Alain Voge’s St Peray Fleur de Crussol 2003 & Marc Sorrels Hermitage Les Recoules 2003
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The Beautiful, Secret Wine Valley of St Peray and Cornas
“The long-forgotten micro-sized white wine appellation south of Cornas has enjoyed an amazing vintage.” Robert Parker The Wine Advocate 12/27/04
Not too long ago I would have agreed with anybody who said that red wines were so much more complex than whites and there just weren’t any white wines out that could stack up against the reds, but that was before I was slavering over my glass of Alain Voges St Peray.
A year ago I was down in the Rhone Valley fighting my way through a crowd of importers for a taste of Alain Voge’s offerings. I’d never had his St Peray, but I figured a crowd was always a positive sign. Now I get what the fuss is all about.
This is a wine for the white wine lovers (and okay,the doubting Thomas red wine drinkers (if there’s anything left in the bottle). Alain Voge is quite famous for his Cornas (red), but he also owns vineyards in St Peray and makes an extraordinary white there. St Peray is the southernmost appellation in the northern Rhone (just south of Cornas). Only white wines are made in St. Peray. The Fleur de Crussol 2003 is Voge’s top cuvee made from 100% Marsanne 70-year-old vines. The wines are aged in barrel for 14-16 months on the lees to capture the maximum amount of flavor. You will taste exotic fruits in your mouth and spices on the nose. It is not a flabby white, but has remarkable acidity. Alain thinks Fleur de Crussol will be at its best about 5 years from the harvest.
And, there’s also another white wine out there that can take on any red in the complexity department.
“The 2003 Hermitage les Rocoules possesses less alcohol (14.8%) (than Sorrel’s 03 Hermitage Blanc) along with additional mineral characteristics, terrific intensity, great purity, and a liqueur of stones intermixed with white currants and citrus oil. Long, rich, and heady, this finesse-styled white will drink well for a decade.” Robert Parker The Wine Advocate 12/27/04
If you want a wine that you will think about and taste in your mind hours after it’s become just an empty bottle, then you should own some of Marc Sorrel’s Hermitage Les Rocoules 2003. It is probably the most complex white I have ever tasted in my life and from a vintage that packs unprecedented power. It is hugely seductive with its hint of anise and exotic fruits. But, it is dry. Marc uses Roussanne (10%) for the aromas and Marsanne for everything else. Marc ages the Rocoules for a year in oak, but not new oak. I will say right upfront that I only have 30 bottles and nobody is talking me out of my 6. Yes, it is that rare and the problem is compounded by the fact that in 2003 quantities were way down or as Parker put it: “miniscule”.
Last March, I was in Tain l’Hermitage to taste Marc’s 2003s. I have never seen a grower more excited about his wines. He, of course, was not alone. Everyone seemed to think that 2003 was so exceptional and so atypical that everyone tasting would be long in their graves before Mother Nature offered up weather like they saw in the summer of 2003. Marc Sorrel is on a very short list of the best growers in Hermitage. His list-mates are the likes of Chapoutier, Jaboulet and Chave. Marc makes on average about 200 cases of Les Rocoules and in 2003, he made a lot less than that.
Hermitage, if you’ve never been, is situated in the northern Rhone on a dramatic stonewalled terraced hillside of granite where the River makes a dramatic circular sweep in its trip south to the Mediterranean. The steep hillside vineyards have a broad southern exposure and are heated by the river and the rocky soil, which stores the summer heat late into the day. Les Rocoules comes from the vineyard of the same name, which is about mid-way up the big hill, which hangs over the village of Tain l’Hermitage.
Both the Les Rocoules and the Fleur de Crussol are serious food wines. Grilled fish, chicken with sauces, Asian food marries very well. These are whites that represent the best of white wine making in the Rhone Valley. If you‘re a set-in-your-ways wine drinker who thinks that whites are somehow just less interesting than reds, these are for you and if you live with any white wine devotees, they will be very grateful. Cynthia Hurley