Is Petite Sirah the Same as Syrah?

Question from Cheryl: Is Petite Sirah the same as Syrah?

Reply: Hi, Cheryl. Thanks for writing! They’re not the same, but they’re related. Dr. Carole Meredith, of UC Davis, used DNA comparison to determine that two varieties of southern France, the very ancient Syrah and a grape called Peloursin are the parents of Petite Sirah.  

Syrah is such an old variety that it may be that Julius Caesar enjoyed a goblet of Syrah, in his time, just as much as we do, today! Peloursin is almost unknown in California and isn’t considered a particularly distinguished variety in France. 

In the 1870s a man named Durif made this crossing with the hope that he’d have a mildew-resistant version of Syrah. Petite Sirah is still known as Durif in southern France. What he got was a variety that does have better mildew resistance, but also happens to be quite vulnerable to bunch rot. It’s a tight-clustered variety that really wasn’t well suited to the growing conditions there. 

However – in warm, dry climates, like ours here in northern California, it does quite well! It was introduced, here, in 1878.  

For a long time Petite Sirah has been viewed as a lesser step child of Syrah. It was used as a blender for any red that wanted more pigment and tannin. It’s gaining in popularity, almost by the day, and it even has its own fan club! Check http://www.psiloveyou.org/ to learn more about it. 

What if My Wine is Hazy?

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Why Does One Wine Cost Five Dollars and Another One Fifty?

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What if My Wine is Hazy?

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Why Does One Wine Cost Five Dollars and Another One Fifty?

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Why Does One Wine Cost Five Dollars and Another One Fifty?

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What is Malolactic Fermentation?

Question from Sally: I was at a tasting room at a winery and when the guy at the bar served the Chardonnay he said “40% M L”. I was too intimidated to ask what that means.

Reply: Hello, servers and barristas everywhere – stuff like this is what steers people toward beer! Be helpful and kind to your customers or get a new job description!

OK, I’ve stepped down from the soap box…

ML is short for malolactic fermentation. This normally follows the primary, alcoholic fermentation so sometimes it’s called the second fermentation. It’s actually a conversion, but whatever.

It’s routine for reds, for the sake of stability and to soften the acid. When it comes to whites, it’s more of a question mark and when people talk about ML it’s usually in reference Chardonnay. This is the technique that makes your Chardonnay buttery. Here’s how it goes:

It takes the wine maker about three weeks to make his Chardonnay. Then, lactic-acid bacteria is added to the new wine. It causes the tart malic acid – the green apple acid, to convert to soft lactic acid – the milk acid. So the wine feels softer on your palate.  ML also has a byproduct, called diacetyl, which adds a sort of viscous, oily sensation to the texture and smells and tastes buttery.

Vanilla in Wine

Question from Karen: It seems like a lot of wine descriptions say “vanilla.” Why would something made of grapes taste like vanilla? 

Reply: Hi, Karenl. Thanks for writing! We usually assume that vanilla character is extracted from the barrel (the barrel would have to be relatively new). Vanillin occurs naturally in raw oak and it becomes more noticeable with toasting, up to a point (the wood staves are bent into place over an oak fire. Then they toast the barrel, a little longer, over the fire in most cases). 

There are lots of different characteristics in wine that are barrel derived and vanilla is in the top five, which is why you see it so often. Other common flavors/aromas: Coconut, caramelized character, smoke, coffee, spice (especially clove), nuttiness, dill (especially American oak), tobacco… 

We can never be 100% sure that any of these characteristics are barrel derived. For instance, spiciness may be barrel derived but some grape varieties are inherently spicy: Zinfandel, Gewurztraminer and Syrah come to mind. Hay and tobacco aromas may come from the barrel, but Sauvignon Blanc and Chenin Blanc display those characteristics whether they’re barrel aged or not.

I think that’s part of the fun. For everything we think we know there is an equal number of mysteries – especially when it comes to fermentation aromas. 

Hope that helps. Cheers!

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What’s This Gritty Stuff in My Wine?

Question from Anna: Once in awhile I notice a dark coating on the sloped part of the bottle or dark sandy stuff in the wine. Does that mean the wine is bad?

Reply: Hi, Anna. Thanks for writing! It sounds to me like you’re describing sediment, something that occurs naturally in wine as it ages. It’s nothing to worry about at all. In fact, it may be a sign that the wine maker went easy on the processing which is usually a good thing. 

As the wine ages, pigment and tannin get together get together to form a chain and become so heavy that, eventually, they fall out of the wine as sediment. This will happen sooner or later, depending upon how the wine was made. If the wine maker was quite thorough in applying clarification techniques such as fining and filtration it will probably take a long time for sediment to form. Perhaps it never will. 

Some varieties are prone to throwing solids. I really notice it with Syrah. Quite often I notice a crust on the shoulder of the bottle and when I pull out the cork there’s gunky sediment on the end that stains my hands. Small price to pay for a delicious Syrah in my view 🙂  

the sediment is gritty, so the thing to do if you have an older bottle of red to serve is to stand it up for several hours to let the sediment go to the bottom. Then, at serving time, carefully decant the wine (move it to another container – a decanter or pitcher) off the sediment and enjoy! If it’s quite old please be very gentle and wait to decant it until you’re ready to actually drink it. If it’s thinking about going over the hill the extra aeration may just give it a push.

Now, if you see sparkling crystals on the cork or in the wine, that’s a whole different kettle of fish: tartrates 

I hope that helps! Thanks, again, for writing. Cheers!

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Warm vs. Cool-Climate Wine

Question from Melanie: I’ve noticed that you and some other wine writers talk about cool climate and warm climate wine. I don’t really understand what you mean. 

Reply: Hi, Melanie. Thanks for writing! 

Climate has a huge impact on your enjoyment. You might find you prefer cool-climate examples of some varieties and warm-climate examples of others. It’s all pretty logical once you think about it. Whether you garden or don’t, you select your produce according to ripeness, right? Tomatoes make a good example.

Cool, climate, warm climate: If you like to garden, you know how seasonal temperatures affect the ripening pattern of your fruit and vegetables. Imagine trying to ripen tomatoes on your patio if you live San Francisco, where it’s foggy daily in the summertime, and temperatures rarely rise above 65F. Unless you’re really lucky, those are going to be some tart, green tomatoes that don’t have much flavor, right?  They start out with high levels of acid, low levels of sugar and vegetative flavors. As the weeks go by the sweetness increases and the tomatoey flavor develops, providing they get enough heat and sun. So, depending upon where they’re grown they’ll ripen slowly or quickly. In a cool-climate situation there’s a risk that they never get really ripe – they’re on the tart side. In a warm climate situation there’s little difficulty getting them nice and sweet and you need to pick them before they start to get mooshy and over ripe.  

The same thing applies to grapes. When they form on the vine, actually now’s about the right time for this, they’re tiny, hard and extremely sour. As the summer goes on they’ll get bigger, softer and the tartness will decrease as the sugar goes up. Flavor characteristics also evolve, accordingly, from vegetal/herbaceous/earthy to fruity, ripe and even tropical or dried-fruit flavors.