Red, Green

Domaine Fouassier 
Sancerre L'étourneau
2005
Current price: about $26

This wine is 100% pinot noir, which one might guess from its color and ringing clarity. But it smells like salad and tastes like hay; a more vegetal wine I have never experienced. It's as if the fruit had been completely drained out through a plug at the bottom, leaving behind an acid bite and lots of tannin. A red that tastes green.

Loire reds are tricky, requiring flawless weather and careful winemaking to coax the fruit. I'd love to taste a luckier specimen. It might be spectacular, or at least really interesting: another expression of pinot.