October 18, 2004

Pinot Noir

Pronounced [PEE-no NWA]

From the International Wine of the Month Club

Pinot Noir, the great red grape of Burgundy, is a touchy varietal. The best examples offer the classic black cherry, spice, raspberry, and currant flavors, and an aroma that can resemble wilted roses, as well as earth, tar, herb and cola notes. Conversely, Pinot Noir can also be rather ordinary, light, simple, herbal, vegetal and even weedy. Other times, it can be downright funky, with pungent barnyard aromas. In fact, Pinot Noir is the most fickle of all grapes to grow: It reacts strongly to environmental changes such as heat and cold spells, and it is notoriously fussy to work with once picked, since its skins are easily bruised and broken. Even after fermentation, Pinot Noir can hide its weaknesses and strengths, making it a most difficult wine to evaluate out of barrel. In the bottle, too, it is often a chameleon, showing poorly one day, brilliantly the next. Nevertheless, it can and does produce some of the plane'ts greatest red wines, like Romanee Conti.

From WikiPedia

Pinot Noir is a red wine grape variety, considered to make some of the greatest wines. It reaches its peak in Burgundy, but is also used in the production of Champagne and is planted in most of the world's wine growing regions for use in both still and sparkling wines. Pinot Noir grown for dry table wines is generally low-yielding and often difficult to grow well. Pinot Noir grown for use in sparkling wines (eg. Champagne) is generally higher yielding.

While Pinot Noir can vary dramatically, the wine tends to be of light to medium body with an aroma reminiscent of black cherry, raspberry or currant. Generally, Pinot Noir is produced as a red wine, although Pinot Noir is used in the production of most Champagne and some rosé still wines, and even occasional "vin gris" white wines.

Originally produced in France, in recent years Pinot Noir has become a popular grape in wines from, amongst other places, California, New Zealand and Chile, with some of the best regarded coming from the Willamette Valley in Oregon and the Russian River Valley in California. As a rule, the better pinot noirs are grown in climates at the colder end of the spectrum for wine growing.

In Germany it is called Spatburgunder, and is now the most widely planted red grape. Historically much German wine produced from pinot noir was pale, often rosé like the red wines of Alsace. However recently, despite the northerly climate, darker, richer reds have been produced, often barrel (barrique) aged, in regions such as Pfalz and Ahr. These are rarely exported and are often very expensive in Germany for the better examples.

There is also a smaller-berried, lower yield variety called Fruhburgunder which is grown in Franken, which can produce very good wines. It is thought to be a mutant clone of pinot noir.

Robert M. Parker, Jr. says in one of his books that German pinot noir tastes thin, like badly made Burgundy. While some examples may not be well made, many are, and are highly sought after.

While it is the most common red grape in Germany, much of the Spatburgunder is used to produce Sekt, German sparkling wine rather than red wine.

The Pinot Gris grape is a mutant clone of Pinot Noir.

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