Archive for the ‘Winemaking’ Category
Monday, August 23rd, 2010
 I was talking the other day with my friend Arthur (The Wine Sooth), and he raised an interesting question: In light of the pressure on the part of producer to maintain profits while maintaining competitive pricing, are we likely to see an overall decline in wine quality as a result of the current economic downturn?
I have to admit that I’d never really thought about this before, but it’s kind of an obvious question to ask as more producers struggle to maintain their revenues and market share while facing an increasingly cash-strapped and reluctant buying public. I’m not really sure of the answer, but there’s certainly both a pro and a con side to this issue.
On the “Pro” side (quality should decline), most obvious is the fact that reducing retail prices while maintaining positive revenue means more and more of the wine on the market has to come from mass-production Central Valley vineyards. These grapes, nothing special to begin with, are then rammed through a fermentation and aging process (if any) that emphasizes doing things on the cheap (to maximize net profit). As more and more wines on the shelves are made of 100% or 25% low-quality Central Valley fruit, on average, we’d expect to see a greater level of mediocrity. As more poor quality California wines enter the market, the lower the overall (average) quality of California wine. It’s a fact of life that fine winemaking and $7.99 retail really don’t pair very well.
But I think it goes further than that. As a producer, can you (or should you) spend the same amount of money to make what used to be a $30 wine that now only fetches $15-20 a bottle? Likewise, if you’re a grape grower who used to get $4,000/ton, and you can’t even get half that now, are you able to (or can you afford to) put the same amount of effort into farming? Measures that lower the cost of growing or producing wine will in all likelihood result in lower quality wine.
Additionally, when you’re already struggling to make a small profit on your wines and you pride yourself on making a high-quality product, why would you want to expand production, or even maintain production, beyond what you’re pretty certain you can sell? It follows that if less high end wine is being produced, the overall quality of wine has to be affected.
Also on the “pro” side is the consolidation that’s taking place in the wine business. To some extent, this is due to the ongoing trend of larger companies buying up smaller ones - a trend that’s accelerated in these hard times. In addition, larger companies are gaining market share at the expense of smaller companies that can’t compete in the lower end of the market. Either way, if you believe, as I do, that smaller wineries as a rule make better wines, the declining market share of smaller wineries should translate into lesser overall quality. It’s a matter of the proportions of what’s on the shelves.
That’s the “pro” side of the argument. But there’s a “con” side as well.
Grapes from the most prestigious areas (e.g., Napa, Sonoma) are still being grown and harvested and turned into wine, and it’s unlikely this will change to any significant degree. So if the best vineyards are still being harvested and wine is being made from them, we should expect that the quality at the high end, as always, will be maintained. Or, at least, that’s the argument.
Also on the “con” side is the general trend towards improvement in grapegrowing and winemaking that we’ve witnessed over the last few decades. This improvement, though minimal from one season to the next, over a period of years has to help the general level of wine quality irrespective of the prevailing economics in any particular year. Even in the Central Valley. And the argument can be made that if, after an economic recovery, wines labeled California continue to be made from Central Valley fruit, market pressures will drive improvements in growing in that region – leading to better (if still not stellar) wines.
And the ultimate “con” argument is that the present economic pressures will dissipate, and we’ll be back to business as usual in a few years. That raises the question whether we’re witnessing a basic change in the wine business that won’t be undone whenever the good times return. Its really going to depend on the consumer, who may, or may not, have permanently altered their view of what’s an acceptable wine. I guess, in the end, that’s the $64,000 question.
Posted in Viticulture, Winemaking | 5 Comments »
Monday, August 2nd, 2010
Whenever I read a winery’s tasting note, I’m always amazed to see that the winery has, once again, produced the perfect wine. Perfect in the sense that the note has only good to say about the wine, and nothing even hinting that maybe this isn’t the best wine ever made. I’d have to plead equally guilty, since our tasting notes are certainly every bit as one-sided as everyone else’s.
I don’t know how to bring this practice to an end, but it would be a good thing if we all started owning up to the fact that only one in a thousand wines is perfect, if that. While I think each of the wines we produce is, at the least, a good solid effort, I wouldn’t claim perfection for any of them.
So, in the hope, vain though it might be, of bringing a little more candor to the to the subject, I’m going to talk some about what, at least in my opinion, is a perfect wine, and where I’ve fallen short in trying to produce one.
First and foremost, the perfect wine should be well endowed with fruit. It doesn’t need to be a fruit bomb, but it can’t be thin, either. Unfortunately, there’s a limit to what you can do if a wine isn’t well endowed with fruit. Blending in a fruitier wine is really all that can be done. I would like to say that all of my wines have shown well in the fruitiness category, but I can’t. I can think of two wines in particular that, for all their other graces, didn’t have the amount of fruit in them that I would have liked to have seen.
Next to being a good expression of fruit, by far the most important thing in a perfect wine is balance. By balance, I mean that the wine doesn’t suffer from a conspicuous lack, or excess, in any one area. Take acidity as an example. Too little acid, and a wine is soft and flabby. To much, and it can be tart to the point of unpleasantness. Much the same applies to things like tannin level (structure), or alcohol level (too much and the wine is hot; too little and it can come across as thin). On the subject of balance, I would give our wines generally a fairly high grade. The one area where I would find fault is alcohol levels, where I’ve often ended up with a wine higher in alcohol than I would have preferred. Fortunately, many people like higher alcohol wines, so to some extent I’ve dodged the bullet on that one.
Maybe best considered as an aspect of balance, but important enough to deserve it’s own discussion, is the subject of oak. I think what type of oak you like is largely a matter of personal preference. But the amount of oak, at least for me, should not be excessive. In my perfect wine, the oak should be something that frames the fruit in the wine, but doesn’t dominate it. I’ve certainly made a couple of wines where I felt I went a little overboard on the oak. I am especially critical of myself in this regard since the amount of oak is something that is pretty controllable by the winemaker. Like alcohol, many people like lots of oak, so you tend to get a pass when you use too much. In fact, that probably accounts for why there are so many overtly oaky wines out there. At any rate, I would put excessive use of oak on the list of my winemaking errors.
I’ve written before on the subject of wine flaws, and how subjective they are (see http://artisanfamilyofwines.com/blog/?p=221 ) . Nonetheless, I would put lack of flaws on the short list of what makes a perfect wine. On this subject, I would give myself high scores, as our wines are cleanly made, whatever their other shortcomings.
Finally, the perfect wine needs to be complex. I’m not sure exactly what complexity is in wine, but I know it when I taste it. To some extent, I think scoring well on the all the above subjects translates into complexity, though I would in particular note that a wine deficient in fruit, acid, or tannin, is not going to be complex. And since a wine builds complexity as it ages (up to a point), complexity is something of a moving target. I think our wines have, with a few years of bottle age, done pretty well when it comes to complexity, though I can’t say that our wines have achieved the levels of complexity of truly great wines.
So I haven’t made the perfect wine, and doubt I ever will. Perfection is the Holy Grail of winemaking, something to be sought, but seldom achieved. If I haven’t made the perfect wine, I can at least console myself that a very few others have either.
Posted in Winemaking | 4 Comments »
Monday, July 19th, 2010
My friend Bob Ecker is, among other things, the wine writer for H Monthly Magazine, and his most recent article (to be published shortly) was on what, in his opinion, were the best available Chardonnay’s out there. The article, fittingly enough, is entitled “Killer California Chardonnays”.
Bob got deluged with over a 100 bottles of Chardonnay in response to his request for samples. I got to taste maybe a tenth of these wines along with him and a few other friends totally at random. And I must say that I was more impressed with the quality of the wines than I have ever been with Chard.
I don’t grow or make Chardonnay, so my take on this subject is purely as a consumer. And I would certainly say I’m not, as a general rule, Chard’s biggest fan. But, by and large, these wines were lovely, a pleasure to taste and drink.
When I say I’m not Chard’s biggest fan, it’s not because I dislike the grape. Quite the contrary, I think the grape an excellent one. Rather, I have disliked how it’s usually been made.
To my palate, a wine, particularly a white wine, should, first and foremost, be an expression of the fruit of the grape. The wine should also pack a decent punch of acidity, which makes it refreshing and emphasizes the fruit as well. Oak should be something that frames the fruit flavors of the wine, not the main character.
Most Chards stereotypically have been diametrically opposed to this paradigm of winemaking. They have suffered from some or all of the following: overly soft (lacking acidity), big buttery flavors, and, most of all, Oak, Oak, and more OAK.I’ve always thought of it as a freak wine, since it is so manufactured and so different than the way nearly all other wines are made.
This group of Chardonnays certainly defied the stereotypical chardonnay. Most were relatively high in acidity (as they should be), making them much better food wines and presaging a longer life span. None were overtly buttery. And, most important, while oak was definitely in evidence, in none of the wines did the oak overwhelm the fruit.
I’m doubt that what I tasted is truly representative of the entirety of the Chardonnay market, but that I would go through 10-12 Chardonnays, at random, and find none of them worthy of bitter criticism bespeaks a major change in the way Chardonnay is being made. What’s happened?
I would think part of it has to be picking somewhat earlier, to maintain acidity. I also assume at least some (though not all) of the blends have higher proportions that haven’t gone through malolactic fermentation, a process that turns the more acidic malic acid into the less tart lactic acid. In some cases, I would have to believe the wines are entirely non-malolactic fermented. Since the buttery characteristic in Chardonnay is the result of a definite winemaking decision, these wines evidence that winemakers have definitely throttled back on this aspect of Chardonnay making. Oak, likewise, is also a winemaking decision, and the fact that none of the wines was oak dominated bespeaks volumes about the restraint that at least some winemakers are using when making their Chards.
While I can’t believe that the stereotypical Chardonnay (soft, buttery, oak dominated) is a thing of the past, the fact that there’s now a definite trend in the opposite direction has to be a good thing for Chardonnay. I can only hope that this counter-trend represents the mainstream of Chardonnay’s future.
Posted in Wine Tasting, Winemaking | 2 Comments »
Monday, June 28th, 2010
A recent post by Steve Heimoff caught my attention, “’Obscure’ varieties a hard sell”, which can be found at http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2010/06/24/obscure-varieties-a-hard-sell/
Heimoff has some interesting things to say about obscure varietals (i.e., varietals that have a tiny place in the market place and that many have never heard of). Since I’ve always had a fascination for obscure varieties, I’m going to agree with some of what Heimoff has to say, and disagree, profoundly, with some of the rest.
First, let me say I got interested in some of the obscure varieties by a problem of the inland California vineyard, excessive heat. The main grape varieties on the market (e.g., Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay) come from France and thrive in the climates of Bordeaux and Burgundy. But compared with the California inland valley, those are relatively cool growing areas. In France, those grapes may ripen under optimal conditions, but here they all too often ripen earlier in the growing season, when heat is at its hottest. Some varieties seem to tolerate the heat just fine (I’m thinking of Petite Sirah), but others don’t do as well (I’m thinking of Cabernet Sauvignon).
Ripening under intense heat opens you up to a variety of problems. Sugar levels can spike, requiring either that you add a bunch of water at the winery or else live with high alcohol levels in the finished wine. Acidity often drops, requiring a hefty acid addition at the crush pad, or else living with low acid, flabby, wines.
Sugar and acid levels at least have the redeeming grace that there are corrective actions you can take. But shrivel and raisining produce flavors in the wine that you pretty much have to live with. Those flavors progress from plum, through prune, to raisin. While some people like those flavors, and therefore seek out those wines, I would prefer to avoid at least prune and raisin, even if some plum is okay.
So this is where some of the obscure varieties come in, at least for me. Many of these varieties originate in Southern Europe (e.g., Italy, Spain, Portugal), under climactic conditions more similar to what we experience in the inland valleys. I’ve played around with a number of these grapes with, I would have to say, limited albeit important success. My two stars are Montepulciano and, to a somewhat lesser degree, Aglianico. Montepulciano is a real late ripener, which we pick usually in late October or even early November. It retains high acidity while achieving moderate sugar levels. It emphasizes the brighter part of the fruit spectrum, unlike other varieties that, ripening under greater heat, emphasize the darker part of the spectrum. I hope my first Montepulciano bottling will hit the market within a year.
To be continued on Friday.
Posted in Harvest, Viticulture, Wine Sales and Pricing, Winemaking | No Comments »
Monday, June 21st, 2010
We all know what the cult winery is. It’s usually located in Napa Valley, and produces a Cabernet Sauvignon, usually one with too much oak and not enough acid. But the wine itself isn’t the telltale point, as many other wines are Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley with too much oak. The main thing is the feeding frenzy that manages to be created around these wines. That these wines are often derivative is almost beside the point.
Somehow, for me, the cult winery manages to exemplify all that is worst about the wine world. Instead of being a beverage, an extremely fine beverage to be sure, wine is transformed into something it is not, and never should be—an icon. And, as an icon, it becomes something to be venerated rather than simply enjoyed.
Maybe it’s just envy on my part, not being a cult wine. But to be a cult wine is to be the same old same old. It involves parlaying a vineyard, usually located in the prime of Napa valley, and processing what is, no doubt, high quality fruit under the aegis of some celebrity winemaker. Often, though certainly not always, the main contribution of the owner of the enterprise is a lot of bucks, with little real knowledge of how the product is made. And the end result is one that, while it can’t be criticized for being inferior (at least most of the time), is one that is remarkably like the output of other cult wineries.
If you’re lucky enough to produce such a wine, and garner a high enough score from the Spectator or Advocate, you may very possibly be at the center of the mass hysteria that characterizes cult wines. And that, namely mass hysteria, is at stage center of the cult wine. Each cult wine is its own private bubble, only these bubbles often don’t pop, or at least not too quickly.
Once cult status is obtained, it must be protected. At this point, the high rating originally obtained should not be risked with renewed competition, competition in which some other, unknown, wine may show itself superior. Particularly since wine rating is pretty arbitrary, the arbitrarily high score one year can easily yield itself to the arbitrarily low score a year later, to the detriment of the cult brand.
But whoever garners the cult laurels of today is really beside the point. Wine shouldn’t be about the one in a thousand winery that succeeds in achieving cult status. Wine should be about the simple pleasure of enjoyment surrounded by good food and good friends. All too often, the cult wine experience is one where everyone must ooh and aah over the wine, whether you personally like it or not, or else risk being branded unknowledgeable concerning the finer points of wine appreciation. It is the brave taster who would utter his belief that the wine is nothing out of the ordinary (as in most cases it will be).
The cult wine also feeds into the cult of Cabernet Sauvignon. This is a fine grape, to be sure. But it’s not the only fine grape, the cult wine buzz notwithstanding. But other equally fine grapes rarely if ever seem to achieve cult status, no matter how wonderful a wine they may make. This results in the denigration of all non-Cabernet Sauvignon wines, if only by way of exclusion from entry into cult status.
And, finally, let me return to the subject of originality in winemaking, something that cult wines eschew in favor of producing the same sort of Cabernet Sauvignon that other cult wineries produce. Wouldn’t ones legacy be of greater worth by doing something (new variety, new style, new anything) that hasn’t been done before, than redoing what other cult wineries have done in the past, and will do again in the future?
Posted in Wine Tasting, Winemaking | 8 Comments »
|
