With a referendum in Chile about to take place, I’m calling for a referendum to elect Chile’s national wine. My vote: Pais.
Contents:
Winemaking, Characteristics, Styles & Pairings
The New National Grape of Chile
Old Vines
Pais might be new to the international wine scene, but it comes from some of the oldest vines in the world.
Old Vines usually means at least 25-40 years old or older. Some are labeled Centenaire or Centenario to show they are 100+ years old. Compared to the Pais grape in Chile, these “Old Vines” are adolescent.
In comparison, Pais grape vines in Chile typically range from 150-400 years old. Although old vines don’t always guarantee quality, older vines typically mean lower yields, more concentrated, ripe grapes and deeper roots to gain more complexity and expression of terroir.
However, most don’t consider Pais to be high quality. Hence, many producers have used Pais rootstocks to graft other varietals and Pais has been steadily decreasing from about 200,000 hectares at the end of the 20th century to less than 10,000 now. Yet, a growing number of producers have been trying to revive its popularity, preserve its fascinating history and explore what type of wine this grape can make.
History
Pais most likely originated in Castilla-La Mancha, Spain, where it was known as Listan Prieto. It disappeared from mainland Spain, but a small amount still exists on the Canary Islands. *Envinate makes a single varietal Listan Prieto from Tenerife that’s quite good called Benje
Pais was the first Old World grape to be brought to the New World. It was first planted in what is now the Dominican Republic and made its way throughout Latin America. The Spanish brought it as a Eucharist grape for the Jesuit priests in the 16th century. For that reason, the grape is called Mission in California. You can also find it in Argentina, where it is known as Criolla Chica. It’s also used in Peruvian Pisco where it’s called Negra Corriente or Negra Criolla.
Pais remained the dominant grape in Chile during the Spanish conquest and colonial period. Although Spanish expansion and deforestation for agriculture was a source of conflict spurring native Mapuche resistance, the Spanish wine grapes were eventually incorporated by natives and mestizos in chicha, which is a fermented drink made throughout South America which had previously been made from vegetables like corn. Other countries still use corn and other plants to make chicha, but grapes and apples have become the norm in Chile. Chicha is still drunk in Chile during the national holiday of Fiestas Patrias in September.
Chicha, along with Pais wines, soon became out of fashion in the 19th century. Chile began to adopt French varietals and techniques instead. However, this was mainly among the rich industrial landowners who could afford to go Europe and taste French wines. Pais never ceased to be the grape of the campesinos in the countryside where these old, untrained, bush vines have been growing for centuries. That’s why it is called Pais or “country” in Chile or even Chilena and Huasa. “Huaso/a” is the name for Chilean cowboys/cowgirls or folk who live and work in the countryside.
Shortly after independence, Pais was only made and drunk by the campesinos. They made jugs of a type of everyday wine called Pipeño for themselves or sold the grapes to make bulk wine until about 12 years ago when some non-Chileans dared to try to revive Pais. Chile is now the biggest exporter of Pais wines.
The Underdog Wine
Most credit Frenchman Louis-Antoine Luyt for the Pais renaissance in Chile. With a background in wine business administration, he came to Chile in 1998 looking for work. Unable to find steady work, he went back and forth from Chile and France, earning a sommelier certificate in Chile along the way.
Luyt recounts that in his sommelier classes, nobody mentioned Pais. They only focused on the French varietals. They told him that Pais was not good quality because it lacked acidity and color and they had never tried to make wine with it. Like in the movie Inception, the seed that was planted in Luyt’s mind grew into an idea and obsession: why can’t I make wine with Pais? Luyt says, “Perhaps I didn’t know enough about wine at the time not to try.”
Luyt went back to France and learned about winemaking from mentor Marcel Lapierre. Lapierre is one of the first Beaujolais producers along with Foillard, Breton and Thevenet to return to old practices of Beaujolais winemaking, which is low intervention and natural winemaking at its core. This was a fortuitous harbinger of Luyt’s approach to making Pais.
After several attempts, Luyt finally made his first Pais wine in 2007. Luyt achieved quick success selling his Pais abroad through his contacts and telling the story of Pais: “a story nobody has told.” He says Pais is the “quiltro” of Chilean wines. Quiltro is a Chilean expression originating from Mapudungun for “dog” which has come to describe the stray mutts that roam Chile.
It’s an underdog story—much like the story of Chile. Chile was initially abandoned by the Spanish as being bereft of wealth and resources to colonize. A stroke of British greed helped them to obtain land that would later make Chile prosperous through mining. Similarly, this grape has been neglected throughout the years, adapting and surviving through wars, earthquakes and dictators, but now it’s making a comeback.
Getting all this history and Chilean terroir in handcrafted wines made from 250+ year old dryfarmed vines for under $15 became an easy selling point for Luyt. Furthermore, it was something distinctly Chilean, and not just a cheaper version of Bordeaux or Napa.
Lifting up the underdog and preserving the heritage of Pipeno/Pais is also part of Luyt’s mission. Luyt doesn’t own his own vineyards, so he has had to convince local farmers in Maule by paying them 3-5 times more for the grapes than they were getting before in order to show them that they could make a living cultivating Pais. The other problem from a winemaking and heritage perspective is how to convince the next generation to continue the tradition. That’s why Luyt sees the missing component of his Pais dream as getting funding to protect the vines as a heritage site.
Current & Future Market
Thanks to Luyt’s work and encouragement, other winemakers have come to the Maule, Itata & Bio-Bio valleys to produce Pais wines for the global market. Pais is roughly the 8th most produced grape in Chile by volume at 35.5 million liters made in 2018.
One producer that epitomizes the partnership of the wine industry and local farmers is Gonzalez Bastias. Daniela Lorenzo is a Santiagan winemaker and one of the founders of Santiago’s best wine bar, Bocanariz. She literally married into the legacy of Pais, after she met husband Jose Luis Gomez Bastias, who is a 5th generation Pais farmer.
According to Lorenzo, they’ve experienced a “small revolution” with Pais in the last 7-8 years. She and her husband have expanded production to around 40,000 bottles a year and now work with other farmers to source their grapes for their Gonzalez Bastias wines.
Despite the growing success of Pais, both Luyt and Lorenzo concur that 90% or more of their sales are outside of Chile. In addition to the attractive history and Chilean authenticity of Pais, Lorenzo also said it appeals largely to natural wine lovers who want an easy drinking wine that won’t give them a headache. However, the natural wine trend still hasn’t quite reached the Chilean market and the heritage selling point hasn’t worked in Chile.
In Chile, Pais can only be found in the better wine shops and wine bars of Santiago and although they are cheap internationally, they’re still more expensive than entry-level mass-produced Cabernets in the supermarkets of Chile.
For Lorenzo, making and drinking Pais is a source of national pride. After years of thinking “our stuff was bad and stuff from other countries was better,” she “wanted to be proud of their traditions, heritage, and history.” At the same time, it’s hard to undo 150 years of being told that Pais is bad and only French varietals are good. Things are slow to change in Chile and classism has always loomed large.
For example, Luyt says that cuicos, Chilean slang for “upper class snobs,” sometimes buy his bottles in secret and take off the label so nobody knows it’s Pais. This is just a small example of cultural, linguistic and food differences that are used to separate the classes in Chile that expats like myself don’t always pick up. Luyt adds that his wines have taken a lot of verbal abuse from Chileans, even ones that actually like his wine.
Still, both Luyt and Lorenzo see the Pais market growing. As the global market grows for Pais, it will give cover for Chileans to jump on the bandwagon. On the other hand, Luyt says it will never be about making a lot of money. Pais producers are not going to become the next Screaming Eagle or Sassacaia. He simply hopes that this success will finally be able to fund the long term preservation of these heritage vineyards and traditional Pipeno practices.
Winemaking, Characteristics, Styles & Pairings
Using the local resources around them, Pais farmers have created and passed down their own farming and winemaking techniques for generations. Although each might be slightly different, most were already using more or less natural methods and this has been encouraged by the new producers sourcing their grapes.
Most vines are handpicked, horse plowed, and free of pesticides. Some choose to use mechanical presses that were introduced by the French the early 20th century, but some like Gonzalez Bastias still use zarandas de coligue, a type of mat made of a bamboo-like plant. They hand or feet squeeze the grapes over the zarandas into open cement lagars, or wine vats.
Fermentation with native yeasts and aging can take place in the lagars or in extremely old, large pipas, which is a wooden container made of rauli, a native beech tree. Some of these rauli pipas are as old as the Pais vines, and that’s where the name of the “Pipeno” wine comes from. Something that has also been used to age their wines for generations is tinajas, clay jars. Some of their clay amphorae are also hundreds of years old. Lastly, little to no sulfur is used and the wines are typically not fined or filtered.
Some producers will mix up their techniques to make different styles of Pais and of course terroir matters. Maule tends to be warmer than Itata, so Maule Pais vines and wines are usually bigger and riper while Itata makes fresher light-bodied Pais from smaller vines.
Some Pais are labeled “Pipeno,” which can indicate the use of pipas or other traditional methods, and they don’t typically get the same aging as other new-wave Pais. Hence, Pipenos tend to be the most rustic and rough around the edges of the Pais wines. They are usually field blends too, so they may include other grape varietals.
However, “Pipeno” for Luyt is a way of life. It’s the tradition of farming and winemaking passed down from generation to generation. At first, the Beuajolais trained Luyt used carbonic maceration with most of his Pais, but now he’s embraced the Pipeno traditions of his partners and only uses carbonic maceration for one of his wines.
By the way, there is a Pipeno Blanco too, made from old white grapes of the region, and they are nationally popular in a watered down form as an ingredient in making terremotos, another special drink for Fiestas Patrias.
Stylistically, Pais wines range from rustic, earthy and sometimes funky Pipeno to elegant floral and fruity wines more similar to Beaujolais. The wines are generally low in tannin and acid featuring dark berry fruit, but more are being made in a fresh red fruit style. They are light-bodied, but light doesn’t necessarily mean lacking in complexity or intensity. *I have tasting notes of various cuvees below.
It’s versatile with food, best served slightly chilled (10-12 C), and could go with anything you’d drink a Beaujolais or rosé with since it’s light and easy drinking. I like it most with charcuterie and spicy sausages like chorizo. I wouldn’t age most Pais because it’s meant for early-consumption. Nevertheless, it’s often better with a little air.
The New National Grape of Chile
Like much of the world, the world of wine is full of classism. Classifications in wine do denote certain history, quality, terroir, standards, etc. but were also used for those in power to keep their power. In the world of wine, Chile is already more towards the bottom of the range of wines. Moreover, Pais is the lowest class of Chilean wines, so it’s the lowest of the lowest—the underdog. At the same time, there is no wine more Chilean than Pais.
The current national grape, Carmenere, is unique to Chile because it has all but died out in its original home, Bordeaux. It came in the 19th century though. They thought it was Merlot and when they found out it was really Carmenere in 1994, wine marketers thought they could make it Chile’s signature grape much like Malbec is for Argentina. That’s really just 26 years of history from a French grape. Similarly, when you drink a nice bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon dominated Don Melchor or Sena, you’re drinking the best of a French tradition of wine in Chile.
In contrast, Pais embodies Chile. Although Pais is also not native to Chile, it has been around since the beginning of winemaking in Chile, which means almost 500 years. Some Pais vines are almost that old too. Plus, uniquely Chilean techniques of growing and making Pais have developed and been passed down generation after generation, so you’re truly drinking the history of Chile.
Lastly, the status and future of Pais is a metaphor for Chile, which is standing at the crossroads with recent protests and a referendum for a new constitution. Chileans are the product of a history of conquest by Spain and then influenced by other European powers and the US. After Pinochet, they have slowly begun to open up and diversify. Chilean winemakers won’t abandon Cabernet and Carmenere, no more than the Chilean people would abandon the European/US influence in their country. At the same time, why can’t Pais be the national grape? Pais is the underdog grape that has adapted and been used in different ways by the Spanish, Mapuches and campesinos over the centuries. It’s a more honest picture of Chilean’s history and people, and the country will need that moving forward as they try to reevaluate their national identity and social contract.
Tasting notes
Below are tasting notes of some Pais I’ve tasted recently while working on this piece. I’ve included a few others that are worth noting that I’ve tasted in the past.
2019 Estacion Yumbel Pipeno Bio Bio Secano Interior 100% Pais. Comes from 150 year old bush vines with original rootstock. 100% destemmed. Aged in 60-80 year old traditional pipas. Dry-farmed, unfined, unfiltered, and no sulphites added. The color is light but cloudy reflecting the unfilitered nature of the wine. The wine is rather typical rustic Chilean Pais. The nose is a bit funky with herbal, earthy, minerally notes. The palate features dark berry fruit with high acidity and a fizzy feel. There’s also a touch of spice. It’s a zippy wine that’s better chilled. The volcanic soil keeps it fresh and minerally. Some may not like the rustic nature of this wine, but it’d be nice with some rustic Chilean food like Prietas, or “blood sausage.” 88 pts.
About $20 outside of Chile and $10-13 in Chile.
2019 Roberto Henriquez Santa Cruz de Coya Pais Bio Bio Only 2,800 bottles made. From 200 year old bush vines over granite and volcanic soil. Minimal intervention. No pesticides or herbicides in the vineyard. No treatments or filtering in the cellar except a bit of sulfur at bottling. The nose has earthy, floral and minty components. The palate has red berry fruit with juicy acidity and some savory notes. Light-bodied. Quite elegant for a Pais, closer to Burgundy or Beaujolais in style rather than traditional country Pipeno. Light and juicy. 90 pts.
About $25 outside of Chile and the same in Chile.
2018 Pedro Parra Vinista Pais Itata This is Pedro Parra’s first Pais under his family label. It’s made from very old dry-farmed Pais grapes on granite-quartz soils. 30% full-clusters were used and natural yeast. It was aged in large oak and concrete vats. This is a Pais that leans towards Beaujolais rather than the rustic versions you can find in Chile. The nose has some earthy herbal notes and the palate is red fruit dominated along with floral notes. What really stands out is the weightlessness and elegance on the palate. Only 544 cases were made. 91 pts.
Around $19 outside of Chile and the same in Chile.
Louis-Antoine Luyt Huasa de Pilén Maule 2019 This site “Pilen Alto” is from a high elevation (500m) vineyard on red clay, granite and schist with 200-300 year old vines dry-farmed by 2 local farmers. He uses the same method as his Pipenos but ages it longer in old tinajas. Natural yeast is used. Harvested and destemmed by hand. It’s a nice light and red-fruited wine with a touch of floral notes and earthiness on the nose and it’s slightly herbacecous and minty on the back end. It definitely strikes a nice balance between the very rustic, natural and stronger Pipeno wines you find in Chile with the more elegant style of Burgundy/Beaujolais Cru wines. 3,000 bottles made. 90 pts.
Around $25 outside of Chile and $12 in Chile.
Louis-Antoine Luyt País de Quenehuao Maule 2019 6,000 bottles made. This Pais differs from his others because it’s aged 10 months in steel tanks and he uses carbonic maceration. Darker and fruitier than his Huasa de Pilen Alto. It’s also a little fuller and rounder. Higher in alcohol at 14%. They’re also made from older vines (300-400 years old) on granite and clay soils. There’s a nice floral component on the nose with a little bit of savory herbs along with the dark red fruit. The palate is fruit driven, easy-drinking with a little bit of chalky minerality. This is probably the least traditional of his Pais wines. I would’ve guessed Beaujolais Cru Fleurie if tasted blind. 91 pts.
Around $15-25 outside of Chile and $12 in Chile.
2019 Gonzalez Bastias Matorral Maule 100% Pais. Made from 200+ year old bush vines, dry farmed over granite soils. Manually crushed over zaranda. Native yeast used. No press juice. Unfiltered. Aged 12 months in traditional extremely old large rauli barrels.12.8% alcohol. 15,500 bottles made. The nose is pretty and rather complex with red berry fruit, floral notes, and earthy herbal notes. The palate is simple and very light with red fruit, a bit of stony minerality and mint. Medium acid. It’s as light on the palate as some rosés I’ve had. It’s very easy to drink and versatile with food. Probably the lightest and most feminine Pais I’ve had, but there’s still enough complexity, especially on the nose, to make it interesting. It lacks the rustic qualities some Pais and natural wines have. 91 pts.
Around $25 outside of Chile and $18 in Chile.
2019 Gonzalez Bastias Pais en Tinaja Maule Mainly different from their Matorral in how it’s aged, in that they age the wine 12 months in large clay jars rather than old restored rauli wood containers. The clay amphorae themselves are 300 years old. A little more acidity with a bit of spritz at first. It’s earthier, with clay, herbs and spice rather than floral notes. Overall, it feels darker even though there’s more acidity, and it’s less fruity. Still keeps the soft and elegant style of the Matorral though. 6600 bottles made. 90 pts.
Around $23 outside of Chile and $18 in Chile.
Others I’ve had in the past:
Cacique Maravilla, Pipeño de Uva Pais Bio Bio This popular producer’s vines are believed to have been planted in 1766. Light, fresh strawberry fruit and earthy. Sells in 1 liter bottles. Find on winesearcher.
Elena Pantaleoni Pisador Pais Cauquenes Maule This Italian producer, more famous for her wines in Emilia-Romagna, is trying to coax a more concentrated big wine out of Pais and is pretty successful in doing so without going over the top.It is darker, fuller, fruitier, riper, sweeter than most Pais. More modern and Rhone-like. Find on winesearcher.
La Causa Pais Itata (Miguel Torres) This Spanish-Chilean producer also makes a Pais that is more modern and Rhone-like. Find on winesearcher.
Vina Maitia Aupa Pipeno Maule Rather typical rustic Pais wine although there’s also Carignan in it. It has a stinky earthy herby nose with a simple light palate. This is also one of the only producers to sell their wines in cans. Find on winesearcher.
Renan Cancino El Viejo Almacen de Sauzal, Huaso de Sauzal Chilena Maule One of the more expensive Pais out there at $30 in Chile. A bigger, darker style with some earthy and floral notes. Find on winesearcher.
Bonus Tasting Note:
Many of these producers also have white wines that feature blends of 200+ year old vines from the same region. Here’s one I had recently.
Louis-Antoine Luyt Gorda Blanca Cuvee Benoit 2017 Bio-Bio Field blend of Moscatel de Alexandria, Torontel, Corinto (Chasselas) and Semillon from dry farmed vines that are 250+ years old. Granite & red clay soil. 6 months contact with lees. No sulfur, fining or filtering. Extremely floral on the nose with a touch of herbaceousness. Chamomile. It’s like a floral air freshener. The palate features savory minerality, citrus, and a bit of rustic, natural, earthy funk. This is not for modern wine lovers, but it’s unique with an interesting floral nose. It’s the white version of Pais dominated rustic Pipenos from this region. Find on winesearcher.
Can you call for a referendum when you’re not Chilean? I’d be curious how many likes you get on that😆
Well that’s the irony. A French person started the trend of raising up this very Chilean grape and the international market likes it more than the domestic Chilean market. However, Chileans overwhelmingly voted for a new constitution last Sunday.
I’m not arguing that it’s the best wine Chile makes. I’m saying it has the most history, is the most unique to Chile, and is connected to their culture. Therefore, it should be included as one of their “noble” and featured grape varietals.