sous bois elements, foresty mushrooms, new leather and loamy, leafy notes. It is softly caressing in the mouth, with plenty of tangy mixed berry fruits in a medium-bodied package. Tannins are resolved, and this is holding onto fine balance. It is sappy-textured with good structure, and a pleasantly wide mid-palate and fine finish.”
- 2007 Chassagne-Montrachet, Bruno Colin: “There’s a touch of matchstick to the aroma along with a little nougat, white peach, Lilies and flint. In the mouth it is bright, energetic and zesty with a fruit sweet, sappy heart and some green apple and chalk to the finish.”
- 1970 Clos Vougeot, J. Confuron-Coteidot: “completely resolved and very mature, but still nicely balanced, with nice sappy flavours of sweet dried cherries, red date tea, haw flakes,and some dried flowers lent a clean feel by well-integrated acidity. Nice depth, with a juicy and succulent mid-palate leading into an open, flowery finish”
- 1993 Pinot Noir Cohn Vyd., Williams Selyem: “Wow, what a tremendous nose on this wine. Gorgeous bright red fruits, mostly fresh pressed strawberries, touch of cherry and some cranberry. Nice floral and perfume components mesh together with the stemmy and red fruit sappiness. Beautiful herbaceous and exotic spice, sage, ginger, maybe some tobacco and plentiful earthy characteristics. On the palate is a seamless, weightless wine that packs a flavourful punch. Incredible grace, completely seamless and weightless but really concentrated flavours that seem to last forever. Round and plus, dancing on the line of flashiness but remains focused and balanced. Touch of CA pinot bottle sweetness that rolls with more of the strawberry and cranberry. Sappy texture, fruit seems to stick to every part of your palate with a touch of dusty oak and more spice. Showing no signs of letting up, some nice acid to keep it lively but the tannins are fully resolved and integrated.”
- 2009 Morgon, Lapierre: “Exuberant strawberry and red raspberry in confitured and distilled form are threaded with lilac inner-mouth floral perfume, striking notes of blood orange rind, nutmeg, toasted pecan, blond tobacco, and subtle hints of game and forest floor. Silken in texture, sappy and pungent, this finishes with an exhilaratingly animated exchange of fruit, flower, and mineral elements and a sense of levity rare for its vintage.”
- 2008 Beaune 1er Cru HdB Cuvee Brunet, Benjamin Leroux: “It shows a ton of vibrancy and life and just gets better and better over the course of the afternoon. In the mouth, it is pure and pretty, but with plenty of stuffing and excellent acidity. The fruit feels sappy on the tongue, and the fine spices and classy tannins already seem to be integrating pretty well.”
- 2007 Chablis Valmur, Christian Moreau: “There’s a little lime brulee to the nose along with pure white peach, white flowers and oyster shell. It is sappy, and dense in the mouth with ripe orchard fruits and a sharp mineral spine that literally scythes through the fruit. It is quite chalky on the finish.”
- 1995 Corton (rouge), Bonneau du Martray: “The wine’s structural elements have just begun to release their vice like grip on some sweet cherry fruits and spicy/floral nuance. It is rich and chewy with sappy fruits overlaying a solid mineral base. It has nice rocky detail and leaves an enticing savoury perfume in the mouth once swallowed.”
- 1995 Chapelle-Chambertin, Michel Noëllat: “Lovely nose showed … strawberries galore, whiffs of kirsch and some very Gevrey earth, meat and mineral notes to go along with the sweet fruited scents. Palate showed more rich red fruit on the attack - strawberries and red raspberries I thought, with lovely sappy roundness on the mid-palate and super-fresh acidity throughout.”
- 2007 Sauternes, Ch. de Myrat: “Incredibly deep nose of tropical fruits and botrytis. Incredibly deep, rich and sappy at the moment but doesn’t get clunky or overripe. Incredible freshness and balance here.”
When I got ready to post I was alerted to your post, so I also searched for for TN’s using ‘sappy’ + ‘pine’ (11 TN’s), ‘sappy’ + ‘resin’ (1), ‘sappy’ + piney’ (2), and ‘sappy + resinous’ (2). FWIW.
Yes, I think this is very true. I cut my teeth in the wine business, and learned to taste by glomming onto distinguished buyers at trade tastings and taking cues from other, established wine pros that I came across. Because of this, I think I formed understandings that were–and I mean this not to be self-aggrandizing-- more classical or old fashioned. Combined with my tendency to reference old wine books, and build my tasting foundation on standards (i.e. Bdx, Burgs), I developed an old world palate and appreciation.
Anyway, in the context of “sappy,” I’ve always taken it to be a positive assessment of a wine’s vinosity and persistence. Freshness and vigor are part of it, but a freshly fruity wine is not vinous, so it’s the interplay and aromatic length, balance, and complexity of the perfectly ripe fruit, alcohol, and other components of a very good wine that is sappy to me.
From Emile Peynaud’s “The Taste of Wine” (mine a '96 edition, pp.245-6):
Sève (literally “sap”) is an ancient expression. Initially, when little was known about the nature of wine, it was as imprecise as many other terms. A connection was made between sève and fire. For Chaptal it was synonymous with strength and vigor. According to another definition: “Séve flatters the palate and implies a good quality, generous wine; it is encountered in fine old wines of unquestionable class.” I have noticed expressions such as sève perçante, meaning a wine beginning to develop, and une sève plus nourrie, corresponding to an aromatic wine. However, te question of whether sève referred to a taste or smell was never asked. Jullien made matters clearer in 1832: “Sève is the name given to the aromatic perfume and spirituous aspect of wine which develop on the palate during the course of being tasted; they fill the mouth with their aromas and continue to be tasted after the liquid itself has been swallowed. This quality is also described as sprituous aroma (arôme spiritueux). The aromatic part of sève is the same as that of the bouquet, but it is usually sensed with greater intensity…This quality is the prerogative of fine wines.” It is clear from this admirably precise definition that sève is the equivalent of what today is called the palate aroma and its persistence. Any other interpretation is confused. The Burgundians have lost the meaning of the word sève which they consider, wrongly, to be exclusively Bordelais: “A term from the Bordeaux region whose meaning is unclear.” It’s amusing to note that, having coined the phrase “intense aromatic persistence,” they do not seem to know that the word sève preceded it by one hundred fifty years.
I will add that I do not use the term often myself; I think that winemaking has arrived at such a point that virtually all good wines have sappiness in this classic context, although I do recognize exceptional examples of the quality. Like vinous, it’s so common nowadays that I scarcely use the term, although I recognise there are many wines that taste more like fresh fruit than wine. In light of this, I also understand that the term “sappy” might be used to take in some other, less common, qualities to give it more…meaning.
Which usage is better or more appropriate I can’t say, but I appreciate a complete, well-written tasting note by which, drawn from the context, I can understand the implied meaning of their use of sappy.
Regarding people learning on their own, I couldn’t agree more. I have hosted organized tasting events and tasted in groups for several years. I live in a small city with a limited wine culture, though. Some people in my network are fairly experienced and traveled within the wine world, but nobody with formal training in wine. We learn as we go and get better as we go, which is true of most, I expect. Even when a group like mine finds consensus on a wine tasted together, we might be different than a group elsewhere, hence the divergence you cite. Sappy is an example and your previous post on minerality as a descriptor is another. Hard to avoid, I suppose, although I would like to see more notes with reasonably plain language and terms better defined within context.
As a brief aside, the local experts who posit their bonafides at restaurant-sponsored tastings usually present wines mostly of the modern, very ripe style that I don’t personally enjoy. Plus, they are quite expensive, so I haven’t attended. Perhaps I should attend more, purely for the educational benefit.
Chaad, thanks very much for a most helpful post, especially the historical literature references.
Brian
I get what you’re saying, but take exception to the phrase “accepted meanings.” Who decides what the accepted meanings are? If something smells and/or tastes like sap, then “sappy” is an accurate descriptor, no?
Many words (including some wine descriptors) have multiple meanings (just look in a dictionary to see the slew of words that have more than one given definition); any attempt to strip one of its definitions is disingenuous, at best. Now, I’m not saying you’re doing this, per se, but the phrase “accepted meanings” does seem to be getting rather close to it, imo.
I enjoy threads like this one to the extent that people use them to learn more about each other and how we perceive wines, but once they venture into the land of saying certain people are right and others are wrong I start to take exception to them; again, the phrase “accepted meanings” implies that they are “not accepted meanings” (i.e.: “wrong” meanings).
When I use the same word for more than one meaning in notes, I’ll do something to distinguish, so it’s consistently clear (to me, at least) what I meant. One example that comes up often is “savory”. If I use it as the general quality, I’ll just say it. If I mean the herb, I’ll qualify it, such as “dried savory” or “summer savory”.
So, in the same way, I suppose, one could use “sappy” for “seve”, then be more specific when referring to tree sap (ie. “pine sap”).
The results of the two word searches above show, by definition, coincidental usage. Trying to glean a definition on the basis of redundancy, or lack thereof, is a bit of a stretch. It depends on the writing style of the individual note if you can really draw a fair conclusion or not.
I think a lot of these terms had pretty widely accepted meanings in the trade once upon a time. In earlier threads about “minerality,” for instance, it was pretty clear that us old farts remember when it meant the faintly flinty (probably sulfur-based) scents you got most often from high acid whites. I have no idea what it could mean in a ripe California pinot. In that case, someone has simply taken a word and assigned an entirely new meaning.
Language is a set of conventions which requires that people converge in their usage to a fair degree. Sure there’s ambiguity, multiple senses, metaphors, and meanings shift over time and distance. But there has to be a lot more in common to our usage than not or we can’t communicate. And to do that people have to interact and see how other people use it.
With wine, that’s hard because you can’t experience the sensations on line. I think they only way you get a convergence in terminology is to taste in a community where the term is used with some consistency. I think with wine boards and self-appointed critics, descriptors get picked up and applied without any reference to they way they were used by other people originally.
For me, that really limits the value of tasting notes on boards like this. Unless I know the person, I find the descriptions pretty useless, I’m afraid. “Sappy” seems to be a case in point. If it means faintly stemmy or acidic (probably in a good way) to some and pine-like or resiny, in the sense of a big, ripe pinot to others, then I kind of give up.
This isn’t meant as a rant; just a set of observations about the discourses here from a one-time philosophy major. 
What does sappy mean to you, John?