Uncorked

By Michael Braverman

I hope to taste the Wolffer Estate Premier Cru 2000, a Pomerol-style Merlot released last month, and at $100 per bottle the most expensive wine to be offered by a Long Island winery. It is the first Long Island wine I know of that aims to match the deep, rich bouquet and intense, layered taste of a top-flight Bordeaux. But that is a pleasure that I will reserve for the chilly nights of fall, when its complex structure can be matched with a rich, hearty meal.

At this time of year I graze mostly in the lower price ranges, seeking simpler everyday wines, where I am comfortable opening a few bottles, then lingering with friends over relaxed early summer dinners on the terrace.

At my table I avoid May-December marriages between wine and food. Right now, I am looking for wines that are young but have balance. I want to pair their fresh, bright, and clear tastes with the local produce coming from the nearby fields - crisp radishes and early lettuces, asparagus, young spinach, baby carrots, and of course our delicious strawberries.

There is a natural logic to this pairing of regional food and wine, something I had discovered in traveling and am delighted now to experience here at home. With this in mind, I decided to examine a young wine from the less expensive end of the Wolffer Estate list - their 2001 Wolffer Rosˇ, which sells for $11 a bottle.

As a benchmark for comparison, I used Ch‰teau de Selle, Domaines Ott Rosˇ 2001. If you have spent time on the Cote d'Azur you may very well have tasted this lovely wine in its distinctive bottle, for the wines of Domaines Ott appear on many restaurant menus. It is another one of those memorable and beautiful tastes of Provence.

It retails in New York for about $25, placing it near the top end of the price range for a rosˇ wine - a bit too expensive for casual sipping but useful for my purpose as a model of a fine rosˇ.

Both wines were pleasing to look at, the Wolffer exhibiting a slight orange color and the Ott tending toward a light cherry or peach color. Both had a light, inviting fragrance, and both were quite dry with a lively acidity nicely balanced by the fruit. While the taste and finish of each was different, I found no difference in overall quality, and had I undertaken a blind taste test, I could easily have chosen the Wolffer for its rich, smooth and uncomplicated taste, and for its esprit.

This is an excellent wine for the simple pleasures of the season, a wine to enjoy with our local fish and farmstand produce, to sip and savor in the light and refreshing air of the East End. Did I really detect a whiff of an ocean breeze in the glass? I like to think so. Knowing the grapes were grown in Sagaponack and the wine produced there certainly adds to the pleasure of drinking this fresh, unpretentious, and elegant seasonal wine.

Michael Braverman can be reached at uncorked@easthamptonstar.com.