This extraordinary-looking wine is absolutely wonderful!
For all of it being an attempt to bottle "a day at the beach" it is a delicious, textural and serious wine that is a genuine field blend made with sensitivity to each of the six or more grape varieties.
The effect is something akin to a slightly broader and riper wine from Germany's Pfalz region - all the minerality from the soils, freshness from the coastal proximity and the ripeness from the West-Coast sunshine. A pitch-perfect balance.
Flavours of tropical fruit, blossom, the wine bursts out of the glass with notes of bergamot, citrus zest and pink grapefruit. The racy palate is vibrant and fresh with balancing roundness from the skins, giving it a gorgeous, subtle waxy touch.
Unfined and unfiltered, the grapes are given just a few hours of skin contact in the winery before the juices are removed for fermentation.
This is not a "skin contact" wine in the modern manner, but there is a superb capturing of the phenolic qualities and textures that the skins provide, setting it apart from most other West-Coast white wines, and providing it with quality that sets it apart from most other skin contact whites!
The blend is 50% Riesling, 30% Gewürztraminer, 14% Early Muscat, 3% Sauvignon Blanc and 3% other varieties that may change from vintage to vintage.
Ovum Wines are made by the wife and husband team of Ksenja Kostic and John House, who set up Ovum (meaning egg, hence the label shape...) in 2011 in the Dundee Hills zone of Oregon.
They use very natural and low-intervention techniques, only adding a tiny amount of Sulphur at bottling.
They use neutral oak and acacia barrels but are most proud of their concrete eggs, which give the wines their texture.
They also employ long lees-ageing of up to 9 months for their wines, which gives wonderful texture and depth of flavour.
This is true for ALL of their wines - they are made identically - meaning that when they taste differently to one another, it's because of the soil and varieties used, not the winemaking. It's a wonderful philosophy!
Region: Oregon
Country: USA
Grape(s): Chardonnay
Style: Vibrant, Svelte, Sustainable, Salty, Organic, Medium Bodied, Elegant, Complex, Balanced
Best food matches: Warm Salads, Tuna, Trout, Tapas, Sushi, Steak, St Stephen's Day, Squid, Shellfish, Seafood, Scallops, Salads, Roasts, Red Meats, Poultry, Oysters, Lobster, Lamb, Hard Cheeses, Grills, Grilled Vegetables, Goat's Cheese, Game, Fine Dining, Duck, Christmas Dinner, Cheeses, Charcuterie
Alcohol: 12.5%
