“I like wild ferments, and if I use any oak, it’s a very low toast,” says Will Wetmore, owner and winemaker at Veer Wine Project, as he outlined some of the techniques that give his wines such character. We were standing in his tasting room – a dark, cavernous space that looked like a sound stage with a brightly lit bar at its centre.
He poured me a glass of wine called Mataro: “It’s mourvrède, but it might have some syrah because I use syrah to top up barrels. It’s won lots of awards.”
I could understand why. With white pepper on the nose, dried cranberries in the mouth and a velvety body, this was a delicious, Rhône-style red. Yet, the river near the tasting room wasn’t the Rhône – it was the Boise. And that’s what is most astonishing about Wetmore’s wines: he grows and vinifies grapes in Idaho.
