Who would have guessed that Sonoma Valley wines could sit at the crossroads of Bordeaux and Burgundy? Sir Peter Michael did…
While it’s no revelation that Napa Valley produces world-class Bordeaux blend wines and that Sonoma Valley makes stunning, cooler-climate Chardonnay, few vineyards are positioned to produce top-quality wines in both styles from one vineyard site.
Peter Michael Winery in Sonoma is this exception where altitude and aspect converge to capture the best of Napa and Sonoma sub-regional climates.Blend the ideal site climate with a French winemaking philosophy and the result is outstanding Sonoma wines that speak with a pronounced French accent! The valley side of the vineyard produces Sauvignon Blanc and two Bordeaux blended reds that bear a very strong resemblance to their French Bordelais cousins while the single-plot Chardonnays express a Burgundian soul and a leaner body than most California chards.
The split personality of these wines is further reinforced by their names - the entire portfolio of has French names that would be a lot easier for a French consumer to understand and pronounce than for the Americans. Nevermind that US consumers butcher the names when ordering, they clearly love the style and understand the wine language swirling around in their glasses.
So how did a homegrown California vineyard end up being so Euro-centric?
The English founder, Sir Peter Michael, was an engineer who spent time working in Silicon Valley. Like a lot of Brits Sir Peter enjoyed a fine-quality claret but had a clear preference for more restrained and classic wine styles from France. His bias changed when he tried the Château Montelena wines for the first time, only then discovering that California could produce world-class wine.
Not long after this epiphany he set out searching for a property where he could establish his own vineyard and produce low-intervention, neo-classical California wines that were terroir specific – wines that could be a snapshot of the vineyard in the glass.
Taking an engineer’s approach he knew exactly the type of vineyard site he needed: a hillside site (itself an unusual idea in the early 1980’s) that had water and the right soil profile. Eventually he found a square mile plot of land with a creek running through it just north of Napa and right at the foothills of Mount St. Helena in Sonoma. What he couldn’t have known then, but soon discovered, is that the 120 acre site offers an amazing diversity of microclimates and soil structures – a vineyard that is both well suited for classic Bordeaux grape varietals and one that has ideal, higher-altitude conditions for growing Burgundy’s favourite white grape, Chardonnay.
The High Road to Burgundy
Stylistically, all four Peter Michael Chardonnays head smartly in the direction of Burgundy first via the Knight’s Valley vineyard then by way of classic Burgundian winemaking techniques that shape the Chardonnay grape’s malleable character.
Knight’s Valley is a large hillside vineyard divided into carefully mapped plots that produce site-specific, terroir-driven wines. The distinctions between each plot’s soil and microclimates is also reminiscent of Burgundy where as little as 10 paces across a paved road can mean the difference between top Grand Cru and 1ere Cru vineyards.
The chardonnay plots are all planted further up on the vineyard hillsides, some of which also experience the fog effect but others that sit above in full sun. The distinctions in the fruit and wine style between the four Chardonnays is marked: The lowest altitude plot, La Carrière (which means quarry in French) is very rocky and produces leaner, more citrus/mineral wines.
Positioned higher up on the same slope (above the fog line) is the Ma Belle Fille plot. Aside from full sun, this site benefits form the cooling marine influence to give generously ripe wines that are still quite mineral and have super fresh acidity. Belle Côte is the oldest and slowest ripening site producing really plush, elegant wines with soft acidity, intense stone fruit flavours and a creamier texture. Lastly is the richer, more honeyed Mon Plaisir made from fruit sourced at two different parcels – one on the Knight’s Valley vineyard and the other from the Alexander Valley.
All of the white wines are fermented in barrel - no tank fermentation – and they have similar time in oak. Since they are all essentially made the same way, it’s the terroir and vintage conditions that account for the variety in style. There’s also some noticeable vintage variation in these wines, particularly noticeable in the Chardonnays. The ’08 vintage yielded wines that were a bit rounder and fatter, and La Carrière ’08 shows off that broader, softer style with a wonderfully delicate, toasted nose fused with lemon curd, acacia honey, and juicy stone fruit flavours.
By contrast the ’09 Ma Belle Fille – produced from the sunniest but highest altitude of the vineyard sites showed a more typical vintage character with bright acidity and wet stone/mineral notes and crisp yellow apple flavours. This was an overall fresher style of wine and illustrated the difference a little altitude can make.
The Lower Road to Bordeaux
The road to the Bordeaux-style side of Peter Michael Winery goes through Sauvignon Blanc vines towards the valley where the red varieties to make the Bordeaux blend wines are planted. Unlike warmer-climate California Sav Blancs that can be flabby and lacking natural acidity the blended “L'Apres Midi” Sauvignon Blanc is crisp and fresh, partly because higher altitude plantings and the region’s maritime fog influence that brings a big swing in diurnal temperatures. This helps the grapes to retain plenty of natural acid freshness.
Another contributing factor is winemaking that’s geared to preserving acidity. A deliberate “no malolactic” fermentation policy means that L’Apres Midi has mouthwatering, searing acidity that practically electrifies the fruit flavours as the wine washes over your palate. The wine is not all pucker though - it has a little Semillon (as per the Bordeaux rules) and spends 5-6 months in old oak before being filtered and fined to round off the acid edge a bit.
The Bordeaux red varieties are planted at the lower part of the vineyard (starting at around 200 feet altitude) in the warmer, protected valley floor zone that also benefits from seasonal fog effect. This coastal, maritime effect ultimately moderates the warmer climate by cooling the vines down in the evening and morning.
Les Pavots is the flagship Bordeaux-blend wine and as such, represents the stylistic vision of the winery. This is the Peter Michael standard bearer wine whereas L’Esprit des Pavots is its alter-ego. To understand the relationship between them it's key to consider each wine’s site placement, vine age and house style objectives. For all of the red wines the grapes undergo a rigorous three stage sorting process – first by cluster then by berry utilizing a screen device called “Le Trieur” to separate the berries by size. This device was jointly developed by Peter Michael Winery and some French counterparts, and like the wines it kept its French name. After fermenting with traditional masceration and pumping over processes the wines are racked and blended before putting them into barrel to age. This is so that the individual wines may marry and meld while in barrel. House style rules dictate that the wines are not fined or filtered, but are racked for clarity as needed.
By nature Les Pavots is a leaner, more restrained style of wine that in the glass has excellent fruit concentration and weight, a refreshingly soft natural acidity, well-integrated toasty oak notes and ripe, elegant tannins to finish it off. Blind I would have thought it was a Bordeaux rather than California mainly because of the acidity and softness of the tannins. With that assumption I would have also placed it in a good Bordeaux vintage because there is plenty of fruit purity in the middle and a long finish.
The alter-ego of Les Pavots is L’Esprit des Pavots. The original L’Esprit vineyard was planted in ’89 and was meant to be a second wine to the older Les Pavots vineyard. However, in the mid-1990’s they realized that the vineyard rootstocks were phylloxera sensitive so replanted the Les Pavots vineyard making L’Esprit the “old vine” wine. Now with 20+ years of vine age it is anything but a second-wine. It’s overall a bigger, fleshier wine and is more “Californian” in style owing to the blend that has less Cabernet Sauvignon and is more Merlot and Cabernet Franc. In keeping with the Bordeaux comparisions, it would be more “right bank.”
Both of these reds are right out of Bordeaux blend “central casting” with elegant, fine grained tannin structures that frame dense and ripe cassis / black fruit. Yet they also have the elegant and lush textures one expects from California while retaining their high-brow, reserved “claret” attitude. Most surprising is how balanced the wines were given their 14+% alcohol content.
The Road to Peter Michael Wines in Asia
The move into the Asia market is more an effort to fulfill the family strategic plan than to find volume for sales. As a family owned vineyard with a 100 x 100 philosophy (100% ownership for 100 years) Peter Michael has a clear motivation in coming to Asia: they want to build an international reputation for these wines. Yet with an annual production of only 15,000 cases (split between 14 different bottlings) plus distribution in 23 US States and a robust private client allocation program, there is a limited amount of wine for the Asia market to enjoy!
If you’re keen to discover these wines the road leads you to Robin at Water and Wine. This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Contributed by Sarah Mayo, TLN Editor
