OK, so just 5 ways... "top" is inferred.
5 ways to improve California wine
Jon BonnéSunday, July 3, 2011
Last Independence Day, I set out five themes to define California wine (see sfg.ly/myxL7s). That seemed like a savvy July 4 tradition to continue, so I sifted through my past year's notes to devise another five.
Again, these aren't about how to build a more perfectly generic Merlot. There are about how independent vintners can carve a better path to the future.
And so, five more ways to continue the roll of innovation.
1. Take white wine seriously. There's a quiet cynicism about white wine - a school of thought is that no serious wine drinker will dabble in it, aside from the occasional overwrought Chardonnay.
Ridiculous. Sure, there have been failures of white-wine ambition - anyone still shelling out for white Meritage? - and whites will always struggle for attention in a market where Cab and Pinot get all the glory. But the seas of bad Pinot Grigio and Sauvignon Blanc, the ho-hum Rieslings and all that bionic Chardonnay are sad testament to what California vintners think of white-wine lovers.
Enough.
Some of the most compelling winemaking is taking place in white wine, whether it's fermenting Sauvignon Blanc in small steel barrels to finesse its texture or the arrival of old-vine white field blends from places like Sonoma's Compagni Portis vineyard. (Even in the supermarket, a blend like Big House White acknowledges the potential of forward-thinking whites.) There's ever more energy behind Vermentino and Grenache Blanc and Albarino, any of which could make a bid to transcend their niche status.
The wine-drinking world has signaled that red-wine bias isn't there; Nielsen Co. data show as much white being bought as red (55 million cases this past year). So give whites their due.
2. Stop the AVAs. What was the original purpose of an American Viticultural Area? To delineate somewhere with unique winegrowing properties.
Point being, there was a time when you made wine, built a reputation for a locale and then tried to get that reputation protected by law - usually in order to preserve your franchise. Now the appellation application comes first; if you're lucky, reputation follows.
You might agree that newly approved Coombsville has earned a reputation as a happy slice of Napa. Maybe the Annapolis area of the Sonoma Coast has ample cachet. But has the Lake County area of Big Valley (southeast of Lakeport), now preparing to submit its application, set the world alight? Not to target them; dozens of obscurities dot the AVA map. (Quick: Where's Covelo?) Even the federal government seems to be wary of the hinky politics behind the flood of applications.
The geography geek in me has a soft spot for AVAs. Wine is all about place, and a regulatory system exists to affirm that. But let's momentarily pause and return to the hard part: building a reputation that earns a place name on a bottle.
3. Let the Pinot thing go. So Pinot was - maybe still is - the next great hope for California wine. The best of California Pinot has unquestionably earned a place at the table with Burgundy. We know that consumers want a $10 bottle of Pinot, and we know what might be required to make that happen (see sfg.ly/9M1nBE ).
Now let's move on. Pinot was always meant to be special; the best way to honor it is to stop trying to turn it into confected, cheap wine. Let's exalt the beauty of grapes that do well in a $10 bottle rather than trying to use silk to sew a dishrag.
In other words, let Pinot go back to being Pinot. Find another grape to overexpose. That probably will be Malbec, though let's pray that California doesn't think it's wise to take on Argentina in a race to the bottom.
4. Redefine the estate. A great tragedy of California's Wine Country is the ridiculous price now required for an enterprising vintner to buy a little slice of heaven.
The prospect of an estate winery, which contains its own vineyards, has become a bauble for the well-off or well-financed. Thus we have lived for at least a decade amid a disconnect, in which those with the knowledge to make amazing wine are often the least able to control that process from budbreak to bottle - which might be why "estate bottled" has fallen into irrelevancy.
I won't be so foolish as to suggest that land prices spin down. But those making wine in warehouses and sheds are trying harder than ever to control their entire farming process; consider arrangements like those made by the owners of the tiny Anthill Farms label to help farm the Abbey Harris site in Anderson Valley. You may not own the soil, but just as leaseholding has long existed in France's vineyards, you can still work it yourself.
One of the most stubborn gaps in California wine is between grower and winemaker. With a new generation of winemakers who very much want to farm, but can't acquire their own land, now's the time to reconsider that gap by encouraging winemakers to hop on the tractor.
5. Simplify. Winemaking costs money. Want wood flavor? Those oak chips (to say nothing of barrels) add to the bottom line. Picked at the wrong time? All that de-alcoholization and acid addition is an added expense.
In the spirit of giving a nickel for each time "great wine is made in the vineyard" has been uttered, it's time for winemakers to practice the essence of that phrase - and simplify their jobs.
So: Grow better fruit (or work with growers to improve their practices) and fine-tune your picking decisions; aim for a balance of flavor so that fruit doesn't need to be tweaked in the winery; put your basic wines in simple steel tanks and your fancy stuff in whatever you think it requires; stop turning every wine into a science project. Have faith that California can grow fruit that requires no repair.
Of course there are vintages that go awry and need high-tech help. Witness Germany's 2010 vintage, when outrageous acid levels forced many noninterventionist winemakers to de-acidify, usually with aghast looks on their faces. But these efforts should be a rare exception, not the rule.
The bonus? You'll spend a lot less money fixing bad decisions later.
Jon Bonnés The Chronicle's wine editor. Find him at jbonne(a)sfchronicle.com or @jbonne on Twitter.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/07/03/FDR71K4B5H.DTL
May be worht it to hear Terry Theise "spin" this one....
http://insidescoopsf.sfgate.com/blog/2011/07/01/germanys-bizarro-2010-vinta…
Germany.s bizarro 2010 vintage
Posted on 07/01/2011 at 9:03 am by Jon Bonnén Wine, Winemakers
The Rotenfels vineyard in the Nahe, a site nearly as intense as the 2010 wines. (Photo: German Wine Institute)
Next to the bearded lady and the four-leaf clover in the Curiosities folder, you can place Germany.s 2010 vintage.
An odd combination of rain and hail, and general lack of sunshine until the very crucial end of the vintage . buoyantly termed a .Golden October. by the Germans . caused a drastic reduction in crop, by an average 25 percent, and produced a heck of an anomaly.
By .anomaly,. I mean a year that left pretty much everyone violently shaking their heads. No one has come up with an apt comparison to any other year. And so, just in time for 31 Days of German Riesling, arriving today, a crazy dose of Riesling.
That might be because the 2010 wines are concentrated in a way virtually no one has ever tasted . little powerhouses of purity. .Forget .vinosity.,. wrote importer Terry Theise in his annual catalog, .these babies are as dense as paperweights..
(Even better is a quote Theise included, which I.ll heist and pass along here, from Johannes Geil in the Rheinhessen: .This year we didn.t really discuss the crop; we knew the names of each berry..)
I queried Theise on the vintage a few months ago, because the head-scratching had begun even before tanks finished fermenting. He was still struggling to get his head around the wines, which are marked by remarkably high sugar levels and even ridiculously high levels of acidity. While recent years have given a surplus of sugar, the acids in 2010 saw that sugar and raised it. By about a million bucks. These wines are very much turned up to 11.
Acid, be gone
Which brings us to 2010.s tricky little side story. Most wines were so high in acid that even some of the most hidebound vintners were typically forced to de-acidify. (Mostly by the use of calcium carbonate; more on that here.) Germans don.t much cotton to tinkering with their wines, so to yank out crucial acid, just to make it drinkable? Well, this must have been one heck of a vintage.
Thus it was with major curiosity that Theise.s annual tasting of German wines rolled into town this week.
How were the wines? Really hard to parse. Even in this first brief glance (although Theise.s tastings are nearly canonical in RieslingWorld), most usual rules of thumb went out the window.
Take a wine like the A.J. Adam Dhroner Riesling, a dry bottling from one of my favorite Mosel producers. It was opulent and nearly impossible to understand . mute in one moment, showing off a polished honeycomb aspect the next. One of Adam.s sweet efforts, the Dhron Hofberg Kabinett, had that same polished aspect, with fermentation aromas still lingering. There wasn.t the electricity I had come to expect, as though the intensity was wrapped in wool; I wondered if the wines received malolactic fermentation, almost unheard of in German Riesling but occasionally used this wacky year. When I later asked Theise about the wines, he said they.d been showing gorgeously in New York. .YMMV [your mileage may vary],. he wrote. Could that be the motto for the vintage?
The TBA that shall not speak its name
Then came were freak wines. The Selbach-Oster Zeltinger Sonnenuhr Rotlay, for instance, showed up without a Pradikat (kabinett, spatlese, etc.) level . mostly because Johannes Selbach wanted to highlight this teensy parcel within the Sonnenuhr vineyard without falling back on classifications. But also because the wine was picked with sugar levels that qualify as Trockenbeerenauslese (at least 150 degrees Oechsle), yet with ridiculous acidity that placed it in a completely other realm. I had no reference point, beyond it being crazy good. Emphasis on both words.
As counterpoint, the Merkelbach Urziger Wurzgarten Beerenauslese. I was shocked to find it in a full 750ml bottle (BAs are almost always in half bottles) until I realized that another vintner might have labeled it a Spatlese, but Merkelbach took the forthright step of slapping a true Pradikat level on the bottle rather than quietly classifying it downward. And it tasted like a Spatlese on steroids. The flavors just hung out in my mouth for a few minutes, refusing to leave.
The tiny Nahe region appeared as a stronghold of finesse in 2010. Harald Hexamer had to resort to a touch of de-acidifcation to bring his edgy wines into line. But his Rheingrafenberg Kabinett and In Den Felsen Spatlese both found ways to harness the beauty of ridiculous acidity . 10.4 grams/liter of acid and up, about double what you.d find in a California Chardonnay. Flavors of lemongrass and fern and grapefruit not only burst forth; they pretty much smacked me in the face.
Of course there was Donnhoff, perhaps the most famous of Theise.s estates, etched and already beautifully showy. Witness the twofer of Oberhauser Brucke wines from Donnhoff.s wholly owned vineyard, crafted from two sides of the same grape bunches. The sun-exposed halves went into the Auslese Goldkapsel, the others into the Spatlese. The Auslese was lush but invigorating, while the Spatlese showed a weightlessness, like a Kabinett on overdrive. .My wines should be a little bit like fresh spring water,. Cornelius Donnhoff told me by way of understatement.
Throw out the rules
If his were a spring, some wines provided a waterfall. A wine like the Meulenhof Wehlener Sonnenuhr Spatlese, usually a bit shy when young, was flat-out electric . full of stone and green apple flesh, already with perfect pitch. But others seemed a bit too twitchy, perhaps overwhelmed by their acid.
In the end? Question marks. There have been many preliminary rules of thumb on 2010 . dry wines will be too austere, typically rich Pfalz wines be snappy and lean. I suspect we.ll throw most of those out; these wines have no obvious corollaries.
But some true successes are already clear. Witness a lineup like that of Johannes Leitz, who engaged in some moderate de-acidification (he gave me a recap on how the process also removed harsh oxalic acid, typically found in rhubarb). His most unkempt, rowdy effort? The popular Eins Zwei Dry, which follows a bit of that party line about dry wines in .10. But his benchmark Dragonstone was charged and powerful, with acidity to nearly transcend its sweet profile (at 90 degrees Oechsle, it.s well into Spatlese territory).
That charged sensation came through even more directly in Leitz.s Rudesheimer Berg Roseneck Spatlese. It exuded the presence of a nectarine at its perfect point of ripeness, with some current (as in electricity, not as in little red fruit) running through.
It.s a galvanizing wine. From a galvanizing year that offered rollercoasters in a bottle. Rather than listen to endless blather about another Bordeaux vintage to die for (or die paying for), I.d prefer to contemplate a vintage that wants to Taser me into appreciation.
.
Whew! For those of you diligent enough to stick it out until the end, a bonus photo from our Teutonic friends. And so 31 Days of Riesling begins . now.
Do not cross the Riesling. (Photo: German Wine Institute)
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* Dr. James Ellingson, jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* mobile : 651/645-0753 *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
* james(a)brewingnews.com James.Ellingson(a)StThomas.edu *
Dear friends,
Fellow Champagne fans have no doubt noticed that in the case of a nonvintage
(multi-vintage) wine there's no way to tell, just from looking at the
bottle, what was the base year and what is/are the other year(s) in the
blend. Turns out the reason why there's no way to tell is not just the
secretiveness of Champagne producers - it's the American government.
Peter Liem reports in today's blog post that the Champagne grower-producer
Pascal Doquet "took the time to design a [back] label that could fit all of
the necessary information [pictured in the blog; the label indicated the
bottle contained a 1999-98-96 blend, as well as bottling and disgorgement
dates and dosage, plus don't drink when pregnant and other warnings required
by law], printed it up and sent it off to his American importer. Looks
great, right? Wouldn't you be thrilled if all champagnes had this level of
detail on the label? Well, you're not going to see this label on any of
[Doquet's] bottles, as it was rejected by the American authorities. The
reason is that in the United States, indications of years are not allowed on
non-vintage wines, meaning that telling you exactly what's in the bottle is
somehow less good than not telling you anything at all. Presumably Doquet
will try again, but he'll have to use a system of codes or some other less
transparent (and more complicated) way of conveying this information."
Aren't you glad the TTB and Homeland Security are keeping you safe from
learning too much?
Cheers,
Russ
FYI/FYE,
Per Bonny Doon's Randall Grahm.
Rose' is the odd intersection of the terminally hip and the terminally un-hip.
Chicago Tribune:
Randall Grahm of Bonny Doon winery, a pioneer in making Rhone-style wines in California, offers a sociological explanation. "They appeal to either the terminally hip or the terminally unhip wine drinker," he says, "and there is an unbridgeable chasm between them."
Dry rosénder $20: The Chronicle recommends
Jon BonnéSunday, May 29, 2011
The happy thing about rosé surging popularity is that the hoary annual roséolumn no longer has to contain its dose of evangelism. Rosé case has been made, enough that there are now frets about a puncture appearing in its balloon.
Its growth has often come at the cost of quality - as everyone with a batch of red grapes to salvage or concentrate was willing to bleed off just a bit of pink juice, or press the grapes quickly enough to escape their faults. That's not the path to serious rosé
Yet, those wines seem to be falling away as the general expectation for pink wine has risen. That was the case with our latest tasting from the 2010 vintage.
That's not to say there aren't still plenty of overripe, overworked roséappearing - often as a tasting room "treat" that quickly makes clear why it isn't being sold beyond the winery door. We encountered our share of such duds as we tasted nearly 60 wines from around the world, including from spots, like Spain, that have been rosétrongholds.
For that matter, we found ourselves short on wines from locales with a strong tradition of making roséor rosé sake. Consider the Loire Valley. While Chinon Rosémade from Cabernet Franc, can show the finest of what pink wine offers, we had not one in our lineup. This seems to be a perennial problem, as though bottles might be in short supply. (If you find one, snap it up.)
But Provence, rosé mothership, came to the party, as did the Languedoc, where serious rosés being made amid a sea of lesser grapes.
Of course, there's also a strong roséradition being upheld on the West Coast. The usual base material of Syrah, Grenache and Carignane are being used to great effect in wines from Horse & Plow and Charles & Charles, while Pinot Noir's pink iterations are being finessed, often by small labels like Vaughn Duffy and Zepaltas.
With a price cap of $20, we still found a bounty of wines to enjoy through the summer - including plenty that can be had for under $15.
As Memorial Day arrives, now is the time to stock up. These are wines that have all the freshness to celebrate the summer, but they're still worth taking seriously. For now is the era to enjoy rosé evangelism no longer needed.
2010 Ameztoi Rubentis Getariako Txakolina ($19, 10.5% alcohol): Ameztoi, which helped put the Basque wine Txakoli on the map, turns out an amazingly refreshing pink version by using slightly more Hondarribi Beltza, the coastal region's native red grape. With a bit of spritz, plus saline mineral edges and iris-accented sour cherry. Light (it dials in under 11 percent alcohol) and deft. Pour it with sardines. (Importer: De Maison Selections)
2010 Argiolas Serra Lori Isola dei Nuraghi Rosato ($14, 13.5%): Sardinia's most influential winery provides a take on a roséhat exudes Mediterranean spirit, harnessing Cannonau (Grenache) and Carignano, plus the indigenous Monica and Bovale Sardo. Intensely floral and curious, with happy berry flavors and a roasted-carrot sweetness, accented by caraway, tart citron and oregano. (Importer: Winebow)
2010 Barnard Griffin Washington Roséf Sangiovese ($12, 12.4%): This value-minded Washington winery turns out a perennially popular pink. While it's been getting sweeter in recent years, the pretty rose-petal and dusty qualities remain, like a garden on a hot day - with a Pixy Stix tartness to the juicy cherry.
2010 Calcu Colchagua Valley Rosé$12, 12%): A snapshot of Chile's potential from winemakers Alejandro Jofre and Ricardo Rivadeniera, combining one-half Malbec, plus Syrah and Petit Verdot. Floral, fresh and tangy, with lots of mandarin orange, tea and raspberry ice. (Importer: Global Vineyard Importers)
2010 Charles & Charles Columbia Valley Syrah Rosé$10, 13.0%): The two Charleses are Smith (of K Vintners) and Bieler (of Three Thieves), and their Washington project shows the best of that state's Syrah bounty. Ripe, deep and spicy - white pepper, leathery cherry fruit and an orange-blossom accent. Also check out Bieler's 2010 Bieler Pere et Fils ($12, 13%) from Provence.
2010 Francois Chidaine Val de Loire Touraine Rosé$14, 12.5%): Chidaine is far better known for his Chenin Blanc-based Montlouis, but this mix of Pinot Noir and Loire native grape Grolleau is a sign of his versatility. Light and stony, with sea-foam and celery notes from the Grolleau and pleasing berry fruit from the Pinot. Peach, raspberry and a fresh herbal accent emerge as you drink it. (Importer: Beaune Imports)
2010 Donkey & Goat Isabel's Cuvee Mendocino Grenache Rosé$18, 13.5%): From Berkeley's Jared and Tracey Brandt (among our 2010 Winemakers to Watch) comes another vintage of this slightly translucent bottle. A curious sweet carob-like accent leads to raspberry jam and a floral hint. An esoteric roséith distinct appeal.
2010 Edmunds St. John Bone-Jolly El Dorado Gamay Rosé$16, 13.1%): Another Berkeley entry from Steve Edmunds, who in recent years has turned his juicy Bone-Jolly from high-altitude Gamay vineyards in the Sierra foothills into a pink version. This has all the appeal of Bone-Jolly in a more buoyant package. Pleasingly grapey, with a curious mix of accents: button mushroom, freesia, Meyer lemon and yellow raspberry.
2010 Chateau d'Esclans Whispering Angel Cotes de Provence ($18, 13.5%): Wine scion Sacha Lichine expanded from his family's Bordeaux holdings (Prieuréichine) into Provence, where Esclans focuses on roséMinerally, with a muted nose but subtly floral fruit and apricot-skin texture, almond-skin and mandarin. (Importer: Shaw-Ross International)
2010 Gaia Wines 14-18h Peloponnisos Agiorgitiko Rosé$18, 13%): This rising-star Greek winery leaves Agiorgitiko (St. George) grapes on their skins for up to 18 hours - hence the name - to gain color and a heady aroma that caught our attention two years in a row. Sanguine, with iris, robust cherry and roasted-tangerine fruit. An iodine edge provides a lovely depth. (Importer: Ideal North America)
2010 Horse & Plow North Coast Rosé$15, 13.9%): This label run by Lutea winemaker Suzanne Hagins and her husband, Chris Condos of Vinum Cellars, has a deft hand with Rhone-native grapes, including this effort sourced mostly from an old vineyard north of Ukiah. A blend of Carignane, Syrah and Grenache with a pleasing grip and spicy bite. Black pepper and celery seed, plus orange peel, apricot and huckleberry.
2010 Paul Jaboulet Ainéarallele 45 Cotes-du-Rhone Rosé$14, 13.5%): A fine effort from a large Rhone negociant, showing the best of the Rhone's roséotential in a Grenache-Cinsault-Syrah blend. (Often-overlooked Cinsault is a great roséorkhorse.) Tense and refreshing, with pretty leather and cranberry, plus a garrigue-like herby freshness. (Importer: Frederick Wildman & Sons)
2010 Moulin de Gassac Guilhem Vin de Pays de l'Herault Rosé$12, 12%): The Guibert family of the Languedoc's Daumas Gassac has been performing wonders with its organically farmed everyday second label produced by a co-op in the coastal town of Sete. This mix of Syrah and Grenache is vibrant and focused, with white mineral, lemon zest and enough robust cherry fruit to match barbecue. (Importer: Beaune Imports)
2010 Stephen Ross Central Coast Pinot Noir Vin Gris ($19, 13.5%): Steve Dooley's Pinot-focused label has yielded a bottle that's juicy and light on its feet - straightforward but full of chive, bay laurel and raspberry.
2010 Suacci Carciere Sonoma County Rosé$18, 13.7%): Time to bury all those jokes about Pinot Noir tasting like Syrah. Here's a rosélended from both, mostly Syrah from Dry Creek mixed with bled-off Pinot juice from this notable Sebastopol vineyard. Savory and foresty, with fresh mint and strawberry, and a burnt-orange tone.
2010 Valle Reale Cerasuolo Montepulciano d'Abruzzo ($11, 12.5%): The Abruzzo region's tradition of turning eminently drinkable Montepulciano into a rubyish version, Cerasuolo, remains one of summer's great pleasures. This effort from Leonardo Pizzolo's relatively new cantina is fresh and full of tart cherry with a beet-root bite. Great ham-sandwich wine. (Importer: Winebow)
2010 Vaughn Duffy Sonoma County Roséf Pinot Noir ($15, 13.2%): Young talent Matt Duffy, who got his winemaking legs at Siduri, has turned out a subtle effort from three vineyards. Burst with the steely, fresh flavors Pinot can show in pink form: wintergreen, strawberry and moss, with a surprisingly refined, lean texture.
2010 Zepaltas California Rosé$15, 13.3%): Though the varietal isn't on the label, this is Pinot - and Ryan Zepaltas turns his Pinot talents to the pink realm here. Twist the screw cap and give it time to open. After 20 minutes the pretty berry fruit is perfectly tart, lemon-edged and refreshing, like ice-cold raspberries.
Panelists: Jon BonnéChronicle wine editor; Mike Millett, wine buyer, Rainbow Grocery; Chris Tavelli, owner, Yield and Pause wine bars.
Jon Bonnés The Chronicle's wine editor. Find him at jbonne(a)sfchronicle.com or @jbonne on Twitter.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/05/29/FD2G1JKR37.DTL
This article appeared on page H - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle
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* Dr. James Ellingson, jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* mobile : 651/645-0753 *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
* james(a)brewingnews.com James.Ellingson(a)StThomas.edu *
FYI
2008 Red Burgundy: The Chronicle recommends
Jon BonnéSunday, May 1, 2011
-- Note: Starting this week, The Chronicle is printing alcohol levels for all recommended wines. They are listed next to the price.
2008 Domaine Arlaud Roncevie Bourgogne Rouge ($25; 13% alcohol):
The Morey Saint-Denis-based Arlaud family employs biodynamic farming methods and plows with horses. They source their basic Bourgogne from a parcel in Gevrey-Chambertin. It shows pretty raspberry and cranberry, mineral and deeper fruit-leather tones. Exactly where it should be. (Importer: North Berkeley Imports)
2008 Domaine Faiveley Clos des Myglands Monopole Mercurey Premier Cru ($35; 13% alcohol):
Faiveley has been fantastic under Erwan Faiveley (see sfg.ly/lgwfM4) and no better proof than wine from Myglands, in less fashionable Mercurey, which shows all the nuance of great Burgundy. Jasmine tea, sachet, white stone, sassafras and huckleberry. Deeply perfumed, with wonderfully bright cherry fruit and proper grip. And seek out another monopole, Clos de l'Ecu Beaune Premier Cru ($57; 13% alcohol), which highlights the finesse that Faiveley brings to Burgundy's tricky tannins. (Importer: Wilson Daniels)
2008 Charles Audoin Cuvee Marie Ragonneau Marsannay ($33; 13% alcohol):
>From the northern tip of the Cote d'Or, Cyril Audoin makes wines that show Burgundy's more delicate side, with whites and reds that share a textural similarity. Minty, with far more mineral intensity and tannic structure than robust fruit. A tiptoe sort of wine, almost wanting fish. Give it a couple of years, and compare it to its nuanced white-wine counterpart, Audoin's Au Champ Salomon ($39). (Importer: Martine's Wines)
2008 Domaine de la Pousse d'Or Clos Tavannes Santenay Premier Cru ($60; 13% alcohol):
One of Volnay's most noted estates also makes a standout Santenay. And Pousse d'Or's in-your-face style brings out the sultry, spicy side of what's usually a light, carefree appellation. Fecund and aromatic, with some distinct wood and aromatic power: full of sandalwood, cocoa, truffle and savory berry fruit. (Importer: North Berkeley Imports)
2008 Morey-Coffinet Morgeot Chassagne-Montrachet Rouge Premier Cru ($54; 13.2% alcohol):
Young Thibault Morey is showing off the best of Chassagne-Montrachet, which too often sits in the shadow of neighboring Puligny. Red Chassagne is a little-known treat - Pinot grown on white-wine soils. Muscular and heady, with Chassagne's crunchy mineral signature, plus soy, cedar and pronounced tannins that underscore the plum and dark cherry fruit. And consider his white Chassagnes, like Blanchots Dessus ($87), as a cellar choice. (Importer: Martine's Wines)
2008 Bouchard Pere et Fils Ancienne Cuvee Carnot Volnay Caillerets Premier Cru ($75; 13.5% alcohol):
Under ownership of Henriot, the historic Bouchard house is pulling off a similar feat to Faiveley, elevating a well-known Burgundian name. The Carnot perfectly frames Volnay's complexity. Sanguine and tight-knit, with a floral presence - orange peel, black tea, dried flowers, thyme and damp forest floor. Also keep an eye out for Bouchard's 2008 Reserve Bourgogne Rouge ($20; 12.5% alcohol), a wonderfully drinkable entry point. (Importer: Henriot Inc.)
2008 Joseph Drouhin Chambolle-Musigny Premier Cru ($90; 13% alcohol):
Drouhin's voluminous holdings are widespread, but several premier cru parcels in Chambolle (Noirots, Hauts Doix, Combottes and so on) are small enough to be combined in this cuvee. Robust and slightly sweet in its fruit, with carob, coppery tang, soy, loam and a winning musky depth. (Importer: Dreyfus Ashby)
2008 Domaine Confuron-Cotetidot Gevrey-Chambertin ($58; 12.5% alcohol):
This Gevrey house focuses on the heavy-hitting reds of the Cote de Nuits, from Gevrey itself plus Vosne-Romanee, Chambolle-Musigny and Echezeaux. It's still getting its sea legs, with a distinct spice note, plus dried sage, pepper and allspice wrapped around leathery, cherried Gevrey fruit. Give it two to three years. (Importer: Beaune Imports)
2008 Perrot-Minot Vieilles Vignes Vougeot ($60; 13% alcohol):
Christophe Perrot-Minot makes a wide range of wines along the Cote de Nuits in a flashy, appealing style. You don't often encounter village-level Vougeot, but this is a standout - deep, oak-inflected and winning, full of sandalwood, dried heather, layered mineral and ripe, forceful red fruit. The Vieilles Vignes Chambolle-Musigny ($75; 13% alcohol) retains the dense, seductive style, but applies it to bright Chambolle fruit. (Importer: Martine's Wines)
2008 Louis Jadot Domaine Clos Vougeot Grand Cru ($95; 13.5% alcohol):
Though Jadot's Jacques Lardiere is a Burgundy master, we weren't swayed by the Jadot 2008 village wines. Totally different story with his Clos Vougeot, a brilliant example of what Jadot can do so well. Tense and mineral-powered, with a hint of its oak but quickly moving to show its layers: dried flowers, pu-erh tea and chalky earth, finessed red fruit and a lithe, taut frame. Not even showing its full depths, but the sheer quality of Vougeot fruit is there. (Importer: Kobrand)
Panelists: Jon BonnéChronicle wine editor; Rebecca Rapaszky, manager, Vin, Vino, Wine; John Vuong, wine director, Ame restaurant.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/05/01/FDMV1J8KG7.DTL
This article appeared on page H - 7 of the San Francisco Chronicle
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* Dr. James Ellingson, jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* mobile : 651/645-0753 *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
* james(a)brewingnews.com James.Ellingson(a)StThomas.edu *
FWIW, I'd like to see the gage R and R on this. I doubt the measurement accuracy is
much better than +/- 0.5% by volume, the accuracy reported for refractive based estimates.
Distillation is on the order of +/- 0.1%.
Oh, BTW, they're talking a.b.v. here or alcohol by (per unit) volume.
A.b.v. is the standard, unless your talking about 3.2 beer in
MN, then it's a.b.weight. 10.0% a.b.w. is about 12.5% a.b.v.
>From the SFJC:
As wines gain weight, Chronicle to print alcohol levels
Jon BonnéSunday, April 24, 2011
Rajat Parr praised Lee's high-alcohol Pinot Noir.
Adam Lee switched alcohol labels during a Pinot tasting.
Time for a small industry secret: Most of the nation's top winemakers spend their days making dessert wine.
In the eyes of the federal government, that is. As far as the federal Alcohol and Tobacco Trade and Tax Bureau is concerned, any wine with more than 14 percent alcohol must be classified type 88: dessert/port/sherry/(cooking) wine.
Marcassin Pinot? Dessert wine. The Cabernets of To Kalon? You got it.
Silly, perhaps, but wine's alcohol level is plenty serious. Why else would it be the one piece of technical data required by law to be on every bottle?
The easy answer - that taxes are higher on wines with more alcohol - ignores the fact that a lot of wine lovers pay keen attention to the big number in the tiny type.
And not just out of curiosity. It's a matter of debate whether high-alcohol wines go with food or show ample nuance. But what's beyond question is that the same-size glass of wine with even a bit more alcohol gets you drunk faster. That's giving pause to more wine drinkers for reasons that have nothing to do with taste.
So, starting next week, The Chronicle will print the listed alcohol levels of each wine we recommend in the Food & Wine section.
A handful of mostly niche publications have taken similar steps. And Britain's Decanter magazine will publish alcohol levels beginning in May. But few newspapers or magazines have routinely published this information.
High-alcohol debate
Including us. Occasionally we've noted alcohol levels where germane. But we resisted printing them regularly because the act of bringing alcohol into the discussion of a wine is inherently political.
Our decision comes at a time when it is harder than ever to understand the implications of alcohol in wine. Regulations reflect a world of decades past, when "table wine" was meant to hover around 12 percent alcohol and anything that dared surpass 14 percent was assumed to be fortified. Early examples that defied the trend, like the 1968 Mayacamas Late Harvest Zinfandel, left regulators stumped.
Yet, the origin of the 14 percent rule is a mystery, even to many in the wine industry. Wine attorney and historian Richard Mendelson suspects it may predate Prohibition.
Or it may stem from a hodgepodge of past practices. After all, the quaint remnant of the "table wine" designation - once meant for wines between 11 and 14 percent alcohol - lives on. Most European wines were shipped with labels that indicated them simply as "table wine," enough that Josh Jensen of Calera chose to emulate language from his favorite Burgundies in his inaugural 1975 vintage. Even then, the term was losing its meaning.
"Initially we didn't want to put the number on," Jensen recalls, "and then after about 10 years of doing that, people would say, 'Oh, this is just a table wine,' and I'd say, 'This is our best wine!' And so we started putting alcohol numbers on."
If 14 percent seems arbitrary as a dividing line, its financial implications are not. Currently the TTB assesses a tax of $1.07 per gallon, or 21 cents per bottle, for wines 14 percent alcohol or less; wines above 14 percent are taxed at $1.57 per gallon, or 31 cents per bottle.
For a large winery producing 100,000 cases of wine, nudging above 14 percent costs an extra $120,000. To the largest producers, there are good reasons to keep alcohols low. And for all the kvetching about high alcohols, most wine taxed in the United States remains in that "table wine" bracket: 440.6 million gallons of bottled wine were at 14 percent or less last year, compared with 50.2 million above 14 percent.
Hot topic in wine world
But for higher-end wines? Life above 14 percent is routine, and for the past two decades it was often a required path to critical success.
All this presumes truth in labeling for alcohol levels, which often isn't the case - enough so that we tested 19 wines to check their accuracy. (See story above.)
No other topic prompts so many flareups in the wine world. In 2008, Sacramento retailer and wine authority Darrell Corti, a longtime critic of higher-alcohol wines, drew flak when it was revealed that he would no longer consider wines that exceeded 14.5 percent. In the aftermath, Corti began publishing alcohol levels in his popular newsletter. His business survived what came to be called Zingate.
"I have never had a customer who has read any of this stuff say anything like, 'You're a fascist' or 'you're stupid' or 'you have your head up your ass,' " Corti says. "They all say, 'bravo.' "
In part, Corti was frustrated because he saw how higher alcohols have come to largely define California's reputation. While most alcohol regulations in Europe mandate a minimum alcohol content - premier cru Volnay must clock at least 11 percent - "in California, it should be the other way around," Corti suggests.
Corti's dustup would feel familiar to Michael Mina corporate wine director Rajat Parr, who was caught in a flurry of attention when, during a tasting at the World of Pinot Noir in March, he endorsed what he thought was a lower-alcohol Pinot made by Siduri owner Adam Lee. Lee had switched labels on two wines, and revealed that Parr had praised a 15 percent wine. (See sfg.ly/hyac9X)
The intentional switch stemmed, no doubt, from Parr's vocal role in the lower-alcohol movement - including a policy that limits New World Pinot Noir and Chardonnay at his San Francisco restaurant, RN74, to 14.5 percent. (The limit doesn't extend to other wines or other Mina restaurants.) And it prompted a long round of bickering about alcohol, including an online finger-wagging from critic Robert Parker, who suggested that "arbitrary cutoffs make no sense, and are nothing more than a form of wine fascism."
The use of alcohol as a barometer leaves many winemakers uneasy - especially since they acknowledge they often take advantage of the built-in leeway provided for wine labels.
"The emphasis on alcohol for me is a distraction from the larger picture," Lee says.
Parker and others often complain that alcohol rules are unfairly weighted against American producers - that often inaccurate labels on imported wines mask a boozier reality.
The trick of balance
Sommeliers swap tales of white Burgundies (to say nothing of ripe-vintage Bordeaux or Barolo) marked 13.5 percent but exceeding 15.
In winemaking, vintners must consider alcohol along with pH level, acidity and so on. This leads us to the tricky notion of balance in wine. A Parr-organized Pinot event, "In Pursuit of Balance," was further skewered for the word "balance" serving as code for less alcohol.
But that's not always the case.
Napa winemaker John Kongsgaard, whose powerful (but balanced) Chardonnays routinely exceed 15 percent, hasn't made a wine below 14 percent in a decade. Yet his concentrated flavors retain balance.
"We never hear complaints about the alcohol, ever," Kongsgaard says. "We hear about it as an intellectual idea from sommeliers, but I think the sommelier class are the people who are the most interested. I think that's fine. They're serving lots of wine to lots of people and they need to be careful about it."
Wine and dine
And that's where alcohol - regardless of balance - remains a defining element of a wine's style. For all the knocks against alcohol-watchers as ignoring the fundamental pleasure of wine, a balanced high-alcohol wine still won't please palates looking for a lighter touch.
Alcohol takes on a new dimension when you sit down to dine.
So sommeliers particularly have become champions of more - and more accurate - alcohol disclosure. Perhaps that's because diners have only their own assumptions to rely on when browsing a wine list. Perhaps it's because wine directors have to pair wines with food - there's a reason one Australian winemaker dubbed high-octane specimens "cocktail wines" - or because they want their customers to walk out the door, not stagger.
For his part, Parr - who makes wine in Santa Barbara - finds more customers, especially under 35, asking about alcohol content.
"I want to have a glass, two glasses, three glasses, and not feel that I'm going to be intoxicated," he says. "It's the wine I drink, it's the wine I make, it's the wine I serve in my restaurant. I never said the other style is wrong."
Increasingly, winemakers agree.
"I think every by-the-glass list should have alcohol listed on it," says winemaker Gavin Chanin, who apprenticed with Au Bon Climat's Jim Clendenen, an early scourge of California's higher-alcohol trend, before founding his Chanin label. "Not because it's the be-all end-all, but for those of us who know what kind of style we want, it's such a great indicator."
Which might explain why at least one restaurant in Wine Country is serving up hard numbers.
At Oenotri in Napa, wine director Sur Lucero lists alcohol levels for every wine he sells on a list that ranges from steely Italian whites to California Cabernet (and the occasional heavy-lifting Chardonnay) that top 15 percent. In part, this was a practical consideration - "there's no way I can keep alcohol levels for 650 wines in my head," he says - but Lucero also considers it a useful guide both for his patrons and himself in pairing wines to food with similar weight.
While those numbers might seem to target the muscle of California, Lucero notes that they can be equally helpful with Europe's high-alcohol offerings, including Barolo, southern Rhone wines or even Alsatian whites that can push 15 percent.
"Here in Napa we have a lot of educated wine drinkers," Lucero says, "enough that it doesn't take anything away from those who think that number is inconsequential, but it adds for those who find something in that number."
The end of 14 percent?
Whether you believe alcohol levels should come down or that the law should acknowledge a higher-alcohol reality, what's evident is that the arbitrary 14 percent barrier needs reform.
"Everybody starts to draw the line at the same place," says Wendell Lee, general counsel for the Wine Institute, the industry's main trade group. "But does it make any sense? Today it probably doesn't."
That could mean raising table-wine limits to 15 percent or enacting a sliding tax scale. Clearly the alcohols printed on labels could be far more precise.
For those who don't care? It's easy to tune out this particular bit of information. But for a lot of wine lovers, alcohol levels will remain a flash point.
So we're adding this one data point to our coverage. We believe that helps everyone make more informed decisions. And rare is the wine lover who doesn't want to be informed.
Inside
Label leeway: Only one wine label proves completely accurate in a Chronicle test. H6
Labels accurate? Often not
How accurate are those numbers in tiny print? Since we intend to begin printing alcohol levels, we wanted to check how trustworthy these numbers are.
We sent samples of 19 wines - all of them received for review by The Chronicle - to an independent wine lab in St. Helena for ethanol testing. Each test costs around $20.
Only one wine was exactly accurate (see chart below). Three were virtually a percentage point off - or more - flirting with the leeway the federal government allows from what's printed on the label (1 percent for wines above 14 percent alcohol; 1.5 percent below 14 percent alcohol).
The biggest gap came on the 2008 Pepper Bridge Walla Walla Valley Cabernet Sauvignon, Washington, which we recommended last week. Its tested alcohol of 15.17 percent was far above the 14.1 percent on the label.
"I'm going to send it back" to the lab, said winemaker Jean-Francois Pellet when told of the results. Pellet said his own test landed the wine at 14.8 percent, but he had used an older technology called an ebulliometer. He said he would send another sample to his outside lab.
Another surprising wine atop the list: the 2009 Calera Central Coast Viognier, made by The Chronicle's 2008 Winemaker of the Year Josh Jensen, who prints fastidiously informative wine labels. It tested at 15.54 percent, but the label lists it as 14.5 percent.
"The discrepancy ... just blows my mind," Jensen said.
He ruled out one frequent cause of inaccuracy - alcohol levels are often tested months before bottling so that labels can be ordered - because Calera tests directly from the bottling tank.
Also pushing the 1 percent tolerance was the 2007 Chasseur Lorenzo Russian River Valley Chardonnay made by veteran winemaker Bill Hunter. A listed 14.8 percent alcohol was dwarfed by the actual number in our test, 15.79 percent - making for a nearly 16 percent Chardonnay.
Another significant discrepancy came from Siduri, whose owner Adam Lee vocally opposes focusing on alcohol levels.
We tested two Siduri wines - the 2007 Keefer Ranch Pinot Noir and the 2007 Amber Ridge Pinot Noir. The Amber Ridge landed at 15.02 percent, nearly three-fourths of a percent above its stated 14.3; the Keefer tested at 14.66, well above its stated 14.1. Yet our numbers were within 0.1 percent of levels Lee tested in 2008.
His explanation? He rarely modifies the alcohol numbers on his labels, in part because of the cost of filing for a new label approval from federal and state agencies.
On the flip side, some major names were remarkably precise. The 2008 Migration Russian River Valley Chardonnay from Duckhorn was spot-on: 14.1 percent tested and on the label. And the 2006 Robert Mondavi Reserve Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon lists an alcohol of 15.5 percent, essentially the same as its tested result of 15.46. That seems painfully high for a wine that once landed in the mid-13s, but the number is accurate.
For our tests, the lab used an NIR Alcolyzer, which measures the absorption of a near-infrared beam in liquid to determine the amount of ethyl alcohol in a liquid - a new technology with precise results. The cost of an Alcolyzer is $16,000, according to Margit Svenningsen, a technical representative for Austria's Anton Paar, which makes the device, and an assistant winemaker at Calera.
Svenningsen echoed a frequent assertion that the new method supersedes more common means of testing: the gas chromatograph, which can test a wide range of winery data but has potential for inaccuracy, and the ebulliometer, a 50-year-old technology based on boiling points, which can be significantly hobbled by elevation and weather.
Sometimes even technology can't explain everything. The 2007 Hall Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon - 14.7 on the label, but 15.21 in our test - was tested by winemaker Steve Leveque at 15.0 percent with an Alcolyzer on its bottling date of May 29, 2009. Such discrepancies have become a way of life in the cellar.
"It's not perfect," said Leveque, "but I'm not terribly surprised."
- Jon BonnéWhy it's tough to trust the label
All labeling has some leeway. The Food and Drug Administration allows rounding on food nutrition labels by 5 to 10 calories, for instance.
But in an environment where even a half-percent difference in alcohol can chase away a customer, wine labels should be more accurate - especially because the numbers are self-reported and rarely checked.
Wines 14 percent or less in alcohol are "table wines" under federal law. They have a latitude of 1.5 percent in listed alcohol - a flexibility largely born out of the prospect that a 12.5 percent table wine could range from 11 to 14 percent. That range, frequently seen on imported wines from the 1960s and '70s, can still be used.
Above 14 percent, the leeway shrinks to 1 percent. But that still allows a 15.4 percent wine to be labeled as 14.5. (See the full regulations at sfg.ly/hherzG)
U.S. wineries that sell overseas also must comply with EU regulations that round alcohol to the nearest half-percent, which also explains why some European wines have less accurate alcohol listings. And some states and Canadian provinces also have their own labeling requirements - and penalties.
The federal Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, which oversees wine labels, will occasionally test alcohol content using a time-consuming but accurate distillation method. But it rarely tests, and has little enforcement for those who exceed the stated tolerances.
Because any change to a label requires a winery to pay for a new label approval, many wineries leave labels unchanged from one vintage to the next - similar to a European practice to change only the separate vintage label.
Differences in testing technology make it hard to reach an exact number. But the leeway could be reduced to a half-percent without causing undue costs to wineries.
That certainly would come closer to truth in labeling.
- Jon BonnéThe test results
Wine Printed % alcohol Actual % alcohol Difference
2008 Pepper Bridge Estate Walla Walla Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 14.1 15.17 1.07
2009 Calera Central Coast Viognier 14.5 15.54 1.04
2007 Chasseur Lorenzo Chardonnay 14.8 15.79 0.99
2008 Siduri Amber Ridge Vineyard Pinot Noir 14.3 15.02 0.72
2007 Peachy Canyon The Vortex Paso Robles Zinfandel 14.8 15.47 0.67
2007 Siduri Keefer Ranch Russian River Valley Pinot Noir 14.1 14.66 0.56
2009 Pascal Jolivet Pouilly-Fume 13 13.51 0.51
2007 Hall Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 14.7 15.21 0.51
2009 Fritz Haag Brauneberger Kabinett Riesling 8 8.47 0.47
2009 Liberty School Paso Robles Cabernet Sauvignon 13.5 13.93 0.43
2008 Vietti Tre Vigne Barbera D'Alba 13.5 13.88 0.38
2008 Williams Selyem Central Coast Pinot Noir 14 14.36 0.36
2008 Bouchard Bourgogne Rouge 12.5 12.71 0.21
2008 Frog's Leap Napa Valley Zinfandel 13.7 13.89 0.19
2008 Duckhorn Migration Russian River Valley Chardonnay 14.1 14.1 0
2006 Robert Mondavi Reserve Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 15.5 15.46 -0.04
2010 Coppola Yellow Label Sauvignon Blanc 13.5 13.35 -0.15
2008 Chehalem Reserve Ribbon Ridge Pinot Noir 13.2 13 -0.2
2009 Rodney Strong Estate Vineyards Pinot Noir 14.5 14 -0.5
Jon Bonnés The Chronicle's wine editor. Find him at jbonne(a)sfchronicle.com or @jbonne on Twitter.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/04/24/FD311J4I7H.DTL
This article appeared on page H - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle
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* Dr. James Ellingson, jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* mobile : 651/645-0753 *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
* james(a)brewingnews.com James.Ellingson(a)StThomas.edu *
Sure, but does it work on plastic corks?
April 19, 2011
The $410 Corkscrew
By ERIC ASIMOV
THEY come in all shapes and sizes. Most often, they can be found stuffed into kitchen drawers alongside potato mashers, melon ballers and other seldom-used essentials of the kitchen. Wine lovers take them for granted, except when nobody can find one. Call a Boy Scout! He.s sure to be prepared with a handy multifunction pocket knife that includes one.
I.m talking, of course, about corkscrews, which, regardless of the screw cap, remain indispensable for achieving access to the wine within. But would you pay $410 for one?
Oh, please, why even ask? In an era when people pay hundreds of dollars for a bottle of mediocre Champagne, not to mention thousands for a bottle at auction, who would begrudge the Code-38 wine knife from Australia its retail price of $220 to $410? No, it.s not made of gold.
The fact is most people pay corkscrews little mind. They.re perfectly content with the gimme corkscrew from the local wine shop; or the cheap double-winged corkscrew, in which you squeeze the arms together to extract the cork; or even the Swiss army knife. Ambitious types can find battery-operated corkscrews or tapered yet cumbersome models the size of restaurant pepper mills, which operate not on the principle of twisting the worm into the cork, but with a press and a pull.
In restaurants the world over, sommeliers, those exacting, extracting professionals, rely overwhelmingly on a simple, handy device known as the waiter.s friend or, sometimes, as the wine key. Essentially a knifelike handle with a spiral worm for inserting into the cork and a hinged fulcrum for resistance, the waiter.s friend has largely stood the test of time, with modest tweaks and improvements, since it was patented in Germany in 1882. Basic versions go for less than $10.
No product, though, no matter how successful, is immune to the fertile imagination of industrial designers. Enter the Code-38, in which the waiter.s friend is re-engineered, using the highest principles of design and top-flight materials. What does that get you?
Well, when I pick up my standby home corkscrew, a Pulltap.s double-hinged waiter.s friend, I.m not wowed by the black plastic handle, flimsy metal fulcrum and serrated foil cutter. It works fine, but I confess I don.t feel much of anything about it. When it breaks, I have others lined up ready to go.
The Code-38, by contrast, offers the satisfying, solid heft of a fine tool. It feels good in the hand, like a well-balanced kitchen knife, and it inspires a sort of confidence that I had been unaware of lacking. The basic $220 model, which I bought and tested for several weeks, is made of solid stainless steel, with a thick, strong worm. The foil blade is a curved steel arc that can be opened with one hand and resharpened on a stone.
The fulcrum is smooth and shiny. It.s a single-hinge design rather than the double-hinge I have on my Pulltap.s. The double-hinge is intended as a safety net for amateurs like me, who can.t always get the corkscrew in the right spot for a smooth, continuous extraction. Instead, the double-hinge allows you to pull a cork part way out, and then re-set the fulcrum to complete the maneuver.
The Code-38.s single-hinge, though, is so precisely engineered that I have yet to meet the cork I could not extract effortlessly, while (in my would-be sommelier.s imagination) bantering wittily with the table in front of me and simultaneously surveying the rest of the dining room for trouble.
That.s the basic $220 model. For $410, you can have the Code-38 Pro Stealth, the flagship model, .a complete blend of blasted textures and vaporized titanium-based finishes,. as the Web catalog puts it.
Ah, well, a fellow can dream. Of course, it.s fine for me, a writer with a (limited) expense account, to sing the praises of the Code-38. What would a professional say?
I lent mine to Michael Madrigale, the sommelier at Bar Boulud, a wine-oriented bistro near Lincoln Center. He liked it well enough, especially the way it felt in the hand, but paused when I told him what it cost.
.What, $220?. he said. .It.s like the $200 hamburger. It.s like reinventing something that.s already perfect..
He added that he was quite happy with his waiter.s friend, a French model, the Cartailler-Deluc, which sells for under $30. Like me, he also has backups on hand.
Not all professionals were as unappreciative. Chaad Thomas, a partner in U.S. Wine Imports and a former sommelier in Ann Arbor, Mich., read about the Code-38 on an Internet chat board and was so intrigued that he wrote to the designer, Jeffrey Toering, who sent him one to try.
.It.s a gorgeous piece,. he told me. .It was superb to be able to extend the knife with just one hand. You could use it really quickly, and it.s very durable. As a sommelier, I would actually wear wine keys out..
He said he plans to buy 10 or so to offer to top clients.
It.s not that the world of cork extractors has lacked high-end devices, or even expensive waiter.s friends. Laguiole, a French cutlery brand, has been renowned for its corkscrews for more than a century. Its waiter.s friends are lovely designs in an older, more ornate style than the minimalist Code-38. Laguiole also fills custom orders. Aldo Sohm, the sommelier at Le Bernardin in New York, designed a personalized Laguiole with an Austrian flag design, which also sells for $220. It.s an elegant corkscrew, and works beautifully, though it differs from the Code-38 in materials and in its serrated knife, which is more difficult to extend with one hand.
What drives a man to try to create the perfect corkscrew? Mr. Toering, the designer, was not in the wine business. He had learned about design as an instrument fitter in the Australian Air Force, which he likened to being a watchmaker, and he previously designed a portable massage table. The idea for the Code-38 came to him in a restaurant in the 1990s.
.I had ordered a nice bottle of something and was observing the waiter.s removal of the cork,. he said in an e-mail from Australia. .He was using a cheap plastic wine key. It was in this moment that it occurred to me that the caliber of corkscrew did not match the level of the wine or the restaurant..
So began an odyssey of trial and error, of testing designs and materials, and comparing sources. He inspected worms from around the world before settling on one made in France. Along the way he became the Australian distributor for Laguiole, but he had concerns about its durability in the heavy-duty use of the restaurant world.
.I have designed the product to withstand continual use over many years,. he said. .I.ve been testing prototypes of the product for over five years and many thousands of bottles, and all I.ve seen is the odd bent spiral, which is more a matter of technique than the product.s ability to survive the professional hospitality environment.. He says the Code-38 is .fully rebuildable. and covered by a lifetime warranty.
Mr. Toering assembles each one individually in his workshop. So far, he says, he has sold 137 Code-38s, each one to a sommelier (and apparently one wine writer). It.s not a lot, but he says the response has been great.
.I think the Laguiole and similar products from that region are brilliant, and I.d like to think that the Code-38 can sit among them as an equal,. he said. .In our world of cheap throwaway products, it.s just nice to use something that has been designed and made without consideration for just meeting a price point..
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* Dr. James Ellingson, jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* mobile : 651/645-0753 *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
* james(a)brewingnews.com James.Ellingson(a)StThomas.edu *
According to decanter dot com, the official Champagne of the royal wedding
will be NV Pol Roger.
(Good choice if you can't acquire a sufficient stock of the 1998, 1996 or
1995, say I. Prince Charles and the late Princess Diana chose Bollinger;
so, perhaps that marque would have been regarded as bad luck.)
As Champagne fans know, Pol Roger had many twentieth century associations
with the British government, although generally with commoners rather than
royalty, particularly Sir Winston Churchill after whom their prestige cuvee
is named. One of my favorite stories is about Lord Soames, giving a press
conference during Rhodesian peace talks way back when, predicting that the
talks would be concluded within less than 30 days. Asked how he could be so
confident of an early conclusion, he revealed that his remaining stock was
only twenty-something bottles of Pol Roger.
Cheers -
