Making wine is, like making love, is good for the soul.  Like making love, it can be romantic, can be messy, can have good or bad results and can take a great deal of effort.  Unlike making love, it is often a rather technical subject.  

Most of the time, with a small production, the winemakers are sanitizing (cleaning) equipment, which is tedious and boring.  The only interesting thing that can happen during sanitation is to nail someone with a high-pressure spray of 180 degree water, which is the bad kind of interesting.  In fact, not much interesting happens in wine production that is good.  The most exciting thing I’ve ever seen at a winery, was a tank full of hundreds of gallons of chenin blanc explode - again, the bad kind of interesting.

Still, I plan to report on some of the steps in the winemaking process.  Understanding the process of production is one of the best ways to understand wine in general.  After all, the wine production process is the second most important influence upon a wine’s character.  It is also the second influence chronologically.  The influences on a wine, in order of chronology and degree are: viticulture (growing the wine); vinification (producing the wine); storage and transportation of the finished product, whether long-term or short-term; and service (what glass you are drinking from, what you just ate, etc.)

 Most of the work for this harvest season is behind me, but I’ll try to do this chronologically.  The next article will be about procuring and selecting grapes.  

Posted under Viticulture and Enology

The question of what makes a great wine has likely been around since thousands of years before the birth of Christ. The Romans, in fact, had some answers that resonate today, citing a lack of adulterants and naturally lower vineyard yields.

But how do we know if a wine is good, great, outstanding or none of the above? We can rely upon the Wine Spectator or Robert Parker, the most influential wine critic of all, to tell us which wine is best or measure quality by the price of the wine as a function of demand. There is no guarantee, however, that these guides will lead us to a wine for our own palate. In any case, what is the point of using prices or reviews as guides without an understanding of the criteria upon which they are judged?

Parker readily admits, in the movie Mondo Vino, that he simply rates whichever wines he likes with a high score. He makes no claim to be objective, beyond the principles of blind tasting, nor does he claim that his palate is in any way more valid than someone else’s when making a subjective determination. We can assume that he has a better shot than any of us at estimating alcohol levels or picking out which two glasses of a series of glasses are the same wine, but his opinions about which wines are good may not be much more useful to you the opinion of your son used to drinking boxed Franzia in his dorm room.

The use of price as the final arbiter of quality was the method of the 1855 classification of Bordeaux. The wine traders of Bordeaux rated the chateaux of the region by price, separating them into first through fifth growths, with only four chateaux being listed as fifth growth, though Chateau Mouton-Rothschild was promoted to this category in 1973. This notable promotion aside, the classification is essentially static. Yet it is still a great influence on the prices of Bordeaux, though many Americans would find little to love in some of these incredibly expensive bottles. How likely would you be to purchase a $300 bottle, which you would have to age at least a decade, only to find that it may still be too acidic or tannic and that this wine is nothing like the fruit-driven Australian and Californian wines you love so much?

So are there some solid, unchanging principles that indicate that a wine is of quality? Karen MacNeil, author of The Wine Bible, dedicates a section of her book to explaining what she believes these principles to be. She includes varietal characteristic, harmony, expressiveness, connectedness, integration and complexity. According to her, even if you don’t like a wine, you can, if trained well enough, determine its quality, which is not subjective.

The staff at University of California at Davis, the greatest wine research center in the country and maybe the world, generally disagrees. According to them, wine tastes are a fashion with styles coming and going and high-dollar fads like heavily-oaked chardonnays, older-vintage ports and merlot-based blends from Pomerol all eventually fade.

Since many centuries before the 1855 classification, the Greeks, with their ancient love of wine, have enjoyed retsina, an aromatized wine treated with pine resin during fermentation that would cause most of the world’s wine critics to gag.

I conducted a blind-tasting experiment at my own home with a group of low-budget wine drinkers, who rarely consume something that is worth more than $8 a bottle. Those wines which would score highest among critics were consistently beaten out by wines that are distinctly flawed. I’ve also noticed that when selling wine, the more a consumer knows about a wine, the more the wine is appreciated as a good wine when it is drank.

So, after all this flip-flopping about what makes a good wine, what is my answer? What makes a wine great is the joy that it brings. For me, wine usually brings me joy because of its appeal to all of my senses, with my sensual faculties as the judge of that. Wine can also provide a particularly pleasant intoxication, which is also a definite factor. Of course, a wine can pin together a good dinner and, together with good company, can play an important part in creating some of the most memorably happy times of my life.

Not that there is any shame in buying a wine for reasons other than the taste. For my parents’ anniversary, for example, I wouldn’t buy them a $12 bottle of Argentinean Malbec, no matter how good it tastes, even if I know they would love it. Why give them wine that is made on a large scale with little of the love that they feel for each other and no association with the festivity of a wedding anniversary? No, I am almost certainly going to give them a bottle of sparkling wine, likely Champagne. They know what Dom Perignon is, and revere it as something special. On the other hand, they would be delighted by an Iron Horse Wedding Cuvee, though they have never heard of Iron Horse, because it tastes great and has an appropriate name. In either case, I think that I, my parents, Robert Parker and price lists would agree that these are high-quality wines, perfect for two people celebrating a wedding anniversary.

Let me know what you think makes a good wine…

Posted under Thoughts on Wine

Whether you’re buying a case of wine so you have some to offer guests, or as a present to get someone’s home wine inventory going, here is a general guide to putting together a case of wine for a variety of meals and occasions.  Buy:
➢    One bottle of Champagne, as per your budget, for celebrations.
➢    Buy a second sparkling wine, like Delmas Blanquette de Limoux, for less festive occasions.
➢    One pinot noir, from the Russian River Valley or Oregon, for lighter and earthier meals.
➢    A jammy Zinfandel from Dry Creek Valley, for Thanksgiving turkey, grilling and pork dishes.
➢    One syrah or Rhone wine for lamb and heavy, earthy meals, or flavorful meats.
➢    One Chianti Classico, like Querceto L’Aura, for a variety of Italian meals and red meats.
➢    Port for blue cheese, like Stilton, and for chocolate, or as its own dessert.
➢    Two bottles of any combination of merlot, cabernet sauvignon or a Bordeaux, for steaks.
➢    An off-dry white from Alsace or Loire, like a Vouvray, for spicy meals.
➢    One California chardonnay, one Marlborough sauvignon blanc and a pinot grigio to have a variety of compliments to light meals and cheeses.

Posted under Buying Wine

Have you ever heard of blue raspberries, bushberries or champagne grapes?  Well, they all exist, but they’re all fake in some way or another.  They are also all delicious.  In fact, just the other day, at Market Hall, I bought all of them.

I saw berries that I did not recognize.  Their taste was most similar to an odd berry that would grow long, to about the size of a child’s finger, that I found in India, but only in one specific spot outside of the town of Rishikesh; it was sold at a relatively exorbitant price.  These ones at Maket Hall Produce were labelled as bushberries, grown in California, though the receipt listed them as black raspberries.

I did some research and found that bushberry is basically an overarching term for any berries that grow on bushes like raspberries, blackberries, thimbleberries, etc.  So they were bushberries, but what kind?   Black raspberries taste nothing like raspberries or blackberries, which fit this case, but they don’t grow in California.  Finally, I pinpointed the taste, like something between grape gummy candies and artificial blue raspberry flavoring.  Further research indicates that they are blue raspberries, also known as blackcap or whitebark raspberries or, confusingly, sometimes also called black raspberries.  They are delicious and should be tried.  I never knew that blue raspberries were real, and am even more surprised that the artificial flavoring is a decent approximation of the real thing.

The other “fake” fruit I bought that day was a pint of “champagne grapes.”  They’re little tiny, seedless, purple grapes on small-stemmed, tight, but large clusters.  They are nothing like real Champagne grapes, which are primarily pinot noir, pinot meunier and chardonnay.  Though they are a bit more difficult to eat than large grapes and not nearly as pleasing to bit into, but the taste is worth it.  This was the final of my fake fruit quandaries; they are called “champagne grapes” as nothing more than a disingenuous marketing tool.  They are actually an ancient Greek cultivar, known as Black Corinth.

Posted under Ingredients

We are excited to welcome the Lamorinda community to our website.

How much time do you spend wandering through the boxes of wines at Jackson’s Wine & Spirits or debating between a $10 and $16 bottle at BevMo wondering if it’s worth the extra $6? Too bad there’s no public agency to evaluate wine and spirit deals in Lamorinda.

Now there is. The Lamorinda Wine Society is delivering unbiased appraisals of the wine deals in Lafayette, Moraga and Orinda. We scour the local wine shops for the best deals on wine and spirits and find out about local events. Check out our deals below and then read a bit about us.

Take a peek at our Wine School and The Notebook, full of information on many aspects of the world of wine and spirits. The Kitchen is where we keep our food-related articles. Information on the wine shops mentioned can be found at the end of this document.

Top Red Wine

Querceto L’Aura Chianti Classico

Full of black cherry and black plum, this wine has a great backbone. A wonderful accompaniment to red meat, which really brings out its earthy notes. As the wine opens up it becomes considerably more generous and supple. Finding a great Chianti Classico for this price is nearly impossible. Here’s a great one, just make sure to give it time to open up by decanting it and then pouring small pours into large glasses at least a few minutes before serving.

Top White Wine

2006 Dancing Coyote Albarino

This is an amazing wine for the price. Though it is full-bodied, it is also very crisp, with fresh acidity and a fruity aroma. Like a bowl of lemons and passionflower. The interesting duality of being crisp enough to go with seafood, yet full-bodied makes it ideal for scallops, lightly sauteed in butter; buttered swordfish steaks. It is also versatile enough to pair with both oysters and heavy cheeses.

Top Spirit

Prunier Axel Gay

Prunier is not one of the best known of the Cognac houses, but their Axel Gay Cognac, from 100% Grande Champagne grapes, is phenomenal, as good as many Cognacs two or three times its price. Many Jackson’s regulars already know about this great find, because they push it, and deservedly so. Currently, Bevmo has it for a bit less than Jackson’s.

How it works:

Please note that we do not include deals that are simply lower prices or sales on commonly known wines and spirits. For instance, Silver Oak is a well-known winery and we will not include a $55 bottle of Silver Oak in our deals, just because it is the best price in Lamorinda. Similarly, we will not carry items like Wild Turkey, just because it is on sale for $14 somewhere. Instead, we try to bring you deals that are a bit harder to find than just comparing prices. Please let us know if you find something we have here for cheaper at another source in Lamorinda.

Posted under Local Picks