image by bonequinha_sf

As it usually goes, I had few interesting wines at Nopa in San Francisco the other night. One is what I’m assuming to be the culmination of Jon Bonné of the Chronicle’s One Barrel series. Jon worked under the tutelage of Kevin Kelley to produce a wine as naturally as possible with fruit from the biodynamically farmed SunHawk Vineyard in Mendocino. Syrah is the dominant grape, accompanied by Grenache, Mourvedre, and Cinsault with the white grapes Viognier, Roussanne, Marsanne and Picpoul. They were all fermented together as a field blend, a practice that is uncommon in the modern wine world. The grapes were left to a spontaneous fermentation, free from dry packaged yeast, and very little, if any sulphur dioxide was added. It’s a fascinating and well chronicled production that you can read all about on the Cellarist (start from the bottom up).

Image from the NPA’s Facebook page

Kevin Kelley is the winemaker behind some really cool Californian projects including The Natural Process Alliance, the winery behind Jon Bonné’s One Barrel wine. The NPA’s wines are bottled from tank into stainless steel Klean Kanteen canisters and delivered within a 100 mile radius of the winery. Restaurants and customers pay a deposit on the containers and get them picked up to be refilled after they’re served. It’s a truly minimal impact mentality and a very laudable practice.

So how was the wine? It was vibrant with an obvious apricot freshness (influence from the white grapes?), a touch herbaceous and a welcomed sweaty funk to the nose. Unique and captivating and I enjoyed it. The NPA ’09 SunHawk Vineyard Syrah-Grenache is $40 a canister at Nopa. Check out theNPA.tv for a couple really well shot videos about the NPA.

AJ’s retro label is a kickback to 1871

The other I’ll mention is an incredible German Riesling from young AJ Adam. AJ’s production is minuscule from 2 hectares (5 acres) of steep, slate covered vineyards over the Mosel River. The wine had plenty of white peach on the nose, reined in with sharp lime acidity and stony minerality on the palate. I figured it probably had a fair amount of sugar in it, but Jesus… it’s only 7.5% alcohol! Clearly that acidity is working overtime to balance this delicious wine. The A.J. Adam ‘Dhroner Hofberg’ 08 Riesling Kabinett is $50 at Nopa.

Always great options on one of the city’s most interesting wine lists…