Smith-Madrone proves Napa
Riesling worthy of the buzz.
©St. Helena Star Thursday, November 20, 2003
By Alan Goldfarb, Wine Editor
We're sitting in the doorway of the Old World-like Smith-Madrone winery,
high up on Spring Mountain, eating cheese, pat≥, crusty bread and
olives; and sipping Rieslings from dusty, mildew-encrusted bottles of older
vintages dating to 1978. We're sheltered mere inches from the fog, soothing
gray mist and drizzle, which envelopes the Valley on a recent cold Friday
afternoon.
There are moments, especially when Charlie Smith recites a stanza from
Ezra Pound, when one looks at his snow white beard and hair and angular
nose, that he resembles a bard from another century.
It must have been the heady aromas from the wine and the food that cast
this hazy, sepia aura around the winemaker's face, but the words emanating
from his lips were of wonderful clarity.
Charlie and his brother Stuart, have been growing grapes on Spring Mountain
since before most anyone in the modern era. With degrees in hand from Berkeley,
they planted Riesling up there 31 years ago. To this day, they remain --
along with Stony Hill and Trefethen -- one of the few in the Napa Valley
who are still making a dry-style wine from the vines planted to their own
roots.
There are only 143 acres of Riesling left in the Napa Valley, and the Smith
boys clutch onto but five of them.
It begs the question why, surrounded by ventricles of Cabernet Sauvignon
planted in the heart of Cab country, have they made a dry Riesling every
vintage since 1977?
"
We've been here a long time. When we planted Riesling in 1972, everybody
was making Riesling, Bob Mondavi, Lee Stewart at Souverian, Joe Heitz.
There weren't more than 30 wineries here and 20 were making Riesling," Charlie
Smith explains. "Everybody quit making it because Chardonnay wiped
it out."
In fact, as early as 1890, more than 65 percent of the 540 growers then
in the Valley were growing Riesling simply because many of the vintners
were of German descent.
Riesling, however, had been abandoned thereafter, leaving it almost entirely
for the eastern Europeans of Germany, Austria, Alsace, and now Australia.
Interestingly, while many consumers are searching for a new wine to supplant
Chardonnay as their white wine of choice, it's only at this precise moment
in the this country, that Riesling is creating a buzz and looking as if
it's creeping up the charts with a bullet.
But, along with his brother, Charlie Smith has an iconoclastic view of
the way wine is marketed in the U.S. They are content making only about
1,200 cases of the stuff each year.
But even for the Smith brothers, the chatter which seems to be swirling
around Riesling -- and how it's a perfect foil for bold-flavored foods
in vogue these days -- the temptation to ride the wave is beginning to
creep into their old, damp winery that seems as if it could fit just as
comfortably on the Rhine.
"
Stu and I had this running argument about Riesling," Charlie relates. "He
had been telling me, 'We've got to make the hard decision,' about making
more Riesling or pulling the vines. 'People love it,' he said.
" And I would say, 'We're not making any money.'
" It went on for years. But it was a war of attrition. He was completely
right and I was completely wrong. It would have been a shame to have pulled
out those vines."
So, the boys decided to re-release their beautiful '97 -- for $50! For
them, out of the mainstream and not on the cusp of forward-thinking marketing
strategies, 50 bucks for a bottle of wine was a lot of money.
But with the glow still on that came when their 2001 Riesling was recently
named one of the best wines of the year by Food & Wine Magazine, the
Smiths made the decision to play with the big boys.
For the time being, anyway.
It's a beautiful wine and deserves the accolades. With apricot, peach and
some of that telltale petrol Riesling aroma, with gorgeous fruit flavors,
it's a Riesling that would fare well alongside the Europeans. The wine,
with less than 1.5 residual sugar, is young, too. It'll continue to be
viable for perhaps another 15 years.
Oh, as of this writing, there were only 10 cases left. To fuel the perception
and enhance the story, the Smiths took a lesson from all those marketing
geniuses in suits, and clamped a three-bottle max limit on the deal.
That ought to ruffle some collars as Smith-Madrone enters the 21st century
world of wine. But don't be fooled. The 59-year-old Charlie Smith is ever
cognizant of his place on the continuum of this coil.
"
We're not going to make money trying to sell Riesling," he reasons,
in spite of what his brother argued to the contrary. "Even in Germany
they can't make money off of the dry style. That's why they make all those
Trockenbeerenausleses."
And that's why Charlie Smith makes much more Cabernet and Chardonnay than
he does Riesling. From its 40 acres, Smith-Madrone produces 3,500 to 5,000
cases per year, with Riesling being only about a third at best or 20 percent
at worst, of their total production. In fact, with the '02, only 750 cases
were made.
Nevertheless, Riesling does very well at the high elevations of Spring
Mountain. It's cool up there in the evenings and they get a little more
sunshine than in some parts of the Valley floor.
"
My assumption would be that we're seeing the usual hillside stuff," Smith
explains, referring to the oft-held notion that grapes on the slopes produce
more intense wines.
"
The fact that we dry farm, it makes for a certain amount of verve, and
a subtle, quite little pop of flavor that you don't get in wines from richer
soils," he says. "It's a racier quality. Any grape that's grown
in the hills, the vines are stressed and they aren't puny and weak.
" Our soils are so much poorer and they have to work harder and it shows
in the longevity of the wines."
Furthermore, Smith thinks it's interesting that Riesling and Cabernet can
coexist in one area.
"
We're lucky here. I can see that we can grow Riesling and Cabernet side-by-side," he
says with a laugh. "That's kind of unusual, don't you think?"
It's also unusual to be drinking Rieslings from the Napa Valley from a
quarter century ago that are still very much alive and delicious. Smith-Madrone's
dry Rieslings usually hover between 0.9 and 1.5 RS --which is pretty darned
arid. They also exhibit wonderful balance with fruit sweetness and sharp
acidity that makes it perfect with many kinds of highly spiced -- but not
necessarily incendiary -- foods.
They are the kinds of foods that have their genesis in the Old World, and
fused now with creations from the New World. Smith-Madrone's wines too,
fit that niche. They are made by a couple of New World guys who seem to
revel in spending a goodly portion of their time in the Old.
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