A few weeks ago I made a wish on Wine Review Online that California’s most out-there region, the Anderson Valley, remain as far from its flashier neighbors as it possibly can. Last weekend I drove up to the Valley for its second annual Alsatian Wine Festival, and it seems I have little to worry about.
Highway 128, the road that cuts away from Sonoma County to the Pacific through Boonville and Philo, hasn’t gotten any shorter or less windy (though it’s a serious kick to drive). It’s still very much out of the way. Whereas Napa is sort of a petting zoo rural, the Anderson Valley is the real thing: I didn’t take a census, but it’s a safe bet that there are more sheep than people within its borders. And it still has a touch of hippie ethos, which may or may not account for the fact that as a region it’s probably more committed to organic agriculture than any in California.
The Alsatian Festival offered plenty of evidence why this remote place could never be another Napa. It’s too damn cold for one thing, and too wet, and too foggy; for years most thought it ill-suited for anything but sparkling wine, and there’s a fair amount of that, some of the best in the state. As for red varieties, there’s Pinot Noir and not much else.
But their whites have been stellar for years. The whites made from Alsatian varieties–principally Gewürztraminer, Riesling, Pinot Gris, and Muscat–are some of the prettiest wines in the state. They’re pristine, unadorned, aromatic, and low in alcohol. Spend any length of time there and it’s not hard to understand why this is so. The soils, alluvial clays and loams, tell just a small part of the story; the weather tells the rest.
To fully understand why the wines are the way they are in the Anderson Valley, you have to wake up there. I have done this about half a dozen times at various times of the year, and have never, ever, seen the sun before ten in the morning. And no, it’s not because I’m a lazy cuss. A persistent fog snakes its way up the coast along the Navarro River, casting as powerful and oppressive a gloom upon the early morning hours as any Old World locale, including London-town.
And it’s bone-chilling, no matter what time of year. But just when you think your mood is going to sink down a hole and never return, the fog begins its retreat, and an almost imperceptibly creamy sunlight starts to brighten the corners of the horizon. The color is amazing, an ethereal pastel, a backlit, pale buttermilk blue; by noon you can see the sky and the sun is no longer just a memory on your bare arms. Imagine what the grapes feel.
Well, I can’t, but I can give you a bit of a primer on what you might expect from some of the finer Alsatian whites the Valley produces.
Muscat Blanc or Muscat Canelli: These pristine wines are some of the most glaring evidence that the Anderson Valley is a long way from the rest of California. Feathery, clean, bracing and light, with a glorious scent of orange-blossoms and peach, these wines and their bracing textures are like the anti-California Chardonnay, with a prettiness undergirded by a solid, fruit-filled body. Navarro and Husch make the Valley’s finest.
Pinot Gris: The Valley’s renditions of Gris are simple, lifted, and wheaty, with quite a bit more heft than most Oregon Gris, but a pleasing spicy fullness to the wines that fairly beg for choucroute. They are perhaps the least complex of all the Alsatian-style wines made in the Valley. One of the best is from Handley, with newcomer Breggo making theirs in a slightly brighter style.
Pinot Blanc: According to my sources there are only two, and I only got to taste one, and it’s beautiful. It’s from Lazy Creek and it’s got the broad reach of classic Alsatian Pinot Blanc with notes of bosc pear, quince and camellia, but the acids lift its rather ample shoulders in an exhilarating way.
Riesling: There are few places in California where Riesling seems more at home. Built on crispness and tension, with a nervy spine and clean flavors of white peach, it is nevertheless an unabashedly Californian in its ample fruit profile and seductive texture. Despite being fermented close to complete dryness, the better ones still possess a mouthfilling richness. Greenwood Ridge, Handley and Navarro all make superb examples.
Gewurztraminer: Perhaps the best known Alsatian white in the region, they’re certainly the best in the state and among the best in the world. What’s especially odd is that they bear little resemblance to the wines that inspired them. Alsatian Gewurz tends to be rich, unctuous, and decidedly sweet; a heady and exotic wine with broad flavors of litchi and quince. There are comparable flavors in an Anderson Valley Gewurz, but it’s as if they’ve been pared down to a much leaner state, with barely perceptible levels of residual sugar and an almost Riesling-like spine of acidity. There several to choose from but favorites include Navarro, Londer, and Handley.
Some Specific, Exemplary Bottlings:
Londer, Anderson Valley (Mendocino County, California) Dry Gewurztraminer 2005 ($22): This lean Gewurz goes against more massive Alsatian tendencies, with a lean and slatey texture, fresh and spicy aromas of winesap apples and rosepetals. It’s almost racy on the palate, with dried quince flavors and a nice line of acid to keep the texture bright and minerally. 91
Greenwood Ridge, Anderson Valley (Mendocino County, California) White Riesling 2005 ($16): At the festival, winemaker Allan Green was pouring Rieslings from 1985 and 1995 as well, to show how wonderfully long lived these wines were (the 1995 was smashing!). The 2005 has a clean, appley scent with a hint of peach; there is plenty of white peach fruit flavor on the palate, with a rich mouthfeel and plenty of tension on the finish. 90
Lazy Creek, Anderson Valley (Mendocino County, California) Pinot Blanc 2005 ($23): A textbook Pinot Blanc with a crispness and taut structure that throws that classic profile into high relief. Clean scents of quince and fresh milk give way to an invigorating grapey fruit flavor on the palate, but it’s the lift of the finish–where a spicy, almost nutty flavor predominates–that jolts the wine with energy. 91
Handley, Anderson Valley (Mendocino County, California) Pinot Gris 2005 ($17): Richer and more full bodied than any Oregon Gris, the Handley has the broad shoulders to shoulder a rich Alsatian meal. The nose is faint in this youthful wine with a golden apple scent. On the palate it’s big without being blowsy or rich, with broad bosc pear flavors and a fine, lifted finish. 90
Navarro, Anderson Valley (Mendocino County, California) Muscat Blanc 2005 (about $18, released in March): Consistently one of the finest California wines from this grape, its peach and orange blossom aromas are so invigorating they’re almost jarring in their freshness. Fully ripe, it has a beautiful mouthfeel and palate weight for such a seemingly delicate wine. For me the flavors are not quite peach, not quite orange, sitting on the fence for a nice complexity, rendered in a clean finish. 90