Saturday, Mar. 01, 2003

NW Syrah may be best in its youth

By Ken Robertson

Q. Since Syrah has become popular in the Northwest, I’ve really fallen for it and have bought several cases of my favorites. How long can I expect these wines to keep their delightful balance of fruit and finesse?

A. If they were classic French wines from Hermitage in the Northern Rhône region, I could give you a rather definite answer. Those wines, produced almost entirely from Syrah, will age well for between 12 and 30 years, according to The New Sotheby’s Wine Encyclopedia.

But, as your question suggests, Syrah is new to the Northwest and if there’s one thing I’ve learned about our Northwest wines, it’s that they age differently than traditionalists expect.

When I interviewed the well-known wine writer Bob Thompson back in 1985, he told me the amazing thing about the series of mid-1970s Cabernet Sauvignons made by Chateau Ste. Michelle “was how little they moved.”

He had bought several cases, especially the halcyon 1975, 1976 and 1977, and he noted that when he occasionally tasted them, they seemed virtually unchanged from year to year.

Interestingly enough, in that interview 18 years ago, he suggested Washington ought to experiment with “Rhônish grapes” because he thought they would have tremendous potential here. Those would be primarily Syrah and Viognier — the current darlings of many wine buffs — as well as Grenache, Mourvèdre, Roussanne and Marsanne.

In today’s wine world, however, I’d be cautious about planning to age most wines for a long time. As one winemaker friend recently told me, “If a wine tastes so good that you buy a case now, why would you want to age it indefinitely and let it maybe go bad?”

One of the Northwest’s veteran winemakers, Rob Griffin of Barnard Griffin in Richland, Wash., has turned out a series of outstanding Syrahs since he started making that variety in 1998. His recommendation is not to wait too long.

“Syrah from the Northwest is awfully nice in the three- to eight-year range,” he said, “when it has wonderful blackberry varietal sorts of things.”

He notes that in today’s wine market, wine is not generally made to age forever. Consumers want wine to drink now, not in a decade, and the financial underpinnings of our many newly founded wineries require that they have wine they can sell within a couple years, not five or 10 years down the road.

Q. I recently opened a 1995 Chardonnay that seemed fine when I tasted it right after pulling the cork. A few hours later, I decided to have a glass after dinner was over and the guests were gone. The wine had changed markedly — and not for the better. What happened?

A. From the wine’s vintage, I’d guess you had a wine that was past its prime and a few hours of exposure to oxygen in a warm room finished it off. Oxygen and heat are the great enemies of wine. Many wine lovers prefer a Chardonnay that’s buttery and oaky, which often means it’s made from well-ripened ripe grapes and a little low on acid. It’s a combination that’s unlikely to age as long as a steelier, higher-acid Chardonnay full of lemon and apple flavors.

Take a low-acid wine, age it past its prime, then let it sit open to the air for several hours and it can oxidize rapidly, especially if it’s allowed to warm to room temperature.

I’ve seen it happen with aged whites of almost every kind. I recently opened an Alsatian-style Gewürztraminer from 1987 (which I knew was probably well over the hill). At first, though its acid was nearly gone, it still had some nice spicy aromas and flavors. Less than an hour later, it was flaccid and flat.

The moral? No matter how wonderful a wine is, you can’t hoard it indefinitely. Age will eventually kill even a wonderfully crafted red. And once a truly old bottle is opened, don’t count on it to last for several hours open to the air.

WORTH NOTING: In my last column, I mentioned that half-bottles (375 ml) are sometimes called tenths or splits. A Seattle reader took me to task for this, saying it was incorrect.

Upon further research, I’ll give her a “split” decision. A tenth, the half-bottle back in the days when wine and liquor were sold in fifths of a gallon (25.6 oz.), technically contained 378.5 ml. Unless one wants to quibble over a few drops, that’s indeed the same as today’s 375-ml half-bottle.

She was half-right about the split. Internationally known wine judge Coke Roth of Kennewick Wash., who also was once a wine distributor, tells me that split often was and is used interchangeably for a 375 ml bottle and a bottle half that size - 187 ml — often sold by the airlines.

Other standard European sizes for small bottles are 100 and 250 ml for still wine and 125 and 200 ml for sparkling wines, according to The Oxford Companion to Wine.

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