Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/101724
DEPARTMENT HEADER SOMMELIER THE WANDERING WHAT TURNS SOMMELIERS ON? GOOD QUESTION—AND ONE THAT WILL, HENCEFORTH, BE THE FOCUS OF RANDY CAPAROSO'S "WANDERING SOMMELIER" COLUMNS. —ED. There's Something Happening Here THE "NEW SCHOOL" OF CALIFORNIA WINEMAKERS story and photos by Randy Caparoso W Matthew Rorick owns and produces wines at Forlorn Hope winery in Suisun Valley. Here, he looks into a barrel of fermenting Trousseau Gris. hat is the appeal of what winemaker Matthew Rorick calls "longshot grapes"? Surely there is nothing new about what is being done by today's "new school" of American vignerons, according to another up-and-coming, almost-famous winemaker named Steve Matthiasson. The aging godfather of the latest movement, of course, is Bonny Doon's Randall Grahm, who began trumpeting "ugly duckling" grapes like Grenache, Viognier, Syrah and Roussanne back in the 1980s. Today's vinous knights, tilting at the windmills, work in lower-key fashion than Grahm, who, if anything, was a one-man PR machine from the get-go. Rorick, who owns and produces wines at his Forlorn Hope winery in Suisun Valley (a little known AVA outside Fairield, at the western edge of the California Delta), quietly toils away with grapes like Torrontés, Alvarelhão, Verdelho, Trousseau Gris, and the misbegotten Chenin Blanc. With even less fanfare, Matthiasson crafts white wines out of Napa Valley hillside grown Ribolla Gialla and Friulano, zipped up with more traditional Sauvignon Blanc and Sémillon. For Rorick, it's a matter of devotion to what he calls "rare creatures." The name of his winery was taken from the Dutch verloren hoop ("lost hope"), a phrase that referred to troops with slim hopes of survival, but with possibilities of glory and rewards for those who did survive, against all odds. "I prefer to work with the challenging grapes," says Rorick, "even if it's a little irrational." But here's where Rorick goes beyond Grahm: Not only has he never used a drop of cultured yeast or any other additive in his craft (although Grahm now espouses non-manipulative winemaking, he wasn't always of that mind), Rorick also freely employs techniques such as fermenting white wines on their skins, as if they were reds—resulting in whites with slightly bitter tannin edges, but also accentuated textural qualities. Hence the somewhat disconcerting taste of wines like his Forlorn Hope 2011 Faufreluches Gewürztraminer (the name is from Dune): rusted trash-can color, a spiced sausage "Almost famous" winemaker Steve Matthiasson talks to a group of sommeliers (from left to right): Marnie Old (Consulting Sommelier, Old Wines LLC and author of Wines Simplified); David Glancy MS, CWE, CSS, FWS (CEO, San Francisco Wine School); Jim Meehan (author of The PDT Cocktail Book); Jesse Becker MS, CWE (proprietor, Périphérique Wine Merchants, San Francisco); Timothy O'Neal (Wine Director, Avenues Restaurant Group, Kansas City). nose and lavors as subtle as ketchup on eggs, yet undeniably deep, savory and compelling— making you salivate for other white meats. Like Rorick, Matthiasson relies heavily on impeccable viticulture and then takes the attitude of "getting out the of the grapes' way" in the winery. His Ribolla Gialla–based 2011 Mathiasson Napa Valley White has a cozy honeyed nut fragrance, and is scintillatingly sharp and minerally on the palate. Says Mathiasson, "Our wines stick out—not everyone likes them. But that's the idea behind this new school. Guys like Matthew at Forlorn Hope, or Kevin Kelley at Russian River Valley– based Salinia and Abe Schoener at The Scholium Project, are not trying to make wines that taste like everyone else's. Why bother? In other words, a deliberate movement from pre-conceived varietal styles: a little bit more real, or authentic—buzz words you've probably heard before, as part of the Millennial lexicon. As Dylan once said, "Something is happening" . . . even if you don't know what it is. Q N 42 / the tasting panel / january 2013 McVod