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From a small place comes small production. Aline Baly, Director of Marketing and third-generation owner of Chateau Coutet in Barsac-Sauternes explains that “to produce a very good wine, a producer will yield approximately a bottle per vine; the classified growths of Sauternes and Barsac produce approximately one glass per vine, due to the concentration level attained by the noble rot.” But it’s not just what happens in the vineyard that’s special: Baly explains another reason why Sauternes’ sweeties have been sought out for centuries, “Many claim that these wines have some aphrodisiac virtues … Sweet seduction in a bottle!”

 

How Sweet It Is: Discovering the World’s Most Famous Dessert Wines

September 6, 2011 by Arianna Armstrong   

Human beings, as a whole, love sweet. Studies have shown that newborn babies, when given a choice, prefer sugar water over milk. We begin life with a sweet tooth, even while that bud is still locked inside the confines of our tiny gums. For most of us, the craving continues to haunt, delight, plague and pleasure us for the rest of our days.

There are bioanthropological reasons for our obsession with sugary stuff. Simply, sucrose gives us a rush that can help you run from a stampede of angry woolly mammoths, or to fend off a scary saber tooth tiger. While the world has changed and the prehistoric dangers have disappeared, our sensitivity to that hit of quick fuel has not.

Fermenting fruit juice has been one way of satisfying our ambrosial urges since time immemorial—or in the case of sweet wines, since around 800 BCE.

 The very first recorded mention of dessert wine appears in the poem, “The Works and Days,” by the Greek poet Hesiod. In it, he describes the process for making a wine called Cypriot Manna—the name given to the straw wine from Cyprus we know today as Commanderia. 4,000 years later, the grapes are still dried on straw mats, just like the poet advised: “For days and nights ten expose them to the sun”. That way, the grapes dry until most of the water has evaporated, leaving only highly concentrated, super-sweet juice. The resulting wine is said to have toasted the Goddess Aphrodite, won the very first wine tasting competition in the 13th century, started wars, healed the sick, and inspired the current classification of wines by place of origin.

 That is a powerful sugar rush, indeed.

It is also one of many. Just consider some of the most famous creations on the sweet side of planet wine(...)

 France: Sauternes

Of course, as with anything, there are skeptics. Those who get crinkle-nosed at the idea of dessert wine—who wave it away in favor of something, perhaps, less “frivolous.” For them, there is this: recently, a bottle of 1811 Chateau d’Yquem sold for $117,000. No doubt, these sweeties are not for kids.

It is not much of a surprise that the most expensive white wine ever sold—sweet or dry—happens to hail from Bordeaux, the home of haute names like Le Pin, Lafite, Petrus, Cheval Blanc and Ausone. There has been winemaking in the region since the 1st Century AD; sometime after that, people started paying whatever price was necessary in order to own the best bottles.

Despite Bordeaux’s long history of grape fermentation, the two prevailing legends about the region’s stickies are set rather late in time. The first involves Monsieur Frederic Focke—a negociant of German descent and owner of La Tour Blanche, in Bommes. Depending on who tells the story, Mr. Focke’s grapes developed noble rot (or, as the French call it, Pourriture Noble) by his own daring choice, or by accident (waiting until after the 1836 rains to begin harvesting). Either way, distant memories of late-harvest vinification in his mother country allegedly led to France’s first bottles of gold wine.

The second legend takes place in 1847 at Château d’Yquem. Marquis de Lur-Saluces, owner of the estate, had made it clear that no harvesting was to happen until he returned from his trip to Russia. Unfortunately (or fortunately), the Marquis was delayed, and the resulting wine from the desiccated, shriveled grapes changed history.

However, the very evidence of Yquem’s record-breaking Sauternes from the 1811 vintage makes it hard to believe there was a lack of botrytis before this time. Furthermore, in his publication Sauternes and Barsac: The Classified Great Growths, French expert Claude Peyroutet explains that “as early as 1741, the Intendant of Guyenne described the manner in which these [sweet] wines were harvested, stating that the owners waited ‘until the grapes were almost rotten’ and added that picking ‘was carried out several times to give a sweeter wine.’ This provides very early confirmation of the presence of the Noble Rot.”

Historians actually credit the Dutch for giving Bordeaux its first taste of sweet wine. During the 16th and 17th centuries, Dutch tradesmen had a strong presence in the region and brought their heavy blends with them—wines made by boiling lesser-quality whites and brandies with sugars, syrups, spices and aromatic plants. Over time, these merchants convinced winemakers in the Barsac area to ferment with higher residual sugar. “As early as 1613,” Mr. Peyroutet writes, “the Barsac nobility compiled documents relating to ‘practices and privileges’ for this growth.” From 1647 on, he says, wines from both Barsac and Sauternes were subject to different classifications and tariff schedules than those produced in other regions of Bordeaux, although it is unclear how large a part—if any—botrytis played in the process. What it does illustrate is that there was already a strong demand for their dessert wines.

 Today, the 5,400-acre territory of Bordeaux sweet wine is made up of five villages: Sauternes, Bommes, Fargues, Preignac, and Barsac. While these can all legally be classified under the Sauternes designation, Barsac estates can claim either Sauternes or Barsac as their home AOC. The regions are separated by the Ciron River, with Barsac to the northeast, and Sauternes on the other side. Winemaking techniques are identical in both areas.

 As with the other regions we’ve looked at, the “twin appellations” of Sauternes and Barsac would be nothing if not for their geography and micro-climate–a micro-climate that has everything to do with the aforementioned Ciron, a tiny tributary of the Garonne River. As the growing season stretches toward winter, the waters of the Ciron get cooler while the deeper, larger Garonne retains much of its heat. The contrast in water temperatures creates the familiar fog that is so important to the development of Botrytis cinerea. The daytime sun dries the grapes, the nighttime mist creeps in under darkness, and the cycle continues. This magic has led to eleven first growth vineyards and one superior growth vineyard, all in an area that is packed into approximately 8.4 square miles.

 From a small place comes small production. Aline Baly, Director of Marketing and third-generation owner of Chateau Coutet in Barsac-Sauternes explains that “to produce a very good wine, a producer will yield approximately a bottle per vine; the classified growths of Sauternes and Barsac produce approximately one glass per vine, due to the concentration level attained by the noble rot.” But it’s not just what happens in the vineyard that’s special: Baly explains another reason why Sauternes’ sweeties have been sought out for centuries, “Many claim that these wines have some aphrodisiac virtues … Sweet seduction in a bottle!”