Ultramarine Blanc de Blancs Heintz Vineyard 2014

Reviews

93WA

"The 2014 Blanc de Blancs Heintz Vineyard (100% Chardonnay) was made using the traditional method and spent 12 months in barrel and 40 months on tirage, with two grams per liter dosage. It was disgorged in November of 2018. It has a rich, autolytic nose of baked brie, brioche and mushroom pastry with baked apples, dried hay, honeyed hazelnuts and hints of lemon cream. Medium-bodied, it has a good core of savory fruit with finely beaded mousse, juicy acidity and a long, savory finish. This has lots of life ahead. Less than 150 cases were made. ‘How do we use sparkling wine to examine site?’ Michael Cruse, winemaker for Ultramarine and Cruse Wine Co., asks. Ultramarine, founded in 2008, is reserved for single-vineyard, single-vintage sparkling wines made in the traditional method. Still wines, traditional method sparklings and pét-nats are crafted under the Cruse Wine Co. brand, founded in 2013. ‘Ultramarine has a very different starting point than Cruse Wine Co.,’ Cruse, who began his career in Napa, explains. ‘Every Napa winemaker at some point wants to make Pinot Noir.’ But the market was already saturated, and Cruse wanted to do something different. ‘I had the idea of taking grower Champagne techniques and applying them to California. I started working with Charles Heintz, and as I learned more about the process, I became obsessive about that process and making the most terroir-driven, traditional sparkling wines in California from single vineyards and single vintages.’ Sparkling wines have always been viewed as dependent on process, stylistically formed via methods in the cellar. Now, the concept of terroir in sparkling wine is gaining steam with the increasing popularity of grower Champagnes. ‘For me, sparkling wine is another lens to examine terroir,’ Cruse says. So, why make both traditional method and pétillant-naturel sparklings? ‘Some things are better for traditional method and some things are better for pét-nat,’ Cruse explains. Stylistically, he says, ‘I want them to both be dry, (brut or extra brut), high carbonation (six bars) and I want them both to be riddled and disgorged. So, the pét-nats aren’t perfectly clear, but they won’t explode when you open them. Everything we do is hand disgorged. We don’t have a freezing station, although we did switch to gyro palettes two years ago. To get that extra level of control, we have to do much of it by hand. A lot of things in sparkling winemaking seem like extra work, and they are, but going through those motions allows a level of control and quality that you wouldn’t be able to attain otherwise.’"