Welcome to The Next Big Thing.  This month’s shipment yields three exceptional, micro-produced wines that are sure to excite even the most jaded palates.  We start with a Pinot Blanc from Marlborough, New Zealand that might be the most exciting white wine I’ve tasted in all of 2008.  That is followed by a Pinot Noir with the humble appellation of Bourgogne, and a character that is far from humble: and you have one of only 1888 bottles produced.  We finish up in Napa Valley, with a Syrah that is nothing short of spectacular. 

To see detailed descriptions of all of the wines in this months shipment, click here, or go to The Next Big Thing in the categories tab to the right of the page.

This is an incredible wine. For me it constitutes the best of both Syrah and of Mount Veeder rolled up into a very pretty, very powerful, and very intriguing wine.

This is a joint , and sole (they have no employees or partners) project between Carole Meredith, and David Lagier. Carole is a famous genetic ampelographer from UC Davis who was one of the group of researchers that determined the heritage of many of the most planted grape varieties in the United States and France, including the true heritage of Zinfandel grapes. David Lagier was the winemaker at Mondavi for fourteen years. In 1986 they purchases a plot of land on Mount Veeder (1300 feet of elevation) to capture the cooling influence of both the San Francisco Bay and the higher altitude combined with the stunning sunlight that mountainside vineyards in Napa provide in such abundance to their crops. Because they do everything themselves, the didn’t plant the vineyard until 1994, and didn’t make their first wine until 2000. But the results have more than confirmed their wisdom in sight selection.

They are arrestingly straightforward people, and prefer to let their wine speak for itself rather than discuss every new (or old) technique that they use. Lagier-Meredith only makes one wine, a single bottling of Syrah from their vineyard on Mount Veeder. They make less than 1,000 cases each year. They don’t like the influence of new oak on the Syrah, so they use only older barrels, and don’t filter at all. David’s primary responsibility is the winemaking, and Carole manages the vineyard, though I suspect that with no employees they both do quite a bit of everything.

The 2005 Syrah is their best wine to date, and is both incredibly powerful, and incredibly elegant: a rare feat. This is a big red for steaks, lamb, hamburgers and wild game, but it is also at home with blue cheese, and because of the intense concentration of fruit, and the spicy character, it handles moderately spicy foods like Southwestern and Barbeque really well. This is also a wine that has the right combination of fruit and structure to age beautifully and will drink well through at least 2018 (though at least one important critic disagrees with me on this!).

I couldn’t have been more surprised to rank a Pinot Blanc among my favorite white wines of 2008. Much less a wine from New Zealand.  But Pyramid Valley is a very exciting winery. My notes on this wine read:

Dry (nearly), rich, creamy, stony. Just a hint of oak (15% new French). Super-complete on the palate. Rich, layered, long. Toasted apple, marmalade, coriander, fresh cassia, baked lemon, fresh cream, honey.

Needless to say, I had to find out more about the people who made such a stunning wine from such a humble grape. In brief, what I discovered confirmed that this was, in fact, a very special winery and destined, for nothing but the right reasons, for fame.

The winery which, along with its four “home” vineyards, is located near Waikari in North Canterbury, on the south island of New Zealand, is owned by Claudia and Mike Weersing. They purchased it in 2000, after a long search for the perfect place to make exceptional wines from Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. Claudia manages the vineyards, where she adheres to strict biodynamic practices. Mike has a background in wine that is as impressive as any I have heard of: he has worked for Hubert de Montille, Nicolas Potel and Domaine de la Pousse d’Or in Burgundy, Jean-Michel Deiss and Marc Kreydenweiss in Alsace, and Randall Graham in Spain, among others. Mike has become a strict non-interventionalist winemaker, following practices of biodynamics in both the vineyard and the winery, and is a firm believer in high-density plantings (at 10,000 to 12,000 vines per hectare they have the highest by a long stretch in New Zealand) and low yields, and cultures all of his own yeasts from the naturally occurring yeasts in the vineyards.

But regardless of technique, it is the wines here that truly shine. This wine is one of the wines that they call their Grower’s Collection. The Grower’s Collection wines come from select vineyards that are worthy of singling out for praise. In each case, the Weersing’s agree to pay the maximum amount that the vineyard would have made by selling the grapes to someone else, and agree to pay for all of the extra work that they demand in the vineyard. This way they ensure that everything is done to their exact specifications (sometimes they even do it themselves). The Grower’s collection includes a number of exceptional Pinot Noir’s as well as a Semillon, a Riesling and this Pinot Blanc from Kerner Estate in the Waihopai Valley in Marlborough.

This is a powerful white wine that will drink well now through 2015 and possibly longer. Because of the power of this wine, it is a great candidate for all sorts of cheese (hard, soft, blue, cow, goat), but will also do equally well with fish, shellfish, pork and poultry.