Dessert Wines

Sweet-toothed Americans may down soft drinks with abandon, but sweet wines have not aroused the same enthusiasm. Even some of the experts are reserved about these wines, especially about matching them with food. Witness these remarks:

“Rich desserts and sweet wines are almost impossible to balance, and sate too soon even if they can be brought into harmony”--Bob Thompson in “The Pocket Encyclopedia of California Wines” (Simon and Schuster: 1985).

“I have a confession to make: I’m not very enthusiastic about matching desserts with a sweet wine”--Kevin Zraly in “Windows on the World Wine and Food Book” (Sterling: 1986).

With that kind of publicity, dessert wines would seem doomed. But that is not the case. In recent months, the wines have drawn increasing media attention. And serious wine makers have come out of the cellar with a raft of interesting products.

In the forefront is Andrew Quady, who produces only sweet wines (Ports and Muscats) at his winery in Madera. “Our sales are increasing--have been for some number of years,” Quady said. He attributes the apparent decline in dessert wine sales to the weeding out of “cheap, sweet, high-alcohol wines that people drank mainly for the alcohol.”

In December, 1981, Quady published the first issue of the Dessert Wine Digest, a semiannual newsletter. In the February, 1985 issue, he spoke out in behalf of serving wine with dessert: “When successfully done, the sensory result is really wonderful. . . . Once one experiences a great dessert complemented by a dessert wine, it is obvious that (the) combination affords a level of enjoyment which cannot be approached by desserts alone or with coffee.”

Quady supports that statement by including recipes in the newsletter and by attaching recipe tags to his two sweet Muscat wines, Essensia and Elysium. Essensia buyers can learn to make a chocolate pudding in the style of Madame DuBarry, while Elysium fanciers receive the formula for a chocolate cream cake.

Desserts aside, sweet wines are pleasant to drink by themselves, as one would drink a liqueur. Or they can accompany cheeses or nuts in place of a rich dessert.

Sweet wine is often a more accurate term than dessert wine, which is legally restricted in its meaning. According to Wendell Lee, counsel for the Wine Institute in San Francisco, a wine must contain more than 14% alcohol but not in excess of 24% alcohol to be labeled a dessert wine. This is the standard of identity regulated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

In popular terminology, a dessert wine is simply any very sweet wine that might be served with a dessert or as a dessert in itself. Some of the sweet wines produced today actually are lower in alcohol than dry wines designed to accompany a meal.

To introduce this category of wines, a Times Food department panel tasted a random sample of California sweet wines that are either on the market now or will soon be released. Ports and Sherries were excluded, since they merit consideration on their own.

The 12 wines reviewed included several late harvest wines, some novel experiments and a Muscat wine that has not yet been released. Prices ranged from $1.99 for a 750-milliliter bottle of Muscat wine purchased at a discount store to $25 for a bottle of late harvest Sauvignon Blanc half that size.

The goal was not to choose the 12 top California dessert wines but to draw attention to worthy members of a class that is often overlooked. The wines are listed in alphabetical order according to winery. Each is accompanied by its winery retail price and bottle size.

Bonny Doon Vineyard Muscat Canelli 1985, 375 milliliters, $10.

Randall Grahm, the wine maker at this Santa Cruz vineyard, has engaged in some fascinating experiments in his attempts to emulate the French vin de paille, a sweet wine that is made from grapes dried on straw mats.

Grahm had the grapes for his 1984 Muscat Canelli dried in a fruit dryer. For the 1985 wine, he took the unfermented juice to an evaporator in Madera. That treatment concentrated the juice until it became “so sweet it hurt your teeth,” he said.

Midway during fermentation, Grahm blended the Muscat Canelli with 19% Pinot Blanc to temper the sugar and add other flavor components. The result is a luscious golden wine with tropical tones that matches well with lychees or other mellow-tasting fruit and with simple desserts. The alcohol content is a low 10.35%, but the sugar is a high 20%.

Although his goal is to produce wines similar to those of the Rhone Valley in France, Grahm switched to the style of the German Eiswein (ice wine) with his 1986 Muscat Canelli. The German wine is made of juice pressed from naturally frozen grapes. Grahm’s alternative was a freezer in Watsonville.

When the frozen grapes were pressed, the water remained behind as ice crystals, leaving the juice concentrated with sugar--”twice as sweet as when first picked,” Grahm said. Fermentation was completed in February. The wine is scheduled to be bottled this week and will be released in April.

Grahm made 900 cases of the 1985 Muscat Canelli, but only 450 cases of the 1986 ice wine, which is 100% Muscat. The new wine will sell for $15 for a 375-milliliter bottle. “It’s kind of tedious to make it,” Grahm said.

Caparone Winery Winter Mist, 375 milliliters, $10.

Dave Caparone is a red wine specialist, and so his first dessert wine was made from a red wine grape, the Gamay. The grapes would have been picked in 1985, but were allowed to remain on the vines until Jan. 18, 1986. For that reason, Winter Mist has no vintage date. “I didn’t want to call it late harvest. It’s really not that. It’s something way beyond,” Caparone said.

The grapes are not from his own vineyard, which is near Paso Robles, but from the eastern part of San Luis Obispo County, where the climate is more extreme and frosty.

Caparone fermented the grapes on the skins for two months “to get every bit of the flavor I could,” he said. After fermentation, the wine was placed in small American oak barrels until bottling in September. The alcohol content is 14%, and the residual sugar is 10.4%.

“It was not an easy wine to make. There was no track record on it,” Caparone said. The wine “literally aged on the vine,” as he put it. “There was a very intriguing aroma and flavor in the juice. Nothing I had ever tasted before.”

The closest he can come to describing Winter Mist is that it has “a hint of very old Madeira.”

Caparone prefers the wine chilled and without accompaniment. “It’s a dessert in itself,” he said.

Caparone planned to make Winter Mist again this year and was pleased that dry, cold weather left the grapes well preserved and high in sugar, looking better than in 1986. Unfortunately, they also looked good to a flock of birds, which settled in and consumed every berry just as Caparone was about to pick them. However, 120 cases of last year’s wine remain. It is sold primarily at the winery.

Geyser Peak Winery Opulence, 750 milliliters, $7.50; 375 milliliters, $4.

Sweet but not syrupy, this pale gold wine was designed to accompany a variety of desserts without overpowering them. It is light and fresh, ideal to sip with strawberries and other desserts linked with spring and warm weather. Times tasters suggested raspberry mousse rimmed with ladyfingers, passion fruit mousse and angel food cake as suitable pairings.

The fruity, floral aroma of the wine indicates the presence of Gewurztraminer. Although the exact formula is confidential, Geyser Peak does reveal that Opulence includes 65% Gewurztraminer. According to wine maker Armand Bussone, the remainder is a blend of grape juices. This blend, called a mute, contributes sweetness. Gewurztraminer provides the flavor. “Gewurztraminer is a very pronounced variety. It has a lot of character to it,” Bussone said.

The wine was taste-tested extensively at the winery with fruit, cakes and other sweets. “It’s just sweet enough to go along with the desserts,” Bussone said. (The residual sugar is 10%.)

Opulence was introduced in 1986. At 13.9%, it is somewhat high in alcohol, but the next batch will be even higher--about 14.3%, Bussone said. That will entitle Geyser Peak to label the bottle as a dessert wine.

Opulence is not fortified by the addition of spirits. The Gewurztraminer grapes have a high sugar content when picked, and the sugar is converted into alcohol during fermentation. The wine is fermented in stainless-steel tanks and kept cold in stainless steel until bottling. The new batch is scheduled for release in April.

Robert Mondavi Napa Valley Sauvignon Blanc Botrytis 1981, 375 milliliters, $25.

The grapes for this wine were affected by the mold Botrytis cinerea, which concentrates sugar and flavor. The blend contains 15% Semillon, which contributes a melon-like round flavor to the more crisp Sauvignon Blanc. Deep gold in color, the wine has a rich aroma and what some tasters described as a touch of burned sugar in the flavor. The alcohol content is 13.8% and the residual sugar 10.5%.

“After a meal with a lot of courses, you have something like this as a dessert by itself,” was one comment from tasters. Fruit pies and cakes or Italian biscotti were suggested as accompaniments for a more substantial finale.

The 1981 wine, which is still available, was followed by a 1983 Sauvignon Blanc Botrytis, which is priced at $50 for a 750-milliliter bottle. There is also a 1985 vintage awaiting release in 1988. However, in 1986, there were not enough botrytised grapes to produce the wine.

Why are these wines so expensive? Harvey Posert, public relations director for Robert Mondavi Winery, said: “Botrytis wine requires leaving the grapes on the vine, which is a gamble. In most years, botrytis does not develop.”

The botrytis-affected grapes must be plucked from the bunches individually. “This is a very costly procedure,” Posert noted. Then the small lot of juice is individually fermented. After fermentation in stainless steel, the wine goes into French oak barrels for more than two years of aging. “If you made it every year and made a lot of it, the price would come down,” Posert said.

Posert credits wine maker Tim Mondavi for leading the winery into the production of a series of sweeter wines, including a Moscato d’Oro, Chenin Blanc, the Sauvignon Blanc Botrytis and four Johannisberg Rieslings, one of them a botrytised wine.

“We’re very committed to the sweeter wines,” Posert said. “We may be leading the pack a little, but we think that Americans are going to learn about the pleasures of dessert wine.”

Mont La Salle Vineyards Chateau La Salle, 750 milliliters, $2.99.

The venerable Chateau La Salle was developed about 1958 by the Christian Brothers and today sells more briskly than any single wine in the line. According to Ron Batori, Christian Brothers spokesman, sales total about 350,000 cases a year. (Batori explains that Mont La Salle Vineyards is the name of the company that produces Christian Brothers wines. The Christian Brothers designation is reserved for varietal wines.)

Chateau La Salle is a blend of 55% Muscat of Alexandria and 45% Muscat Canelli. “We’ve done little on using it as a dessert wine. We’ve never positioned it that way. We’ve always thought of it as a refreshment wine,” Batori said.

Ronald Hanson, manager of the plant at Reedley, 20 miles southeast of Fresno, where the wine is made, dubs it “a ladies’ teatime wine.” The label refers to it as a “naturally sweet light wine” to be served chilled or iced. One Times taster called it “a cooler without sparkle.”

At 11% alcohol and 9.5% residual sugar, Chateau La Salle is sweet enough to use as a dessert wine. Its delicate Muscat flavor makes it appropriate with lighter desserts, nuts and plain cookies. The Christian Brothers themselves tried serving it over peaches. That gave rise to a peach-flavored version of Chateau La Salle that was introduced in 1986. This wine is made with natural peach flavoring added to Chenin Blanc, not the Muscats used in the original.

“In the first year, it exceeded our expectations,” Batori said, estimating sales of the peach wine at about 100,000 cases. Its success has given rise to a berry-flavored Chateau La Salle that will be released in May. Also based on Chenin Blanc, the new wine will include blackberry flavoring.

A rose version of Chateau La Salle was introduced several years ago. This wine blends Muscat with Pinot Noir, Zinfandel, Petite Sirah and Gamay.

Chateau La Salle is commendable because its remarkably low winery retail price and the even lower prices charged at some stores make it possible to serve a decent dessert wine on a limited budget.

Angelo Papagni Special Muscat (unnamed), 750 milliliters, projected price of $7 to $8.

Due for release in June and still nameless, this wine was made in an interesting fashion that included nine years of aging in 50-gallon new American oak barrels. “It took a lot longer for this wine to get to the mellowness that I thought it should have,” winery owner Angelo Papagni said.

Muscat of Alexandria grapes grown in the Papagni Vineyards at Madera were picked at a high level of sugar, fermented in stainless-steel tanks and fortified with grape spirits before aging. A fortified wine requires more aging than a red table wine, Papagni commented. The finished wine has an alcohol content of 18%.

Papagni is pleased with the result. “This wine reminds me of some of the older Muscats that are produced in Portugal. It has a nutty richness with the Muscat flavor,” he said. Papagni wants to name the wine Odyssey after the wine drunk by Odysseus during the wanderings described in the Greek epic poem “The Odyssey.”

The anticipated price seems low considering the long production time. “We’re trying to give the people an excellent buy. We want to give them an introduction to our wine,” Papagni explained.

An advance tasting produced varied responses from The Times’ taste panel. One thought the wine had a dual flavor, reminiscent first of brandy, then of Sherry. Another found a liqueur-like quality. Suggestions ranged from serving the wine chilled or over ice to presenting it in a brandy snifter to accompany conversation by the fireside. Most said they would prefer the wine alone rather than with dessert. Its rich flavor also inspired the idea of using it to plump raisins for a raisin pie.

Angelo Papagni Moscato d’Angelo, 750 milliliters, $6.50.

This wine was made from Muscat of Alexandria grapes that were picked when very ripe and full of sugar. The Muscat of Alexandria “grows beautifully in the hot weather,” said Papagni, whose vineyards are located north of Fresno.

Cold fermentation lasting six months was designed to capture the fragrance of the grapes. After fermentation, the wine was aged in stainless-steel tanks, then in bottles for a total of one year. The alcohol content is low (10.5%), but the sugar content is high (14%). Papagni says aging will benefit the wine. “As it ages, it gets a rich, honey taste to it,” he said. Tasters noted a raisin-like aspect to the flavor.

Moscato d’Oro is made each year but is not vintage dated. Fruity and light in style compared to the Papagni fortified Muscat, it seems appropriate to go with desserts that are also light in flavor, and could be used in cooking as well.

In accordance with his Italian background, Papagni suggested using it to make zabaglione or to flavor an Italian-style ricotta cheesecake. He also recommended pouring it over peach ice cream. Cookies or fruitcake were suggested as accompaniments by Times tasters, who felt that an excessively rich dessert or a strong cheese would overpower the wine.

Joseph Phelps Vineyards 1983 Napa Valley Scheurebe, 750 milliliters, $15.

This late harvest wine with the hard-to-pronounce name (say shoy-ray-buh) is made from a grape that was developed in Germany. Craig Williams, Phelps’ wine maker, explains that in the early 1900s, a botanist named Scheu crossed Sylvaner with Johannisberg Riesling in an attempt to produce a grape with Riesling character and high sugar content that would grow in the colder parts of Germany. Scheu made many crosses in order to reach this goal.

In 1974, several German crosses were planted on an experimental basis at Phelps. The Scheurebe outperformed the others, and in 1982, Phelps began to make the wine on a commercial basis. There were only five acres of grapes, and production was 500 cases a year.

Williams admires the wine for its “wonderful aromatic character of peaches, and pears, citrus and honey.” This character shows best when the wine is produced from late harvested grapes affected by the mold Botrytis cinerea, he said.

The grapes are pressed to obtain as much sugar as possible and fermented in stainless-steel tanks for one month or longer. The wine is allowed to settle, then filtered and bottled as soon as possible to preserve its fruitiness and freshness. The 1986 vintage was picked in October, bottled last month and will be released June 1.

This rich, nectar-like wine has a residual sugar content of 12.2%. Tasters envisioned it with such desserts as trifle, apricot tart and a Christmas steamed pudding. Williams suggests fruit desserts and walnut or hazelnut tarts.

“It’s difficult to pronounce the name, but people are very interested in buying it,” Williams said. Phelps has extended the acreage devoted to Scheurebe and has increased production slightly but does not plan to go beyond 700 cases a year, Williams said.

Joseph Phelps Vineyards 1983 Napa Valley Delice du Semillon, 750 milliliters, $15; 375 milliliters, $7.50.

At 7.2% residual sugar, this wine is still very sweet but not as concentrated as Scheurebe. It also contains more alcohol (13.5% compared to 10.3% in Scheurebe). Therefore, Delice du Semillon can complement a wider variety of food or even be served as an aperitif. Its sweet, honeyed aroma and full flavor inspired tasters with thoughts of pecan pie, rich cheesecakes and chocolate truffles as accompaniments. The wine could also mate more successfully with cheese than could Scheurebe.

Delice du Semillon is a blend of 75% Semillon and 25% Sauvignon Blanc and is made only from botrytised grapes. The first vintage was 1983. In 1984, weather conditions were not conducive to botrytis, and neither Delice nor Scheurebe was produced.

The 1983 Delice was fermented in small French oak barrels for four weeks, then allowed to remain in the barrels for six months. After racking, the wine went into barrels for another six months. In all, the wine received slightly more than one year of aging in French oak and small German ovals to imbue some oak flavor and complexity and to develop its bouquet.

The 1983 Delice was bottled in 1985, released in the summer of 1986 and sold out at the winery in 75 days. However, some bottles may still be available in retail outlets. The 1985 vintage is scheduled to be released Sept. 1, according to wine maker Williams.

Andrew Quady 1985 Essensia, 750 milliliters, $11; 375 milliliters, $6.

The entrancing floral scent of this wine hints of orange blossoms and roses. Its warm golden tones call to mind a sunny summer day. That makes Essensia a congenial wine to accompany springtime desserts. Try it with coconut cake or an apricot-almond tart for Easter dinner. Add it to a Champagne cocktail for brunch or serve it, slightly chilled, as a cordial after dinner.

Wine maker Andrew Quady says Essensia has captured the major share of his business, which also includes the production of three styles of California Port and another Muscat wine. The 1985 vintage is blended of 80% Orange Muscat and 20% Muscat Canelli. In 1986, more Orange Muscat was available, and Quady omitted the Muscat Canelli, although he likes the effects of the addition.

Crucial to the success of this wine is the maturity of the grapes at harvest. “We taste the grapes in the field in order to pick them at a good flavor level,” Quady said. The grapes go into cold storage for 10 days to drop their temperature to 30 to 35 degrees. They are crushed, then undergo slow fermentation. After fortification with neutral grape brandy, the wine is aged in French oak for about three months. The residual sugar is about 13.5%, and the alcohol content is 15%.

Quady began to make Essensia in 1980, using grapes from Reedley. Now the Orange Muscats are picked from vineyards near his winery at Madera. Essensia is plentiful. Production has risen from 6,400 cases in 1985 to more than 8,000 cases in 1986. The 1986 wine will be released in April.

Andrew Quady 1985 Elysium, 750 milliliters, $11; 375 milliliters, $6.

Elysium is made from Black Muscat grapes picked at Manteca and is as dark as the black-skinned grapes can make it. Named for the mythical Greek paradise, the wine has a rose-like aroma that gives it special charm. Elysium is made in the same fashion as Essensia and has the same alcohol content but is slightly higher in sugar--14%.

“I like to promote it with cheese and fruit, particularly pears,” Quady said. Elysium is so complementary to cheese that Quady has paired it in a tasting with an assortment of domestic and imported blue cheeses.

The Times’ panel recommends it as a companion to cheesecake or creme brulee and felt it would stand up to cinnamon or any strong seasoning.

The annual production of Elysium is 3,500 cases. Newer than Essensia, Elysium was first produced in 1983. The 1986 vintage will go on the market in April.

Sutter Home Winery 1983 Dessert Zinfandel, 750 milliliters, $7.50; 375 milliliters, $3.75.

Sutter Home Winery in St. Helena is a Zinfandel specialist, producer of the first white Zinfandel blush wine, of standard dry Zinfandels and now of this dark red sweet wine. The dessert wine is 100% Zinfandel, made from grapes grown in the Twin Rivers Vineyard of El Dorado County, which is just across the county line from Amador County. Amador is renowned for its Zinfandels.

The wine was fermented in steel tanks, fortified to an alcohol content of 18% and aged for one year in American oak tanks. The sugar content is 9.4%.

Sutter Home management figured that a sweet wine would sell more briskly in small bottles. Ironically, the 750-milliliter bottles have sold out, and only the smaller bottles remain. A 1984 vintage has yet to be released.

Tasters thought the Dessert Zinfandel resembled a light young Port and found it suitable to go with an assortment of cheeses after dinner and with winter holiday desserts such as fruitcake and plum pudding. The deep color led to the idea of turning it into a spritzer, a pleasant idea for the warm days to come.

Food styling by MINNIE BERNARDINO and DONNA DEANE / Los Angeles Times