Princic PG - It’s Pinot Grigio, but not as we know it, Jim

Picture from http://dobianchi.com (a great web blog)

If Dario Princic’s wines didn’t exist we would have to invent them.

2006 Vino Bianco Pinot Grigio, Dario Princic

Another one of Princic’s characteristically idiosyncratic ambergris offerings this Pinot Grigio – come back, come back, I say - (banish for an instant from your mind notions of emasculated, milquetoast, mimsy gnatspiss effusions) explores the “real” potential of the grape variety. A combination of beautifully healthy ripe grapes cultivated in biodynamic vineyards from exceptionally low yields, lengthy maceration on the skins, wild yeast ferment and no filtration or fining produce a wine with all its component parts in tact. This baby can age.

The exposed, windswept vineyards, free of chemicals since 1988, are located on the poor limestone soils in Gorizia (Friuli) near the border with Slovenia.  The drying winds make this ideal territory for biodynamic viticulture, although Princic extends his natural, non-interventionist regime into the winery. He is one of the founders of Vini Veri with his good friend Benjamin Zidarich.

2006 was supposedly one of the greatest vintages in the last fifty years. The harvest was around 15th Sept with selected grapes from low yields only, eight days maceration on the skins in wooden casks, nothing controlled as always. The fermentation is done in big wooden vats with indigenous yeasts – as per usual - covered only with a plastic film (to keep out pesky fruit flies). No batonnage is made as the lees moves biodynamically. The wine rests, mellows and generally ruminates for two and a half years in tonneaux before bottling. 100% fermented juice, nothing is added… as the man himself says. It has a dark pink-amber colour, with exotic and ripe fruits, mutating all the time. “...the nose, which offers a heady mix of peach, apricot, mandarin, ginger nuts and rose water - like a supercharged Alsace Pinot Gris with bells on. The palate comes as a bit of a shock. What you get is a very rich, yet bone dry wine, with lots of extraction, lots of complexity, some warming but not hot alcohol and a dry, almost dusty - even tannic – finish” – Leon Stolarski - http://leonstolarski.blogspot.com.

The Pinot Grigio is prettier than the rest of Princic’s snorting stable of orange-amber whites with its rose-tinctured delicacy, but it is still a remarkable wine and will change from day to day and even from glass to glass. This then is PG PG (Parental Guidance Pinot Grigio).