Rebel Rose

Some Like it Hot A very interesting history of the rise in popularity and production of high alcohol wines, by the controversial owner of Vinovation in Sonoma. He doesn't seem to be grasping fo the ultimate, shocking sound bite here but delivers a very thought provoking piece. It's long, but well worth the read. (I like the cartoon, too.)

A quick note from your forum host: I've placed a link to our event guidelines in the pinned announcement section. Please give it a try . . . I can help you establish a planning thread for regional events or get-togethers. In a planning thread members can freely discuss their plans and questions for a single dinner or event. Please PM me if you have any questions.

In this month's issue of Business 2.0 magazine, writer Joel Stein shares a pretty much hilarious interview with Fred Franzia, the 'Bronco Brain' and creator of Two Buck Chuck. A few excerpts:

Just thought I would point all ardent wine lovers to a fantastic blog written by Francois Audouze. The blog is in French, however even if you don't speak French you should visit the blog for the wine and food photography! Les carnets de Francois Audouze

Ah yes, the Ministry of Silly Walks. Very apropo.

I haven't seen 'Wine for the Confused.' But I love Cleese and Fraser . . . I'll have to check it out. Also need to brush up on my Pythonisms, that's for sure. Plus, I just realized that my son is probably too young to have an appreciation for classic video literature. I shall have to rectify that, forthwith!

Wow, a very complete report. Thanks, Bill! I don't know whether to salivate more over the menu or the wines . . . so an inquiring mind wants to know--where did you eat?

We still have some seats available for dinner, and we may have room for 4 more people in the Saxum tour. So far, the weekend includes a casual get together at Vinoteca wine bar on Friday night, and on Saturday tours of the local abalone farm, an olive oil producer, premium wineries, and a two-hour private tour of Tablas Creek (owned by the Perrin family of Chateau de Beaucastel) where we will also picnic. A fantastic prix fixe dinner prepared by chef Tom Fundaro at Villa Creek, using heirloom tomatoes, olive oils and abalone from our tours will be followed on Sunday by a private tour and barrel tasting at Four Vines and a visit to Windrose Farms. This thread is now closed . . . please respond in the California thread if you have any questions! I must have final reservations within 1 week of this post. Note: Accomodations are getting very scarce. Let me know if you need help finding a place to stay. Thanks, it's going to be a GREAT weekend!

"Self selection by affinity." Ah, Max, you have such a talent for the perfect turn of phrase! Yes, some of the wine forums I read have a majority of the first creature, some of retail shops I pour at occasionally have mainly the second creature. And yes, I was being facetious when I asked "Is there such a creature?" There is, and you've descibed him perfectly, Max. Whenever I have a theme tasting for local industry folk, the few "civilians" who are invited to attend are generally in your camp--and very knowledgeable and pleasant they are, too. But one day recently I was observing some bullying and passive-agressive resistance between two almost caricature-like examples of Buyer #1 and Buyer #2 and I thought, if I were their King and got to smite one, which one would it be?

Who is the more discerning wine buyer? * A buyer who only purchases expensive wines, say $70 and up (and up, and up), purchases based on critic's scores and cellar consultant notes, and refuses to sully his/her palate with wines not on 'The List.' * A buyer who prowls his local wine shops, reads the wine forums, shops for QPR experiences and bargains, delights in the delicious yet unusual, and refuses to pay unGodly amounts of money for a wine. (Unless his curiosity overwhelms.) * A buyer who combines the best of both? Is there such a creature?

I hope you find some companions, tupac! Everyone, please send a PM to tupac to make arrangements or convey regrets. Thanks.

Florida Jim obliquely (very obliquely) inspired this Quest . . . How would you categorize your cellar or your taste in wine? The Holy Grail Something Entirely Different A ComPLETE Waste of Time (Precise percentages, please! It can't add up to 99.99%.) And are there any quotes/titles/phrases that are particularly applicable to your tastes?

Brand focus is a good thing. We also learned this the hard way. We had a contract for some fruit that Dan was less than happy with, so he made a tasty little table red, which we sold for $10 a bottle. We had meant it to be a little QPR wine for the tasting room, appealing to the pop-n-go crowd. Unfortunately, it became a big hit. Our distributors loved it, stores in NC were doing floor stacks of it, and customers were loading up their SUV's. But it was so not what we're trying to do here. Now the 'Renegade Red' is gone, no more. We published a notice via email and on our blog, but we still get requests every weekend. It wasn't sweet, but one good lesson we learned from the experience is that there is a huge market out there for tasty, inexpensive wines. I had a lovely, semi-sweet rose from a local vineyard this summer, but the producer won't be continuing it, because it doesn't fit his desired profile. I can't blame him. Consumers expect wineries to have an easily identifiable identity. Three or four word associations per label, I think.

It looks like an extraordinarily early harvest this year. Vineyards throughout the central coast have started picking whites and some pinot noir almost two weeks early! Our syrah and zinfandel are still not quite there. While most of California is reporting a lighter than usual crop load (25%), ours is significantly heavier, and we chose not to drop fruit as our little vineyard usually sets only 1.5 to 2 tons per acre. (So what might be a 'significant' increase for us would be a berry-in-a-bucket for someone else.) Still, we estimate our crop load to be 25% to 30% heavier than usual. After a cooler than usual summer, with few days over 90 degrees, we were slammed with hot temps this week. To top it all off, we just had an 18 hour thunderstorm, with lightning bolts smacking down into the hills immediately around us and spiffs of heavy rain. We are worried about mildew in the fruit, of course, but fortunately the rain spells were brief and the extremely hot temperatures burned off the moisture quickly. It has been uncharacteristically muggy though, so we will continue to monitor the clusters and watch for signs of mildew, but in our windy location I think we'll be okay. On a positive note, the fields, vineyards and orchards are a clean, vibrant green . . . a nice way to start the Labor Day weekend.

How was the offline tasting, John? By the way, the name of the wine is "Broken Stones." (I changed the title for you.) Clearly you enjoyed it alot.

From Wines & Vines: Busting Vineyard Myths Does dropping fruit concentrate the rest? Does water stress improve quality? Does irrigating reduce quality? While not directly related to dropping fruit, we had always assumed that it was a truism that first crop, second crop, and third crop berries would not ripen at the same time. Last year, with cooler fall temperatures, we were a little worried about getting the pH up there with the sugars, and we had 2-3 levels of cluster ripeness--some ripe, some lavender, some way behind. We asked old vine grower Benito Dusi to look at the vineyard and he said (in his calm, Italian way), "Just wait . . . just wait." Twice Beni came to the vineyard and advised us to wait . . . not to drop fruit or pick too soon. Amazingly, the ripe clusters held at an appropriate sugar level, and the second and third layers caught up! We did not lose any of our (already low tonnage-per-acre) harvest, and all the fruit was high quality. Maybe these "myths" come from 1950's/1960's agricultural "science"?

Sure thing.

Thanks for the plug, Kathy! Jon, if you are set on buying only Napa wines, I am sure there are NoCal residents here who can make good suggestions for their region. However, I'd like to point out that the major wine critics are beginning to pan Napa as the go-to source of fine wine. This week wine critic Robert Parker had this to say about Napa . . . And they have a lot of good things to say about Paso Robles and the Central Coast. If your menu is "progressive American", then don't you want to have a "progressive American" wine list? In California, it's considered old news to be Napacentric . . . so in addition to Napa you should also have some of the following wines on your list! Santa Rita Hills/Central Coast pinot noirs Arcadian Loring Jack Creek Paso Robles Rhones Tablas Creek (Owned by the Perrin family of Chateau de Beaucastel in Ch.du Pape Jacob Toft Paso Robles Zinfandel and Cabs Linne Calodo L'Aventure Napa/Sonoma hot small producers Rivers Marie Dry Stack Cellars August West Kosta Browne And to be truly progressive American, you'll want some Oregon pinot noir, Washington cab and syrah, and some Finger Lakes wines . . . perhaps it's time to kick up some "best of the best" threads for these regions . . .

Aha! I guessed before I even clicked on the link that the article was written by Jon Bonne! In the past I have been somtimes disgusted by SF Chronicle wine coverage because it has at times been nauseatingly Napa-centric. Jon was previously with MSNBC, and has just moved to San Francisco to take over the wine coverage. I am now looking forward to some real wine journalism coming from the SF Chronicle. I think his article is very balanced--it looks at the good and the bad, the real estate market, the boom of small wine productions, the drive for brand proliferation among the big beverage companies, etc. The story's hook is, of course, that Stag's Leap has always been "the little winery that could," a family winery that became famous and highly sought after. So in a way we're losing an icon with the sale of Leap to a corporation. The unspoken question however is: with the astronomical prices of Napa real estate, is it even worth it to try to establish a new brand there? An online comment from wine critic Robert Parker, July 31, 2007: Discuss?

You are a lucky duck indeed. Go for it! All the vineyards are excellent sources, and Steve Edmunds continues to produce elegant wines at myth-busting price points.

Here is the menu at Justin Winery. . . Lunch Menu Dinner Menu Good luck! Let us know what menu you decide on and how the job interview turns out.

Who knew? Well, this being eGullet and all, someone probably did, but it's news to me. About Coca-Cola From Wikipedia entry for John Pemberton: I wonder what the original wine formula tasted like? Can I get coca and cola teas or extracts from my health food store? It would be interesting to re-create the original.

I lif to efiscerate.

I guess we could loosely associate Manfred Krankl with Sine Qua Non, but you're kinda pushin' it!

From the article: So far this sounds pretty good, but I don't think this guy really knows what he's talking about. As for his health findings, I don't know enough science in that field to support or refute his comments, but . . . * He refers to some polyphenols as procyanadin. We have long referred to them in the business as flavanoid complexes called proanthocyanidin. * He says that highly tannic wines pair well with food. I have never found that to be the case. Acidity and balance are key to wine and food pairing. Frankly, as a former wine educator, I find this claim . . . bizarre. * He claims that "Mass-produced, modern wines are often lower in procyanidins because extraction periods are very short. Grapes are also left on the vine longer, resulting in riper fruit and higher sugar levels which, on fermentation, produces more alcohol." Actually, it is mostly the artisanal producers who push for later harvesting. Mass productions simply bring the wine in within their contractual harvesting dates and mechanically adjust the wine with additions of acid, powdered tannins, megapurple, and other additives. * "I do hope that at least some winemakers revert to making wines with less than 12.5 per cent alcohol and appreciably more tannins - for the sake of our health." Egad. An under-ripe wine with appreciable tannin? Can he give an example of a good one? Does this guy even drink wine? * If tannins are that critical to good health, why not drink good tea instead of bad wine? Or buy grape seed extract? So to me, the article reads as a sloppy promotion for a poorly researched book. Well at least there's a plug for Trader Joe's!