Cylons

Costières & Soleil “Sélectionné par Laurence Féraud” 2009 Vin de Table “Plan Pégau” (Rhône) – Even more structured and manly than usual, which makes me wonder if the non-Rhône-traditional grape component of this wine has been upped. Dusty, a bit tarry, and hazy with blackened fruit. The ideal match might be mastodon. (7/11)

Rovere good

Cascina Roera Vino da Tavola “La Rovere” (Piedmont) – Lot LR1, but I can locate no other indication – no matter how secretive, and VdT producers usually find some way to provide this information – of vintage. This is barbera, and I don’t just mean that it’s made from barbera, I mean it is barbera: sharp, violently red, yet precise rather than overwhelming. There’s a dusty minerality that may be about half dark evergreen herbality, but whichever it is it adds great character without dragging the wine into more serious realms than it is willing to enter. Really fabulous for its very simplicity, and the lack of striving for anything other than purity of expression is incredibly welcome. (7/11)

Foulard me once, shame on you

Les Foulards Rouge 2010 Vin de Table “Octobre” (Roussillon) – Spicy, frothy acidity with sharp, boisterous red berries. There’s more to it, thankfully, with earthier and more herbal…well, I was going to write “nuances,” but they’re more like microbursts. Nothing’s quiet in this wine. Fun, if simple. (3/11)

One more

Occhipinti 2008 “SP68” (Sicily) – Corked. (2/11)

What happened to Compuserve?

Leclerc “Domaine Chahut et Prodiges” 2008 “Coup de canon” Vin de Table (Loire) – Firmly in the rapidly genericizing “natural wine” taste realm of light, dancing fruit on the thin, crisp side of berrydom, a little earth, a lot of vivid acidity, and mild but (for now) thoroughly unobtrusive suggestions of uncleanliness. A lot of fun, in other words. (11/10)

Roussanne, don't walk away

JP Brun “Terres Dorées” 2008 Vin de Table Roussanne (Beaujolais) – Bright. A roussanne, bright? Oh yes. Aromatic honeysuckle with other flowers, yes. But not heavy at all. Instead, its fresh with good acidity, and really, really good. (6/10)

Julia Mancuso

Martúe 2006 Vino de la Tierra de Castilla (Castilla & León) – Haphazard red fruit, sun-warmed and reasonably acidic. Neither knit nor multisyllabic, but pleasant enough. It says it’s a country wine and it tastes like a country wine. Truth in advertising! (1/10)

Forsoni, not for Toshiba

Forsoni “Poderi Sanguineto I e II” Vino de Tavola Bianco (Tuscany) – Lot 04/09. Hot. Decayed flowers and guttered raindrops, with that ever-present alcoholic fume dominating no matter what the temperature. I love Sanguineto’s reds, but am a more than a little repelled by this effort. (1/10)

Set it and forget it

di Lenardo Vino di Tavola “Ronco Nolè” (Friuli-Venezia Giulia) – Thick reddish-purple fruit layered with vanilla-infused oak. Modern but pleasant. (1/10)

BSG

Costières & Soleil “Sélectionné par Laurence Féraud” 2005 “Plan Pégau” Vin de Table (Rhône) – After a number of very poor showings, my most recent two bottles have evidenced a bit of a comeback. Perhaps I judged prematurely. In any case, there continues to be no obvious reason to hold onto these wines longer than the time it takes to drink them, for as the structure fades, the dark and sloshy fruit remains firmly in place, yet with someone’s hand pulling back on the fader. A fair quaff. (12/09)

Gaddafi

Mas de Libian 2008 “Vin de pétanque” (Rhône) – Bretty and twisted. I think there’s a rough little quaffer in there somewhere, but the wine’s not clean enough to know. (9/09)

Not a man, not a Plan

Costières & Soleil “Sélectionné par Laurence Féraud” 2005 “Plan Pégau” Vin de Table (Rhône) – Muted at opening, then delivering a slow, slow, so slow process of cabernet-ization; by the end of the bottle, it would be the sheerest luck to identify the wine’s Rhônish origins. That’s not a bad thing – it’s a vin de table for a reason, after all – but what isn’t quite so good is the way the wine never rises above tediousness, albeit a tedium delivered via sledgehammer. Every single bottle of this wine has been worse than the last one. (3/09)

Lot's wife

Blanchard Vin de Table de France “Lot 1” (Loire) – A mysterious wine. A bit of online research leads to the following: sauvignon blanc and, believe it or not, cabernet (franc or sauvignon, we don’t know) vinified white. The thought behind the closure is equally mysterious: a crown cap under a wax capsule. Kind of irritating. OK, so how about the wine? Bewildering is what it is: foamy, powdery, and sweet, with a bit of lime. Very, very strange. (12/08)

Failure to Plan

Costières & Soleil “Sélectionné par Laurence Féraud” 2005 “Plan Pégau” Vin de Table (Rhône) – Corked. (1/09)

Émile Zola

Chaussard (Briseau) “Nana, vins et cie” Vin de Table “You are so nice” (Loire) – 2006 bottling. Plays at fun, but the structure’s a bit on the scowly side, with an angry slash of tannin and acidity cutting diagonally through the wine, reducing the appeal of the fruit. Is that some granite in the background? This might just need the right food to tame the angrier elements. (10/08)

Nana, visitor

Chaussard (Briseau) "Nana, vins et cie" 2005 Vin de Table “La Pangée” (Loire) – The actual producer here is Briseau, but that appears nowhere on the label, so you just have to know, I guess. It’s got that fizzy, biting, razor burn texture, plus a musty raw paper aroma, that says pineau d’aunis to me (and in fact that’s here, along with gamay), and it’s the very reason I’ve always been cool towards the grape. Its sweet, almost keening melody – some sort of ancient woodwind on a misty hillside – is something I want to be more appealing than it is, but I suspect what I like about this wine (the pretty, light red fruit with a zesty zip of acidity) is mostly about the gamay and the lack of winemaking. Unfortunately, what I like about this wine is a very low percentage of its totality. (8/08)

Little burnt houses for you and me

Augé “Domaine des Maisons Brulées” Vin de Table Français “Le Herdeleau” (Loire) – Pinot noir and gamay, bringing the qualities of each to the fore: the brighter, racier red fruit of the latter with a deeper, blue-black berry (in comparison, that is) from the pinot. It’s sort of like a well-behaved older brother and a fidgety younger brother managing to coexist peacefully for a time. Nicely balanced, perhaps ageable, but I don’t have much experience with these sorts of things. It’s better than any Passetoutgrains I’ve tasted, though I admit I haven’t done extensive research in that category. (6/08)

Tiny winey

“Le petit vin d’Avril” Vin de Table (Rhône) – Blueberry, gravel, leafy tobacco. Slightly underripe and tannic, but fair enough for the price. (2/08)

An ill Zind blows no good

Zind-Humbrecht 2002 “Zind” (Alsace) – Heavy and, truth be told, tasting very much like chardonnay grown in Alsace. The flavors are fair enough, with a heavy metallic edge to the weighty, spiced stone fruit. And there’s some acidity, balanced with a little bit of residual sugar. But mostly, it’s powerful to the point where you’ll want some sort of palate version of earplugs. (2/08)

TT boy

Mayr-Nusser “Nusserhof” 2006 Blaterle (Alto Adige) – Or possibly Blatterle. There seems to be some disagreement between labels past and present, marketing materials, the web, dubious sources, and authoritative sources. I certainly can’t adjudicate. Anyway: papaya dominates a big, fat nose to which acidity and structure are joined much, much later. There are falling apple leaves, as well. This wine is all about cold-climate diffidence, and that’s pretty much how I feel about it. I’m still waiting for my blat(t)erle epiphany. (1/08)