Now although we usually try to find good value wines at around $30 or under for our weekly wine picks, we couldn’t help ourselves to go (ever so slightly) over the budget in picking this week’s wine, Channing Daughters 2008 Meditazione.  Wow! This is truly one of the most interesting, complex, funky and fun white wines that I have ever had!  When you take a sip, you realize that this wine is something very special and very different.  It is a skin-fermented Meditazione – a white blend inspired by the “Vino da Meditazione” wines in the Friuli region of Northeast Italy.  It’s a part of the growing “orange wine” movement, with winemakers in places like Loire (France), Brda (Slovenia), Friuli (Italy), and Umbria (Italy) crafting wines that hearken back to an earlier era, when white wine was typically macerated with its skins during fermentation. Don’t just take our word for how good this wine is. We read that Paul Grieco (of Hearth and Terroir) described Channing Daughters Meditazione as “the greatest white wine in America” and we discovered the 2006 vintage on French Laundry’s and Per Se’s wine list (and even on the Spotted Pig’s list!).  I think that pretty much sums up the awesomeness of this wine – you’ve got to get it.

Wined & Dined’s Quick Tasting Notes

Wine: Channing Daughters Meditazione      

Vintage: 2008

Varietal(s): 27% Sauvignon Blanc, 27% Chardonnay, 16% Tocai Friulano, 16% Muscat Ottonel, and 14% Pinot Grigio

Region: Bridgehampton, Long Island

Alcohol: 12%

Price: $40

Color/Appearance: Golden orange – deep rich color

Nose/Aroma: Honeysuckle, vanilla, citrus liquor, spicy peach (very aromatic)        

Mouth/Flavors: Dried apricot, bright green apple, white nectarine, honey, toasted nuts, light spice.  It’s got a nice minerality, crisp citrus notes and a medium body.  Hugely complex, challenging, and all together awesome.

Conclusion:  This wine is really up there for one of my favorite whites – ever.  I think $40 is a steal when you think of its greatness in comparison to so many bottles of red that we expect to buy for the same price without flinching.   Even though this wonderland of a white is certainly a food wine (think game meat, rich stinky cheeses, seared duck breast, fall seasonal vegetables), I could easily drink it as an aperitif instead of a glass of Lillet.  The crazy complexity comes from the hand-harvested grapes (grown in Bridgehampton- prime real estate there!) being fermented on their skins for 10 days and then raised in 63% new and 37% old/neutral French and Slovenian oak puncheons, hogsheads and barriques for 18 months.  It’s refreshing to find something that is local, so different than what I am used to and just so good.  Remember not to kill its complexity by serving it too chilled.  It would be a shame not to taste and enjoy every note and layer of this gem.

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