Pollux Membership June 2022: The Little Violet House and Vineyards on the Moon
Sunset at Ca Viola in Piemonte.
“The Little Violet House”
Langhe Riesling, Ca Viola, Piemonte, Italy 2017
As we enter month 3 of Gemini Wine Company, it’s no secret that one thing I like to do is take a famous, world-renowned wine region and then find something that isn’t necessarily the calling card of that particular place. One of my other loves is to introduce you to talented winemakers who have become famous plying their trade for others and who, whether still consulting or not, also make very tiny amounts of their own wine. Enter Giuseppe “Beppe” Caviola, one of the most talented winemakers in Italy, who over his career has been a consultant for a veritable who’s who of producers in Piemonte, and who under his Ca’ Viola label makes very tiny productions of traditional Piemonte reds like Dolcetto, Barbera, and Nebbiolo from small, exclusive parcels of vineyards, dealing with the most important locations in the region. He settled in the commune of Dogliani, a small town in Langhe, in the heart of Piemonte. Playing word games with his last name, Caviola the man became Ca’ Viola the winery (“little violet house” in Piemontese dialect). With a total production of less than 7,000 cases for all of his wines put together, each cuvee’s availability becomes minute. Especially if, like I have done for Pollux members this month, you ignore the red varietals the appellation is famous for and focus on his DOC Langhe Riesling.
Giuseppe “Beppe” Caviola.
Beppe Caviola has had his own small cellar in Dogliani, a town in the Langhe due south of Barolo, since 1991. He has continued to consult for other famous houses and in 2002 was named the Enologist of the Year by the Italian wine industry’s most important trade publication and guide, the Gambero Rosso. In 2003, Beppe started growing grapes in the famous Sottocastello vineyard in Novello, and there produces his top red wine, Barolo Sottocastello. I have always been intrigued by Beppe’s wines, as he makes a diverse array of cuvees from multiple grape varieties; his holdings don’t always include the most prestigious, attention-grabbing vineyard names, at least in the eyes of press and collector, but to the wine professional the terroirs Beppe works with are gems, many of them unsung heroes of the Langhe DOC. One of my favorites has always been the tiny village that produces his Langhe Riesling, Cissone.
Vineyards in the commune of Cissone, Piemonte.
In the southern area of the Langhe DOC, Cissone is southeast of Barolo and northeast of Giuseppe’s “Little Violet House” in Dogliani, forming a little triangle with those two locations. An off-the-beaten-path hilltop town with vineyards rimming the outer edges, Cissone’s current population is a robust 100 or so, and the town is far enough from Barolo to the south and east that it doesn’t make the cutoff for mapping the Langhe in most wine atlases, and yet the site and output of the Cissone vineyard is awe-inspiring: at 600 feet above sea level, Cissone’s eponymous vineyard clings to steep hillsides. Here, as with other high-elevation sites from top Piemonte Riesling producers, the grape can excel due to stronger diurnal temperature swings that allow the ripening to go low and slow-harvest tends to be later than other grapes in the area. Beppe’s Riesling is grown in a tiny one-hectare plot and production is practically non-existent: the most recent shipment into the state of Virginia included all of 24 bottles. I can’t rewrite the wine atlases, but at least in the Gemini Wine Company realm, I am proud to put this stunning white wine of “Beppe” Caviola on the map-D.
Langhe Riesling, Ca Viola, Piemonte 2017
Country of Origin: Italy
Places and People: Giuseppe Caviola produces this tiny production of Riesling from a single vineyard called Cissone, in the commune bearing the same name. The small 1 hectare plot of Riesling vines are approximately 10 years old. Due south vineyard exposure at 600 feet elevation.
Soil: Calcareous marl and clay.
Grape Varieties: 100% Riesling.
Winemaking: Organic viticulture yields a tiny production of Riesling grapes that are softly pressed and fermented for 15-20 days in temperature-controlled stainless steel tanks.
Aging: The Ca Viola Riesling is left to age in those same steel tanks for 10 months prior to bottling. The aging is done “sur lie” (the spent yeasts from fermentation remain with the wine and are not racked off, adding a textural richness to the mouthfeel).
Flavors and Foods: The Ca’ Viola is not your average Riesling; working at a higher altitude than many of its German counterparts, this wine has a body weight that belies its association to Riesling from any other place; it is strictly Italian and more in line with other whites from Piemonte than other Rieslings from abroad. At 13% ABV, the wine isn’t shy, from it’s brilliant and striking yellow color to the nose of acacia blossom, white peach, and citrus. The palate is again uniquely singular: pronounced acid and mineral notes act as a bed upon which lies the aforementioned white peach and citrus (running more orange than lemon/lime). The Ca’ Viola doesn’t give off the stone fruit of German or Alsace Rieslings-a more racy note of something not unlike grapefruit enters in the mid-palate and leads to a finish that also espouses some non-fruit aromatics like cedar and fresh thyme. A truly complex white wine that would pair extremely well with white meat dishes (pork tenderloin, roast chicken) or Mediterranean seafood such as branzino.
Service and Cellar: The Ca’ Viola Riesling 2017 works well served at white wine cellar temp (48-52F); if cooled in the refrigerator give the wine a few minutes to come up in temperature and you’ll be rewarded with more of the white peach/citrus notes mentioned above. The 2017 is in a fantastic place to drink and should remain so for another 2-3 years.
Smoke trails from PAF fighter jets on the morning of our visit to Domaine la Colliere in Rasteau.
“Vineyards on the Moon”
Rasteau “La Fontaine”, Domaine la Colliere, France 2016
The first thing we have to do is thank Georges Perrot for the military flyover. The French PAF fighters (their air maneuvering squadron, equivalent to the Blue Angels) dart in and out of formation across the cloudless Rhone Valley sky, and even though it’s the middle of January, the sun and supersonic entertainment make it feel warmer than it actually is. We’ve arrived in the village of Rasteau in the Southern Rhone Valley to meet up with a man who is rapidly changing the expectation of what is possible in this valley floor appellation that until recently was known primarily for its sweet dessert wines and rustic, rough-and-tumble reds that came in at the grocery store level. Georges Perrot, the owner and (now) winemaker of Domaine la Colliere, is a spry, rail-thin middle aged man with dark hair and an unabashed zeal in both speech and mannerisms. My companions for the visit are my boss, importer Olivier Daubresse, along with his good friend and former owner of Provence estate Domaine d’Eole, Christian Raimond. Rounding out the group is another Olivier-Olivier Grataloup, who along with his wife started a wine brokerage firm based in his home city of Avignon and works to further the interests of small wineries like Domaine la Colliere, who don’t have the means or manpower to do so on their own. All of these men have special qualities: obviously, I wouldn’t be on this trip without Olivier Daubresse (my boss), and Christian is an older man in his sixties whose quiet, amiable assurance was secured years ago in the world of finance. Olivier Grataloup, the wine broker, is a nervy man around 40 who, like me, has young children and worries about providing for his family. It is evident that he needs to calm down as he jumps from person to person trying to please; winemakers and men and women of the wine industry (particularly French men and women) place no small amount of distrust in men who appear stressed or frazzled. For me, though, Grataloup is a lifeline, quick to fill in the gaps in an explanation by Georges of a particular plot of land, or translate a more philosophical conversation in his excellent English when my serviceable but by no means fluent French goes awry. None of these three men, however, need worry: not Olivier my boss, Olivier the broker, or Christian, because my attention was one hundred percent committed to hearing the wine gospel from a dynamic evangelist, Georges Perrot.
The sponge-like blue clay soil of the La Fontaine Vineyard, Domaine la Colliere, Rasteau.
I grew up fairly active in church; three decades later, I am no longer a strict follower of organized religion but consider myself very spiritual, and I say this knowing that it sounds like hyperbole and exaggeration rolled into one, but for me, speaking to Georges Perrot about wine is roughly akin to a religious experience. For a guy who married into the vineyards he now owns, and who employed a high-priced consultant at the outset of his domaine’s existence, Georges sounds like he’s been making wine since birth. Georges Perrot was taught to love the earth and have reverence for things that grow by his grandmother, and it became a passion for him. He was especially intrigued by the art of winemaking, but with no vineyards or formal training, he instead worked a series of odd jobs throughout his twenties. All of this changed when fate-or as Georges likes to say, Cupid-intervened; Georges met his wife Delphine, whose family just happened to own vineyards in the appellation of Rasteau in the southern Rhone Valley. Georges fell in love with the potential of the Rasteau vineyards; the varying elevations and expositions encompassed everything from valley floor to hillside terraces, and the famous “blue clay” soil was truly unique to the appellation, distinguishing it from its more well-known neighbors.
Leasing space from the renowned Andre Romero of Domaine de Saumade, he began creating his wines in 2002 with the idea of going the “other way”-focusing on elegance in texture and purity of fruit without oxidation or “hot” flavors, and finding power in the densely concentrated mouthfeel rather than through alcohol or stemmy tannins. Working ecologically with organic grapes, natural groundcover, and employing biodynamic principals, Domaine la Colliere today is reshaping the way that we think about the potential of Rasteau wines, and indeed, about Rhone wines in general. Each terroir we visit brings an impassioned speech in surprisingly hushed tones about the nature of the ground on which we walk, and the great possibilities the land brings to the wine. Tucked into the Rhone Valley floor north and east of Chateauneuf-du-Pape, Rasteau is an appellation that was long considered sweet wine territory (Rasteau VDN, or Vin doux Naturel, is produced using the same arrested fermentation and addition of grape spirit as Port wine), and as we were there on a bell-clear winter’s day, it was hard to stop the mind from wandering ahead to the dry heat of summer, when these vineyards on the valley floor would be supremely difficult to manage. Like most wine regions, however, there are diamonds in the enological rough, and George’s single vineyard La Fontaine is one of those: located on one of the few hills of note in the western part of the appellation on the way to the village of Cairanne, La Fontaine is a single vineyard of old-vine Grenache grown in the soil type that sets Rasteau apart from villages around it: blue clay. Blue clay isn’t blue at all, but rather a bright sandy color, and arriving at La Fontaine, you can’t help but feel as though you’ve joined some sort of zero gravity lunar excursion expedition: my Vasque brand hiking boots are practically levitating from the soft, porous clay soil, and the famous galet roulets (“rolling stones”, rocks deposited here thousands of years ago by the once wider Rhone River to the west) run through the vineyard, polished smooth by the march of time. The Grenache vines that grow here are equally otherworldly, benefitting from the well-drained soils and their exposition off of the valley floor. With the rolling stones both regulating daytime temperatures as well as storing heat that nurtures the vines overnight, these older vines produce Grenache fruit that is both low-yielding and highly concentrated: the fact that Georges is able to make this kind of wine, here in this place, is extraordinary, and you would be hard-pressed to find the level of pure, inky dark fruit he coaxes from these vines in higher-priced bottlings from the mountainous Gigondas to the southeast, or even lower-level entries from the famous Chateauneuf-du-Pape to the southwest.
Domaine la Colliere owner Georges Perrot and his Mid-Atlantic importer Olivier Daubresse tour a new plot Georges has just purchased.
Later in the cellar, the full mastery of George’s hands-off philosophy becomes apparent: his white Cotes du Rhone is the cleanest, most crystalline white wine from the Southern Rhone I’ve ever had, rendered inexplicably inexpensive by the fact that Rasteau is a red wine-only appellation, leaving the amazing white to be classified only as a regional Cotes du Rhone. The red wines, in tank, barrel, and amphora, leave no doubt as to the winemaker’s philosophy: purity. Each wine tastes of ripe delicious fruit and is equally unadorned by any sort of concession to bombast. The Colliere wines are fresh and lively, tasting like a truly impeccable sauce was reduced for days until the resulting flavors are both concentrated and subtly complex. Tasting a barrel sample of Mourvedre, I become enamored by the dark purple fruit and spicy aromatics; I make eye contact with Olivier and the importer flashes eyes of agreement. Later in the conversation, he asks Georges to blend us another tasting of the red in question, only with more Mourvedre-Georges does so, and is so impressed by the concoction suggested that he invites Olivier to return next year and participate in all of his blending sessions. I smile to myself (instincts vindicated!) and am utterly enraptured with this place and this winemaker. As we retire to a lunch of a beef stew that Georges’s wife has left on the stove all morning waiting for us, deepening and concentrating like the wines of her husband, we attempt to solve the problems of the world over a meal and a bottle. Even with my so-so French managing to keep me involved in the talk, my mind daydreams of a day in the future when I could live here full-time, endeavoring to glean every bit of knowledge possible from Georges Perrot and the sponge-like lunar majesty of La Fontaine.
Domaine la Colliere Rasteau “La Fontaine” 2016
Country of Origin: France
Places and People: Georges Perrot began Domaine la Colliere in 2002 and has since become one of the most highly acclaimed winemakers in the appellation; the grapes for La Fontaine grow on a single vineyard of mostly Grenache that is located in the western part of Rasteau AOP, at a crucial 160 meters elevation. The vine age of the Grenache is 40-70 years, bringing outstanding concentration of fruit to the wine.
Soil: The famous blue clay of Rasteau.
Grape Varieties: 95% Grenache, 5% Mourvedre.
Winemaking: Hand-harvested and fermented in concrete tanks, the La Fontaine is given every chance to be an expression of purity and elegance. Full destemming of the grapes and no racking or movement of the juice after pressing.
Aging: The aging period is 15 months; that time is spent in the same concrete tanks for the Grenache, while the Mourvedre is aged in french oak demi-muids (larger barrels). The result is a wine that plays for elegance and smooth texture rather than over-extracted, tannic fruit.
Flavors and Foods: The La Fontaine is at once big and small: the fruit is monumentally inky, with black cherries, Damson and Santa Rosa plums, and black raspberry all given their due. The “small” comes in the texture, which is remarkably devoid of any rustic, stemmy tannin or underripe herbaceous elements; rather, a delicate nod to the blue clay soils comes in a slight wave of rocky earth, and there are some light spice elements as well (allspice, nutmeg), but these are varietally driven by the Grenache and not a result of oak aging. The uniqueness of La Fontaine is the fact that it relies almost solely on the character of the fruit, and that fact does not render the wine a “fruit bomb” or one dimensional-a rare find. The texture is impeccably velveteen and the finish entirely in check for a wine of this ripeness level (15% abv). A truly stunning red wine! Given the elegance of the wine, eschew the traditional rustic gamey meat pairings for Rasteau and treat yourself to a fine duck breast marinated in citrus sauce, a savory yet creamy boudin blanc, or steak in red wine sauce (the more regal steak cuts, the better, so go for the less-marbled tenderloin and its tributaries, chateaubriand and filet mignon).
Service and Cellar: That 15% abv does demand a little caution from you in serving the La Fontaine; although the wine opens quickly the 2016 does best served at red wine cellar temperature (58-62 degrees). The 2016 shows no signs of slowing down with 5 years in the bottle and I think another 5 will easily be achieved.