Viognier

​Viognier is a white French grape, found mostly in the Rhone region.  The grape is used to make a varietal with the same name (duh!) and as a blending grape, but with the red grape Syrah.  This unusual combination is supposed to produce a very nice wine which some day I hope to get my hands on.  As far as Southern California is concerned, to date Viognier only shows up as a varietal or in a blend with other white grapes.  I say “to date” because at least one winery (Edwards) is growing Viognier to blend with their Syrah.
While Viognier is considered an uncommon wine, it is grown just about everywhere – in the US, Australia, South Africa, Italy, Argentina, Chile, New Zealand, Portugal – you get the idea.  Now, back to the blending of this white grape with Syrah grapes.
As you may or may not know, to make white wine the grapes are crushed and the juice pressed out.  The juice then is fermented.  OK, crush, press, ferment.  To make red wine, the sequence is crush, ferment, then press.  Crush, ferment, press.  So, if you are making a blended wine using both white and red grapes do you blend after fermentation, or do you ferment them together?  If you ferment them together, do you press the white grapes first and add the juice to the red grape must, or crush and ferment them with the red grapes?  Must, by the way, is the name for the fermenting crushed red grape mixture.
To answer this question, I quote from the Ridge website:
“The idea of co-fermentation isn’t new, we see greater complexity and color develop when zinfandel co-ferments with field varietals such as petite sirah, carignane, alicante bouschet, mataro etc.   In the northern Rhone valley, viognier has been used in small percentages to co-ferment with syrah to aid in stabilizing the abundant color of syrah and to temper tannin extraction.  This has been successfully done for hundreds of years.  I would also say that viognier has a few extra weeks of ripening ahead of syrah, so in the northern Rhone valley, on a cold year, the viognier might bring ripeness to the wine….
Chemically, there are non-pigmented phenolics within the viognier skins that have a strong affinity for bonding to side-groups of the anthocyanin pigment of syrah.  Once these bonds are formed, they remain soluble and stable within the wine and provide a deep blue/purple spectrum of color.  Viognier also has a beautiful pungency of apricot, peach, and white flower which helps lift the total aroma of syrah which tends to be dark and gamey.“
I should add that Ridge did quite well in the “Judgement of Paris” wine tasting competition, i.e., it is one of the great American wineries, so if they say the grapes should be field blended I have to go with it….