Le Clos Ornasca: A Corsican heart of gold

When I telephoned Laetitia Tola about setting up an appointment, the owner of the AOC Ajaccio vineyard Le Clos Ornasca agreed, but she wanted to know how long it would take. “Several hours,” I replied, explaining that I needed to interview her and take photos of the estate. “You can have an hour,” was her reply.

I sensed, from her voice, that this detail wasn’t open to discussion. Thanks to my father-in-law, who often arrives on his visits from Corsica with a selection of wine to sample, I had already tasted the Clos Ornasca’s Cuvée Stella. This ruby-red AOC wine is a blend of 80% Sciaccarellu, a native Corsican grape variety, and 20% Niellucio, a close cousin of Tuscany’s Sangiovese grape. Fruity, with hints of licorice, a wonderful mouth feel, and a long finish, this wine lives up to its name—“Star,” whether accompanying grilled veal cutlets or a nice Roast Beef Au Jus.

“No problem,” I told her. I was curious about her other wines, and I figured that one hour was better than nothing. Turns out that Tola is even tougher in person. It wouldn’t be surprising to hear a Brooklyn accent come out of her mouth, rather than the melodical Corsican accent that she speaks with. Although petite in stature, this is one tough woman, with a big personality. She’s someone who obviously doesn’t mind speaking her mind.

When we met, she told me straight out: “I’m not making a grand cru, artisanal, biodynamic wine.” No, her wines reflect her style and temperament–honest and unpretentious, they are full of life and flavor. As it turned out, my interview with her went well over two hours, and she proved to be a gracious, warm host. I thought initially that it might have been my charm, but later discovered that my father-in-law had called her the day before. That’s how things are often done in Corsica…

Tola had to be tough, I suppose, taking over in 1999, at just age 26, the wine estate that her father, Vincent Tola, had started in 1995. He was, she told me, passionate about wine, and expanded the Clos Ornasca from its initial five hectares to its present 10 hectares of vines. He also added a modern cellar and planted the traditional grape varieties they now use to make their wines.

She earned her BPA (Brevet professionnel agricole), a diploma for running or working in the agricultural sector, in Aix en Provence. Part of her education involved two, three-month internships on vineyards in Burgundy and in Australia.

Tola’s partner, Jean-Antoine Manenti, gave up his goatherd for the Clos Ornasca. He now tends to the vines, while she is responsible for the estate’s accounting, sales and business activities. They also have a full-time employee, Jean-Jacques Maris, who works primarily in the wine cellar, but who also helps out with vineyard work. Technical analysis of their wines is done by Olivier Nales, a consultant oenologist from Aix-en-Provence who works with a number of Corsican wine estates.

Because of a lack of manpower during the harvest season, they’re now forced, she says, to harvest their grapes with a machine. I heard the same from other Corsican winemakers. A lack of migrant workers or university students, and a declining number of young people, who often leave to find work on the mainland, has forced an increasing number of winemakers here to give up hand harvesting. One advantage of mechanical harvesting, she explains, is being able to harvest in the cool of the night, which saves energy by eliminating the need to refrigerate the harvested grapes to prevent fermentation beginning before they are brought into the cellar. They improve the grape selection by having someone walk ahead of the harvesting machine, while someone else follows it. The person ahead of the machine eliminates unripe or overripe grapes, while the person behind hand harvests any grapes that have been missed.

She says the vineyard practices “agriculture raisonnée,” which is a term often heard when talking with French winemakers. This agricultural method, which involves certification through the French Departments of Agriculture and Ecology, is a minimalist intervention approach, in terms of chemical product use, to farming. For example, weed control is mainly through the use of a side hoe (an intercep in French) that uses hydraulically controlled blades to remove weeds without damaging the vines. However, they also use a small amount of herbicide, she explains, to control weed growth at the foot of the vines. But any products that are used to treat the vines, she says, are “bio,” i.e., natural.

Last year they lost 30% of their grapes because of oidium, or powdery mildew. The Mediterranean is close by, but that wouldn’t have been a factor as this sort of fungal infection is not affected by humidity. Canopy management was the primary problem, she believes. More aggressive pruning to open up the canopy, and to let in more sun, has prevented the problem from reoccurring this year.

Corsican vineyards like the Clos Ornasca often face a problem that winemakers in other French regions or elsewhere in the world (outside of certain parts of Australia or California) might never see: wildfires. Lack of rain in the summertime can make the scrubland maquis that covers much of the island tinder dry. The island is infamous for intense conflagrations that burn thousands of hectares of land each summer. Last year, two such fires burned a short distance away, on either side of the vineyards. Over a two-day period, Tola says, temperatures on the ground in the vineyard ranged between 45-48 °C (113-118 °F). The grapes didn’t seem to be affected, but the leaves on the Niellucciu vines reacted, she says, by curling up.

Fortunately, this was only a temporary phenomenon, and the 2009 harvest was a good one. Like some femme fatale character in a Quentin Tarantino film she shrugs off these oidium or wildfire problems with a resigned aplomb. Such self-confident, assured poise when faced with the vagaries of nature (fire, disease, hail, drought, etc.) is something that I admire in winemakers (or any farmer, for that matter) in general, and in Corsican winemakers in particular. For those who have been to this island, or know any Corsicans, you will understand when I write that Corsicans–with their strong inner fortitude and oftentimes, somber sobriety–have a strong streak of stoicism. Three examples of this that come immediately to mind are Napoléon, the traditional polyphonic choral Corsican music (which includes refrained emotion, funeralistic songs (lamenti in Corsican), and brotherhoods of singers (cunfraternita)), and the comic book, Asterix in Corsica, in which Asterix and Obelix join forces with the Corsicans to kick some Roman butt. This amusing adventure features many stereotypical Corsican clichés, including pride, vendettas, feuds and lots of grim glaring.

In good times and bad, the Clos Ornasca makes consistently good wines. Besides the Cuvée Stella, Tola and Manenti have a second wine named for another of their two daughters, the Cuvée Lesia. This is a white wine made from the Vermentinu grape. The well-drained and decomposed granite and sand Clos Ornasca soil provides the perfect foundation for the aromatic Vermentinu grape. The Cuvée Lesia is minerally in taste, with strong, persistently fruity notes. Like the Cuvée Stella, it benefits from barrel aging that provides a subtle oak influence and long length.

There’s also an interesting AOC Clos Ornasca Rosé. Made from the Sciaccarellu grape, this pale, salmon-colored wine has the spiciness that is typical of this grape variety. It’s nicely rounded,  quite fruity, and shows good balance and mouth feel.

Almost 90% of their wine is sold in Corsica (with almost half of that sold directly from the cellar), and the remaining 10%, she says, goes to the “continent” (which is Corsican-speak for the French mainland). This is probably another reason why my initial telephone call to set up an interview appointment with her was met with so little enthusiasm; she has little reason to promote her wine through articles such as this one, as she already sells all of their limited production.

If you do travel to the Clos Ornasca to taste some of their wines, don’t be put off by any perceived pugnacity. You may find, as Asterix and Obelix did during their adventure in Corsica, that a Corsican’s rough exterior often hides a heart of gold.

Tagged as: Corsica