Prima Materia NV Grenache (Volcano Label)

The Wine

I'll let winemaker and owner Pietro Buttitta present this wine, as he is very well spoken and a passionate writer of his own tasting notes:

Pretty, cheerful, wonderful Grenache! We make one or two barrels per year from Tablas Creek's lightest clone. Pure strawberry fruit with a bit of savory sage and earthy goodness to round it out. Low tannin, low acid, but generous and possibly the perfect picnic wine on a sunny day.

Grenache is a strange and wonderful beast, and something I look forward to making every year because it is the opposite of many of our wines. There are very specific layers we want in the Sangiovese, a sinewy tension in some wines, specific tannin textures and a taught verticality in the Aglianico for example. But Grenache just is, freeform and unencumbered.

Various things get thrown into the fermentation, like white grapes, red grapes, stems, pressed skins sometimes and it does what it wants while fermenting rather than being led somewhere, you know, the woo-woo free-spirit thing.

The type we planted [in their estate vineyard in Lake County] is particularly light in tone and color anyway, so no point in trying to amp it up. Without tannin or rigorous sun exposure requirements to worry about, it gets a very light and iterative canopy handling in the vineyard as well, following the spirit of the vines and vintage rather than a specific vision. It is almost restorative in a sense, and quite forgiving in its happy nature, aided by the fact that it just loves Lake County weather, sucking up heat and sun while needing very little water.

In California, Grenache will usually be a lighter-weight affair, low in color, acid and tannin and fairly high in alcohol if you want ripe fruit flavors, and underripe Grenache does have a distinct grassiness.

Sure, Spain’s Garnachas can be much more dense and serious, and there are many, many different clones of Grenache that all respond in different ways to their home terroir. Let’s call it a diverse and warm-bodied wine that likes rocky soil challenges and limited water to prevent what could be excessive growth and crop.

We could think of all these low-ish things as a deficiency in the normative and culturally judgy sense, but often a thing’s intrinsic nature can be an asset. Grenache can thrive in very challenging places. Food pairing can be a fun adventure as well, though not really needing food, just friends and nibbles. This is Grenache’s greatest trick. It can be blended beautifully in the Rhone or served solo, which is done in many excellent diasporic forms in Australia, Sardinia, and as wonderful rosé almost everywhere - a truly international grape.

Label Image: This label image is Athansius Kircher’s 1638 drawing of Mount Vesuvius’ eruption in his incredible Mundus Subterraneus. A true genius, artist, and polymath, he lowered himself into smoldering Vesuvius, eventually passing out and needing rescue while sketching and documenting his discoveries. All the fruit in this wine came from the lower pyroclastic slopes of the Mt. Konocti volcano that stands guard over our vineyard, having last exploded just 11,000 years ago, spewing glistening obsidian over the entire county.

The Winery

Writing about a winemaker you respect can be a bit daunting, for fear your words will be read by said winemaker and found lacking, unimaginative or banal. In this case, I'm happy to pass the buck, as the great Esther Mobley already penned a nice overview of Pietro:

"Some California winemakers are already working in climates that feel extreme and are adapting to them in innovative, sometimes even radical, ways. Pietro Buttitta, owner of Prima Materia winery, is one such winemaker…The Prima Materia wines are balanced and vibrant. Buttitta’s Grenache is light and bright, tasting like strawberry and basil. A carbonic Nebbiolo recalls rose petals and cranberries. A silky Sangiovese smells like cherries and cigars, with a refreshing bitterness."
Esther Mobley - SF Chronicle