Loma Prieta Finds Gold

In times gone past they headed to California to dig for gold. Now it’s their wines that are finding gold. Loma Prieta winery’s gold rush is led by its Pinotage. The medal count for the 2010 Pinotage so far this year is eleven Golds, and it also won Best of Class Red Vinifera Varietal for the second year running at the Indy International Wine Competition.

 

Pinotage grapes growing in the Estate vineyard

 

The winning 2010 Pinotage, as with their previous vintages, comes from the Amorosa Vineyard in Lodi, but owner Paul Kemp’s future plans include releasing four separate single vineyard Pinotages. This year he is bottling his first Estate wine from his own vineyard, as well as from the Amorosa Vineyard in Lodi, and  he’s also made wines from grapes grown in Karma Vineyard, Lodi and Sierra Ridge, Amador County.

 

My notes on the Loma Prieta 2010 Pinotage Amorosa Vineyard noted blueberry and cherry flavours, there’s a good fruit acidity which makes the wine very moreish, some tannins and, after the bottle has been open some time I started to notice an underlying soft coffee accent developing. It’s a delightful wine now and I think it will only get better.


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California’s Oldest Pinotage Vineyard Sold

Steltzner Vineyards, on the Silverado Trail in Napa Valley’s Stags Leap region has been sold to the Plumpjack Group.

Steltzner’s vineyards were first planted in the 1880s and were acquired by Dick Steltzner in 1965. Steltzner planted Pinotage in the late 1970’s after he returned from a trip to South Africa, although his first varietal Pinotage release was the 1996 vintage.

The property has 36 acres planted to Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Malbec, Cabernet Franc, Sangiovese as well as Pinotage.

The Plumpjack Group owns a number of resorts and two Napa wineries, Cade Estate and Plumpjack, a highly reputed California producer of premium Cabernet Sauvignon. Plumpjack’s plans for Pinotage are not known.

The Steltzner family retain the Steltzner brand name and will continue to produce wines under that brand from their other properties.

Paul Kemp of California's Loma Prieta. - Video

Paul Kemp, owner of Loma Prieta Winery in California, joined me for dinner earlier this month as he paused in London on his journey home from South Africa to San Francisco.





Paul has become enthused with Pinotage and believes he is now the largest Pinotage producer in the America’s, having bought in all the grapes he could find to add to his own increasing plantings.

While he was in the Cape the Pinotage Association had arranged a series of tastings during which he visited winemakers at Simonsig, Beyerskloof and Kanonkop Estate. He told me he was blown away with the breadth and quality of the wines he tasted. He had not been able to find many South African Pinotages back home.

He had shipped a case of his own Pinotages to the Cape for tasting and had saved two bottles for me.

We started with a sparkler I was certain Paul wouldn’t have previously encountered, the Ridgeview Estate Merret-Cavendish 2006 methode traditionelle, an excellent English estate sparkler.

Paul suggested we opened his 2008 Loma Prieta Pinotage and keep the 2009 for later. He wanted the wine decanted, but I poured the wine to see how it developed in the glass.

At first it reminded me of an Italian wine because of its acidity which made it ideal for food pairing. After about 15 minutes the wine softened and became more voluptuous with juicy berry flavours and after about 40 minutes it was showing underlying coffee flavours. The evolution was most interesting. I am not sure I would have identified this wine as Pinotage in a blind tasting although the later coffee aromas were a hint. It was an excellent wine rich in berry fruits and rewarding drinking.

Paul says that he can sell all he makes of his Pinotage and has customers who pre-book cases. In the USA many wineries operate ‘wine-clubs’ where subscribers receive regular shipments of wine and Paul has started a Pinotage only club which already has a thousand members committed to buying his Pinotage. That’s one of the reasons Paul is fast planting more Pinotage, a variety he thinks has a bright future in California.

We also opened Te Awa 2006 Pinotage from Hawkes Bay and L’Avenir Estate 2003, made by Francois Naude whom Paul had met in the Cape. Te Awa was most delightful, lean like a greyhound and L’Avenir was at its peak of elegant maturity.

I have since heard that Loma Prieta 2009 Pinotage won a double gold and best of class in the Indy International Wine Competition. Paul says "I am bottling next week so I will have both the second bottling of the 2009 and the new 2010. I think that the 2009 that will be bottled will be better than my 2009 that now has won 3 golds
and 1 double gold."

Congrats Paul!!

Gold Rush for Loma Prieta Pinotage

Pinotage is the mother lode of a modern day California gold rush for Loma Prieta Winery with their first Pinotage release.

So far this year the Loma Prieta 2008 'Amorosa Vineyard' Pinotage has won Double Gold at the Florida State Fair International Wine Competition, and Gold at the Hilton Head Island Wine & Food Festival in South Carolina, plus Gold at the prestigious San Francisico Chronicle Wine Competition, the worlds largest competition of American wines.




This small artisan winery is found 2,300 feet up in California's Santa Cruz mountains. Owner Paul Kemp told me that he got interested in Pinotage

"by knowing the owner and winemaker of Vino Con Brio in Lodi, CA. I liked the wine so much that I got one ton in 2008 and five tons in 2009. This year I will probably do close to 20 tons which may make my winery the largest producer in the USA. I have already grafted over 500 vines to Pinotage and will plant another 500 bench grafts."

Stett Holbrook, reporting for the Los Gatos Observer wrote of the maiden 2008 wine, of which only 51 cases (two barrels) were made, and which included 10% Pinot Noir:

"It has the soft fruit and perfumed flavors of pinot noir and the backbone and earthy, spicy notes of a syrah or cabernet sauvignon. If pinot noir is described as a feminine wine and cabernet sauvignon as a masculine wine (yes, these are lame gender stereotypes; female soft, male brawny), then Kemp’s pinotage exhibits traits of both. It’s got yin and yang going on in equal measure.

In spite of its relatively high 15 percent alcohol content, pinotage is not the fat fruit grenade you might expect. Yes, it’s a big wine loaded with juicy, round grape and blueberry flavors, but the acid and tannins balance and tame what could otherwise be a sloppy, lip-gloss-covered kiss of a wine. As pinotage decants in the glass, it seems to get a little leaner and racier.

That lively acidity makes pinotage great with food, too. Unlike South African pinotage, Kemp’s wine lacks the telltale banana flavor. He says he didn’t like the few South African pinotages he tried. He is out to make a California pinotage."

The image used for the label was painted for Loma Prieta by New Orleans artist Martin LaBorde. The rolling green mountains in the background depict the view of Mt. Loma Prieta as seen from the Loma Prieta Winery. The yellow, red, and orange running beneath the mountains represent the famous 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. The flying wine connoisseur in the painting is a recurring character in Martin LaBorde's work, a little magician named Bodo.

Welcome to the Pinotage Family, Loma Prieta.





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Steltzner Pinotage with the Casual Connoisseur

Kristin Hanson, a native Californian, is a Napa Valley resident, attorney, writer, artist, and self-described “casual connoisseur” of California wine and food. This year she discovered Pinotage from California's oldest vineyard, Steltzner. Kristin writes in her Casual Connoisseur blog :

Steltzner Vineyards (“Steltzner”), located in the Stag’s Leap District in Napa Valley, is known for producing an excellent Pinotage each year and is one of the few local wineries to do so.

A quality Pinotage is recognized for being medium-bodied and subtly flavored. Steltzner’s 2005 Pinotage accomplishes both of these elements. The 2005 Pinotage presents a nose which has an ever-so-slight floral note of lavender, warm allspice, cherry and an essence of smoke. In the mouth, the wine is a medium-bodied red wine with a smooth feel. The tannins are not overwhelming (nor should they be), which allows the fruit flavors found in the wine to burst forth.

Soft notes of cherry (which is characteristic of grapes from the Stags Leap District), spice and a tiny dash of white pepper dance across the palate. Red wine lovers should readily embrace this Pinotage and wine aficionados who typically wrestle with the overly bold, tannic red wines of Napa Valley should love this wine, too. If the wine’s mere accessibility is not enough, given the characteristics of both the nose and the mouth, it is readily apparent that this Pinotage will pair beautifully with a wide range of foods. In short, the discovery of Pinotage is a giant “win” due to its versatility.

Kristin pairs the Steltzner Pinotage with Honey Lavender Barbequed Chicken and Oven-Roasted Potatoes Au Gratin noting that "just as lavender will sometimes pair well with certain Pinot Noirs, it is equally well-suited to Pinotage".

She concludes with the advice to "explore Pinotage. It is a great red wine that most people can enjoy and if served at a gathering, it is a great conversation piece as most will learn something new".

Read Kristin's full report with recipes and pictures of her recommended dishes at The Casual Connoisseur

Wine Spectator - "If you like Pinot but have never experienced a Pinotage, you owe it to yourself to try one"

Wine Spectator's James Laube recently blind tasted a flight of 2007 Sonoma Pinot Noirs and found one

"that stood out, and that I really liked. It was dark in color, notably spicy and peppery, with pretty floral scents and ripe, vivid black and wild berry fruit. Tight in structure, dense and concentrated, even a tad rustic, ending with a complex array of fruit, herb and anise, with firm tannins.

My first reaction: Is this a Syrah? Had I missed the change in varietals in the lineup? Did we shift from Pinot to Rhône reds? The wine certainly fit the critique some people have of some California Pinots--that is, they’re too big and almost Syrah-like in their structure, strength and flavor profile.

When the bags came off, the wine made sense. It was a 2007 Pinotage ($38) from J Vineyards and Winery. I liked the new J Pinots, too, but the Pinotage caught my fancy that day, and later that night as I tried it after it had had eight hours of aeration. It was still going strong the next day.

It’s a wonderful wine. If you like Pinot but have never experienced a Pinotage, you owe it to yourself to try one and taste the crossroad of Pinot and Cinsault, or the point where red Burgundy meets the Southern Rhône."

Read the full review at http://jvineyards.blogspot.com/2009/07/james-laube-of-wine-spectator-on-j.html



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Obscure Pinotage

Pinotage is one of the wines made by Obscurity Cellars at the memorable address Slug Gulch Road, Fair Play, California.

Owner winemaker John Smith says “Pinotage is, like many of our offerings, one of the most obscure grapes in California. It originated in South Africa … and has been known to produce anything from a violet-infused light-bodied wine to a heavier wine with flavors of earth and mushrooms. This version has ripe, almost ethereal aromas, with an extremely fruity, yet complex combination of flavors in the mouth. Since this is our first version of this wine, we don't have much experience pairing it, but we think it will be ideally suited to prosciutto-wrapped figs, and other complex, fruit-rich snacks or main dishes."

The grapes from that initial 2003 vintage wine came from California’s largest Pinotage vineyard; John Bree’s Sutter Ridge Vineyard in Amador County. I visited John in 2002 and tasted his own excellent Sutter Ridge Estate Pinotage. But John Smith tells me "John Bree, after years of pleading with people to take his Pinotage grapes, sold his entire crop early last year, and couldn't supply me any. Instead, the good folks at Vino Con Brio sold me two tons from their KARMA Vineyard (the name is an acronym of all the Matson family members' first names)" for the Obscurity 2006 vintage.

I like Obscurity Cellars philosophy “Many grapes have gotten a bad rap because they were not understood, or weren’t planted in the right places, or just had odd quirks that required a little curiosity and experimentation to uncover. So here we are, launching a new venture into very small quantities of really good wines made from many uncommon grape varieties. They won’t all be for everyone, but …. for the adventurous, the eclectic, the curious and the skeptics, we will produce just enough of each wine to provide a serious challenge to the status quo. After all, there are plenty of really good Merlots and Chardonnays offered by California’s other wineries to satisfy the taste buds of those who mostly prefer what they’ve had before.”

John Smith says to look out for "Obscurity Dolcetto this summer (only 25 cases made) and Carmenere in the near future. We also did a Malbec Rose this year, and we think it's the first one in North America."



Another obscure Pinotage is Okha (right) which has been sold in Japan for at least four years. I’m guessing it is a shippers brand: does anyone know anything about it?



And, harking back to a recent post, is Warthog Pinotage, whose US importers confidently state the varietals in the bottle are Pinot Noir & Cinsault and intriguingly inform us that "All the vineyards from which our wines in the Stellenbosch area come, are actually bordering the Atlantic Ocean. The climate and area is typically Mediterranean, perhaps even more so than the actual Mediterranean." (my emphasis)

Fort Ross 2002 Pinotage

"Fort Ross 2002 Pinotage, one of only a handful produced in California, is a marvel. Deep inky purple, it gives off concentrated aromas of dark red fruit – dried strawberries, blackberries, black cherries – spiced with white pepper and infused with smoke. The fruit grows luscious, creamy and mouth-filling but not in a big-wine, jammy way. Rather, it's like dipping through layers of mousse, with dry tannins and nice acidity that roll to a chewy finish."

I have not tasted Fort Ross's Pinotage -- yet! (I must get back to California soon ), but don't you just want to drink that wine after reading Kim Pierce's review in Dallas News?

Kim tells us that Fort Ross's owners Lester and Linda Schwartz came from South Africa, and that they imported the vines from there and had to wait 5 years for them to clear quarantine. The wait was worth it.

Domaine St Gregory's Pinotage is Biggest Hit

The fruit for California's Domaine St Gregory from Perry Lloyd's vineyard. I asked Perry how he came to plant Pinotage.

"When I bought my vineyard," says Perry, "it was almost entirely planted in Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, and while they are both wonderful varietals, and do very well in our terroir, wine-growing is so prone to fluctuations and happenstance that I thought it wise to branch out, so to speak. So, when I had to do some replanting (due to Phylloxera in some own-rooted Pinot Noir vines), I put in a row each of four varietals that had not been tried before in my particular neighborhood - two relatively conservative: Syrah and Viognier; and two more experimental: Arneis and Pinotage, and so far at least, I am quite glad I did.

"I got my plants from the Duarte nursery, here in California, and I don't know where they got their budwood, though I suspect it might have been Steltzner vineyards, since they seem to propagate the most around here. All four varietals seem quite happy and have produced some very nice fruit, but the biggest hit (and, frankly, surprise) has been the Pinotage. Everybody who has tasted it has been very impressed, and Domaine St. Gregory liked the current production enough to ask me to bud an acre of my replant over to Pinotage, for their use. That worked out perfectly, since pruning the current row provided just enough budwood to bud over one acre of my Pinot which should produce nicely next year.

"Pinotage production does seem to be taking off lately in this region, with several enthusiastic proponents, including McNab Ridge, Domaine St. Gregory and Steltzner."