Why This Bottle, Really? Serine, Vin de France, Northern Rhone, Guillaume Clusel

Lessons from a "Modest" Syrah

2021 Serine, Vin de France, Northern Rhone Valley, Guillaume Clusel, about $33 (US importers Avenelle Wine, Charles Neal, and Grand Cru Selections).

In the northern Rhone town of Ampuis, on the flat land below the steep slopes of Côte Rôtie that set the world standard for Syrah, Guillaume Clusel of Domaine Clusel-Roch produces a more modest wine called Serine. His big, intense, tannic Côte Rôties — fermented in whole bunches and aged in old oak casks — need time to reveal their qualities. You don’t have to wait for Serine, though you might keep it for a few years.

It’s 100 percent Syrah from ten to twenty-year-old vines, from the particular form of northern Rhone Syrah called Serine, raised organically and fertilized with composted sheep manure. Serine is the domaine’s only wine made entirely from destemmed grapes, which helps make it easy to drink right away. But like the domaine’s grands vins, it’s fermented with indigenous yeasts, not laboratory-selected ones, and aged in demi-muids, which hold 500 liters (10 percent of them are new each year). Clusel produces 5,000 bottles of Serine.

The 2021 vintage currently in the US (2022 is on its way) comes from a cooler, rainier year, but over a few hours it opens to reveal berry fruit, a suggestion of elegance, and a long aftertaste. Compared with warmer years, there’s less of Syrah’s typical tannin and more prominent acidity. The wine’s alcohol is a pleasing 12.5 percent.

I point to the alcohol because around the world the warming climate has led generally to more alcoholic wines and often overripe flavors. Above 13 percent, you tend to taste the alcohol separately from the rest of the wine, and you can’t drink as much wine. (In a store, I reflexively check the percentage of alcohol on a label; in a restaurant, I somewhat apologetically ask the server to check before I decide. I’m not the only one who does those things, but in a restaurant it may take a little confidence to ask what probably seems to be a naïve question. You may hear that the amount of alcohol claimed on bottles isn’t necessarily accurate, but for what I want to know it’s perfectly reliable.) In traditional wine-producing countries, consumers are drinking less but better wine. Rather than wine being an everyday thing with meals, it has become more of a tasting drink, which isn’t a bad thing. But when the wine is also more alcoholic, the experience is different. You drink less and the role of refreshment is mostly lost.

There’s still a little 2020 Serine on some retail shelves, and if you see it, buy it. (On Vin de France labels, giving the vintage is optional, and on the Serine I bought it appears only in what looks like a code at the very bottom of the back label.) The warm, dry weather of 2020 produced a richer Serine, more earthy and even animal, with raspberry and black currant. The grapes were harvested earlier, again giving 12.5 percent alcohol.

Serine goes with charcuterie (lighter and fresher, not too dry a saucisson sec) and roasted and grilled meats (not the deep-flavored dishes and game that go with Côte Rôtie). Rarely ever does red wine go with cheese — I’ve written that, almost militantly, more than once. So I was surprised when Serine went well with a piece of Jasper Hill’s Alpine-style, cow’s-milk Alpha Tolman that I happened to have on hand. Then on the Clusel-Roch website I saw that Serine was supposed to go with goat’s-milk cheese. I bought three kinds. The lighter and stronger vintages of the wine were both very good with Mothais-sur-feuille and a creamy, ripe Belgian Cabricharme. Neither the wine nor the cheese diminished the flavor of the other, which is high praise, because true synergy seldom occurs with wine and cheese. The wine was overwhelmed by the third cheese, a very ripe and peppery Monte Enebro from Spain, but that didn’t really count.

It was a revelation to me that Serine could be so delicious with goat cheese. You’d expect the area’s white wine to go with cheese, as it does, but the red? I put the question to Guillaume Clusel, who answered, “We’ve always had goat’s-milk cheeses chez nous.” He gave the classic explanation: “They all come from the same terroir, and things from the same terroir go well together.” Terroir forms the raw materials as well as the sensibilities of the people; the influences in a place go back and forth. I often think that the same palate forms both the wine and the cheese. ●

Correction: In writing, I managed to misspell the name of the wine and overlook the importance of the clone that gives its name to the wine. I've made an addition and corrected the name.