Dessert wine: Part 1

I’ve always like dessert wine more in concept than in consummation. From a psychological perspective, it tends to cap the whole decadent progression of wine throughout a meal; like, we’ve had our meet ‘n’ greet Campari and soda, our Muscadet with the oysters, our New Zealand sauvignon blanc with the greens (which wasn’t supposed to go, but did), our big, overpriced pinot noir with the roast iguana course, maybe an overbearing cab with the entrée, so now, what’s for dessert?

Wow, more wine.

At this point, I’m either too full or too blotto to really want to deal with some molar-crumbling syrup picked by fanatics at midnight from frostbelt climates that aren’t supposed to be producing pine trees let alone grapes.

But that’s just me.

For others, dessert wine occupies a hallowed role in the casting call of wine, although there is no single definition that everyone agrees on—except that dessert wine is wine served just before, just after, along with, or instead of dessert.

Does that sufficiently belabor the obvious?

Though dessert wines tend to be sweet, residual sugar is not an inherently defining factor in labeling it ‘dessert wine’. Some are sweeter than others.

That said, the most simple rule of thumb for enjoying dessert wine is that the wine itself should be sweeter than the food it accompanies.

How the extra oomph gets in there, which often includes a higher alcohol percentage, varies from product to product.

Briefly, here are the categories:

BOTRYTIS WINES: Noble rot sounds only marginally more appealing that moldy grapes—much like head cheese sounds only marginally more appealing than pieces of pig face—and in fact, botrytis cinerea is referred to more poetically as pourriture noble by French people and Edelfäule by the Germans.

Noble rot is a much sought-after fungus which settles on grapes during late summer when correct conditions have produced correct levels of humidity; decisively, in any given harvest, not a given. Once established, noble rot sucks moisture from the grapes, concentrating sugars, fruit acids and minerals. Meanwhile, mid-suckage, botrytis spores begin to contribute their own signature flavors—often mango, apricot and honeysuckle—to the

thickening, sweetening juice. It’s said that the grapes are so desiccated by the time they’re pressed that it requires a yard of vine to produce a single glass of wine—accounting for the luxe price often affixed to the bottle. Wines of this ilk are led by the ultra-exclusive Chateau d’Yquem (the only Sauternes to wear a Premier Cru Supérieur rating), Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese wines and Aszú of Tokaj-Hegyalja, especially Eszencia, the most exclusive wine in the

world. Eszencia is said to age and improve for two hundred years, or in my wine cellar, up to a couple of subsequent weekends.

Eszencia is so sweet that it can’t even technically be called wine, and is said to be a deathbed offering to dying Hungarian kings—highlighting both the noble and the rot.

Incidentally, botrytis is the identical off-color fuzz that gets all over your room-temperature strawberries—with slightly less transcendent results should you happen to know a dying Hungarian king in need of an exit shot.

ICE WINE: As the name suggests, ice wine is what happens when grapes freeze on the vine, usually to a temperature below -19ºF. This results in a concentration of sugars and the preservation of acids—the pas de deux of all great

dessert wines. Top-drawer ice wines hail from Austria, Germany, Hungary and Switzerland, but currently, the Niagara region of Ontario claims to be the world’s most widely respected producer where it is typically—though not exclusively—made from vidal or riesling grapes and only on nights when an NHL game has not gone into overtime. Canada 's quality control board, the VQA (Vintner's Quality Alliance) is partly responsible for the reputation of these luscious concoctions, especially those of Inniskillen, Jackson-Triggs and Peller Estates.

The VQA strictly prohibits ~~cheating~~ artificially freezing grapes to produce ice wine, but this ~~scam~~ technique has been used with interesting results in California and New Zealand—wussy regions not typically prone to heartless, thankless, execrable, manly winters.

Randall Grahm, whose Vin de Glacier artificially-frozen ice wine is good, not great, scoffs that trips to a local, commercial freezer have ‘basically’ the same effect as the darkness-shrouded, nearly-sacred harvests of his (in his opinion) less foresight-blessed brethren. …like, to learn how to play hockey, joining a smash-mouth league has ‘basically’ the same effect as watching a game on TV.

RAISIN WINE: In particularly hot dry climates, mostly in Southern Europe, a centuries-old technique involves air drying grapes after the harvest. Like ice wine, these raisinated offerings are as complex and concentrated as ice wines, but it

is fair to suggest there is less bravura involved in spreading grapes on racks than on tromping around vineyards in the middle of a sub-Arctic night. Classic raisin wines include Tuscany’s Vin Santo, the traditional biscotti accompaniment, Recioto di Soave, Pedro Ximénez-based wines from Spain and the amber Cypriot specialty, Commandaria.

FORTIFIED WINES: The microcosmic world of Port, Sherry, Madeira and muscat or grenache-based vins doux naturels of Southern France is one of fortification— meaning that neutral-grain alcohol is added to the must before the yeast has completely transformed fruit sugars into alcohol, thus killing off the alcohol-producing yeast. This seemingly self-defeating approach began as a preservation technique and results in some of the world’s most highly regarded dessert wines; naturally sweet and unnaturally high in octane. Think of it as the wine equivalent of steroids with the understanding that Sammy Sosa still had to put in gym hours to get arms that big.

Other, perhaps less heralded dessert wine tactics include chapetlization—adding sugar to wine before fermentation to increase both sweetness and an ultimate alcohol content, mostly illegal in countries as serious about their wine as they are about their celebrity blogs. Then there’s Süssreserve, the German term for adding up to 15% grape juice to wine must, elevating the sweetness like a push-up bra, in process decreasing the alcohol via dilution.

Whatever the modus operandi, with most after-dinner wines, you should pay attention to the price label with the reasonable assumption that the better stuff wears the more impressive price stamp.

Caveat emptor always, but if you’re willing to shell out the shekels, by and large, you’ll get your just desserts.

TASTING NOTES:

Feiler-Artinger Traminer Beerenauslese, Burgenland, Austria, 2004, ½ bottle, about $25: From the fascinating traminer grape, a kissing cousin to gewürz; the sweetness is now settled in along with explosive aromas of roses and lychee; rich and honeyed with tropical fruit jam; chalky background and a long, wonderful peachy finish.

Jackson-Triggs, Proprietors’ Reserve Vidal, Icewine, Niagara Peninsula, 2007, ½ bottle, about $25: Pure gold both in color and value, with papaya, mango and apricot holding court with bright acids and silken texture; melts in your mouth if you don’t spill it on your hands. Canadian winemaker Marco Piccolo reports that the grapes were harvested at minus 10ºC, which means nothing to Americans and leads to a pertinent question: were Canadians simply bullied into celsius by the rest of the world? Like, if the rest of the world jumped off a building, would Canada?

Castello Di Volpaia Vin Santo, 2000, about $40: Coppery and fully into it’s own, this caramel-touched, amber-colored, oxidized, rummy and raisiny vin pretto settles into a final course with holy confidence. Lots of orange peel and hazelnut, this Trebbiano and Malvasia wine is the other side of the red Chianti coin.

Blandy's Madeira, Malmsey, 15 Years Old, about $30: Orangey, sugary, apricotty and fruit flanny—since Madeira was George Washington’s favorite wine, and given the state of his teeth, this may well have been his Madeira of choice.