Kayra Old Vine Semillon
Shortly before Christmas I saw that my local shop, La Cave, would soon be stocking a new wine from Kayra. Kayra might be one of the giant wineries here in Turkey but their wine, especially the mid range and top shelf, is solid. Then I saw it was a Semillon and I immediately contacted La Cave to ask him to put aside two bottles for me.
While Semillon may not have as long a history in Turkey as say, Merlot in northern Italy, it has grown here for close to 100 years now. Considered by many to be a traditional, if not native, variety, Semillon gained popularity here early in the 20th century. After first the population exchange and then phylloxera wiped out the wine industry, it took Turkish wineries some time to gain back ground. Literally with the vineyards decimated by phylloxera. Like other European countries, a lot of the grapes they planted were French since it was they who first got their act together by grafting grape varieties onto louse-resistant American root stock.
The legacy of French varieties in Turkey remains strong but Semillon kind of fell out of favor. The last few years have seen a surge of its return though which thrills me to no end. We all know I want to see fewer international grapes here and more emphasis on Turkish varieties…but Turkey does Semillon really well. Really well.
Kayra Old Vine Semillon, 2019
This wine comes from what is apparently Kayra’s Experimental Series. I’ve never heard of this before so I assume/hope this is the first wine in, well, a series that we will see. The grapes for this wine came from 60 year-old vines that apparently Kayra forgot they had. Or someone found the vineyard and Kayra bought it/the grapes. Probably there was a shepherd involved. There’s always a shepherd in these stories.
The vineyards sit in the Güzelköy (which means beautiful village!) area of Şarköy, along the Sea of Marmara. The grapes, old as they are, grow in the old head-trained/goblet style. They fermented on the skin in oak. For all that though, the color in the glass was really very light. Pale but consistent to the rim gold.
Esat bey from La Cave warned me to let this warm up a bit before drinking it. I’m impatient but I also wanted to see how much of a difference a few degrees really made to the wine. Right out of the fridge this was wow on the nose. Grapefruit, passionfruit, jasmine, lemon peel, flint… If I’d had this in a blind tasting I’d have sworn it were a Sauvignon Blanc.
At the warmer, recommended temperature, the wine retained those pretty floral notes but the fruit found new (and tropical!) depths with orange and melon, and touches of bitter almond.
On the palate the wine was light and lively with only 12.5% abv; but a touch of oily weight kicked the overall body up to medium-adjacent. More melon here and almond along with bergamot, lemon peel oil, and daisies.
Absolutely lovely. I cannot wait to see how this ages!