Is this the most exciting time in American winemaking history?
A classic Virginian sunset.
Last October JamesSuckling.com gave a glimpse of the sweeping strides in quality and sophistication of American regional wine. James and his senior team blind tasted and rated nearly 900 American wines (excluding the West Coast). Stay tuned this fall as we update you with new releases from some of the high scorers.
Our 2018 report, The American Wine Revolution, looked at wines from top producers in the west (Idaho, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas), the east (North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey) and the center (Ohio, Michigan, and Missouri).
It documented not just quality, but the remarkable stylistic and varietal diversity and elan that is emerging across America.
Not coincidentally, the tasting also showed the power of terroir. The highest ratings went to wines from producers who let their vineyards speak. This represents a sea change in American regional wines over the last few decades. Gone are the days of modest goals, no longer are “standard” and recognizable varietal flavors, sometimes created rather than grown from haphazardly selected sites, de rigueur.
The best producers across America know their sites and plant genetics as never before. And they don’t limit themselves to conventional wisdom about what to grow.
We saw it in the purity of fruit of the Rune (Arizona) Grenache Willcox Pillsbury Vineyard 2015; the drive of the sleek and minerally Linganore (Maryland) 2017 Albarino; the full-bodied and sophisticated energy of RdV’s (Virginia) stunning 2016 cabernet sauvignon-dominated Lost Mountain; and the seductive freshness and complexity of the Snowy Peaks (Colorado) 2016 syrah/petit sirah/mourvedre blend Grand Valley Eleve.
Behind these and hundreds of other wines we tasted are passionate winemakers, but above all remarkable and distinctive terroirs. They extend, literally, from the shores of the Chesapeake to 6,000-feet-high Rocky Mountain vineyards.
Respecting those terroirs is a new generation of edgy and focused winemakers. One secret to their accelerating success is the way they collectively leverage their training, knowledge and experience; this feature of regional American vinifera production belies its relative youth.
We got a little taste of that earlier this month at an informal east coast “wine summit” at Maryland’s Big Cork Winery. The brainchild of Pennsylvania journalist Paul Vigna, the formula, in its third year, was great. Twelve winemakers, six states (from North Carolina to New York), 24 wines, and a day of nonstop conversation and criticism.
There was a lot of discussion about soil, technique, and weather (east coast wines are very weather driven). And straightforward comment on each other’s wines, from Brooklyn Oenology’s “Broken Land” Finger Lakes orange wine to Big Cork’s “Russian Kiss” (experimental Russian clones) to Hawk Haven’s northern Rhône styled syrah from the New Jersey coast. And a lot in between—from Rhône, Bordeaux, Burgundy, and Galician varietals. Even the nurturing and forward-looking hand of the state was there, in moderator Joe Fiola, the University of Maryland’s viticulture coordinator.
But the big takeaway was the collegiality and adventure of the discussions by pros who know they’re breaking new ground and have a lot to learn from each other. They respect the accomplishments of tradition, but are eagerly embracing what their sites can yield in the future.
It’s a story that ought to be familiar to any reader of JamesSuckling.com, because it is being repeated, as we have reported, across America and the world in wine regions new and old and as far afield as Swartland, Margaret River, and Rioja.
That’s the link that helps make the quest so big and fun, whether you’re a producer, consumer, dealer, critic, or any other critical player in the fine wine ecosystem.
The American regional scene is exciting, and has verve. It includes so many world class wines, in that sweet spot of value and quality. At the apex are new icons. Keep an eye on this story. We’ll help you do that.
– William McIlhenny, Jamessuckling.com strategy