Appellation Vs. Terroir
On occasion Roger Dial of Appellation America shoots off an e-mail to their mailing list. They are very often very interesting missives. Todays was particularly enlightening and held one particular statement of great importance and foresight.
In general, Roger is arguing that understanding what makes America’s appellations, and the wines that come from them, unique is of critical importance to the American wine culture. But the very last paragraph of his communique reads like this:
The fact that so much terroir talk is bull, and so many appellations are just distribution-minded assemblages, only heightens the need for pushing the process of documenting terroir from the ground up, and doing radical surgery on appellations to give them ecological authenticity. Then, and only then, will the North American wine industry be secure and the wine culture enriched.
YES!! "Radical Surgery on Appellations"
If the American wine industry wants to truly place the notion of terroir next to the idea of well-defined appellations, then radical surgery of the appellatlons is needed. The notion that the Russian River Valley can possibly possess a single terroir that will deliver a similar character to any wine made from its grapes is just silly. Russian River Valley alone should be broken up into at least five different appellations just to begin to the region real terroir-based meaning.
Well said, Roger!!!
Below is the entire text of Roger Dial’s email:
APPELLATIONS AND TERROIR
Not too long ago our Mendocino editor, Thom Elkjer, penned a rather assertive piece called "Terroir vs. Appellation"
in which he concluded that terroir is spin, whereas appellation is fact. Of course, both concepts are mobilized to peddle wine, but the latter has accountability in regulatory law, whilst the former is subjective, at best, and ultimately meaningless, in Thom’s view.
Thom isn‚t the only one to lay the "meaningless" charge at the doorstep of the vocal terroirists. As Roger Bohmrich MW says in an informative piece on the "terroir debate" in Wine Business Monthly
, when the definition of terroir goes much beyond nature (climate, exposure, etc) to encompass nurture (viticultural and vinicultural intervention), terroir becomes everything, and therefore nothing.
Bohmrich, in much the same voice as Appellation America’s own Alan Goldfarb
, would have us assessing the nurture part of what makes the wine what it is in terms of specific sorts of human interventions, categorizing them as favorable, neutral, or suppressive to the expression of terroir in wine. He offers us a "Terroir Wheel" as a canvas on which to focus the ongoing debate. It’s a handy graphic, which I’ve already got pinned up over my computer.
Mirroring the terroir debate is the controversy about the concept of appellation. Thom Elkjer’s defense of "appellation", notwithstanding, the chorus of antagonists —"appellations are created by marketing departments not nature"— is very persuasive. Appellations are just spin! Terroir is just spin! End of debate. Well I hope not, because when we retire these debates, it WILL BE THE END of the North American wine culture.
We need to ask ourselves WHY it is that we need to identify terroir and delineate appellations in North America∑ admittedly we are late coming to the game that has been the foundation of the world wine culture for eons. I would argue that this need (for terroir and appellations) borders on desperate, and, yes, marketing is central to that need. But the marketing department doesn‚t have to be central to the process of identifying terroir and delineating appellations.
Put simply, the compelling public-consumer interest in wine is in its diversity. Terroir distinctions, based in ecological fact, and appellations delineated in respect of those ecological facts, are the mapping tools of diversity. To be sure, well-defined appellations should also "map" diversity in nurturing elements that contribute to the taste-of-place.
The fact that so much terroir talk is bull, and so many appellations are just distribution-minded assemblages, only heightens the need for pushing the process of documenting terroir from the ground up, and doing radical surgery on appellations to give them ecological authenticity. Then, and only then, will the North American wine industry be secure and the wine culture enriched.
When I taste the distinctive flavor of Sta Rita Hills Pinot Noir, as compared to, say, Bien Nacido, even when those wines are made by the same vintners using the same techniques, what am I tasting? Different soils, different microclimates (ie terroir). Hmmm…also different clones planted in the two regions. Possibly different vineyard practices. Is the choice to plant Pommard clones in Sta Rita Hills related to the idea that they do better there — terroir again — or is it based on greater availability of those clones now than was the case when Bien Nacido was planted?
Personally I think there is something to terroir. Appellations of course are first and foremost political — at least the way they are created here. But insofar as they follow recognized terroir boundaries they do make sense. Sta Rita Hills is different from Santa Maria Valley and deserves to be recognized. On the other hand, Peter Cargasacchi’s Jalama Vineyard is outside the SRH boundaries (for example) and yet…
In these few examples I have drawn exclusively on wines made and grown in close proximity. If we expand our horizons, surely it is possible to state with some certainty that Santa Barbara’s Pinot Noirs are different from Oregon’s. What terminology do we use to discuss those differences? Maybe the terms terroir and appellation are not the best way to think about these issues, but at present they are all we have. I think we ought to work with them.