Pinot Gris

When is a wine orange?

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Trousseau Gris grapes sit on their skins.

Brant Ward/The Chronicle

Trousseau Gris grapes sit on their skins.

Curiously, most of the response to my story this week on using skins in white wines hasn't been about the technique — which is on the radical side — so much as the term we used: "orange wine."

First it's worth noting that the term isn't mine. I don't exactly know where it emerged, and I don't actually find it that helpful, since there are many wines that could fit in this category that aren't orange, and there are orange wines (think of a passito or certain sherries) that don't necessarily conform to the skin-fermented realm. Oh, and then there are the endless gradations of "skin contact" — in which a white wine gets extra time on its skins but doesn't necessarily ferment on them. I'd thought maybe my "somehow" in the first paragraph of the story might telegraph my puzzlement. Maybe not.

A good question along these lines came today from Clark Terry at Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant, who wrote:

For a few vintages now we've imported a Pinot Gris from the Loire that falls into the "orange" wine category, however on the label, it says "Reuilly Rosé, Pinot Gris."

From a marketing standpoint, regardless of the tinge of pink (orange to light red) these wines are still in the consumer's mind "rosés." Are people starting to label their wines as "orange"? This would strike me as very confusing for the consumer. ...

So shouldn't we just be calling these wine rosés and then inform the consumer on what makes them unique?

An interesting question. Pinot Gris is always the outlier in this category, since as a grape it's a mutant: somewhere between white and red, a mutation of Pinot Noir. It might not seem this way from the watery examples of Pinot Grigio that pervade supermarket shelves, but the grape can be made into a pink/orange/salmon wine almost inadvertently just by leaving it on its skins. And the number of slightly colored Pinot Grigios available keeps increasing. As I noted in the piece, Pinot Gris is one of the more popular grapes to give a skin-contact treatment.

But to me, the "orange" moniker is more specifically for those white wines that have been taken all through the process on skins, and the color is somewhat different from the slight blush that Pinot Gris offers. These are white grapes left to ferment and exposed to oxidation, giving them a color that verges much more into the orange/sienna realm.

It is really confusing, though.

Along the same lines, I'd hesitate to call a Pinot Gris a rosé specifically, since to me rosé is from distinctly red grapes while Pinot Gris has that mutant thing. It's basically a pink/orange grape being made as an appropriately colored wine.

But then we have to slot it into a spectrum of colors that also includes pale reds (Grignolino, the dry Brachetto I had the other night) and dark yellows (oxidized whites, sherry, vin jaune) and even green. Can you imagine a wine list that sorted out all this stuff? (Scratch that: I'm sure someone is working hard on a list that offers "orange" "inky black" and "rubyish with orange bricking" in addition to red, white and rosé.)

Given all that, I'm sometimes amazed that consumers get this stuff as much as they do. I'd rather think about a color spectrum for wine, perhaps with young Semillon and Vinho Verde on one end, overextracted Petite Sirah and vintage Port on the other. Along with that color spectrum comes a textural spectrum, too. If ever there were a case for people drinking what they like rather than tunneling into a comfortable category, this would be it.

One other side note: What came up in the course of the skin-contact piece is how modest forms of the process have in fact been used for decades here in California. I noted Hanzell's longtime use, but other examples have since cropped up. If anyone knows how and why the technique lost favor, let me know.

Posted By: Jon Bonné (Email, Twitter, Facebook) | October 13 2009 at 03:25 PM

Listed Under: Importers, Pinot Gris, Skins, Winemakers | Permalink | Comment count loading...

2009 oyster wines - the final results

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The Chronicle

I shared my personal faves last week, but the final results from this year's the Pacific Coast Oyster Wine Competition are just out, as follows (updated with more precise wine names):

2008 Airfield Estates Thunderbolt Sauvignon Blanc (WA)
2007 Anne Amie Vineyards Cuvee A Amrita White Wine (OR)
2007 Cedergreen Cellars Sauvignon Blanc (WA)
2008 Chateau Ste, Michelle 08 Pinot Gris (WA)
2007 Covey Run Pinot Grigio (WA)
2008 Hogue Cellars Pinot Grigio (WA)
2007 Kenwood Vineyards Reserve Sauvignon Blanc (CA)
2007 Robledo Family Winery Seven Brothers Sauvignon Blanc (CA)
2007 Rutherford Ranch Sauvignon Blanc (CA)
2008 Sweet Cheeks Winery Pinot Gris (OR)

On balance a really good, solid list, and good see some new arrivals like Airfield, based in Prosser, Wash. Looking back at my own notes, the only puzzling things are a few wines that seemed either too indistinct (so much as you can tell without smelling the wine) or had a bit too lavish a texture -- from lees or oak -- to seem like oyster fodder.

But that's why Jon Rowley gathers together 41 of us to judge -- because there are many, many ways to match an oyster.

Posted By: Jon Bonné (Email, Twitter, Facebook) | April 27 2009 at 01:30 PM

Listed Under: Oregon, Pairings, Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc, Sonoma, Washington | Permalink | Comment count loading...