Tasting Notes (Feb. 7): Syrah Around the World

If you'll pardon a bit of wandering before I get to the subject of wine, I want to talk about language for a moment. Soviet philosopher and literary critic Mikhail Bakhtin said that there are always two kinds of forces at work when we use language. Centripetal forces (like official language laws, prescriptive grammars, and usage manuals) are forces that seek to push language toward a central point of conformity and sameness. They are the "rules," as it were. Centrifugal forces (like innovation, creolization, and even sheer accident), on the other hand, are forces that constantly work to push language out from the center, toward change and differentiation.

Rugged individualists that we Americans tend to be (apologies to the one Roman who I know regularly reads this blog) it may seem that we should enthusiastically root for the centrifugal while trying to boo the centripetal off the field--that we should, in short, vigorously celebrate difference, change, and innovation. But the fact is that language, and by extension human society, can only exist in that tenuous middle space between too much sameness and too much difference. If language becomes too centrifugal, then we end up with a kind of Babel--nobody communicating with anybody. If it becomes too centripetal, it becomes moribund, going the way of Latin--something for dusty textbooks and clerics.

So what does this have to do with wine? Everything, actually. Just like language, wine is the happy (ok, very happy) result of a similar play between centripetal and centrifugal forces. Take terroir, for instance: the tendency for wines, especially good wines, to reflect "place" assures that the same kind of grape grown in different places will likely make very different wines. If terroir didn't exist, even taking into account winemakers' abilities to manipulate the final product through specialized techniques, there would simply be no point in having a "syrah around the world" tasting. There would just be syrah, period. It wouldn't matter where it came from, other than perhaps the minimum criterion that syrah actually be able to grow and ripen there.

So terroir is a centrifugal force, in that it is largely responsible for the differences among wines from one country to the next, one region to the next, and even one vineyard to the next. But, alongside terroir, there's a centripetal force at work: the varietal (i.e., the type of grape). After all, if terroir were an absolutely determining force, then there would be no reason to care whether a wine is a syrah, or even to distinguish a syrah from, say, a zinfandel. All that would matter is where it came from. But, different as syrahs around the world can be, they are not all so different from one another that there isn't--usually, anyway--at least a smidge of continuity from one to the next.

For syrah--to my palate, at least--that smidge seems to be spice. Of all the wines I tried this Thursday, only the first doesn't include some kind of spice in the tasting note note. And, yet, despite this commonality and a few others almost as prominent (blackberry, for example), it will be clear from the descriptions below that these are very different wines, and that the difference has as much or more to do with place--with terroir--as with price.

It's this give-and-take between sameness and difference that makes wine so mesmerizingly appealing to me and, I suspect, many others. Now, the notes:

1. Backsberg Pumphouse Shiraz 2002 (South Africa; $19.99/bottle)
This shiraz boasts aromas of big blackberry fruit, toasty oak, and leathery earth, followed by flavors of tart but ripe blackberries, saddle leather, and tar. The finish reveals subtle graphite notes as it lingers. Dark and nice, with an old-world quality.

2. Delas Crozes-Hermitage Les Launes 2005 (France; $22.99/bottle)
Bold aromas and flavors of wild berries, dusty spice, dry earth, and cured pork practically scream northern Rhone, of whose wines this one is a typical, and decent, example. Finishes with drying tannins. Try this one with smoked sausage.

3. E. Guigal Hermitage 2001 (France; $79.99/bottle)
Even pushing $80, this would be considered an entry-level hermitage. And, while it is perhaps less intriguing and complex than the Jaboulet "La Chapelle" from the Jan. 10 Rhone tasting, it is more balanced, with more integrated flavors, making it a real pleasure to drink. Aromas of dark berry, musk, damp earth, smoke, and leather are followed by flavors of blackberry, tart cherry, pepper, dust, and smoky cedar. The peppery, spicy finish lingers nicely.

4. Arcadian Syrah 2005 (California; $26.99/bottle)
This wine may be from California, but the nose says northern Rhone, with dark berry, animal, and smoky notes. On the palate, the fruit is more red and rounded than a Rhone, but it's followed by delicious exotic spice and black licorice. Medium-bodied, with a smooth mouthfeel.

5. Red Car Speakeasy Syrah 2006 (California; $59.99/bottle)
Almost black, this thick, full-bodied syrah offers a nose of black plum, sweet spice, oak, and earth. Flavors of ripe black plum, tar, and spice glide like satin across the palate, with a ripe, almost grapey fruit re-emerging on the finish.

6. Mitolo Jester Shiraz 2006 (Australia; $21.99/bottle)
Dark and complex, this shiraz boasts aromas of blackberry and black currant, sweet spice, and musk and flavors of tart blackberry and black cherry, dark chocolate, tar, and spice. Full-bodied, but more restrained than one would expect from a big Aussie shiraz. It reminds me, in fact, of a nice GSM--heavy on the M.

7. Cayuse en Chamberlin Syrah 2004 (Washington; $74.99/bottle)
This super-ripe syrah from Washington is definitely made in a new world style, though it, too, offers a mélange of new world and old world flavors--cherry and blackberry, oak, smoke, sweet spice, salt, and corned beef (with even a bit of cabbage thrown in). Thick, rich, and fruity but also dark and brooding at the same time, this wine prompted one of the tasters to refer to it (in a good way) as "fornicating with my mouth." How often can you say that about a wine?