I was out in SoCal last week before aborting my trip because of anticipated travel restrictions because of Coronavirus. But I did manage to squeeze in a visit w/ Helen & Adam Tolmach up in Oakview.
I have, of course, followed AdamTolmach from the very start, his '83 Syrah, one of the first great Syrahs made in Calif (the others being the Qupe '82 and BonnyDoon Syrah '82, both made from GaryEberle's EstrellaRiver Syrah grapes, and the SierraVista Eldorado Syrah '82.
Adam's Syrah was made from his young Syrah vnyd, planted in '81 at his property. Alas, the area is surrounded w/ lots of river-bottom forests and a great home for the glassy-winged sharpshooter. So his Estate vnyd eventually succumbed to Pierce's Disease and had to be pulled.
Last Fall, AndyWalker, UC/Davis, released his first crosses that are found to be highly resistant to Pierce's. Crosses between Vinifera and native American Vitis Arizonica. Adam took his first crop from his vines in the 2019 vintage.
After sitting around his dining room table, at a proper social-distance according to current guidelines, we sampled three wines from his library and got caught up on things. It'd been some 4-5 yrs since I'd last visitied w/ Adam. Afterwards, Adam wanted me to taste the new wines from Andy's varieties. He only has one row of each, so had about 1 brl of each wine. Didn't take TN's so from my recollect of this tasting in a pouring rain.
1. Ambulo Blanc #102 2019: Light yellow color; quite fragrant some R/mango/floral fairly aromatic nose that reminds me a lot of GrunerVeltliner; fairly tart/tangy on the palate and quite interesting.
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2. Caminante Blanc #016 2019: A bit richer/fuller nose of melons, not as aromatic, reminds more of Chard or maybe PinotBianco, slightly earthy but a very attractive white.
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3. Unnamed Red #07 2019: Fairly dark color; somewhat earthy/plummy reminds me mostly of ContraCoast Mourvedre, maybe a bit of Zweigelt.
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4. Paseante Noir #047 2019: Dark color; strong nose of blackcurrants, rather reminiscent of CabSauvg, slightly plummy; a solid 4-square red.
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A wee BloodyPulpit:
1. These varietal names are obviously not going to make a wine that will sell like hotcakes, since they are totally unknown and there are no European varietal equivalents. But the big take-away for me were that all 4 wines spoke strongly of vinifera and had no hints of their native American heritage. Adam thinks he will probably blend the two whites and the two reds together and release the two wines under a proprietary name.
Tom
Adam's comments on his experience with these vines:
OUR EXPERIENCE WITH GROWING ANDREW WALKER’S PIERCES DISEASE RESISTANT VARIETALS
December 4, 2019
The Ojai Vineyard is located in southern California 100 miles north of Los Angeles and south of Santa Barbara 30 miles. Although it is less than 10 miles from the Pacific Ocean, Red Mountain often blocks ocean breezes. The summer weather tends to be warm and dry. Planted in early August 2017 from small potted plants, grafted on 101-14 rootstock. The vine spacing is 5.5' between the rows and 5' between vines in the row on a VSP trellis with a fruiting wire with 4 sets of catch wires. A drip irrigation wire with two 1/2 gallon per hour drippers per vine. The soil is loamy with Monterey shale two to four feet below the surface. In 2019 the vines were irrigated generously in the spring and the irrigation was cut to the amount needed to maintain the canopy after the shoots reached the top of the trellis. At harvest there was some leaf drop in the fruit zone. 2019 was our first harvest from these vines.
2019 was an unusually mild growing season with a late bud break, no extreme heat, and the powdery mildew pressure was high. Except for a few clusters, none was found on the fruit. The vineyard is grown using organic culture, sulfur used early and other materials later in the season.
Ambulo Blanc #102 (white) A vigorous grower with long canes that tend to drape down. It produces large clusters of medium size berries. At veraison the crop was thinned from about 8 tons per acre to about 5.7 tpa. The grapes were harvested on September 6th and 12th. They were pressed whole cluster, settled overnight, then drained to older French oak barrels and 35ppm sulfur dioxide was added. The next day a native culture of yeast from our grapes/winery were added to the barrels for fermentation. The juice fermented in the 53-70 degree Fahrenheit range in a cellar that was maintained at 53 degrees. The wine remains on its lees in barrel at this time. Although unresolved at this point it possesses an aroma of lemon curd, medium weight on the palate, and is zippy and fresh.
Harvest date: September 6th and 12th
Harvest Sugar: 20.8
Harvest TA:
Harvest pH: 3.31
Alcohol: 12.5
Caminante Blanc #016 (white) Slow grower with delicate shoots that took all season to reach the top trellis wire. Upright growth that conformed to the VSP trellis easily. Small heavily lobed leaves and small clusters with small berries—quite ornate, and the fruit was very distinctive in a pleasantly herbal way. Despite the small clusters, there were many of them and this varietal yielded about 6.5 tpa. Treatment of these grapes was identical to #102. At this point the wine is very strikingly herbal and interesting, but difficult to read.
Harvest date: September 6th
Harvest Sugar: 21.6
Harvest TA: 7.2
Harvest pH: 3.33
Alcohol: 13.3
Unnamed Red #07 (red) A moderate grower that easily reached the top wires of the trellis, but didn’t overgrow it much. Upright growth that is easy to manage. Develops 3-5 clusters per shoot of medium-large clusters of medium-large berries. The crop was thinned in half when the berries were pea sized, and then thinned aggressively again at veraison. The crop was harvested at 4.7 tpa. The fruit was half destemmed and half whole clusters and put in an open top fermenter. No SO2 was added to the grapes and a culture of native yeast was added at crush. The tank was pumped over daily, and later in the fermentation punched down by hand. The temperature achieved 85 degrees in the cap and 72 degrees in the juice. At pressing the wine settled for 48 hours and then was placed in 225 liter older French oak barrels for aging. The color is medium dark and the aroma is distinctly floral and pretty. The flavor is lively and spicy, and the wine is quite agreeable today, it remains on its lees in barrel unracked.
Harvest date: September 6th
Harvest Sugar: 22.1
Harvest TA: 7.6
Harvest pH: 3.45
Alcohol: 12.7
Paseante Noir #047 (red) A vigorous growing vine with long canes that tend to droop down, making it a difficult candidate for VSP training, but we encouraged it to conform with lots of effort. It produces large clusters with medium size berries, but often only one per shoot, we achieved about 4 tpa. The grapes were noticeably low in acidity and required an addition of tartaric acid. The winemaking was similar to the #07, 18% of the fruit was whole cluster, the rest destemmed. The tank was pumped over once a day. This wine has a spicy, smoky fruity character a bit like syrah, the wine is quite aromatic. It remains in barrel, unsulfured and unracked, and is quite delicious.
Harvest date: September 18th
Harvest Sugar: 23.7
Harvest TA: 4.6
Harvest pH: 3.72
Alcohol: 13.95
