A manger!

Viognier may not be the wine varietal of the month, but it is here in the Northern Rhone.  With the cool wind beckoning the oncoming fall, the Syrah and Viognier vines cling to their steep cliffs, breathing in the last of the warm summer days.

This terroirist arrived here in the Northern Rhone about two weeks, and is as inspired by the luscious, floral, and earthy wines as the roots of these old vines run deep into the steep gravelly soil.

With all the buzz in the wine writing community about “natural” or
“authentic” wines out there, I could not feel a greater sense of pride.  Here at Les Vins de Vienne (where this terroirist is working the harvest), the idea is that each wine reflects its appellation, and will taste different every year.

We begin drinking Condrieu at 9 in the morning here (along with some cheese, meats, bread, and chocolate), and continue with St. Joseph, St. Peray, and Cote-Rotie for lunch (each with its own course, including a cheese course thrown in there).  Since we didn’t eat enough for breakfast, mid-morning snack, and lunch, we accompany dinner with the leftover Condrieu and maybe some of our estate vineyard, Seyssuel.  This combination is creating optimal conditions for understanding how every year creates conditions for different wines.  Simple enough, right?

So what’s the big deal with wine that tastes different every year?  Is it really too romantic of an idea?  Is it essential for an “authentic” wine?  Is it “unauthentic” to add things to your wine to make it taste better?  Perhaps if a consumer is just discovering a new winery, and tastes a thinner wine than the previous vintage, they may not return.  That’s unfortunate.

At LVDV, we put ripe grapes into the fermenter, some sulfites, and let them do their thing.  No water, no acid, no sugar, no enzymes, no yeast, no bacteria…just grapes.  As the rains begin to pick up, and the grey mold spreads across the land; it means its time to bring ’em in.  No extended hangtime here.

The funny thing is, the sugars stay low, yet the flavor and concentration of these grapes are what California growers dream of…is it the soil?  The temperature?  The humidity?  C’est la terroir, et c’est la Cotes-du-Rhone.

One thing is for sure, the French love, to eat.

T1r3, how sweet the sound

Yes, this short post just may prove to be one of my geekiest to date.  Here’s a quick examination of our tongue’s perception of sweetness.  The tongue is coated with taste buds.  These taste buds have different concentrations of different proteins that are responsible for stimulating our different taste sensations.  Traditionally, western gastronomy and anatomy has regarded our tongue to have 4 types of taste buds, although recent culinary evolution and scientific understanding have given way to a fifth taste, umami, mainly initiated by our old friend MSG.

Taste buds from Gray's Anatomy

Wine contains many different types of sugars, including mannitol, arabinose, and even more complex polysaccharides that may be pivotably responsible for such wine attributes as mid-palate, finish, and retro-nasal aroma.  But in general, the two most common sugars are fructose and glucose.  Since glucose is more readily eaten by yeast and bacteria, when we sip a sweet and evolved riesling, it is more likely fructose that is trickling across the complex surface of our palate.

A tastant, such as fructose, manages to fit snugly into a lock and key enzyme situated on a particular protein located on a taste bud.  In our example today, the protein is called taste receptor Type 1 member 3, T1r3 for short.  About 3 months ago, when the residual sugar of the 2005 Donnhoff Niederhauser Hemannshohle Auslese Riesling tickled my tongue and evoked my emotions, it turns out that the sugar molecule actually entered the active site of the protein/enzyme, and the different subunits of the T1r3 protein split apart.  This split, incredibly enough, caused ion channels in the cell membrane to open, resulting in nerve signal transmission.  The nerve signal reached my brain, and registered both sweetness and pure joy.

Selection de Grains Nobles, a French sweet wine that I would try

Incredible.  So remember, for the next time you are testing for your advanced sommelier degree, or even just sipping at a casual German winetasting, you can say, “I feel my T1r3 receptor proteins splitting apart, this must be a trockenbeerenauslese!”

The information in this post was inspired by my inorganic chemistry textbook Chemistry, a Molecular Approach by Nivaldo J Tro. Chapter 10, Molecular Bonding.

Microbe of the Week Monday: Hanseniaspora uvarum

With sincerest apologies to my co-terroirists and appreciative readers, I return to the wine blog, awaken from my slumber.  As Eric knows, I often succumb to deep sleeps, where my alter ego awakens and fights crime, saves maidens, and I become, Dream Warrior.

After a brief respite from the Wine World (I spent the summer gardening and hiking with kids), the harvest approaches, and I am drawn back, powerlessly, to the vines.  As a heat wave has settled in on the California Coast, growers and producers worry and hope, simultaneously.  Will the flavors and phenolics be ripe before the sugar spikes?

Looking for Hanseniaspora, Alisos Vineyard, Los Alamos, CA

And I, the Microbiologist, am pondering the populations of Hanseniaspora out there.  As I await my own little bins of Pinot Noir to arrive, I consider the question of the year: To inoculate, or to allow spontaneous ferment.

This is a popular question these days, so let me focus on a little critter with two names.  The French enologist Emile Peynaud suggested that perhaps 95% of the wild yeast present on the skin of a grape in the vineyard, is an apiculate (pointy ended) yeast named Hanseniaspora uvarum.  This pointy-ended yeast is seen in this photo sourced from my new favorite website, http://www.mycobank.org.

Hanseniaspora uvarum

This is what microbiologists call the anamorph form.  This means, the yeasts are making new yeasts by budding, which you can clearly see here.

If these yeasts were to make little saturn shaped spores, they would be called by their teleomorph name, Kloeckera apiculata.

So what?  Why does this matter?  Because these guys predominate the topographical surface of a grape.  When we harvest next week, and smash up these globes of goodness, this yeast will eat sugar and make nail polish remover.  If there are enough Saccharomyces around, (our Odysseus from previous post) he will essentially slay these foul-smelling pointy-yeasts, with his ethanol production of course.

But if there isn’t enough round shaped yeast, and we don’t intervene, Hanseniaspora will win.  He will marry Penelope, he will cause a stuck fermentaion, and he will cause our wine to taste like…I don’t even want to go there.

Stay Tuned,

Michael the Microbiologist

Nematology 101

As I write, I am watching a critical World Cup match between two incredible and distinct wine regions, Switzerland and Chile.   I can only blame the fact that it is 8:23 in the morning, as to why I am not quaffing a rich and fleshy Carmenere alongside an austere and gripping Blauburgunder.  It makes me think that perhaps we should have a World Cup of Wine.  Bottle a Bottle.  16 countries enter, 1 shall emerge victorious.  I guess if France and Italy don’t advance to the Round of 16, they can’t enter the World Cup of Wine either.

That’s not what I wanted to write about today, instead, I want to present an extremely nerdy topic, nematology.  The passion and focus of this topic can only be expressed in this following quote.  It is lengthy, but bear with me, because it is worth it.  You will be transformed.  The great pioneer of nematology, Nathan Cobb, wrote in 1914:

“If all the matter in the universe except the nematodes were swept away, our world would still be dimly recognizable, and if, as disembodied spirits, we could then investigate it, we should find its mountains, hills, vales, rivers, lakes and oceans represented by a thin film of nematodes. The location of towns would be decipherable, since for every massing of human beings there would be a corresponding massing of certain nematodes. Trees would still stand in ghostly rows representing our streets and highways. The location of the various plants and animals would still be decipherable, and, had we sufficient knowledge, in many cases even their species could be determined by an examination of their erstwhile nematode parasites. ”

Nematodes (Photo by Greg Tylka)

Nematodes are microscopic worms.  They are less evolved structurally than earthworms.  They are tiny, and they are everywhere.  Thousands in a handful of soil.  90,000 in a rotting apple.  Nematodes (NEE-ma-toads) are the most diverse family of animals on the planet.

Also known as roundworms, they are involved in some of the most interesting life cycles on the planet.  They are pathogens of plants, whales, humans, insects, and my personal favorite, the fig wasp.

Agaonidae is the family of wasps responsible for pollinating fig trees.  It is hypothesized that fig trees’ reproductive survival depends upon a nematode, Parasitodiplogazter sp. (Diplogasteridae) to digest the female wasp so that she successfully dies within the fig flower…ok, this topic needs its own post.  I will come back to the fig-wasp nematode another time.  Just know that when you eat a fig…ok, maybe you don’t want to know.

The longest known nematode, Placentanema gigantissima lives in the placenta of a sperm whale, and grows up to 9 meters, thats almost 30 feet for our American readers.  Dracunculus medinensis, or Guinea Worm, has infected humans through contaminate drinking water since the beginning of history.  In this disease, the nematode  larvae emerge from tiny copepods and begin to eat and grow, eventually burrowing their way out through the our skin.  Gross.

Root-knot nematode in action

Ok, time for grapevines.  Sometimes when an old orchard is cut down, and a vineyard is planted in its place, it never seems to take off.  It just seems kind of sick.  Possible diagnosis?  Nematodes.  The root-knot nematode, Meloidogyne incognita is one of the most economically damaging of nematodes.  These guys drill into the roots of plants to insert their eggs and make little galls, sucking the life forces out of vines and roots of all sorts.

And our final nematode for the day, the dagger nematode. Xiphinema index. This particular nematode strikes fear into the hearts and minds of viticulturalists.  This is because the piercing mouthpiece of this particular nematode is one of the only places on Earth where a particular virus can live, the Grapevine Fanleaf Virus.

Fanleaf virus afflicted Vitis vinifera

When carried into a grapevine, the Fanleaf Virus causes distortion of the leaves, stunting of growth, and the creation of tiny and useless, aborted berries.  The life-expectancy of a fanleaf vine is cut in half.

A fungus entrapping a nematode. Mother nature at her finest.

However, there is hope.  Understanding nematode ecology means understanding beneficial nematodes, plant-based nematode poisons, and even nematode devouring fungi.  With the incredible diversity of nematodes, there are indeed nematodes who prey upon the damaging parasitic nematodes.

Field of arugula and mustard, almost ready to be turned over

Recently, scientists have identified a fungus Arthrobotrys oligospora, that is seen at the right entrapping and ultimately digesting the squirming nematode.

Gardener’s have long known that marigolds offer beneficial protection along the borders of garden.  Scientifically we understand the process of certain plants that release a chemical upon tissue damage that transforms into a strong nematode poison.  Other plants capable of this are in the mustard and arugula families, and these plants can effectively be sowed inbetween the grapevine row.

Nematodes are part of our world, for good and for bad.  As we further our understanding, we come closer to the realization that our Earth is truly unique, and infinitely complex.  Agriculture is not just about killing everything except your desired crop, it is about understanding and nourishing the complex processes of nature.

Thank you to all of the fine researchers who have dedicated themselves to nematology.  I am merely a student standing upon your shoulders.  Please contact me if you do not approve of my use of your images, or if you simply would like some credit for them.

Cheers,

Michael the Microbiologist

The Million Dollar Question

Ok.  Here it is, for one million dollars*:

Ampelos Vineyard, Santa Rita Hills, CA

Wine is the most incredible beverage in the history of the world because:

A) Wine contains tartaric acid, one of the most long-lived acids only rarely found in nature.  Long-lived wines contain enough tartaric acid to keep the wine’s pH below 3.5.  This is an important number in Food Science, and ensures minimal microbial activity.  Tartaric acid provides the tart, mouth-water flavor of wine, and often adds to a wine’s suitability to pair with a given meal.  These long-lived acids allow some wines to be aged for more than a hundred years, and their traces allowed modern archeologists to identify 6,000 year old purple stains in clay sherds as wine.

B) Wine contains phenolic material. These molecules have been stored by the grapevine in places like the skins, the stems, and the seeds.  They were produced by the transformation of phenylalanine (an amino acid) into products other than protein.  Some of these plant products include lignin, for woody structure, anthocyanins, for color to attract seed dispersers (birds), and bitter catechins in the seed coat, perhaps to encourage the survival and integrity of the seed.

For humanity’s sake, these chemicals are strong anti-oxidants, and help prevent cancer and heart disease, as well as preserve the wine itself.  Among these brave chemicals are quercetin and resveratrol, fascinating chemicals with important medical implications in promoting healthy lifestyles.  Resveratrol may be responsible for activating an anti-aging gene, and quercetin may help prevent influenza and even prostate cancer.

C) Wine contains alcohol. This component  of wine commonly corresponds with 12-15 percent of a wine’s volume.  Ethanol is the result of anaerobic fermentation of the sugars produced by the leaves and even the green grapes during the summer growing season.  These sugars (glucose and fructose) are stored in vacuoles (the storage part of a cell) in the grape pulp.

The storage of sugar is explained by evolutionary theory as the grape’s desire to attract birds.  Their optimal sweetness corresponds in time with the changing of the grape color from green to a dark red, and evenutally, the lignification of the seed.  In essence, the genetics contained in the seed are ready to be spread.

Grape juice has the highest percentage of fermentable sugars compared with any other plant.  It was uniquely suited to fermentation by the early peoples of the Caucasus Region (modern-day Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia) who lacked modern processing techniques.

Early men and women soon discovered the social lubricating effect of this drink, and its popularity spread across the known world. Alcohol also helps with the microbial stability of wine, and its low to moderate consumption is regarded by many medical institutions to contribute to a healthy lifestyle.

D) Wine contains unique flavor and aroma compounds. Teensie

Riesling cluster

amounts of such compounds as cis-rose oxide, 3-isobutyl-2-methoxypyrazine, beta-damascenone, 1,1,6-trimethyl-1,2-dihydronaphthalene, and my personal favorite, vitispiraine, can add the most incredible complexity and depth of flavor.  These flavors and aromas can elicit intense and emotional human responses, and are known to promote feelings of joy, love, hope, altruism, and a sense of brotherhood.

Many of these compounds are stored in the grape because they are actually toxic to the vine.  They are often attached to a sugar or an amino acid, and are only unlocked during the magic of fermentation.  As if the grape’s destiny was to become enjoyed by humans in the form of wine.

E) All of the above.

Answer correctly, and you will be eligible to enter into a drawing to be selected as a guest on the Terroirst Show!   Must be of valid age to participate.  Rules and Conditions apply.

*You will not actually win a million dollars.