Grape Chase 2009 Part 3

My Wednesday appointment was actually with Lee, who was John's local contact in Paso. John had spoken to me a few days and informed me he had to be in Temecula. I found this a little dubious since we had agreed on the date some weeks earlier but he assured me Lee was really my main man anyway. This turned out to be true. In our phone conversation John revealed the high end Santa Rita chardonnay vineyard - it was Presidio, owned by Doug Braun. I had met Doug when the class toured his vineyard, which is certified 100% biodynamic. The tour had been fascinating and Doug is a successful grower and winemaker with deep roots in the area. Unfortunately he has been screwed over by the TTB, as his properly lies directly adjacent to the boundary for the Santa Rita Hills appellation. This means that he's outside the appellation, meaning that I could not put the magic "Santa Rita Hills" moniker on the bottle. I've had his chardonnay and it's excellent - you can really taste the soil (in a good way), but the price tag for the grapes, which was already high for a cash-strapped newbie,  now became too high,

 

Lee picked me up at my motel around 11:00 on Wednesday. He drives an enormous black SUV, and off we went. Our first stop was a large vineyard near the airport. I was vaguely aware of the existence of Paso Robles Airport but I'd never seen it. It's off in the boonies on the Eastside; the vineyards are slowly closing in on all sides of it. I'm sure when it was built there was not much of anything around except perhaps grazing land and the odd isolated ranch. The airport itself seemed deserted and is only for small private craft.

 

Lee is a local vineyard manager and has a good handle on the area, which he proved immediately by getting lost. Shortly after turning around and trying a new route he had to stop and pull over. The poor guy was sick and he had to run out in back of his truck and vomit. An inauspicious start. He did seem to feel much better after our unplanned pit stop and explained that it seemed to be a reaction to the medication he had taken for a chronic sore throat. The good news is that his sore throat had disappeared since taking said medication..

 

After conferring with someone at the winery on his cell phone Lee found the vineyard (ironically the winery and tasting room is on the Westside). The vineyard is a large spread (I think about 130 acres), featuring several varietals. We were looking at Mourvedre and Viognier. Following our visit here the Grenache vineyard was next, which this winery had used but was now dropping. Lee explained to me that the winery was scaling back on its Rhone program, thus grapes were available.

 

After meandering up and down a few vineyard blocks we found the Mourvedre. There was a post marked MV at the head of the row, so I was certain it was indeed the Mourvedre block but it looked like, yes, most vineyards. The latest in a series. We got out and looked. It all looked fine to me, per usual. The only thing I noticed is the vines had already been cropped a bit and that they were spaced very far apart, which I presumed meant machine harvesting. Lee assured me the fruit would be handpicked however, which as small production craftsman and artisans, we prefer, damnit. There was a sufficiently small amount of the Mourvedre in relation to the size of the vineyard that it was probably the case.

 

Following the Mourvedre visit we looked at the Viognier in a nearby block. It looked... pretty much the same. No problems I could discern. It was time to check out the Grenache vineyard.

 

Whereas the West side district is much more hilly and densely forested, Eastside Paso Robles resembles horse country more than wine country. In fact what it looks like is horse country with a lot of vineyards thrown in. The overriding impression I always get when comparing the two is a sense of expansiveness and light - while there are plenty of rolling hills in the east, they don't have may trees on them, whereas the Westside roads (except for the main drag, Highway 46), are filled with towering trees. You still see horse ranches and hay fields on the Eastside, and you also see lots of vineyards, many of them planted very recently.

 

We rolled into a more or less residential district, which seemed to have originally been oriented towards homeowners who wanted to keep a horse or two on their property. The tracts were very large by residential standards (between 10 and 20 acres it appeared), and some of the intrepid homeowners were clearly more focused on grapes than horses. We rolled up to one of these estates, a typical California ranch house on a hill .surrounded by about 15 acres of vineyards. The Grenache vineyard was on the highest point of the property, situated in front of the house; the rest of the vineyards were on a sloping hill on the perpendicular to the Grenache. The other vineyards comprised Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot and Petite Sirah, an eclectic mix. I've noticed more and more Petit Verdot around Paso, so I guess maybe some see it as another of those varietals of the future, although I've never discerned all that much personality in the noble old Petit Verdot grape (one of the 5 Bordeaux varietals, originally used to contribute color, spice and tannin I believe). Similarly I've always had a soft spot for Cab Franc, although it's usually found in somewhat cooler climes than Paso (in Bordeaux Cab franc is much more prominent in the cooler climate Right Bank)

 

The Grenache was well established, planted 10 years ago. It looked, well, it looked fine and indeed well-established, planted East-West to avoid the worst of the scorching late summer heat waves. The vines were bushy and Lee assured me they would be thinned in the weeks to come - he does the vineyard management for this vineyard, known as Longshot.

 

Okay, vineyard is not dying, looks OK, tour over, let's get some samples. We had arranged to meet the rep from the first vineyard in town. He handed us some barrel samples of the Longshot as well as the Viognier and Mourvedre from the estate and I parted with lee, promising to give him a report on my impressions. Lee was a little concerned about Longshot, as they had the whole production of the vineyard unaccounted for - he asked me several times if I knew anyone else who wanted Grenache. Since just about everyone I know buys fruit by the pound rather than the ton this was unlikely but I assured him I'd ask around.

 

One of the pleasant surprises I encountered as I toured with Lee was that the fruit here in good old Paso Robles was lower priced than I expected. Having come off a vintage where I paid $1900 a ton for far away fruit from Amador County, and knowing that Santa  Barbara County Rhones commanded over $2000 a ton, I was quite jazzed when Lee told me the grapes I would look at today would be around $1600 a ton.

 

It was about 2:00 PM so I decide to head off to Cass Winery. Cass had been touted to me by a wine drinking friend who had taken his maiden trip to Paso recently and stumbled onto Cass, where he'd had a good time and in fact joined the wine club, something he doesn't do lightly, even when drunk. I was a little bit tired of playing wine maven; it's time to play tourist. Cass is buried on the Eastside so after a quick lunch near my motel I was back heading Eastward, in the same general direction as Longshot. Vineyard.

 

To get to Cass you head out on Highway 46 East, one of the three major arteries heading in and out of Paso Robles. About five miles out of town your turn off a side street and travel past the usual Eastside mix of horse farms, vineyards and emptiness. At the end of the road about 3 rolling miles later you hit Cass, a substantial estate off by itself, featuring several acres of vineyards and a large tasting room / winery. Cass is additionally distinguished by having a well-regarded café, as well as the usual gift shop featuring the usual gifts.

 

I sidled up to the bar and started tasting some wine, something I have much more experience in than sidling up to a vineyard and examining immature berries and trellising strategies. The wines were good and the tasting room was nearly empty; I was relaxed and started quizzing the girl pouring the wines about the winemaking techniques. She was new and didn't know the answers but lo, here comes the winemaker. She was happy to refer my queries to Lood.

 

Lood is an engaging guy in his mid-twenties with a thick Afrikaner accent. We started yakking about his techniques, which he was proud to share with me and shortly into our conversation he remarked that I seemed to be in the industry. I guess I am, tourist afternoon notwithstanding, so I revealed that I was in Paso looking for 2009 grapes. Lood motioned to a middle aged gent who'd just walked in and said "that's the guy to talk to about grapes." Sure enough it was Steve Cass himself.

 

After introductions Steve asked what I was looking for. I mentioned that I would love some Sangiovese. I don't know why I said this. I think I wanted to be a little esoteric. There were chuckles all around, and shakes of the head from Lood and Steve. I appended this with my Mourvedre/Grenache quest. Steve didn't know about the Mourvedre but he was fairly certain they would have Grenache for sale. Would I like to try barrel some barrel samples?

 

Um, OK.

 

The barrel room is right off the tasting area: Lood and I proceeded next door, Steve remarking he would be joining us shortly. We first tried some Grenache, since that was for sale. It was nice, reminding me a bit of my Amador Grenache, a bit candied but with good acid and, as I'm finding with a lot of Grenache, a bit too pale on the color. The mourvedre was next, a step up in class, very tasty, medium bodied. I decided this one was a keeper, assuming Steve could find me some grapes to sell.

 

Steve soon joined us, followed by three other winery employees: junior partner Ted, junior partner Ted's wife and Steve's son Brian, who is in charge of the wine club. Lood was soon darting from barrel to barrel, offering us various barrel samples. The tasting session soon evolved into a strategy meeting (the Paso wine festival was coming up in 3 days), and there I was enjoying the wine and listening to everyone talk shop. I was on the inside, both figuratively and literally and I must say it was damn hospitable.

 

After spending over two hours at Cass I hit a couple of more tasting rooms (4 Vines is open until 6:00, so it tends to be a natural last stop) and returned to my motel room pretty drunk. Actually very drunk. It was time to taste the barrel samples I'd gotten earlier in the day.

 

First off, the Grenache. This was the one I was most interested in, and possibly the most important wine of the Ritual 2009 vintage. I poured a bit into my complimentary four vines wine glass, looked at the color (pale). Smelled the aroma (nice!). Took a sip. Excellent! Boy, this is good. I was suddenly excited, visions of high scores, international awards and massive acclaim dancing in my fairly addled head. All for an affordable price!

 

I tasted the Mourvedre: flat. I tasted the Viognier: flat and fizzy, if that's possible. Scott the vineyard manager had warned me that the samples had been pulled two weeks earlier and suggested I get some fresh ones, so this was not a shock. Except that the Grenache kicked ass.

 

I retasted the Grenache. Earthy and fruity, none of that candied overtone that could be common in California Grenache. Still tasty, I was psyched up. I also realized I was pretty drunk and shouldn't make any hard decisions until I retasted in a more sober and thoughtful frame of mind.

 

As Thursday morning dawned I realized I was not in the mood to visit more vineyards with Matt Turrentine (or anyone else). He hadn't called so I was presuming it wasn't going to happen. He hadn't checked in since our original

conversation but I felt there was a minor threat of him calling me that morning. He did not, to my relief. Drinking heavily the last two days certainly didn't help my predisposition to take long rides out to distant vineyards - being around a wine area had triggered my basest instincts i.e. drink lots of wine! Perhaps I need to adopt a more "professional" (i.e. sober) approach to these wine country excursions?

 

I decided I would come back in a week to taste some fresh samples; Lee also had a Viognier vineyard he wanted to show me. I called him the next day and relayed my affection with the Grenache, as well as my disappointment with the other two and confirmed I'd be back in a week to revisit the wines, check out the Viognier, and maybe cut a deal. Lee was happy I liked the Grenache - he's the manager of that vineyard of course, and was only showing me the other one as part of his relationship with Agajanian. He also reiterated that he needed to move the rest of the output of the Grenache vineyard and asked me (once again) if I knew anybody to take the rest of the fruit.