by Andrew Chalk
You may recall that Crave conducted MoAT1 (the Mother of All Tastings No. 1) just a month ago where we pitted 16 Texas wines from the Viognier grape against two known stars from California and a French example. Texas took the top six spots, confirming an improvement in quality that I have seen happening over several years. Now comes news that TXWineLover blog, one of the best blogs about Texas wine, has conducted a similarly comprehensive tasting, but this time of wines from the Roussanne grape from Texas. Roussanne is a good choice. It has also been steadily improving and is also a wine grape originating from the southern Rhône region of France.
The nineteen judges were consumers, grape growers, wine makers, competition judges, sommeliers and wine bloggers. They blind tasted 17 wines from 10 wineries. When all was said and done the organizers revealed only the top five wines which were…
|
YEAR |
WINERY |
SCORE (out of 100) |
|
2012 |
McPherson Cellars, Texas, Reserve Roussanne |
88.21 |
|
2011 |
McPherson Cellars, Texas, Roussanne |
87.53 |
|
2012 |
McPherson Cellars, Texas, Roussanne |
86.95 |
|
2011 |
Brennan Vineyards, Texas, Roussanne Lily blend |
85.95 |
|
2012 |
Brennan Vineyards, Texas, Roussanne Lily blend |
85.74 |
Interesting that two wineries took home all the top 5 honors. It should also be noted that the two Brennan bottlings are blends with less than 60% Roussanne. Full details of the tasting methodology can be found here.
The full list of included wines is:
- Arché, Texas (Saint Jo), 2010 Vintner’s Reserve Roussanne
- Arché, 2012 Roussanne (tank sample-free fun)
- Arché, 2012 Vintner’s Reserve Roussanne (bottled 6/15/13, barrel fermented)
- Becker Vineyards, 2009 Reserve Roussanne
- Blue Ostrich Winery, Texas, 2011 Roussanne
- Brennan Vineyards, Texas, 2011 Roussanne Lily blend
- Brennan Vineyards, Texas, 2012 Roussanne Lily blend
- Brushy Creek Vineyards, Texas High Plains, 2010 Roussanne
- Calais Winery, Texas High Plains, 2011 La Cuvee Principale Roussanne
- Cap*Rock Winery, Texas High Plains, 2010 Roussanne
- Cap*Rock Winery, Texas High Plains, NV Roussanne
- McPherson Cellars, Texas, 2011 Roussanne
- McPherson Cellars, Texas, 2012 Roussanne
- McPherson Cellars, Texas, 2012 Reserve Roussanne
- Spicewood Vineyards, Texas High Plains, 2010 Roussanne
- Spicewood Vineyards, Texas High Plains, 2012 Roussanne
- Wedding Oak Winery, Texas Hill Country, 2012 Terre Blanc blend
All great wine is local!
Congratulations Dr. Brennan
“It should also be noted that the two Brennan bottlings are blends with less than 60% Roussanne” Thanks for pointing this out, Andrew. I am miffed as to why a varietal tasting was conducted this way.