St. Laurent

St. Laurent (Sankt Laurent) is a silky, dark-fruited red grape of Central Europe, most at home in Austria, where it ranks among the country's most respected native-adopted reds. A member of the Pinot family, it shares that lineage's fine-grained charm: deeply coloured yet supple, with sour-cherry and dark-berry fruit, a savoury forest-floor depth and soft, velvety tannins. It is best known today as one parent of Zweigelt, Austria's most planted red grape, a cross with Blaufränkisch that has eclipsed St. Laurent in acreage while inheriting its plush texture. Temperamental in the vineyard but rewarding in the glass, St. Laurent is the connoisseur's Austrian red — Pinot-like elegance with a distinctly Central European soul.