Did you read dirt when you were young, or old, or now? Yesterday. I'm not talking about those worms and crumbled up Oreos, I'm talking about dirt. Yeah, dirt. Oh, good, how was it? It's delicious. Helps me digest. Digestive? How do you think I keep this girlish figure? Dirt, I'm assuming. Dirt, yeah, lots of dirt. It's a teaspoon of dirt in my coffee. There you go. You sprinkle it on the salad. Get away, chia seeds. I hear dirt has a different flavor depending on where you taste it from. It might. Dirt is delicious, yes, but dirt is different depending on where you are, right? We know that soil composition changes. If you're in California, if you're in Illinois, if you're in New Zealand, if you're in Italy, right? You guys get the point. We're talking about something that's kind of much more than dirt in the wine world. We're talking about terroir. I'm Kristen Ellis. welcome. And my co-host, of course, Jeff Carlin. How are you? Hello, hello. We brought in actually our beer guy, Roger Adamson. Hey, Roger, how are you? Doing well. Thanks for having me. Terroir is a concept in beer, right? Yeah, absolutely. Where does that really come into play for you? I would say the most pronounced aspect of beer that's going to be influenced by terroir is hops and where those hops are from. Beautiful. And on the spirit side, we've got Joe Maloney. Hey, Joe. Hey, thanks for having me, Kristen. Oh, we're happy to have you. And terroir in spirits. Oh, for sure. What's that all about? And how does that work? All over the board, especially if you get into, if we do cognacs and armagnacs for sure. Oh, yeah. You know, if we're talking about tequilas, they can terroir based upon where the agaves are grown. And then for certain, also on whiskey with the grains. Perfect. So let's define gentlemen terroir together. Like I said, it's not just soil. It's kind of an all encompassing term. It's a French word, so it can't be difficult for some people to say. I have a friend who lives out in New Jersey. When he says it, it's like nails on the chalkboard. No, a French Jersey, but you can't say terroir. Anyway, so what it means is that it gives the wine, the beer, it gives the spirit a sense of place. So it's the soil where the products, the agricultural products that provide that said spirit or beer. It's a soil where it's grown, but it's also the climate that's grown in. It's the aspect, right? The direction in which the crops face East, West, North, South. It's the slope. It's the drainage. It's everything that's all encompassing. And that is terroir. And that's what makes chardonnay from France tastes different than chardonnay from California and different than chardonnay from Australia. And so terroir is the concept of the podcast today. So when you guys think of terroir, do you think of soil first? Is that the first thing you think of? That's the first thing that comes to mind for me. Yeah, because we take it to the crops. I would say soil is probably the second most important aspect when it comes to terroir. Really? Why? Number one is climate. Why? Yeah, because it depends on where it's growing. Is it warm or is it cold? In terms of grapes, that's going to directly influence ripeness. If it's a cooler climate, then your grapes are going to ripen slower and they're going to be actually less ripe when you're harvesting them. So they're going to be higher in acid, lower in sugar. That wine is going to be lighter in body. Conversely, with a warm climate, you're going to get warmer, riper grapes that are going to be higher in sugar, lower in acid. So those wines will be fuller. So it's really climate first. That really is kind of the judge, the character that really has to do with how we define terroir of a specific place. How about yeast? I feel yeast is another aspect that applies to beer. I know it definitely for wine, right? So pushing along with the definition, it is the natural place, it's the natural factors. But then terroir also has room for the human aspect of it. So it's what does the winemaker, what does the distiller or the brewmaster do to kind of create their different style? So are you going to use wild yeast, ambient yeast? It actually is more than appropriate when we come up with this definition. So it's not saying that one is more important than the other, it's just that one has more of an effect on the other and climate, I would say, is definitely number one. Because, I mean, if you grow hops in a cool climate versus a warm climate, how would they display differently in the glass of beer? Well, we definitely notice huge differences from southern hemisphere hops versus northern hemisphere. And as far as just the growing regions within the United States, a huge percentage of American hops are pretty much grown in the Pacific Northwest. That's where the lion's share is coming from. They're starting to make inroads in growing some of them back in some traditional growing regions that used to grow them in the past. Right here in the Midwest, we see some hop potential in Michigan and Wisconsin. So, but like Yakima Valley for sure is one of the most famous hop growing regions in the US. So, yes, so climate, right? Right, Joe? Climate and then soil. So let's get into soil just a little bit more. It's kind of a bit arcane. Honestly, you guys, there is no definitive scientific evidence that soil changes the way a wine will taste. They can't prove it. They can't say this X in soil or this is limestone, so it does this to the grape and makes it taste like whatever. They just can't articulate it that way. But we know, over trial and error, tasting wine from different places, that the soil has a dramatic difference on the way that the wine tastes on the tongue. So ultimately, it's the tongue that is the almighty decider as to how the wine is going to taste. If it tastes different coming off of limestone versus clay within the same vineyard, then that's kind of proof enough for me, right? Sure. You can't quantify it, but you can qualify it. Exactly, exactly. So we find that the big differences where we can really see it is kind of mountain terrain versus valley floor. Mountains are rocks, right? So naturally, that soil is going to be rocky and less fertile. We find oftentimes in valley floors that that soil is much more fertile. So we've got this rocky, thin, brittle topsoil in these mountains. And what we find is that it makes it more stressful for the vine to produce fruit. So what they do is the vines just produce less fruit that's more concentrated versus a fertile valley floor where they have less to worry about. And so it's just a growing party and they go ahead and just kind of go for it. They'll focus more on vegetation or vegetative growth versus fruit growth on the valley floor. What kind of wine would you bring to a growing party? We have some Santerre here, actually. Hey, good segue. Yeah. I poured you two wines here. We've got Sauvignon Blanc, both in the glass. We've got one from New Zealand and one from France. With terroir, like I said, the big example here is we can get the same grape from different places, and they show dramatically differently to us. So let's try the one on the left, your other left. There you go, Jeff. So what sorts of things do you smell? Peach. Peach. Get loads of peach. Lots of peach. Good. I get grapefruit and that classic green pepper. Green pepper indeed. That's what I'm smelling like. It's just a bunch of green pepper. Yeah, for sure. It's pretty indicative of the style of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. Lots of grapefruit, that peachy stone fruit quality, but the green pepper just comes through. Do you get that too, Roger? Yeah, it's apricot too. Yeah, for sure. How does it feel structurally on the palate? Is it light or full bodied? Is it high acid? I know I said I get high acid, but do you guys get that as well? It's screaming high acidity, don't you think? You really need some food to tone this down. Even chips or salty popcorn would nip that acid in the bud and really temper that a little bit for you. Let's go ahead and try the Sauvignon Blanc on the right, please. What are some things you smell here? It's very floral. It's floral. Yeah, kind of honeysuckle, acacia. Talk about gooseberries. What do you get there, Joe? Yeah, floral. Yeah, definitely for sure. It's definitely a little bit softer. It's not as explosive. Right. So it's more reserved. It's softer. No green pepper, guys. No green pepper at all. So here we have two glasses of wine made of the same variety, albeit most likely different clones but still the same variety altogether. It's worth saying from two different places and they show drastically different. Now, in the winery, they're treated very much the same in the sense that these aren't oaked, they aren't aged oxidatively, nothing like that. So they're very freshly made in stainless steel and temperature controlled environment, especially through fermentation. So they're kind of made very similarly, but they come from different places and taste drastically different. The New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc just kind of jumps right out at you. The Sancerre is a bit more reserved, right? Just kind of a bit more demure. It's demure. I like that. Yeah. So I'd say there are many more examples you could sort of, you want to have a terroir differences, let's say, tasting. Pinot Grigio versus Pinot Gris. It's the same grape. Pinot Grigio is great in Italian and Gris is obviously gray in French. And so you could get a Pinot Grigio from Italy or Pinot Gris from Oregon or France. Alsace more specifically and taste those side by side. It's going to be another great example. I also like Cabernet for this. Get a Bordeaux from the left bank. Get a St. Estephe. Get a Cunawara Cabernet from Australia. Get a Cab from New Zealand. Go ahead and get one from Stel and Bosch from South Africa and you're going to have four drastically different wines from the same grape variety. The Terroir War? I like that. I love him today. I like the Terroir War. And it sounds like I have enough bottles to get now where I can get the mixed case discount price. Oh, here you go. Shameless plug. If you come into your neighborhood Binny's, we hope you do, and you buy 12 or more bottles of really anything, you're going to get a 10% case discount. Wine. I love discounts. Wine. Right. Not 12 bottles of beer because that's how they're sold. Well, that's a 12 pack. Yeah, sure. No, wine and spirits. Yeah. I think Jeff, I think I just got fired and Jeff just got hired. I'm just protecting you. Yeah. You're doing a good job. I feel safe. Very cool. But when it comes to European winemaking, the concept of terroir, it's a French word, so it started obviously there. What it's about is just like I said, that sense of place. But also in the winery, there's so much that a winemaker can do to change maybe how the natural terroir of soil and climate could have an effect on the wine. Some of the things they could do, of course, Roger very geniusly mentioned yeast. They could also put the wine through malactic fermentation, temperature of fermentation, the time of maceration if you're making a red, how much time you let the wine spend on the grape skins drastically will change how the wine will be in the glass. With structure and color, tannin and even flavor, of course. Also, if you go way, way back to ancient Rome and ancient Greece, what they started it literally terroir, even though it's a French word, these guys would stamp these amphorae or amphora that they used to carry and trade wine in with the regional stamp from where the wine came. And that's how these wine regions became so popular. They produced the wines that were the best. And now we still drink these wines and still herald them as the best, the same as the Romans did. So the concept of terroir existed long before the word was invented in France. Can you talk a little more about the, even within a really small climate, the sun-facing hills, like I know I heard something once about Riesling. There's examples of that, right? Where they quantify certain land just specifically with the sundial, like where the sun-facing regions are. Well, the sun, so think of heat as ripeness and sun for flavor. Sun is, we get the flavor from the grape skins, right? And oftentimes in the pulp, but that even slow ripening with the benefits of sunshine are going to dramatically change how the wine will taste. So that being said, let's take Sauvignon Blanc. Now, Riesling is kind of a different story and it's still up for debate, so it's kind of touchy, but Riesling gets burnt very easily, especially in cool climates. If viticulturists don't manage their canopy with the shading of the leaves, that's the engine of the vine, the grapes will get burnt by too much sun exposure because they're thinking, well, it's cold, so we must get all the sun on the grapes. And oftentimes or sometimes what would happen is it would be cold, but the grapes would be exposed to too much strong sun and these skins would get burned even though it wasn't a million degrees outside. So let's take Sauvignon Blanc. Did you smell the green pepper in the New Zealand expression? Well, that comes from an enzyme in the skins called pyrazines. It exists in Carmonaire, exists in Cabernet. That's why Cabernet from Cool Vintage will smell like Capiscum because it's the same basic chemical in the grape that's doing that. So some wine makers want that and some don't. The more sun exposure you have, the less of that green pepper you're going to taste in the glass. So they will orient the vineyards one way. Let's say if you are in Southern Hemisphere, you orient your vineyards east and west. One side of your grapes are going to get all the sun. In the other words, others aren't naturally, depending on how north or south you are in your latitude. Right? So that makes sense. So then you can have some grapes that have a lot of that pyrazine effect and some that are not. If you have more of a north and south facing vine scheme, then of course you might have more of that even sunshine as the sun comes from east to west over during the day. So it all depends on how you want to play with it. It can really, really capture the sun or not, depending on the style that you want. If it's super hot and sunny, you're going to burn those grapes. And you want to make sure to manage that canopy and keep the leaves shading. So as the sun just kind of comes through each part of the canopy, it just sort of trickles over the grapes for even ripening that. Well, Joe, I'm happy you're here and Roger, you as well. Of course, Jeff, but you know what I'm getting at. Because this wine question was pretty interesting. And I think that it's right up your alley and maybe a bit of mine. I've got a weird opinion on this. Let's see where we go. OK, so how did you get this question? Yeah, good question. If you guys write in to us at Binny's Bev on Twitter, you could win a $20 gift card to Binny's Bev if you if we use your question, if you get your question chosen. We chose a question from a lovely lady named Kelly W. So Kelly, this is your question. Everything seems to be ex-Berbin barrel age now. What are some of the best wine and beer in particular? So, bourbon barrel aged wine. Unfortunately, Kelly, I've not met one that I liked. I can't lie. I can't lie to kick it. I just, it's not working yet. It's brand new. I think maybe that they just have to try some more, maybe. Try on there to get it right. But it just seems that for some reason, in those charred, oaked barrels, no matter how long the bourbon has sat in there, when you put the heavy cabernet inside and then bottle it, it just, I don't know. The last one I tried, I was surprised that it didn't have much bourbon aroma or taste. And maybe that's something that wine makers are used to have a bit more nuance, whereas with bourbon barrel-age beer, it's most often you want a lot of bourbon flavor to come through, or at least the bourbon barrel-age beer geek that is seeking it out wants a lot of that. So my guess is maybe they probably need to actually turn the dial up a little bit. They're probably struggling with... Go to 11? Yeah. Yeah, they're not going big nor going home. How about you, Joel? Oh, well, you know, I think that the bourbon beers that I've had have been the kind of the big name ones, but the fun spot for me is really in single malts in Scotland, because a lot of our bourbon barrels are finding their way to Scotland, since in America we can only use our barrels once for our bourbons. And for me, it's fun to go through each different distillery and find different malts that have been aged in bourbon barrels, because I'm familiar with the flavors of bourbon and can extrapolate out those flavors to get a better sense of the character of the distillery. So I could sit around and develop a bit of a taste memory. But you know, some of the fun ones have been like the Akintoshans in bourbon one have been fun. There's actually some tequilas that got aged in bourbon barrels too. And you like those? Those are good? Those are fun. Cool. Yeah, because they bring in the toffee and the vanilla to counteract the pepper and the vaginal spices that you find in a young tequila. So it's really, really fun playing with all the bourbon barrels. Yeah, we should have a bourbon finished podcast. See how many ideas we come up with just by spitting out these questions. We should be writing these down. You know what, I do like the gin. You literally have a pen in your hand. I know I do. I just want to, okay. That was a self-inflicted joke. Gin, this barrel age, I found is pretty good. Like that's one of the things that I really like. Because it softens, you know, a lot of times people like gin, it just punches you in the face and then you punch somebody else in the face. That's kind of the impact. But I don't know, is there gin, you guys, that's ex-bourbon barrel finished? Oh, for sure. I'm pretty sure that FU uses some bourbon in this. Is it? Oh, cool. And I think Koval does too. Yeah. And here locally, they do it. I mean, that's the beauty of it, that does mellow it out a little bit, and it's got that more of a sipping essence to it that you want from a gin. Because I mean, I'm not a gin guy normally, but I love gin, but I'm not like an aficionado. Yeah. A lot of gins I wouldn't necessarily sip. I know they're out there, but the ones I have found that I would sip are the ones that are barely aged. Cool. Right on. All right, Kelly Dubs. I shouldn't call her that. Okay, Kelly W. Thank you so much. And ladies and gentlemen, I hope that you enjoyed this terroir specific episode of Barrel to Bottle. I'm Kristen Ellis and Jeff Carlin, as always. Thank you for joining. Gentlemen, good to have you. Thanks for having us. Come again. Yes. You'll be back. Oh, for sure. I hope so. Keep tasting. See you next week.