Grape variety
Pinot Gris
Pinot Gris, called Malvoisie in Valais: the grey mutation of Pinot Noir, made dry or as a sweet flétri. Origin, where it grows, character and pairings.
- Colour
- White (greyish-pink berries)
- Origin
- A colour mutation of Pinot Noir; the German name Ruländer goes back to a find at Speyer in 1711
- Grown in Switzerland
- About 240 hectares across all regions; German-speaking Switzerland, Valais and Three Lakes lead
- Typical aromas
- Dry: pear, hazelnut; as flétri: quince, apricot, honey
- Classic pairing
- Dry with mushroom dishes and white meat; flétri with blue cheese and apricot tart
- Synonym
- Malvoisie (Valais), Grauburgunder, Ruländer, Pinot Grigio
Pinot Gris has no family tree of its own: it is a whim of Pinot Noir, a colour mutation in which the berries turn greyish-pink instead of blue. It appeared independently in several places in the vineyards of Burgundy. In 1711 the Speyer merchant Johann Seger Ruland described feral vines in a garden at Speyer, which is why the grape was long called Ruländer in Germany; today it is Grauburgunder there and in German-speaking Switzerland, Pinot Grigio in Italy. Switzerland adds a name of its own that confuses more than it explains: in Valais the grape is called Malvoisie.
Valais Malvoisie has genetically nothing to do with the Greek-Italian Malvasia. The name already appears in a 17th-century Valais recipe book, and only in 1869 did the Zürich chemist Kohler establish that it was Pinot Gris. The name stuck because it stands for a style: in Valais Malvoisie is almost always made as a flétri, from grapes left to shrivel on the vine, sometimes with noble rot. The result is golden, sweet, concentrated wine with quince, apricot, honey and spice that finds its balance after a few years in the cellar. Dry versions are labelled Pinot Gris in Valais. The canton has a little over 50 hectares of Malvoisie.
Across Switzerland there are about 240 hectares, spread over every region: more than a quarter in German-speaking Switzerland, a quarter in Valais, nearly a fifth each in the Three Lakes region and Vaud, the rest in Geneva and Ticino. Outside Valais the grape is mostly made dry. It is then a full-bodied, rather low-acid white with pear, hazelnut and a faintly bitter echo on the finish; some estates age it in wood, which adds smoke and creaminess. The grape ripens early and, like all Pinots, its compact bunches make it prone to rot, so it needs airy slopes.
At the table dry Pinot Gris is an all-rounder with white meat, poultry, mushroom dishes and Rösti with creamy mushroom sauce. The sweet flétri wants a foil: blue cheese, terrines, an apricot tart or simply a slice of Valais rye bread with butter. Serve the dry wine at 10 to 12 degrees, the sweet one a little cooler.
To meet both faces of the grape, buy a Malvoisie flétrie from Valais and a dry Grauburgunder from the Zürich Weinland or Lake Biel and taste them side by side. It is hard to believe the same grape lies behind both.