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WINE NOTESOCTOBER 31, 2009
By DOROTHY J. GAITER AND JOHN BRECHER
Tasting the Winemaker's Vision
One of the things we've most enjoyed about visiting wineries over the years is the opportunity to taste the winemaker's vision. Having several wines to taste through gives us a pretty clear window into his or her passion. There emerges, overa few sips, a prevailing arc that spans the entire production, from reds to whites. It's almost like a fingerprint,distinctive and telling. We recently had the pleasure of cramming two parents' weekends into one weekend at our daughters' colleges. Afterkissing Zoë goodbye on her forehead—Dottie on her tippy toes—and reminding her to use her hand sanitizer, we loadedthe car for the drive home with a couple of stops in mind along the way. After watching the entire growing season of apples along our route through New York's Hudson Valley, we wanted to buy some, fresh off the trees. Our second goal was to visit one of the valley's wineries, 10-year-old, 3,200-case Whitecliff Vineyard & Winery, whose lyrical white wine we'd been served recently at an elegant little restaurant.The winery and tasting room are in a pretty spot, set amid the owners' 70 acres, with a beautiful view of theShawangunk cliffs. White-netted vines lined the way, protecting late-ripening grapes from predators. A guy in a cap, who turned out to be winemaker Michael Migliore, who owns the winery with his wife, Yancey Stanforth-Migliore, waved us into a parking spot and then disappeared. Inside, for a fee, we chose six wines to share: Awosting White, the winery's most popular wine, an off-dry blend of Seyval Blanc and Vignoles; three of its estate-grown red wines (Gamay Noir, Pinot Noir and Cabernet Franc); Sky Island Red, a Bordeaux blend; and a fifth red, Redtail, a light, sweet blend.The white was pleasant and interesting, but the estate-grown reds really rang our bells. They were elegant, focused,true to their varietal type and ripe, not an easy feat for so cold a region. What struck us so, though, was the consistent vision of the wines. Though they were white and red and ranged from dry to sweet, they had a restraint to them, a visionin which everything—including the winemaker—took a back seat to the fruit itself. And the fruit was delightfully pureand real. There was nothing showy about the wines. They just tasted good, offering a kind of relaxed gracefulness andeasy balance that would make them good on the dinner table. We left with a bottle each of our favorites, the Pinot Noir ($19.95) and the Cabernet Franc ($20.95), and immediately  went home and tried them with lamb chops. Wines often taste better at the winery for many reasons, including thescenery, but these were even more impressive with food. Each was varietal in its own way—the Pinot was hauntingly earthy, the Cab Franc was sharper, more focused—but the vision of both as food wines was true. When we called the next day (we visited anonymously), Michael Migliore spun off some dazzling science-speak, befitting the physical organic chemist he is. He has lived on the property for around 35 years, since he was a graduatestudent studying organic chemistry. After buying the land, he started planting the vineyards in 1979, trying to figureout, as a scientist would, which grapes grew best there. The Migliores now grow 20 grape varieties, some in smallexperimental lots, on the 26 acres planted to vines. "We make first and foremost the things we like ourselves," Yancey Stanforth-Migliore said. Their vision? "To produce high-quality, food-friendly wines," Mr. Migliore said, adding,"generally not cocktail wines, which tend to be higher alcohol and more fruit-forward. Ours have more acid structure,
Tasting the Winemaker's Vision: Gaiter and Brecher's Wine Notes...http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870357460457449...1 of 211/6/2009 7:07 AM
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