L.A.S Marea Vermentino 2022
L.A.S Marea Vermentino 2022 is one of the most unusual wines you could ever hope to encounter.
It’s not often that I come across a wine that is genuinely different. This wine is genuinely different. A container load of the grapes that were used to make this wine were submerged in the ocean prior to them being fermented. As in, the grapes were actually sunk into the ocean, at sunset. Just to emphasise that point a third time, I’ll quote from the L.A.S winery website:
“‘Marea’ means tide in Italian and to our knowledge this is the first wine in Australia whose hand-picked grapes were immersed into ocean water following techniques used by the Ancient Greeks. The idea was sparked by the encounter of two Italian girls (Maria & Teresa) who met working at L.A.S. Vino and had a dream to create a wine that reflects the beauty of the ocean surrounding Margaret River.”
Not all of the grapes used in the making of this wine went through this process; more than 50% of the end wine was made using more commonplace techniques. The end wine, or the taste of it, though suggests that all the above remains of absolute relevance.
It is because the wine tastes of the sea. It tastes of vermentino grapes too: it’s citrussy, and grippy, and underpinned by a genuine fruitiness, and sprayed with fragrant herb notes. There’s some aniseed-like flavour in this wine too, though there’s also salt, and seaweed, and a generally briny feel. A long time ago I sat and drank a couple of bottles of Lemon Ruski on a beach somewhere in Western Australia, and tasting this wine invoked the fullness of that memory, via its salty, citrussy, saltbush-y feel. This wine didn’t invoke the sweetness of that Lemon Ruski: it invoked its lemons, and the beach itself. I drank a half-glass of this wine and started craving hot fish and chips, with vinegar.
I have no real interest in putting a score on this wine, and have no idea what it would be if I did. What score an experience, and an invocation?
L.A.S Marea Vermentino 2022 is $45, if you can find it.
