Ah, the Sérinity (Sic)
August 2019
Preface: Having been in the wine business now for almost forty years, I often ask myself what I might still have to contribute before hanging up my spur(-pruner)s. From a career standpoint, clever wine labels, even some clever winemaking have all been well, good and amusing, but in the end, they don’t really constitute the kind of contribution I seek to make. I believe that what is most valuable to the world is the creation of original wines and the discovery and expression of singular terroirs. Apart from being particularly satisfying for the producer, the creation/discovery of these new elements enrich the world profoundly for those fortunate enough to experience them. The other element of the equation for the discernment of original wine is perhaps the discovery or creation of original grapes, or at least the ability to discern a high degree of congruency or acclimation of a particular grape or set of grapes to a given site. This degree of “tuned-ness” is what allows the originality of the wine to emerge. Thus, it seems particularly useful to the world for a winemaker to attempt to develop a sort of empathic, I-Thou relationship with a given site instead of unilaterally imposing his or her stylistic vision on the produce of that site. In this way, the winemaker can perhaps express an aspect of Nature’s great complexity, far grander than the vision bounded by an individual imagination.
Do we really need more or new grape varieties in this world? Very possibly not, but arguably, we might well benefit from fine-tuning the ones we have, enabling them to be better adapted to the world’s changing climatic conditions or better suited to growing sites that are rather different from those of their original provenance.[1] We know that Pinot Noir is capable of producing brilliant wines in Burgundy, but its potential harmony and majesty often can be elusive when it steps out of its historical geographical context. (This is understandable, as there has been ample historical time for producers to note which particular clones, biotypes - even rootstocks for that matter - are best adapted to their sites.) I, for one, am a great fan of Syrah and know that it is capable of producing interesting and complex wines far away from its traditional home in the Northern Rhône. Alas, that’s often due to a fair bit of manipulation in the winery to achieve a certain felicitous result. Having said that, it is my core belief that if a “complete” wine can be made with substantially less winemaking manipulation and vinous maquillage, the results are potentially far more dramatic and rewarding than a wine of artifice, and that is the course that I, for one, would prefer to follow. I am intrigued by the idea of trying to craft a unique Syrah wine in the New World with two basic aspirational ideas: 1) Discovery/creation of unique biotypes better suited to the growing conditions of coastal California than that which the extant clonal material currently provides; 2) Utilization of a larger range of distinctive biotypes (or clones) to create enhanced complexity in the wine, with an eye toward a more articulate expression of the unique qualities of the site from where the grapes derive.
Syrah is a genius grape. It can possess a seductive scent that is both hauntingly sophisticated, complex and at the same time expressing a dusky, earthy, animal aspect, in the same way that some great perfumes seamlessly conjoin floral notes with elements of splendid, musky, decadent decay. Like many great wines, Syrah is capable of producing one of wine’s great special effects - that of simultaneous weightlessness and great power and persistence. (I think that may be what we mean by “elegance.”) I wonder sometimes how we mere mortals had the wit to have discovered this brilliant variety. But we did, thank Bacchus. Loving the grape is a necessary but, alas, insufficient criterion for producing a brilliant wine from the variety. What is rather more needed is a greater understanding of and the ability to deliver what the grape truly requires, or, failing that, perhaps the ability to affect changes in the grape itself to attain better congruity to its site. I believe that there are a number of reasons why the prospects of a great Syrah from the New World seem to be a far more manageable proposition than many others I could imagine.[2] But we are beginning from a very different starting point in the New World, in comparison to those who are working from vineyards with long storied histories of greatness, and our methodology in pursuing excellence, however that is understood, must perforce be slightly different.
In the Old World, the traditional way of “improving” one’s vineyard is done through the rather slow and tedious process of sélection massale, which is not merely the replacement of sick, moribund, or deceased vines with healthy upstarts, but rather actively looking for individual biotypes that might bring a particular character to the overall wine, in some sense enabling the wine to become more complex, balanced, in some sense more truly itself, as that is understood. In considering a particular biotype or clone of a given grape variety, one is seeking to capture the purest expression of its Platonic ideal, with the very important caveat that its expression is also caught up in the optimization or idealization of the terroir from which it derives. In the New World, we are beginning with a significantly blanker slate, further handicapped by often having but the most rudimentary understanding of the nature of a particular site’s terroir,[3] and working with very different environmental and climatic conditions from the Old World paradigm.
Que Syrah sera? Modern “Syrah” appears to be slightly different from what is generally believed to be its varietal antecedent, the variety known in Côte-Rôtie as Sérine, and in Hermitage as “la petite Syrah,” (a rather different beast than the variety that is similarly named in the New World.)” There is general agreement that the two varieties are genetically very similar, but phenologically, they do look somewhat different. Compared to Syrah, Sérine produces a smaller, tighter cluster, often more prone to bunch rot and other maladies, and does not grow as robustly as some of the modern Syrah clones. It seems to produce its best work in the coolest sites under generally lower light and more overcast conditions. From a winemaking standpoint, it has been observed in a side by side comparison with Syrah, Sérine’s fruit is higher in acidity and varietally more “typical”- a stronger expression of the characteristic white pepper and bacon fat. It has been opined that Sérine is merely Syrah that has been infected with a particularly felicitous set of viruses.[4] In any event, as I am hoping to discover/create a particular biotype (or biotypes) that will have a particularly intense fragrance under our New World conditions, I’ve decided to begin with Sérine rather than Syrah.[5] [6]
My plan is to consider the historical variety of Syrah/Sérine in its original context to be in a sense a jumping off point, and rather than attempting to replicate note for note the qualities of an Old World examplar (rather like the famous example posed by Borges’ Pierre Menard),[7] by allowing Syrah vines to self-pollinate or cross with themselves, I am hoping to create alternate variants of the variety; some of them will be similar, some wildly divergent from their parents. (The differences found from sélection massale would tend to be rather minute and subtle.) One would then observe if a particular offspring shows a distinctive personality, expressed in what is a historically new and different climat and terroir. By creating multiple iterations of the crosses and comparing these biotypes with the parent Syrah/Sérine itself, one can observe telling differences, and the question becomes: What are you actually looking for that might in some sense be more interesting than that which you started with (at least in this new location? [8] [9] It is not an unreasonable hypothesis that while there may well be one or two particular biotypes of these new Sérine self-crosses that stand out as being “complete”, with the most intense flavor, fragrance and perhaps, if we’re lucky, a degree of drought tolerance, it might be the wiser course to select a number of different individuals with somewhat differing qualities - one selected for fragrance (maybe the most important), another for texture or weight, another for acidity, etc. Ideally, we would produce enough vines for a small lot production of these individual lots and then play with creating what we reckon is an appropriately proportionate field blend.[10]
I continue to wrestle with trying to define what makes a particular variety “great,” and what are the qualities of a particular clone or biotype that make for a superior example of that variety. Every interesting grape variety seems to express its worthiness in a different way,[11] and its “quality,” with the case of Syrah in large part derives from both its unique texture coupled with its haunting aromatics. Greatness in wine, I suppose, is a bit of a subjective call, but I believe it can only arrive in wines that furnish something like a “complete” experience, i.e. both real complexity as well as a dynamic ability to change and evolve both in the wine glass and in the bottle.[12] Syrah/Sérine certainly meets both of these criteria.
We attempted to germinate almost 8,000 seeds of Sérine in a nursery in the winter of 2017, and achieved excellent success, though did lose a fair number (more than a third) to a late spring frost. We found quite a bit of disparity in the appearance of the seedlings; some were quite vigorous and apparently healthy, others rather puny and etiolated with an odd growth habit. We kept approximately two thousand of what appeared to be the healthiest ones. When you work with seedlings, the internode distance in the small stalks is very close, and it is very important that you carefully disbud all of the basal bud whorls, lest the seedlings vexatiously shoot suckers from below the surface for the life of the vineyard, which creates a major inconvenience. (We did a reasonable, though not perfect job of disbudding.) The seedlings were then planted out in nursery rows in the spring of 2018 in our vineyard in San Juan Bautista. Nursery rows are very narrow, about three and a half feet between rows and the vines themselves were planted approximately 8 - 12” apart. In the first year the vines that survived gopher or human blight grew anywhere from a few inches to perhaps two feet in length, and were pruned back to just a couple of buds the following winter. We were blessed by a fairly wet winter/spring in ‘18/’19, and that contributed to some very impressive growth in the ‘19 growing season.
According to Professor Andy Walker of UC Davis, vinifera grape seedlings need to achieve at least two meters of growth (mostly vertical, if possible) before they are able to move out of their juvenile phase and begin to receive the hormonal signal to bear fruit. At UC Davis, where there is deep soil, ample water, lots of heat and very little wind, seedlings generally bear fruit in their third year, whereas in Torino, Italy, it is said to take on the order of seven or eight years for the vines to become fruitful. Because San Juan Bautista is generally quite dry (though we did periodically irrigate the young seedlings), not very warm, and exceptionally windy, it was my expectation that we would end up with fruit on a time-table rather more like Torino than Davis. What actually happened is that in this the second year of vine growth, we’ve observed enormous variability in growth and vigor. Some seedlings are still quite stunted and others have put on truly impressive amounts of growth, well over two meters.
The incredible disparity in appearance of the vines. Not only do they show rather dramatic differences in growth, there are some differences in the shape of the leaves and great differences in the color of the leaves and stems - every shade between lime green, Kelly green, crimson, even, amazingly, pure black (a rather Goth look). From a practical standpoint, we made the decision to establish a cordon wire at approximately four feet, and from a cost standpoint, we decided not to use individual stakes for each seedling, but rather attach twine to the wire, anchor it to the base of the seedling and train each vine up the string ladder, as it were. It’s of course impossible to predict precisely, but I reckon that maybe we’ll see fruit appear on maybe one third or more of our vines next year, which I will regard as somewhat of a miracle.
When Andy Walker came out recently, he counseled us to grub up all of the weak vines, which on its face seemed like sound advice. Sometimes it’s clear that the weakness of the vine stems from funny, sub-optimal genetics but often it’s not always quite clear whether the problem is a genetic issue or simply the fact that maybe the vine wasn’t planted properly or got chomped on early in its life by a critter, or any of the thousand natural shocks that grapes are heir to. When you train these young seedlings, these are the things that you are doing: Making sure that you’ve removed as many of the suckers (subterranean shoots) as you can locate. Disbudding most of the lateral shoots, so as to encourage virtually all growth to the apical tip, ensuring that your vine will grow tall, tying up the vine to the twine every foot or so (the more vertically it is trained, the faster it will grow and the taller it will be. (You’re also trying to protect the growing tip from becoming damaged due to abrasion by the wind.)[13]
It doesn’t really work to stand up between the rows as you will soon need to get back on your knees to do the work, most of which occurs at ground level. I hit upon the clever idea of buying knee pads, such as is used by plumbers and tile people and other folks whose work is highly terrestrial. So, when you have the opportunity to work for several hours on your knees, performing essentially some pretty repetitive tasks, your mind has the opportunity to wander. You begin thinking about how you are going to interpret the vine’s outward signifiers as indicators of its suitability of purpose. Maybe it’s just me but I have a certain tendency to anthropomorphize vines, or perhaps it’s a function of inordinate empathy. Will the mesomorph vines - those sturdy, studly, alpha vines really be capable of producing wines with the greatest degree of finesse and elegance?[14] Might it not be the vines that are more moderate and conservative in their growth habit be better capable of going the distance, i.e. not running out of water before the end of the season? Syrah/Sérine possesses the tragic flaw of having very poor stomatal regulation, the ability to conserve moisture under adverse, i.e. windy or extremely hot conditions. Very vigorous vegetative growth is often correlated with aggressive rooting capability, as I had previously mentioned, so the ultra vigorous vines might well be the most suitable. Or perhaps not. Stomates that are open all the time will photosynthesize all the time and therefore grow like crazy; maybe it will be the moderate ones that will optimize the water balance. (They may not find as much water in the soil, but won’t lose as much through the leaves.) It was Andy’s suggestion (and a good one, I believe) to retain the healthiest looking moderate growers as well as the healthiest vigorous ones, and see for ourselves what produces the best result. (It’s a bit difficult to work this out a priori.)
At the end of the day, we’re looking for vines that will produce grapes of extraordinary character under our conditions and at the same time show true sustainability under our conditions, i.e. drought and wind tolerance. While a vine that could somehow manage its stomata better than the others would likely appear to be more moderate in its growth habit, until the vines are tested under replicated field conditions, we won’t really know. Since the factors governing stomatal regulation are probably located on multiple genes, you probably need an enormous sample size, much bigger than ours, to find an individual with superior regulation. It may well turn out that the best we can determine is which individuals produce the most flavorful and or distinctive character and pursuing the characteristic of drought tolerance would be a slightly different exercise. I’m thinking that by flying a drone over a large and fairly uniform, unirrigated Syrah/Sérine vineyard - perhaps in Australia, perhaps in southern France or elsewhere - and through remote sensing, most likely the infrared detection of leaf temperatures, seek to detect individual vines with the most functional stomatal regulation (after ground-level confirmation for a few seasons). Perhaps this brilliant water-conserving individual could be crossed with the particularly flavorful Sérine that we’ve observed, and we’d end up with a great selection of Syrah for a warmer and drier planet.
It could be argued that this project may be a bit of a folly, given that at the moment, in the U.S., at least, Sérine qua Sérine is largely unknown, Syrah is still (rather unfairly) despised and largely misunderstood and perceived as being largely unsaleable.[15] But this project itself will take some years to near completion, and in that intervening time, the fickle public may well come to its senses. Syrah, when grown skillfully in appropriate temperate sites, is certainly capable of producing wines that are at a minimum, soul-satisfying and at best, utterly transformative. May we all find some form of Sérinity.
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[1] Grape vines can suffer from debilitating viruses as do other species. Viruses are not generally propagated through grape seeds, so sexual replication (via self-crossing), while creating its own challenges, can eliminate at least one major issue.
[2] While a great Syrah can certainly be said to be complex and soulful, at the same time it wears some of its unique charms on its sleeve, to wit, its extraordinarily distinctive perfume. While there are certainly other molecules that contribute to its complex aroma, the compound, rotundone seems to be the most important element in contributing to Syrah/Sérine’s distinctive fragrance of white pepper. Rotundone can be of course readily detected organoleptically, but an assay for differential rotundone concentrations could easily be set up. As long as other conditions within the vineyard - light exposure, yields, etc. - remained static, one could potentially identify the highest rotundone-producing biotypes for warmer sites.
[3] Arguably, it would take many, many years for someone to deeply understand the qualities of terroir of a relatively newly vineyard, if only for the reason that it takes vines a number of years to come into a form of homeostasis or dynamic balance with their surroundings.
[4] Virus-free Sérine is apparently available from French nurseries, but I have no personal knowledge as to whether it is as expressive in its virus-free form as compared to in its wild state. Frankly, it doesn’t make much sense to me how the Ur-Syrah, if that’s what it is, would be less pristine than its descendents. I’m certain that with more study, this particular mystery will be illuminated.
[5] For one thing, the dryer weather in California should be helpful in obviating many of the fungal issues to which Sérine is susceptible. The higher acidity found in Sérine should also be helpful in a grape that is prone to higher pHs, especially in warmer climates.
[6] It is a pet theory of mine that a clone of Syrah similar if not identical to Sérine already exists in California - the so called “Estrella River” clone. Putatively imported from Hermitage more than forty years ago, I’ve found the Estrella clone to be the most singular of extant Syrah clones in California, albeit only when grown in the coolest sites. It does seem to produce a smaller cluster and a more aromatic wine than everything else out there; I am almost certain that it is the “petite Syrah” of Hermitage.
[7] In the Borges story, a fictional character, Menard, attempts to rewrite “Don Quixote” word for word, several hundred years after Cervantes, by subjecting himself to experiences analogous to what Cervantes himself might have undergone.
[8] This methodology is not without some hazard. Because one is performing self-crosses, heterozygous vinifera vines will express recessive genes, carrying genetic weakness or defect. A non-trivial percentage of the crosses will be sterile, non-productive, or show other weakness in their phenotypic presentation. Vigorous growth may be a pretty good indicator of a degree of drought tolerance (that’s great!), upright growth perhaps is a good indicator of wind tolerance (a plus), and the presentation of smaller bunch size often correlates with greater flavor concentration. Looking for the obvious positive qualities is the relatively easy (if time-consuming) part; discerning the elements of what can produce a great and complex wine from simply tasting the grapes is a bit more challenging.
[9] Owing to many decades of neglect and some misguided human efforts (essentially the restriction of phenotypic variability), the autochthonous varieties, Gaglioppo and Magliocco dolce, in the Cirò appellation of Calabria had deteriorated significantly but in recent years a group of researchers, sponsored by the Librandi company launched an initiative to revive or “improve” these varieties. In other words they were looking to improve qualitative parameters, while at the same time preserving the unique adaptive characteristics of the cultivars to the unique conditions of the region. They employed a similar strategy of allowing self-crosses, beginning with approximately 3000 accessions, and ending up approximately twenty years later with 22 biotypes. The main difference between their work and the one that I am undertaking is that they are attempting to preserve or return to a sort of historical ideal of these two cultivars, whereas my objective is more open-ended, i.e. to attempt to discover vinous beauty in whichever way it will manifest itself.
[10] In the Côte-Rôtie vineyard from whence the Sérine seeds were derived are interplanted Viognier vines. It’s not inconceivable that there may be some Sérine/Viognier crosses among the seedlings. It also seems likely that there will be a substantial number of white biotypes produced amongst the seedlings, owing to the parentage of Sérine (the white Mondeuse blanche and red Dureza). We will look carefully at the aromatic potential of the white biotypes (maybe using Viognier as a “control”) and keep an eagle eye out for pink biotypes (Andy suggests that they very seldom occur), which in my experience also often possess particularly intense aromatic potential.
[11] I would argue that there are certain features that all “great” varieties share, (with the caveat that it is grown in an appropriate location). One crucial feature is the ability of the grape to produce a wine capable of conservation and continued development as it ages. This must certainly be linked to the particular antioxidants found in the grape, but, naturally, every great grape variety solves this problem differently. The antioxidant profile of Cabernet Sauvignon is rather different from that of Pinot Noir, for example, and the particular profile of antioxidants leads to rather different winemaking protocols, and ultimately to very different wine styles, each with their own merits. What I might propose as another criterion of grape “quality” is perhaps a bit controversial, and maybe it’s more a matter of my own aesthetic predilection rather than an immutable rule. I believe that a “great” grape variety is one that has enough “openness” in its structure to allow the expression of soil characteristics to emerge. That is to say that the flavor profile is not so dense or tightly packed with flavor elements, as to obscure the expression of soil characteristics. I would argue that certain varieties like Pinot Noir, Nerello Mascalese, Rossese, Cornalin, even Poulsard, can serve as the basis for wines of far greater complexity in comparison to grapes that produce denser, more robust wines, such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Tannat, Mourvèdre, Aglianico, Sagrantino or Charbono. (An interesting corollary to this to this would be the differential concomitant winemaking technique - vigorous, aerative extraction for the latter varietal category versus gentle, less aerative infusion for the former.) What seems to be key in characterizing the “openness” of the structure of the wine is the ability of the wine to kaleidoscopically evolve after it is opened, shifting its form and revealing new aspects. Where does one place Syrah on the cool/warm or open or dense continuum? I’d argue that Syrah (or Sérine) grown in cooler sites, such as Côte-Rôtie, has a lot more in common with Pinot Noir in comparison to, say, Cabernet Sauvignon. Analogously, Nebbiolo, grown at higher elevations, in cooler sites, such as in the appellation Carema, (in comparison to say, Barolo), is likewise capable of showing rather dramatic finesse and complexity. There will always be wine drinkers who prefer the impact and weight of denser wines, and the eternal Bordeaux vs. Burgundy debate is perhaps unresolvable. There are many potential dichotomies at work analyzing the issue of how to achieve success in planting a vineyard in the virgin territory. Knowing where you are in the world at least climatically is helpful, and the Mediterranean vs. Continental distinction can be useful. And yet most all of us aspire to be more elegantly Continental (eg. Cary Grant) as opposed to Mediterranean (Anthony Quinn as Zorba the Greek). If your climate is dramatically warm and dry, you are probably best advised to embrace your inner Anthony Quinn and work with sun-loving, drought tolerant varieties. If your site is on the warmer side of cool, (and thanks to Global Climate Change, many of us now or soon find ourselves in this condition), the question might be what steps might you take to bring a degree of elegance and finesse to the wines you’re making in a warmer, drier climate that is inexorably pushing them Zorba-ward in the direction of rusticity.
[12] One might certainly argue that all “great” wines express some element of soil characteristics, a bit of an ineffable quality, but correlated to identifiable and commonly understood organoleptic clues, included in the vexing concept of “minerality.” Wines of terroir express the quality of dimensionality and a distinctive persistence on the palate.
[13] I’m not sure if it is entirely due to wind damage that shoots become forked, i.e. split in two with no dominant apical end. (Might it well be a genetic disposition, such as one finds with the Michet clone of Nebbiolo?) But when it happens, the possibility of achieving the growth you seek is essential cut in half. One is therefore placed in the Solomonic position of having to decide which of two branching shoots will live, and which will be lopped off. It’s not a monumentally difficult decision to make but just a reminder that we are always facing life’s forking paths.
[14] And of course I easily succumb to the fantasy that perhaps it is the most misbegotten-looking vine that somehow has the capacity to produce the most flavorful fruit. It’s very possible that the big vines will handily overshadow (rather literally) the small vines, but if there’s an opportunity to keep some of the smaller vines (at least the ones that are not too anomalous looking), we certainly will, maybe just because “a vine is a terrible thing to waste.” Small vines do tend to produce small fruit, and all things being equal, small fruit is the most intense. I’m sold now on the concept; we’ll retain some small, slower growing vines that do not evidence obvious defect.
[15] This, owing to the somewhat irrational exuberance of growers planting Syrah in mostly inappropriate (way too warm) areas of California, and perhaps the flooding of the market with certain jaundiced caudal Antipodean examples.
