For the last eight years Sauvignon Blanc has been on the verge of becoming the next trendy Australian white wine. It is almost there – but I said the same thing three years ago…Three factors have helped to let down the fans of the grape which put the Fume in Blanc. Firstly our Chardonnays, which now that they are generally actually being made with the grape after which the wine takes its name, have got better and better. And to my mind their curve of improvement shows no sign of levelling off. Secondly, that noble and maligned old grape, the Riesling, has retained a loyal following, and is even showing early signs of a genuine revival. Great news for lovers of wine, not wood. But perhaps most significantly, Australian Sauvignon Blancs are only now approaching anything like consistency in style. And over time they have suffered terribly at the hands of some unfortunate and grossly over-wooded wines, made from a complete lack of understanding of what the grape was about. The plethora of `Fume Blancs’ made without one iota of Sauvignon Blanc have undoubtedly fed the confusion in the marketplace. A large number of mongrel brews have been labelled as such. Who can blame the consumer if he does not understand that `fume blanc’ does not signify a grape variety, when most of the promotion of these wines waxes on the virtues of Sauvignon Blanc? Just be sure to read the back label, folks. In fact our peace-loving neighbours across the Tasman have done a lot better than we have with this particular grape. For years our Sauvignon Blancs have been thin, hard and acidic; biting young wines picked without any real flavour, bottled permanently encased in a cage of oak. Only now is there a group of wines, representing a number of different regions, that shows that we have just about got the grape right. These wines all come from the southern areas in South Australia, Western Australia and Victoria. Sauvignon Blanc is the classic white variety from Sancerre and Pouilly on the Loire Valley, and Bordeaux, where it makes full-flavoured wines of class and character. Frequently described as “pungent, grassy and herbaceous”, it sounds more like a stockfeed flavouring than a premium white varietal wine. Writers record its `green’ character, and readers will doubtless have come across the well-worn similie of its nose of “freshly mown grass”. An esoteric mob, aren’t we? Funnily enough, the best Sauvignon Blancs are exactly as described. Their flavour is more powerful than complex, often quite austere, and the best of them finish quite dry. Many are partially fermented in oak, or matured in wood after fermentation to add another flavour dimension. As I’vef suggested, this is frequently over-done, unless you prefer to chew on a mouthful of splinters than fruit. The word `Fume’ originally meant a soil-derived `gunflint’ smokiness from the Loire Valley ( Pouilly-Fume is the Sauvignon Blanc from Pouilly ) or else the `smoky’ appearance of the vine-rows when the gusty wind blows the local mouldy bloom off the vines in a `smoky’ sort of a way. I guess it depends on whose story you believe, but sometimes I can imagine what they mean by `gunflint’, although it’s been a time since I last tasted one. Nowadays `Fume’ indicates a smokiness derived from wood maturation, although speaking personally I’m darned how people detect a smoky flavour from the sort of old barrels many Australian Fume Blancs are aged in. One of life’s little mysteries. In addition to its well-publicized herbaceous features, Sauvignon Blanc can also be delightfully fruity, with flavours of gooseberries and lichees dominant. But as with most varieties, the spectrum of flavours varies from winery to winery, resulting from different viticultural and winemaking practices, and different regional characters. Their greenness, most evident in the wines from New Zealand, can often be present in the extreme. Wines such as these have been confused with asparagus soup from time to time. And more interestingly still, there are some of you out there who are actually allergic to that taste! I wonder what the Health Department will make of that? There has been a genuine effort to `de-grassify’ New Zealand’s Sauvignon Blancs, best illustrated in the wines of Morton Estate and Cooper’s Creek. These two emphasise the fruitiness of the variety, rather than its sometimes over-blown vegetative qualities. Other big-name New Zealanders, from Cloudy Bay and Te Mata are to fine wines indeed, although some people will find them very grassy. There is even more variation amongst the pick of the Australian bunch. Not only do some winemakers make oak character more of a feature in their wines than others, but the variety expresses itself differently from wine to wine. The Margaret River Sauvignon Blancs made by Cullens, Cape Clairault and Leeuwin Estate highlight the real sweet, ripe lichees flavour of the grape, although both wines are quite dry. The Cullens usually shows a fuller but well-integrated oakiness. Moving east and into South Australia, excellent Sauvignon Blancs are made by Katnook Estate, Wirra Wirra, Lindemans Padthaway, Hill-Smith Estate and Jim Barry. More gooseberry-like and green, all these wines are to my mind fine examples of varietal Sauvignon Blanc. My favourite Fume Blancs are made by Tim Knappstein in Clare, Taltarni and Tisdall ( from their Mount Helen vineyard ) in Victoria. Although they frequently carry more oak than other Sauvignon Blancs, these wines are still fine varietals of unmistakeable quality. w To cellar Sauvignon Blanc or not can be a vexed question. I have yet to try an old bottle of Sancerre or Pouilly-Fume which has in truth benefitted from its bottle-age. The same can be said for the Australian examples I have come across. It seems to me that when a wine bursts out with the sort of freshness and intensity of youthful flavour that Sauvignon Blanc achieves time and again, why bother to cellar the stuff? What have you to gain? It’s never going to become one of those gloriously complex Rhine Rieslings or Semillons with age, but usually gets broader and fatter, and like an waning stage personality only dims further with every new opening. Leave the wines to mature for a couple of years or so, then finish them before they finish themselves. Winetasting Hint #9(f). Sauvignon Blanc and crabmeat go together better than a snake-bite and anti-serum.
