Dinner last night was excellent. Mike and I had dinner on the Moshulu, a four masts ship anchored on the Delaware River in Philadelphia. There is no doubt in my mind that this could be a temple for Riesling. I’ve enjoyed greatly the story of the boat; a freight vessel was originally German then captured by the US during WWI, then captured back by the German during WWII to be finally purchased by the US in 1970. How can a French guy not love that story?

The food is perfect for Riesling: modern, lots of seafood and accent of asian influences throughout the food. Mike and I tried the duck spring rolls, the spicy tuna tacos and the surf and turf (braised short ribs with seared scallops). We had three wines to enjoy with the food, a French sparkling, our dry Riesling, and a Mosel kabinett. Seriously, our Riesling was the best. The Kabinett was a tid bit too sweet for the food and had a strong banana aroma (not usual in my experience) and the sparkling was a bit simple. I was please to see the dry Riesling pairing well with everything from the wasabi sauce of the tacos to the rich umami taste of the short rib - scallop combo. If you stop by Philadelphia, I recommend the Moshulu for the evening. Thank you Bill Bergan for running a great establishment like the Moshulu.

I had lunch last week at “Taste”, the restaurant in the Seattle Art Museum (SAM). I was meeting with Shannon Borg from the Seattle Magazine and we’ve decided to try Pacific Rim wines with a sample of the menu. The food was freshly delicious and a perfect match for our wines. My favorite combos were the spring pea and sorrel soup with the Chenin Blanc 2006, the hot italian sausage and herb pizza with the dry Riesling and the mini organic burgers (with yummy french fries) with, well actually the sweet Riesling…

Taste is a great place for a quick lunch downtown Seattle and the food is very fresh and organic. Danielle Custer, the general manager, is really running a great restaurant there. Highly recommended.

Well, things keep moving forward at the winery site. We have plumbing and electrical going up right now. We are getting close to pour the crush pad to receive our new press and hopper. It is mid-June already and we have 10 weeks left to get everything done before harvest.

This is the first serious episode on my quest for the perfect Riesling site in the Pacific Northwest.

I was in the Snake River Valley AVA this week. I went to see a few vineyard sites (Bitner Vineyard, Williamson Vineyard…) and visited a few wineries (Parma Ridge, St Chapelle, Koenig….) to understand what is happening in Idaho. The area is beautiful, quite reminiscent of the Yakima Valley of Washington that we call home. The climate seems pretty similar though with more precipitation (11 t 14” a year) and at a higher altitude (most grapes are grown above 2,000 feet of altitude). This was unfortunately not the cool site I was dreaming about.

One particularity of the region is the proximity to Boise and the increasing pressure that residential real estate development puts on the farmers. I saw some acreage selling for $40K/acre that would have been great vineyard land. I am not sure where the AVA is going but they will have to deal with this before long.

The wines were nice. My favorites were the Viognier from Koenig and the Syrah from Williamson Estates. Both were made by Greg Koenig and I must say that I was impressed. Koenig winery itself is worth the visit if you like eau-de-vie makers. The big dog in town is St Chapelle as it represents about 85% of all wines made in Idaho. Chuck Devlin, the winemaker at St Chapelle, produces good wines at reasonable prices.

I think I want to try to make a Snake River Riesling to see if I can produce something distinctive. I am thinking about a small 500 cases lot if I can find the right grapes. I think I have a couple of irons in the fire to make that possible. May be my dream of a pan-Northwest Riesling can come true?

Our first sweet Riesling is now bottled and shipping. What a fun wine! It is made from 100% Columbia Valley grapes picked a bit riper than the grapes for our Dry Riesling. We stop the fermentation at 8.5% Ethanol leaving about 7% of Residual Sugar. The wine is packed with acid and we leave a good amount of Carbon Dioxide to make it lively (yet not spritzy).

Well, it just tastes great. The wine is sweet but the acid makes it very appropriate with food. Spicy food is always a great match (Mexican, Thai, Carribean, everything works as long as it is hot!). The low alcohol (8.5%) does not make the dish hotter and the sugar reduces the burning sensation. The final acid bite cleans up the palate so you are ready for another bite. The sweet Riesling is also very good by itself on a warm summer day. It is a fun wine to make and a great wine to sip.

We are close to be releasing our 2006 Chenin Blanc in our brand new shiny package. Chenin is one of those underappreciated varietals that really deserve more attention. Chenin vineyards were mostly planted in the 80’s and are among the oldest vineyards in the State of Washington. Luckily few wineries are interested in buying Chenin allowing us to source a good amount of Chenin grapes from those older vineyards (25 years old). The advantage of sourcing older vineyards is that they produce lower yields and have a more established root system providing us with a better expression of the soils of Eastern Washington.

Our Chenin winemaking is supported by two main principles, 1) Chenin has a tendency to go reductive (reduction is an electrochemical state accentuated when the wine is poor in dissolved active oxygen. Its manifestation can range from a slightly canned fruit taste to overly stincky rotten egg) and 2) Chenin has a slight bitter finish reminiscent of chewing a grapefruit rind. We keep our Chenin very clean at all time as wine lees are a great oxygen scavenger and can increase the reductiveness of the wine. We also leave a tid bit of Residual Sugar (1.2% in 2006) to coat the mouth soften the finish.

The result in a great Chenin Blanc loaded with all I love about Chenin. It is a bit grassy with melon and grapefruit notes, a bit like a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. It has a good acidity balancing the Residual Sugar. This is a great aperitif and a good companion to salads and vegetables. It is also awesome with goat cheeses.

Quick update on the winery building. Walls and roof are up. We are now working on the inside and we have received our first tanks. We should receive tanks until the third week of July. We have 23 tanks coming. We are on pace to be open for the first grapes in September.

Take another look at the white that’s storming the West

Review in Sunset Magazine