Here at Askawinemaker, our love for complex, well balanced, age worthy dessert wines is matched by our love for complex, well balanced, age worthy Chardonnays. Interestingly, there is sometimes a link between the two: Botrytis cinerea, or "Noble Rot".
When it comes to wine, Botrytis is the double edged sword of the fungal world. Chris Kissack, aka, The Wine Doctor, has a terrific article on the benefits and the dangers of Botrytis in the vineyard, as well as the role Botrytis plays in producing sweet wines from Sauternes, the Loire Valley, Germany and beyond. While Botrytis can elevate some grapes to sweet nobility, it also has the power to ruin an entire harvest where it is an uninvited guest. In the best cases, it can add layers and complexity to dry wines. In conjunction with Candid Wines 2005 tasting of Domaine de la Romanee Conti and our subsequent visit to the cellars in Vosne Romanee, Aubert de Villaine explained to me that they encourage Botrytis in the Montrachet vineyard for up to 25% of the crop.
Re-reading The Wine Doctor's article on Botrytis, this passage sticks out in relation to DRC's use of such a high percentage of botrytized grapes:
Early Botrytis infection, which turns the grapes a purple-green, is known as pourri plein, and at this stage Botrytis cinerea consumes grape sugar without concentration of juice; hence the grapes may actually be less sugar-rich than before Botrytis set in. Pickers must wait until the grapes are fully desiccated, when they are known as confit or rôti, before harvesting. At this stage the Botrytis has consumed more sugar, but such is the effect of dehydration that the juice is highly concentrated and sweet; in addition, the fungal action creates glycerol, dextrin and other compounds which contribute to the texture and unique and desirable honey, toast and apricot flavour profile of a botrytised wine. (The Wine Doctor)
So a grape with early onset Botrytis can have some of the benefits like increased richness (from the glycerol) and more layered flavors without having additional sugar. Assuming that the flavors can be steered in the right direction, this makes sense to me. This of course is the fodder for many more direct questions we can ask down the road. In particular, I'd like to ask Klaus Peter Keller of Weingut Keller in the Rheinhessen about Botrytis and Riesling. Klaus Peter makes some of the world's best dry Rieslings but avoids Botrytis in those wines like he might avoid the plague. So many questions.
I was fortunate to help with the 2006 harvest in the Russian River Valley and was present on the days when Fred Scherrer of the Scherrer Winery and vineyard owner Don Helfer made the decision about when to pick the Helfer Vineryard Chardonnay, which was starting to be affected by Botrytis. Here is a discussion of that process that we recorded with Fred in January of 2007.
Warning! This video contains lots of pictures of Chardonnay grapes covered in the spores of Botrytis cinerea, which The Wine Doctor points out is the asexual form of Botryotinia fuckeliana. (That's the actual scientific name, and not a product of my inner twelve year old, though my inner twelve year old is laughing.)
Still hungry for more information on Botrytis? An outfit called Picturebookpublishing.com has a detailed look at Chardonnay harvested after Botrytis had set in in order to make a dessert wine at Simi Winery in the Russian River Valley. It is good read, especially after watching Fred Scherrer describe his efforts to control Botrytis in the production of dry Chardonnay. The article also includes many good pictures of shrivelling grapes as Botrytis affects more and more of the vineyard.
ADDITION:
The series of pictures I took during the 2006 harvest at the Helfer Vineyard, documenting the process of going from vine to bottle is on http://www.candidwines.com/. The pictures document the decision of when to harvest given the growing threat of botrytis, as well as the work done in the vineyard and at the winery.
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