September 21, 2005
>From Trappist Monks, Heavenly Brew
By ERIC ASIMOV
FOR single-minded devotion to quality, purity and tradition, the Trappist monks of Belgium are hard to match, especially when it comes to ale.
It doesn't take much imagination to get carried away picturing them at their work. Seated at their rough-hewn tables, clothed in their coarse robes, they spend hours in the serenity of silent prayer and study. Then the word goes out: "It's time to brew the beer, it's time to brew the beer," and like so many Keebler elves, off they go to perform their sacred chores.
Pure fantasy, of course. Though they adhere to traditional styles, Trappist breweries today are largely modern affairs, where the workers are often professionals hired by the abbeys. They have computerized equipment and well-designed Web sites. But the devotion remains to making ales as complex and distinctive as any in the world today, and, as the Dining section's tasting panel discovered, their beers set a lofty standard.
The term Trappist describes the source of these ales rather than a particular brewing style. In fact, the beers vary considerably. Some are dark as chocolate stout and some are amber-gold, bordering on orange. They can be intensely sweet or dry enough to pucker. Sometimes they can be both, reaching a full, rich, complex sweetness as you turn the ale over in your mouth, yet turning dry and refreshing as you swallow. They can all be wonderfully fragrant, with aromas of spices, flowers and fruit, and they are always strong, ranging in alcohol from about 7 percent to 12 percent, as opposed to the 5 percent of a typical lager.
Producing Trappist ales requires more than the usual sort of commitment. Only six breweries in the world, all affiliated with Trappist monasteries in Belgium, are permitted to use the hexagonal seal designating each bottle an "Authentic Trappist Product," and one of those six, the abbey of St. Sixtus at Westvleteren, sells its beer only at its monastery. A seventh Trappist monastery, Tegelen, in the Netherlands, sells La Trappe beer, but it is now made by a commercial brewer and no longer carries the Trappist seal, which guarantees that the beer is brewed in an abbey under the supervision of the religious order, and that most of the income will be used for charitable work.
In the last few years, authentic Trappist beers have become increasingly easy to get in the United States, even at corner delis that take beer seriously. Some of the brand names have become well known, especially Chimay and Orval. They have been so admired that the Trappist styles are now widely imitated. Dozens of Belgian breweries make excellent versions of Trappist ales. Some of them are even commissioned by monasteries to brew ales or are licensed to use a monastery name. These are known as abbey beers. North American craft brewers, likewise inspired by these beers, have made their own distinctive versions.
The panel tasted 25 ales, including bottles from the 5 exporting monasteries, 11 Belgian abbey beers, 7 from the United States and 1 each from Canada and the Netherlands. Florence Fabricant, Frank J. Prial and I were joined by Tony Forder, co-publisher and editor of Ale Street News, a consumer publication.
By the time the tasting was over, we were all feeling the spirit. The quality of the beers was exceptionally high, which was surprising because so many were imported. Most beers are fragile. If they are not protected from heat or light, they can easily lose their vitality. They don't take well to long voyages and are generally at their best as soon as they are bottled.
But Trappist-style ales are the rare beers that are meant to age. They are generally what brewers call "bottle conditioned," meaning that a small dose of sugar and yeast is added to each bottle just before it is sealed. Then, as with Champagne, the beers re-ferment in the bottle, developing complexity over time and a wonderful texture of pinpoint natural carbonation.
Unlike the sediment in Champagne, the ale's sediment is not removed before the bottles are sold. It is left to settle to the bottom, and these unfiltered beers develop a soft haze. They are at their best served cool, rather than cold.
As pleased as we were by the ales, we also disagreed considerably over which were our favorites, possibly because they were so stylistically varied. The two best-known Trappist styles are dubbel and trippel, which I've Americanized to double and triple. While these styles are never defined precisely, the doubles tend to be dark and rich, often with flavors of chocolate and mocha and a layer of fruity sweetness that can turn dry as you swallow. The triples are lighter in color and body but stronger in alcohol, with complex spicy flavors. Usually they are dry. There are even quadruples, which are stronger yet.
Nonetheless, glorious exceptions to these categories exist, like the Orval Trappist ale, an unmatchable combination of the bitter austerity of a Pilsener with the full-bodied richness of an ale. It was one of my favorites in the tasting, and Tony noted that it stuck out from the others. But Frank and Florence found it merely routine.
Other than the Orval, we tended as a group to prefer the drier examples, like our consensus favorite, the deliciously complex and balanced triple from the Westmalle Trappist abbey, and our No. 3, the spicy, refreshing Affligem, an abbey triple. Our No. 2, La Fin du Monde from Unibroue in Quebec, was also on the dry side yet with a pronounced, lively intensity.
All five of the Trappist beers made our list, including the creamy, complex Achel, the light-bodied, floral Rochefort, and the Grande R�serve from Chimay. The Chimay epitomized the divisions in our panel. It was creamy and rich, with an aroma of roasted chocolate that struck me as beautiful. It had flavors of dried fruit and spice and gave the impression of sweetness until it turned dry as you swallowed. Florence also liked it, suggesting that it would be great with a steak, but Frank and Tony were less impressed.
Frank and I both loved the Witkap-Pater Abbey Triple Ale, which I found complex, delicate and delicious, but Tony and Florence demurred. Perhaps I wasn't critical enough, because there were few ales that I did not like, regardless of the style. Tony and I very much liked the Southampton Abbot, a dark ale that had brilliant flavors. But Florence and Frank felt it was overwhelming. It just missed making the list.
The only American beer in our Top 10 was the Weyerbacher from Easton, Pa., a complex, hefty quadruple-style ale that was the strongest we tasted at 11.9 percent alcohol. In addition to the Southampton, American ales that narrowly missed out included the Ommegang Abbey Ale and the Victory Golden Monkey Triple Ale.
Why is it that the monks have historically been able to make such great beer? In his book, "The Brewmaster's Table" (Ecco, 2003), Garrett Oliver suggests that not only were they patient, educated and thorough, but because of their lower costs, they were able to use better ingredients than commercial brewers. No doubt that is all true, but I can't help imagining that somehow they get a little bit of extra help.
Tasting Report: Aged in the Bottle, Beers With Character
Westmalle Belgium Trappist Triple
$6
*** �
Floral, fruity and dry with long, lingering flavors; superb; 9.5 percent alcohol, 11.2 ounces. (Importer: Merchant du Vin, Lenox, Mass.)
Unibroue Chambly, Quebec La Fin du Monde
$2.30
***
Complex and full-bodied, rich, deep and dry; 9 percent, 12 ounces. (Unibrew U.S.A., Shelburne, Vt.)
Affligem Belgium Abbey Triple
$7.50
***
Dry bordering on austere, yet spicy, complex and very refreshing; 8.5 percent, 25.4 ounces. (Fischer Beverages International, White Plains)
Weyerbacher Easton, Pa., Quad
$6
***
Rich, complex and fruity; seems sweet at first, but turns dry; 11.9 percent, 11.2 ounces.
Achel Belgium Trappist Extra
$11
***
Citrus and spice aromas, complex flavors and creamy texture; 9.5 percent, 25.4 ounces. (Shelton Brothers, Belchertown, Mass.)
Orval Belgium Trappist
$6
** �
Floral and herbal aromas; very dry with long, lingering flavors; 6.9 percent, 11.2 ounces. (Merchant du Vin, Lenox, Mass.)
De Ranke Belgium Abbey Guldenberg
$10
** �
Lean and dry with complex, balanced citrus, herb and spice flavors; 8.5 percent, 25.4 ounces. (Shelton Brothers, Belchertown, Mass.)
Witkap-Pater Belgium Abbey Triple
$3
** �
Floral and citrus aromas; dry, delicate and complex. 7.5 percent, 11.2 ounces. (Vanberg & DeWulf, Cooperstown, N.Y.)
Chimay Belgium Trappist Grande R�serve
$10
** �
Roasted aromas of chocolate, dried fruits and spices; creamy and rich yet dry; 9 percent, 25.4 ounces. (Belukus Marketing, Princeton, N.J.)
Rochefort Belgium Trappist 10
$6
** �
Surprisingly floral; balanced and light-bodied with persistent spice flavors; 11.3 percent, 11.2 ounces. (Merchant du Vin, Lenox, Mass.)
--
------------------------------ *
* Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
Greetings,
Group is going to the Big S pre-sale tasting. Joyce has negotiated a
very good deal for us. $10 off. I wish I was going... Take good notes.
Next week, wines that work at the Rainbow Chinese Restaurant at 26th and Nicollet.
More details next week.
Cheers,
Jim
----- Forwarded message from jhegstrom(a)csom.umn.edu -----
To: wine(a)thebarn.com
Surdyks is allowing me to offer the "Bubbles Discount" for either of the
two tastings on the 22nd.
Spotlight is normally $60 - $10 off with Bubbles Discount = $50 (includes
BOTH tastings)
Charity is normally $35 - $5 off with Bubbles Discount = $30
To take advantage of this discount, they would like you to call the store
at 612-379-3232 during the DAY and ask for either Zack or Lynn who will
sign you up. You need to mention that you want the "Bubbles Discount".
Discount cannot be applied to internet ticket sales or tickets purchased at
the store.
S?? U?? R?? D?? Y?? K?? S
Charity Pre-Sale Spotlight Tasting
Event proceeds will benefit the American Heart Association
Thursday,??September 22nd
Millennium Hotel - Loring Ballroom
1313 Nicolett Mall??- Minneapolis
5:30pm - 6:30pm
SPOTLIGHT TASTING: From 5:30 until 6:30, we will have our Spotlight
Tasting. During this time, some of highest quality wines of the Fall Sale
will be featured, as well as some ???special purchase??? wines available
during this tasting only! The donation is $60/person to attend this
portion of the event. Join us to sample the best of the best in this
exclusive tasting taking place before the main event.
Arrive Early! Attendees will be invited to participate in a Scavenger Hunt
for a one carat ???Heart on Fire??? diamond pendant! The first person to solve
all of the clues will win the pendant worth $12,000! Jewelry has been
donated by J.B. Hudson Fine Jewelers.
$60.00 (tax deductible)
Price includes both events
(Main Charity Tasting and Spotlight)
7:00pm - 9:00pm
Try before you buy! Our Pre-Sale Wine Tasting Event will feature more than
200 of the wines you???ll find in our fall sale. Enjoy cheeses and
appetizers from Surdyk???s Bistro 2GO, artisan chocolates, and live jazz
performed throughout the evening. In addition, there will be a silent
auction featuring exciting wine items, gift certificates to great local
restaurants, and a few must see surprises. And best of all, attendees have
the opportunity to order wines at the sale prices two weeks before the
sale begins! All wine orders taken the night of the event will be at sale
prices.
Donation -
$35 in advance
$40.00 at the door
----- End forwarded message -----
--
------------------------------ *
* Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
We have 6 confirmed and a few others unheard from...
It's "Trade Tasting" season, so several are busy with that.
Greetings,
Those of us not lucky enough to be in Piedmont this week are mining our
cellars for a nice Syrah to bring to The Craftsman.
Dave T has made the reservation for 8 people, Thursday at 6:30.
We will adjust as needed.
The Craftsman Restaurant
4300 E. Lake St.
Minneapolis
612.722.0175
www.craftsmanrestaurant.com
Dave T.
Karin
Nicolai
Jim
Russ
Bill
Joyce may join us later.
Janet?
Annette?
Cheers,
Jim
----- Forwarded message from The 30 Second Wine Advisor <wine(a)wineloverspage.com> -----
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Subject: 30SecWineAdvisor: Trade tasting
From: The 30 Second Wine Advisor <wine(a)wineloverspage.com>
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THE 30 SECOND WINE ADVISOR, Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2005
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IN THIS ISSUE
* TRADE TASTING I wangle my way into a for-the-trade sampling and bring
home notes on more than 40 new wines.
* KATRINA FUND-RAISER: WINE SWEEPSTAKES WINNERS ANNOUNCED We've selected
16 prize winners in our online forum's charitable-giving sweepstakes for
Hurricane Katrina victims.
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TRADE TASTING
If you enjoy trying small samples of a lot of different wines and don't
mind a bit of a frenzy, there's hardly a better way to get this sort of
educational exposure than to wangle an invitation to a trade tasting.
A trade tasting is a display of wine samples hosted by an importer or
distributor to give commercial customers a taste of what's new. Even if
you're not "in the trade" of buying and selling wine, chances are that
if you have a good relationship with a local fine-wine retailer with
whom you're a steady buyer, you can arrange an occasional invitation to
an event of this type.
It was my pleasure to get in on such a tasting this week, when the
excellent Cincinnati-based importer/distributor Vintner Select came to
town to show local wine buyers and restaurateurs samples of more than 50
new arrivals from Italy, France, Spain and Australia, as well as a
cross-section of its fine California portfolio.
The scene at Louisville's Blue Dog Bakery (which provided delicious
goodies from pizza to pat� and, of course, first-rate artisanal breads)
was crowded and noisy. One of the difficulties of this kind of tasting
can be a distracting environment that makes it tough to spend much time
in deep analysis of each wine. But I soldiered on, and came home with a
PDA full of brief notes on more than 40 new wines, which I share with
you today.
Prices given are my unofficial estimates, approximating what you might
expect to pay based upon the distributor's wholesale price.
Vintner Select distributes wines in Ohio, Kentucky and parts of North
Carolina; many of its imports are also represented in other parts of the
U.S. by other regional importers such as Skurnik in New York and North
Berkeley in California.
Note that some of these wines are recent arrivals, so it may be a while
before they show up on retail shelves. To find vendors and compare
prices, plug in specific wine names on Wine-Searcher.com:
http://www.wine-searcher.com?referring_site=WLP
ITALY - MARC DE GRAZIA
Il Palazzone 2002 Rubio ($15)
Mostly Sangiovese, this wine is from Umbria but shares the style of
neighboring Tuscany's Chianti with a profile of ripe cherries and a
touch of earth.
Il Palazzino 2002 La Pieve Chianti Classico ($22)
Good fruit and singing acidity come together in a fine Chianti that's
young but drinking very well.
Sassetti - Pertimali 2002 Rosso di Montalcino ($27)
A little shy on the nose but structured very well, with a good balance
of fruit and acldity.
Le Terrazze 2002 Rosso Conero ($16)
Spicy cherries and plums, lots of brown spice and lemon-squirt acidity
make this a good food wine.
E. Pira & Figli 2001 Chiara Boschis Barbera d'Alba ($27)
Meat, smoke and barnyard character make for a rustic wine on the nose,
with sweet fuit more apparent on the palate.
La Spinetta 2001 Pin ($54)
A "cultish" blend of Barbera, Nebbiolo and Cabernet from a respected
Piemonte producer, this is a big, "international" wine, with oak a bit
too evident for my tastes. Sweet fruit and violets meld with heavy
tannins on the palate, suggesting that cellar time may be a virtue.
Clerico 2001 Arte ($45)
A Nebbiolo-Barbera blend from Piemonte, perfumed sweet fruit and oak.
Although I like Marc de Grazia's wines in general, they do tend toward
an oaky, international, "Parkerized" style, as this and the previous
wine suggest.
La Spinetta 2002 Barbaresco ($90)
Very pretty, black fruit and violets. Tannic, young, but already
drinking well, the flagship bottling from the respected Barbaresco
producer Giorgio Rivetti, with his trademark rhino on the label.
Casanova di Spinetta 2002 Toscana Rosso ($20)
La Spinetta's Giorgio Rivetti has a new Tuscan estate, where he
fashioned this excellent "mini-Super Tuscan," predominantly Sangiovese.
Ripe and juicy, a crowd-pleasing style built on a good, solid acidic
structure. I'll be buying more of this goodie.
FRANCE
My old friend David Schildknecht, Vintner Select's French importer,
presided at this table and modestly accepted congratulations on his
recent appointment as contributor for Austria, Germany, Eastern Europe,
and North America east of the Rockies in Robert M. Parker Jr.'s Wine
Advocate.
Marc et Roger Labb� 2004 Abymes Vin de Savoie ($9)
Peachy, prickly and gulpable, a delicious value favorite from the French
Alps.
Boudin 2003 Chantemerle Chablis ($22)
Juicy apples, rich and ripe, very atypical Chablis in the "California"
style that's typical of the hot and super-ripe 2003 vintage throughout
France.
Javillier 03 Meursault les Tillets ($54)
A delight from a favorite white Burgundy producer. Rich, clean, pure
fruit over stony minerality.
Egly-Ouriet non-vintage Brut Tradition ($45)
Highly carbonated, foamy mouthfeel, appley and crisp. Good minerality,
but 75% Pinot doesn't really manifest itself in this Champagne.
Chateau Haut-Guiraud 2001 C�tes de Bourg ($14)
Spicy red-berry fruit, plushy for a Bordeaux. Fine value.
Herv� & Cyprien Arlaud 2003 Bourgogne Roncevie ($22)
Ripe, fruit-forward and tannic. Good Pinot if not typical Burgundy,
another "Californicated" 2003.
G�rard Raphet 2003 Givrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Lavaux St. Jacques ($76)
Lovely, ripe strawberries. Big fruit, juicy and sweet. Atypical again,
but one of the most stylishly handled 2003 Burgundies I've encountered.
Priced well above everyday level, but I love it if somebody else is
pouring.
Domaine R�m�jeanne 2003 C�tes du Rh�ne-Villages "Les Genevriers" ($22)
Another old favorite that turns up on steroids in the 2003 vintage. Pure
raspberries, ripe and fresh, julcy and sweet.
Le Roc des Anges 2003 C�tes du Roussillon-Villages ($30)
Meat, smoke, leather and ripe red fruit.
Domaine du Dragon 2003 C�tes de Provence Cuv�e St.-Michel ($16)
Cherries and plums, tight but balanced.
SPAIN - EUROPEAN CELLARS (ERIC SOLOMON)
Gramona 2004 Penedes Gessami ($15)
Muscat adds a splash of Sauvignon Blanc, but the Muscat dominated with
attractive grapefruit aromas leading into fresh, grapey fruit with crisp
acidity for balance.
Arrazu 2003 Artazuri Navarra ($11)
Garnacha character shows in an appealing blend of raspberries and white
pepper on the nose and palate.
Les Alcusses 2002 Roure ($18)
Black cherry and "barnyard" for a touch of rustic character in this
tasty Tempranillo blend.
Elvi 2003 Makor ($20)
Red fruit and earthy red clay mix in this rather strange blend of the
indigenous Spanish grapes Utiel and Requena from wine maker Sarah Perez.
It's a kosher-for-Passover "mevushal" wine, a heat treatment that
satisfies religious ritual but, in my experience, does little to enhance
quality.
Casta�o 2002 Sola�era Yecla ($15)
A blend of Monastrell (Mourvedre) and Cabernet. Warm, plummy, a bit
pruney, but good acidity holds it together.
El Seque 2002 Alicante ($30)
Mostly Monastrell. Extracted, intense, black cherry fruit and steely
acidity, on the "international" side.
Closa Battlet 2002 Priorat ($45)
Raspberry Grenache fruit is framed by forward, somewhat intrusive new
oak, but there's fine Priorat minerality beneath, waiting for a little
cellar time to bring it out.
CALIFORNIA
Cinnabar 2002 Santa Cruz Mountains Chardonnay ($30)
Smoky, rich, full, a big but stylish take on California Chardonnay.
Alban 2003 Edna Valley Estate Viognier ($36)
Varietal character is a bit overtaken by oak. Better on the palate,
peachy and full-bodied.
Lane Tanner 2003 French Camp Vineyard San Luis Obispo Syrah ($24)
Bright and ripe, bold Syrah fruit in good balance.
Bonny Doon 2001 California Le Cigare Volant ($36)
The original "Rhone Ranger," Randal Grahm's California homage to
Chateauneuf-du-Pape, is very pretty, perfume and fruit. Good balance,
more "Rhonish" than I recall from earlier iterations.
Robert Sinskey Vineyards 2001 Merlot Los Carneros ($30)
Black fruit. Cherries and chocolate, excellent structure and balance, a
Merlot that might have made the Sideways guy change his attitude.
Robert Pecota 2002 Kara's Vineyard Napa Cabernet Sauvignon ($45)
Fine, well-balanced Cabernet character; tannic, young but impressive.
Rabbit Ridge 2002 LPR Russell Family Vineyard Reserve ($34)
A blend of Zinfandel, Primitivo, Petite Sirah and other grapes, but Zin
takes the lead role in its luscious bramble fruit, raspberries and
blackberries. Jammy but beautifully structured, outstanding.
Selby 2002 Sonoma County Bobcat Zinfandel ($35)
Loads of fruit, big but refined. Nice.
Qup� 2003 Central Coast Syrah ($18)
Ripe fruit, good balance. A value treat.
Edmunds St. John 2003 Bone-Jolly El Dorado Gamay ($20)
Fresh berries, juicy, a whiff of meat. Gulpable.
Talbott 2002 Logan Monterey Pinot Noir ($22)
Red fruit, herbs, lots of spice and cola. Idiosyncratic but pleasant.
Havens 2001 Napa Merlot ($27)
Big, rich and powerful - the 14.5% alcohol shows. Good balance, though,
in another serious Merlot.
Laurel Glen 2001 Sonoma Mountain Estate Cabernet Sauvignon ($60)
A beauty from a personal favorite California producer, showing very well
today in spite of its youth, with black fruit and sleekly muscular
structure over firm but palatable tannins.
Paras Vineyards 2000 Mount Veeder Napa Cabernet Sauvignon ($100)
Classic old-style California Cabernet. Outstanding. Not a cheap wine,
and not easy to get ... Vintner Select received just a few cases of a
wine that's usually available only from the winery.
AUSTRALIA
These two top Australian selections were tucked in at the end of a line
of Californians.
Dutschke 2002 Willow Bend Barossa Merlot-Shiraz ($25)
Fruit-forward, good structure, an unexpected blend of varieties, but it
works.
Torbreck 2003 The Struie Barossa Shiraz ($50)
Black plums and menthol in a big but balanced package. Torbreck is one
of my Australian favorites, and The Struie is perhaps the point at which
bargain price and value meet in its portfolio.
I regret missing the table at which Robert Whale's Australian imports
were presented, as it included such Ozzie favorites as Plantagenet,
Coriole and Parker Coonawarra Estate.
________________________________________________________________________
TALK ABOUT WINE ONLINE
If you'd like to ask a question or comment on today's topic (or any
other wine-related subject), you'll find a round-table online discussion
in our interactive Wine Lovers' Discussion Group, where you're always
welcome to join in the conversations about wine.
http://www.myspeakerscorner.com/forum/index.phtml?fn=1&tid=66275&mid=570216
If you prefer to comment privately, feel free to send me E-mail at
wine(a)wineloverspage.com. I'll respond personally to the extent that time
and volume permit.
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printed out for your scrapbook or file or downloaded to your PDA or
other wireless device.
http://www.wineloverspage.com/wineadvisor1/print050914.html
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KATRINA FUND-RAISER: WINE SWEEPSTAKES WINNERS ANNOUNCED
Many thanks to the 126 Wine Advisor readers and Wine Lovers' Discussion
Group participants who made our charitable fund-raiser a big success by
contributing well over $10,000 in donations to non-profit organizations
involved in the Hurricane Katrina clean-up effort.
We've closed out the associated wine sweepstakes today, and the winners,
selected at random from all entries, are listed below, along with the
wine prize that each winner will receive.
Nick Molnar, New York, wins the Chateau Meyney "mini-vertical" (1986,
1989 and 1990) contributed by Dale Williams.
Bob Archibald, Oregon, wins the 1990 Chateau l'Angelus contributed by
Randy Buckner.
Bill Gussett, Ohio, wins the 2001 J.J. Prum Goldcapsule Auslese
contributed by John Trombley.
Mark Lipton, Indiana, wins the 1999 J.L. Chave Hermitage contributed by
Robin Garr.
Carson Callahan, Florida, wins the 1998 Donnhoff (Oberhauser) Eiswein
contributed by Randy Buckner.
Johanna Turner, Kentucky, wins the Dehlinger 1998 Russian River Valley
Syrah contributed by Robin Garr.
Elizabeth Freligh, Massachusetts, wins the 1999 Bousquet de Papes Chante
le Merle Chateauneuf du Pape contributed by David Bueker.
Paul Marquardt, Washington, D.C., wins the 1982 Chateau Latour
contributed by Bob Ross.
Roger Merrick, Colorado, wins the 1990 Chateau Pichon Longueville Baron
contributed by Randy Buckner.
Marc Davis, Washington, wins the 2000 Chateau Leoville Barton
contributed by Randy Buckner.
Evan Schwartz, New York, wins the 1982 Leoville Las Cases contributed by
Bob Ross.
Dale Williams, New York, wins the 1975 Chateau Lafite contributed by
Howie Hart. (Dale was the source of the fund-raiser idea, by the way, so
the happy coincidence that made him a random winner returns a small,
well-deserved reward for the significant effort and personal
contributions he offered to make this venture a success.)
John Tomasso, California, wins the 2001 Marcassin Chardonnay Three
Sisters Vineyard contributed by Allan Bree.
Dr. Arthur Lewis, Georgia, wins the 1998 Muller-Catoir (Muzbacher)
Eiswein contributed by Randy Buckner.
James Dietz, California, wins the 2000 Marcassin Pinot Noir Marcassin
Vineyard contributed by Allan Bree.
Clark D'Elia, Washington, wins the 2000 Chateau Lynch Bages contributed
by Randy Buckner.
Winners will be formally notified by E-mail today, along with contact
information so winners and prize donors can get together to arrange
shipment of the prize wines. (By the way, while winners were selected at
random, I paired winners and prize donors non-randomly, seeking where
practical to minimize the distance between winner and donor to simplify
shipping issues.)
And, although the contest is over, of course we continue to encourage
contributions for Katrina relief and other worthy causes through Network
for Good, a reputable organization that acts as a clearinghouse for
online contributions to quality nonprofit organizations in many areas of
need. A list of more than 100 worthy Katrina-related organizations will
be found online at
http://www.networkforgood.org/topics/animal_environ/hurricanes/
A NOTE ON RANDOMNESS:
In case you're interested, I generated the random number lists used to
select the winners from the intriguing Website Random.org, which
provides an online form that generates true random numbers based on
atmospheric noise, which for many purposes is statistically better than
the pseudo-random numbers typically generated by computer programs. If
you're interested in reading more about this, I recommend the essay
Introduction to Randomness and Random Numbers by Mads Haahr, the host of
Random.org, at
http://www.random.org/essay.html
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Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Copyright 2005 by Robin Garr. All rights reserved.
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* Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX *
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Greetings,
Those of us not lucky enough to be in Piedmont this week are mining our
cellars for a nice Syrah to bring to The Craftsman.
Dave T has made the reservation for 8 people, Thursday at 6:30.
We will adjust as needed.
The Craftsman Restaurant
4300 E. Lake St.
Minneapolis
612.722.0175
www.craftsmanrestaurant.com
Dave T.
Karin
Jim
Russ?
Bill?
Ruth?
Janet?
Nicolai?
Annette?
Cheers,
Jim
Craft's Fare
A terrific bar lurks within East Lake Street's newest fine-dining restaurant
by Dara Moskowitz
The Craftsman Restaurant
4300 E. Lake St.
Minneapolis
612.722.0175
www.craftsmanrestaurant.com
In a new fine-dining restaurant, it's incredibly easy to make a million dollars--if you start with five million. It's not just that the startup costs are astonishing. You think it's expensive to buy a new dining room set and a case of wine? Try multiplying that by 40. There's the rent, the licensing, the liquor, the pots, the china, the ovens, to say nothing of the everyday food costs, which in fine dining are nothing short of astronomical. You say you want to pay a Maine diver to jump off a boat, pry up some scallops, and Fed-Ex them to you? Prepare to dig deep, my friend.
Worse yet, when an aspiring fine-dining restaurateur finally spends more than he ever dreams possible, the customers drawn to fine dining aren't particularly frivolous or forgiving. Charge someone 10 bucks for dinner, and you can serve it off the back of a truck in a parking lot. Charge that same person 50 bucks, and you best compare favorably with that new TV that could fit in that one corner of the kitchen. And let's not even talk about the scrutiny: Every chef, every neighbor, every TV station, every architect, every interior designer, and every single amateur or professional critic within 40 miles will feel free to weigh in on your every choice, without any knowledge of the reasons you had to make them. Opening a fine-dining restaurant is wildly, desperately, insanely difficult. As a critic, I do know this.
Which is exactly what makes it so difficult to contemplate the Craftsman, the newest fine-dining restaurant in Minneapolis. For it is a place that is really just a few dozen minor adjustments away from pulling off that insanely difficult feat. Let me explain.
When I first started visiting Craftsman, I would enter the one large, very noisy, sage-and-mustard-colored main dining room, and I would contemplate the fine-dining menu. I would delight in the thoughtful grace notes of high living that the restaurant presents: the wonderful Rustica Bakery bread; the complementary vial of high-quality, high-priced Sciabica olive oil in all its eucalyptus and herb bouquet glory. I would order from the utterly ambitious fine-dining menu, and I would receive a parade of dishes that occasionally hit the mark, but were, more usually, a combination of various objects that showed some fine cooking skill, yet ultimately kind of fizzled out.
Let's dwell first on the triumphs. The kitchen's most reliable dish is its ahi tuna poke. (That last word is pronounced pokey, for some reason.) In it, cubes of red ahi tuna about the size of gumdrops are dressed in a sweet and spicy tamarind vinaigrette, shaped into a low cylinder, and crowned with a fluffy wig of baby herbs. It is served with a paper-thin cracker, and costs $10.75. Slip a forkful of the slick tuna into your mouth alongside a few tangles of herb, and you encounter a sparkling achievement in texture and taste: the glassy tuna and grassy herbs, the spice of chile and the sweet jungle of tamarind. Sometimes the cracker might be striped wittily with black and white tracks of salt and pepper, and it might taste fried and lilting and light, like one of those Chinese soup noodles, suddenly ennobled. And sometimes it just might be kind of over-browned and nothing. In any event, the dish is whole, accomplished, and well balanced.
It's the only appetizer that is. The Craftsman Caesar salad ($8.25) is a large volume of very thick garlic dressing coating two small, unseparated heads of lettuce beside a little block-stack of extremely hard homemade croutons. The Summit Oatmeal Stout-steamed Prince Edward Island mussels ($9.95) is a generous portion served in a wide white bowl; sometimes that bowl is filled to brimming with a super-salty brown broth topped with acrid-tasting burnt onions, and sometimes you only get a cup of the liquid so that the mussels aren't too salty, but they are cold. Sometimes these mussels come with slices of grilled bread that are beautiful, olive-oil-swabbed, and as roasty and pure as an autumn bonfire. And sometimes they arrive with slices of grilled bread so hard and inedible that your friends think it's a funny joke to pass a slice to you saying, "Here, try this, it's great." The pleasant natural saltiness of good-quality cold smoked salmon ($9.25) is lost when paired with a very salty salad of baby arugula in a soy-and-wasabi vinaigrette.
The entr�es have a similar swing-and-a-miss tendency: Grilled citrus-marinated Wild Acres Farm chicken with grilled leeks and blue smashed potatoes ($18.75) was served so dry and overcooked that it was charmless, but the grilled leeks were sweet and elegant, and the smashed blue potatoes were nice, earthy, and rich. A thick piece of hamachi ($18.95) was served in a bowl surrounded by an off-puttingly sweet broth; the irony soba noodles and baby bok choy that accompanied the fish only seemed to accent how weird the broth was.
A pricey nightly special of rose-salt-crusted marlin was disappointing: For $28.95, a big gray fist of fish was covered with a crust made of salt, rose petals, pink peppercorns, green peppercorns, and fennel, a crust which made it smell lovely, not just floral, but fresh and lively as a meadow. Unfortunately, the salt crust also made this fish nearly inedible. I found that any bite of marlin with any bit of the salt crust was so supremely salty that it turned my tongue to ribbons of fire, and any taste of the fish without the crust tasted unseasoned. The grilled ramps beside the fish were lovely curls of roasted springtime, but couldn't rescue the dish, which also came with dry and overcooked Yukon gold potatoes and mushrooms.
As I pushed away dish after dish at the Craftsman, I glumly considered what a jerk I was going to feel like saying negative things about the first really nice upscale birthday-destination restaurant in the recent history of East Lake Street. I thought about the bazillions of dollars, hours, and dreams that owners Mike Dooley and Susan Kennedy-Dooley had invested in the spic-and-span restaurant and the pretty outdoor patio. I imagined the unpleasantness my notes would wreak upon the life of young chef Dennis Marron, until recently the sous-chef at W.A. Frost. I considered all the sweet, young, well-meaning servers who would likely suffer. And I thought about how the difference between a great kitchen and a good one isn't in the quality of ideas, but in the consistency of execution. I also devoted a few seconds to thinking about how much more fun it is to be fun than to be critical.
As I toyed with my dessert, which on the occasion in question was a sort of rhubarb-strawberry cobbler topped with a scoop of ice cream and a chiffonade of fresh basil ($6.25), I wondered why such a pleasant, sturdy little cobbler was called an upside-down shortcake. I generally found that the desserts followed the same wildly unpredictable pattern as the rest of the fine-dining menu at the Craftsman: When I tried the "double-decker monster ice cream sandwich" it was made with oversweet M&M cookies that tasted like they could have come out of a convenience store, pressed together with a bit of nice chocolate ice cream ($6.25), and served with a tiny iced vanilla latte, which swam with odd white flakes.
Another night, another dessert had been nothing short of elegant: To one side was a stack of understated lemon ginger snaps, to another side a snappy scoop of sharp citrus sorbet, and in the middle of these two was a pale little flat-topped dome of coconut-and-passion fruit panna cotta wearing a curly crown of sweet and tart orange zest. Scoop a forkful of the two together, and you experienced the delightful sensation of mellow and sharp, creamy and bright, frivolous and accomplished.
I think it might have been at this point that I noticed something fairly obvious: While I sat at one of only two occupied tables in the fine-dining room, the bar was jumping.
I had an idea. I assembled a reconnaissance party. We went to the Craftsman bar. We ordered burgers, from the bar menu, and cocktails. We had the best experience of all my visits to the Craftsman, by a country mile. The burgers and fries were the highlights.
The Korean BBQ burger ($10.50) was fantastic. To make it, a big, buttery, fluffy patty of sweet meat is topped with thick, salty planks of well crisped bacon, a bit of white cheddar, sprigs of cilantro, grilled green onions, basil leaves, crunchy daikon, and, for wit and comedy, a little wad of translucent noodles. Then, the whole mess is sandwiched in a sweet, sturdy bun. The overall effect is like experiencing a perfectly executed boxing combination that leads to a knockout: sweet, spicy, meaty, salty, herbal, pow pow pow--and we're down for the count!
Dang. The burger comes with a mug of wonderfully crisp, caramel-sweet, salty, slightly spicy, and entirely addictive sage-dusted French fries; the fries were so good that my friends kept passing the mug around even after they were groaning with fullness. Set that devastating combo beside a pint of crisp Rush River Amber Ale ($4.50) and you've got a burger to enter into the pantheon alongside the ones at the St. Paul Grill, Matt's Bar, and Vincent, which is the highest praise I know. The blue cheese burger ($9.25) topped with good-quality, ashy Black River Blue, arugula, tomato, and grilled green onions is also excellent.
When you sit at the bar, you're more inclined to try the house special martinis, some of which are wonderful. The tomato water martini ($7.50), for instance, doesn't taste anything like tomatoes, really, but somehow the gin strained through them and steeped with white pepper and coriander comes out reminding one of ocean water made into a spear tip. The Minnesota pickle martini ($7.50), made with Minnesota Shakers' vodka and pickle juice and garnished with two little pickles feels somehow Depression-era and also deliciously modern, like eggs fried in a black iron skillet, or some other sort of thing that's so simple and simply brilliant it must be very old.
In fact, everything having to do with Craftsman's beverage program is charming: The wine list is an unadulterated joy, offering so many of my favorite wines that I almost wondered if it could read my mind. Funky, yeasty, profound Schramsberg bubbly is available both by the glass (their Mirabelle, for $9.50) and by the bottle (the flirty and lilting Brut Ros� Napa Valley for $53). Their by-the-glass Pinot Gris, King Estate, for $8.25, is so wonderfully energetic and floral you wish you could plant it in the garden. The Terre Rouge "T�te-�-T�te" is one of the roundest, fullest, most spicily, strawberrily pleasant wines I've ever seen on a glass list for $7.50. I've only had Smith Wooton Cabernet Franc a very few times in my life, but I remember the stuff tasting like floating through the night sky in a black velvet balloon, so the next time I have $54 in my pocket, I know exactly what I'll do with it: Splash out for a bottle, and pair it with a couple of the Craftsman's burgers.
This imaginary meal, I'll point out, unites the absolute most highbrow stuff on offer at the Craftsman, namely, one of their most expensive wines, and the most lowbrow, namely, a burger that costs less than certain appetizers. Is this silly? Yes. But also, in my experience, sensible.
And so I offer this recommendation to you, dear readers: There is a wonderful bar hiding in the front of the Craftsman, a bar with fabulous burgers, great beers, and fine wines, and if you go there, it will be worth your while. Meanwhile, I offer this advice to you, dear Craftsman: When I say to you that you need to integrate the high and low parts of your establishment, and fast, I say it not because I want to be a jerk, but because I think it would be better for all of us if you hear it from me now, and not from your accountant two difficult years down the road. Chef Marron has a bold vision and a certain confident fearlessness that is impossible to teach, and I can well imagine him leading the Craftsman to great heights.
� � Vol 26 � Issue 1274 � PUBLISHED 5/4/2005
URL: www.citypages.com/databank/26/1274/article13250.asp
HOME: www.citypages.com
City Pages is the Online News and Arts Weekly of the Twin Cities
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* Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
Great food, fun at JP's American Bistro.
Ditto the BBQ Friday night at Chez Gregory.
10 tough matches
Our Pairings expert plays matchmaker for foods that don't get along with most wines
- Lynne Char Bennett, Chronicle Staff Writer
Thursday, September 8, 2005
Click to View
They're the problem children born to the marriage of food and wine -- the argumentative asparagus, bullying blue cheese and churlish hot chiles -- we send to their rooms because they act up when there's wine on the table.
Some foods just aren't all that wine-friendly, clashing like a pair of band cymbals (think of bitter greens washed down with an oaky, tannic Cabernet Sauvignon). However, take comfort in knowing that there is a wine for every dish, and that like kids, all it takes are a few rules -- guidelines, actually, because nothing is hard and fast in matching food and wine -- for harmony to prevail.
I chose 10 of the most challenging ingredients to match with wine and ultimately found a great partner for each. Two basic principles came out of the experimentation. One: White wines go well with a much broader range of foods than red wines. Two: Wines with no oak and a touch of sweetness (Riesling, Gewurztraminer and even simple White Zinfandel) and wines with bright acidity and citrus notes (Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Gris and brut sparking wine) are often the best choices for the most difficult ingredients.
I recommend wines made primarily from major grape varieties in both the New World (the United States, New Zealand, Australia) and the Old (Europe), but there are so many different wines and foods that other matches will work, too. Everyone's palate is different, so try your own pairings. Trust your taste buds.
Here are 10 of the toughest matches for wine:
1 Artichokes and asparagus
When I offered my next-door neighbor some asparagus soup, he said, "No, thank you."
He didn't like asparagus. "It tastes like grass," he said.
Asparagus and artichokes are double trouble when it comes to matching them with wine. People either love them (like me) or hate them; a sip of the wrong wine can create a clash of the titans that even the most ardent asparagus or artichoke fan can't win.
Both have a green, grassy, herbal character that by itself is not wine-friendly. Additionally, artichokes increase the pairing difficulty because they contain cynarin, a compound that causes a sweet aftertaste for most people and a metallic or bitter taste for others, though a few lucky people are not affected at all.
The best wines to pair with artichokes and asparagus are citrusy Sauvignon Blancs and Pinot Grigios that can have a touch of herb or grassiness. Citrus aromas and flavors, brisk natural acidity and a lack of oak in the wines brighten the vegetables, much like a squeeze of lemon juice would. The wines' dryness and acidity help balance the sweet aftertaste from the artichoke.
Sauvignon Blancs, especially those from New Zealand and the Sancerre region of France, echo the herbal notes in the vegetables, though they can be too overpowering for those who don't care for the green character.
Improve the wine-food match by grilling or roasting the vegetables, or serving them with a mild vinaigrette or citrusy dressing to moderate their greenness and offset the artichoke's sweetness. A mayonnaise-based dip also works.
2 Bitter greens
I recently discovered that I'm more sensitive to bitterness than most people. Now I understand why I don't like black coffee and can only drink it wimpified with milk and sugar.
Though I grew up eating Chinese bitter melon and mustard greens, it still takes me a bite or two to calibrate my palate to the taste, though at times I crave some bitterness in my food. After moving to California, I started eating other vegetables with some bitterness: broccoli rabe, radicchio, endive, chicory and tiny Thai eggplants.
You can add ingredients such as bacon, sauteed onions and cheese to bitter vegetables (or coconut milk in the case of Thai eggplants) to moderate their bitterness. You can also roast the vegetables, serve them with a sauce or dressing or add them to braises. But simply prepared, they're hard to match to wine. Blame our ancestors.
Humans are usually able to detect bitterness at low levels, whether it's in coffee or medicine. Many poisonous plants are bitter. It's Mother Nature's way of protecting us from -- or at least making us think twice about -- what we might put into our mouths.
Some people are very sensitive to bitterness compared to the general population, according to Linda Bartoshuk, a professor at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Conn. These individuals, dubbed supertasters, have a greater number of taste buds for sweet, salty and sour as well as bitter. Bartoshuk says that a greater percentage of women than men -- and Asian women in particular -- are supertasters.
At the opposite end of the spectrum are the non-tasters -- individuals who have fewer taste buds than normal. These folks detect less bitterness in food and wine. Bartoshuk provides an analogy: supertasters "taste" in neon colors and non-tasters in pastel; everyone else "tastes" normal colors.
Very few wines can overcome bitter vegetables that are served plain. Yet bitterness is offset by a contrast of sweetness, which is why so many liquid medicines are sweet. Semisweet New World Rieslings serve this purpose (many German Rieslings have a petrol character that conflicts), so try serving them with unadorned radicchio, broccoli rabe and other bitter vegetables. Sauvignon Blancs are also good. Otherwise, if the vegetables are modified with other ingredients, pair the wine with the main flavors on the plate. At traditional Chinese banquets, the classic drink is Cognac, brandy or whisky diluted with 7Up, perfect for dishes that have a bitter element. Don't knock it until you've tried it.
3 Soy sauce
Salt is one of the most important ingredients in cooking, enhancing flavors and making them pop. Saltiness gains complexity when it's in seasonings and condiments that have the savory character of umami, including soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce, fish sauce and oyster sauce.
On its own, too much salt increases the perception of tannins in a wine. The umami in soy sauce intensifies that tannic effect. Any bitter notes or off flavors in wine -- especially red wine -- also come to the front, while the wine's fruitiness is muted. But soy sauce is not eaten as a stand-alone ingredient. It's used in a multitude of ways, including seasoning sushi, stir-frys, marinades and dipping sauces, so pair the wine with the overall flavors of the dish.
An unoaked or lightly oaked Chardonnay with good fruitiness and medium- to medium-full body supports the depth and saltiness of dishes with soy sauce, though the toastiness will be accentuated. Also, an off-dry white wine like Riesling provides some sweetness to balance the saltiness of the soy sauce.
Brut ros� and blanc de noirs sparkling wines and New World Pinot Noirs with low tannin levels have the fruit and acidity to complement dishes that contain soy sauce.
The combination of Cognac and 7Up also does the trick -- Cognac cleanses the palate, and 7Up adds a touch of sweetness to balance the saltiness and strong umami of the soy sauce.
4 Candied yams
I see yams and sweet potatoes baked with brown sugar and marshmallows only at Thanksgiving. Why is that? Tradition, most likely, plus it takes our teeth and palates the rest of the year to recover from the huge hit of sticky, sugary sweetness.
Candied yams are one of the problem children -- besides the niece and nephew who keep chasing the cat around the house -- who visit on one of the most food-focused holidays of the year.
Most wines taste thin and sour when they follow a bite of candied yam. As with wedding cake and other sweet desserts, the wine should be at least as sweet as or slightly sweeter than the food.
Riesling has the ripe stone fruit and residual sugar to match the sweetness of candied yams. German Rieslings with Spatlese and Auslese levels of ripeness also have enough acidity to balance the residual sugar, so the wine doesn't seem cloying.
Demi-sec sparkling wine, with 3.3 percent to 5 percent residual sugar, is sweet enough for many wedding cakes and candied yams that are on the less sweet side. The effervescence also helps cleanse the palate.
5 Chiles
Heat is where it's at for many ethnic cuisines, where hot chiles combine with sweet, savory, spicy and pungent ingredients. Kung Pao chicken, Mexican salsa frescas, Thai red curry and Vietnamese dipping sauces are but a few of the dishes that can take your mouth from warm to burn.
Beer is often the adult beverage of choice for chiles, because of its low alcohol and ice-cold serving temperature -- refreshing when your mouth's on fire.
Alcohol exacerbates chiles' heat. Sweetness calms it. Tannins add insult to injury on palates already assaulted with chiles. So if you have only one wine choice, pick a well-chilled bottle of fruity Riesling with some residual sugar and balanced acidity. Slightly sweet White Zinfandel is also a good companion to fiery foods.
6 Chocolate
"Cabernet and Chocolate" tastings are common in Wine Country, but let's face it -- Cabernet Sauvignon and chocoholics should stop meeting like this.
Dark, bittersweet chocolate -- also called semisweet -- has a palate-coating texture, intensity of flavor and some bitterness. Cabernet Sauvignon's firm tannins and bitter, astringent character go toe to toe with dark chocolate, and neither one can win this bout.
Wines that suit rich chocolate truffles must have similar fullness and intensity to the chocolate, and also need to be as sweet as or sweeter than the dessert. Fortified wines like Port and some late-harvest Zinfandels have the alcohol, sweetness and full body to stand up to a dense dark chocolate dish.
Muscats and some white dessert wines hold their own with moderately chocolatey desserts like chocolate mousse.
Moscato di Asti, a lightly sparkling Muscat from Italy, and demi-sec sparkling wines pair with lighter-textured, desserts with some chocolate in them, such as white wedding cake with chocolate filling.
7 Eggs
Most people have eggs at breakfast, without wine. But egg-based dishes like quiches, frittatas, omelets and eggs Benedict are often on brunch and lunch menus and sometimes are enjoyed at dinner, too.
The rich, palate-coating yolk of a runny egg can seem metallic when consumed with wine. Fully cooked hard-boiled eggs have yolks with a slightly crumbly texture and light sulfurous aromas and flavors -- also a wine-pairing challenge. A dry, medium-bodied wine with bright acidity and citrus aromas and flavors like Sauvignon Blanc, Alsatian Pinot Blanc and brut sparkling wine will cut through an egg yolk's richness.
Mayonnaise, Caesar salad dressing and hollandaise sauce also contain egg yolks (with richness that primarily comes from oil or butter) and will work with a lightly oaked, moderately acidic Chardonnay that has a little buttery character. Add other ingredients to eggs to make them more wine-friendly, like onions, mushrooms, bacon and cheese. They provide texture, overshadow any sulfurous quality and modify the egg's flavor.
No wonder sparkling wine -- with or without orange juice -- is often served with brunch -- it's a great match for eggs.
8 Blue cheese
Pinot Noir, Syrah/Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon often are served with a cheese course, but if blue cheese is one of the selections, it won't do the wine, or your palate, any favors.
There are many types of blue cheese, with varying levels of salt and acidity, richness and pungency. But in general, blue cheese and dry red wine bring out undesirable characteristics in each other and suppress the positive ones. For example, a salty blue cheese like Point Reyes Original Blue can make a moderately tannic Cabernet Sauvignon seem sharp and bitter.
The most universal match with blue cheese is a fruity white wine with moderate acidity, no oak or minimal oak character and some residual sugar. The wine's ripe fruit and sweetness are a refreshing contrast to the pungency and salt of the cheese, while the wine's acidity refreshes the palate after the cheese's mouth-coating richness. The best results come when the wine and cheese have similar levels of acidity, body and intensity.
New World Sauvignon Blancs are a surprisingly good blue-cheese partner; the match works because of the similarity in acidity, as long as there is no oak in the wine.
Sweet dessert wines such as Sauternes and Port also work with blues like Roquefort and Stilton. If you must have a red wine, choose one that is fruity, with soft tannins.
9 Sweet and sour pork
Balanced acidity and sweetness in food and in wine creates harmony in the mouth. However, high levels of acidity and sweetness in a dish can overwhelm the wrong wine, making it seem harsh and tannic.
Sweet and sour pork, lemon chicken, sauerbraten, pickled beets, sweet pickles and cranberry sauce make dry wine taste tart, to the point of sourness, even though there is acidity in the dish. Keep the food's acidity and sugar in balance and lessen the intense pungency for the most successful wine matches.
Fruity, off-dry, high-acidity wines are best with sweet and sour dishes. Off-dry to semisweet Gewurztraminer and Riesling are good bets, though Beaujolais Nouveau and fruit-forward, low-tannin Zinfandels will work if you insist on a red wine.
10 Vinaigrette
You order a pricey Cabernet Sauvignon to go perfectly with your porterhouse steak, yet every time you take a bite of your side salad, you think you've wasted your money. What in the world is going on?
Vinegar can be death to wine. If a vinaigrette is more acidic than a wine, the wine can taste flat by comparison. The vinaigrette's tartness can also make tannins or oak in wine seem harsher.
But if the acidity level in the wine and vinaigrette are somewhat similar, the fruit in the wine comes to the front. Choose a Sauvignon Blanc with zippy acidity, citrus aromas and flavors and no oak for the salad course. The wine's acidity will help cut through the oil in the vinaigrette.
If you're making your own salad dressing, reduce the vinegar to match less acidic wines like Viognier, Pinot Grigio/Gris and Gruner Veltliner. Use a higher proportion of oil to vinegar, say four or five parts oil to one part vinegar, or add some stock to increase the volume and dilute the acidity.
Or try something less acidic in the vinaigrette, such as orange juice, rice vinegar, raspberry vinegar and even red and white wine, which all have less acidity than sherry, Champagne and red wine vinegar. Add other ingredients like fruit, nuts or cheese to the salad to round out its flavors and increase the chance for a successful match.
Ten classic matches
Just as some ingredients give wine-and-food aficionados a devil of a time, other successful pairings are made in heaven. Here are 10 can't-miss matches:
Cabernet Sauvignon with steak grilled medium-rare: The steak's protein and fat smooth the wine's tannins, while the intensity, complexity and chewy texture of both steak and wine sing in harmony.
California Chardonnay with lobster in butter or cream sauce: The rich, sea-sweet succulence of lobster was made for a rich, mouth-filling wine. When made in a buttery, oaky style, Chardonnay needs an equally opulent dish.
Chianti with pasta bolognese: A high-acid Italian wine made from Sangiovese has red fruit aromas and flavors and finds a friend in the acidity of the tomatoes; Chianti's typical rusticity mirrors that of the dish.
Pinot Noir with duck and mushrooms: Rich, fatty duck gets a refreshing wash of natural acidity from Pinot Noir, and the wine's earthiness and truffle character are spot-on matches for fungi; in addition, the berry fruit in the wine plays counterpoint to the gamy duck.
Sauternes with foie gras: A rich dish calls for a wine with similar richness; at the same time, the wine's sweet fruit and honey flavors contrast with the meaty flavor of the foie gras. Although an unctuously sweet wine, the Sauternes also has enough acidity to cut through the fat of the foie gras.
Sancerre with fresh goat cheese: The wine and cheese are complementary in their tanginess, yet the racy acidity of Sauvignon Blanc clears the palate for another bite of creamy, mouth-coating chevre.
Muscadet, Chablis or Sauvignon Blanc with raw oysters: These clean, crisp, citrusy and sometimes minerally whites counter the briny, slightly metallic character of fresh-shucked oysters without overwhelming their taste and texture.
Red Bordeaux with lamb: The meat's intense, gamy flavor stands up to a full-bodied red like Bordeaux; the lamb's fat moderates the wine's tannins.
Sparkling wine with caviar: The effervescence and firm acidity of bubbly mediates the salt, oil and crunch of the caviar. Luxury to the nth degree makes this an especially sexy match.
Zinfandel with barbecued ribs: A spicy wine complements a spicy dish; the inherent sweetness of the Zinfandel grape suits sauces that include brown sugar or molasses; and there is enough tannin and acidity in the wine to slice through the meaty, slightly fatty ribs.
-- Lynne Char Bennett
Basic pairing principles
Some considerations in pairing wine to food include the similarities and contrasts of richness, texture, intensity and flavor of the dish and the wine.
Similarities -- Match food and wine richness and texture. For example: lobster in butter sauce with a buttery Chardonnay.
Contrasts -- Opposites can work too, especially in cases of richness versus acidity. For example: lobster in butter sauce with a crisp brut or blanc de blancs sparkling wine.
Regionality -- Regional food usually pairs well with the wine produced there. For example: Alsatian choucroute with Riesling and wild salmon with Oregon Pinot Noir.
Flavors -- Pair food and wine with similar flavors, such as steak in green peppercorn sauce with a peppery Syrah. Opposite flavors also can work -- a fruity, New World Pinot Noir goes with earthy sauteed mushrooms.
Balance -- Balance the acidity of the dish or sweetness of a dessert so it is similar to the wine. When pairing wine with dessert, the wine should always be as sweet as or sweeter.
Dominant flavors, sauces and accompaniments -- The main ingredient is not always the dominant flavor in a dish; other ingredients contribute flavors and textures -- like chicken braised with olives and tomatoes versus simple roast chicken -- and influence the wine pairing. Modifiers to a dish, such as sauces and garnishes, can improve a match or allow a dish to happily mesh with more than one wine. For example, while many white fish go best with lean white wines like Pinot Gris, adding a sauce made with rich chicken jus helps the dish work with richer Chardonnay; adding mushrooms makes it Pinot Noir-friendly.
Other factors that influence the match include:
Cooking method -- Steaming and poaching are better suited for lighter wines. Medium- and full-bodied red wines are better with grilled, roasted and braised dishes that have more intense flavors.
Occasion -- A chilled ros� is perfect for a warm day at the beach or a picnic with grilled shrimp and vegetable pasta salad.
Price and time commitment -- While some people might have meat loaf with a $100 Cabernet Sauvignon, similarity between the price of a wine and the ingredients in the dish usually makes more sense. Grab a pepperoni pizza and a bottle of inexpensive Chianti. Or, plan a dinner party and go all out with an elegant, earthy red Burgundy and made-from scratch pappardelle topped with light creamy wild mushrooms and shaved truffles.
-- L. C. B.
E-mail Lynne Char Bennett at lbennett(a)sfchronicle.com
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URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/09/08/WIGCEEHLHD1.DTL
�2005 San Francisco Chronicle
--
------------------------------ *
* Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
Surdyks is allowing me to offer the "Bubbles Discount" for either of the
two tastings on the 22nd.
Spotlight is normally $60 - $10 off with Bubbles Discount = $50 (includes
BOTH tastings)
Charity is normally $35 - $5 off with Bubbles Discount = $30
To take advantage of this discount, they would like you to call the store
at 612-379-3232 during the DAY and ask for either Zack or Lynn who will
sign you up. You need to mention that you want the "Bubbles Discount".
Discount cannot be applied to internet ticket sales or tickets purchased at
the store.
S U R D Y K S
Charity Pre-Sale Spotlight Tasting
Event proceeds will benefit the American Heart Association
Thursday, September 22nd
Millennium Hotel - Loring Ballroom
1313 Nicolett Mall - Minneapolis
5:30pm - 6:30pm
SPOTLIGHT TASTING: From 5:30 until 6:30, we will have our Spotlight
Tasting. During this time, some of highest quality wines of the Fall Sale
will be featured, as well as some “special purchase” wines available
during this tasting only! The donation is $60/person to attend this
portion of the event. Join us to sample the best of the best in this
exclusive tasting taking place before the main event.
Arrive Early! Attendees will be invited to participate in a Scavenger Hunt
for a one carat “Heart on Fire” diamond pendant! The first person to solve
all of the clues will win the pendant worth $12,000! Jewelry has been
donated by J.B. Hudson Fine Jewelers.
$60.00 (tax deductible)
Price includes both events
(Main Charity Tasting and Spotlight)
7:00pm - 9:00pm
Try before you buy! Our Pre-Sale Wine Tasting Event will feature more than
200 of the wines you’ll find in our fall sale. Enjoy cheeses and
appetizers from Surdyk’s Bistro 2GO, artisan chocolates, and live jazz
performed throughout the evening. In addition, there will be a silent
auction featuring exciting wine items, gift certificates to great local
restaurants, and a few must see surprises. And best of all, attendees have
the opportunity to order wines at the sale prices two weeks before the
sale begins! All wine orders taken the night of the event will be at sale
prices.
Donation -
$35 in advance
$40.00 at the door
Guys,
There's three seats left at a Rioja tasting I'm putting together for
Saturday October 1, or perhaps Friday September 30. It will be a pretty
unique tasting: there will be Riojas from 1935, 1942, 1952, 1964, and some
more recent wines as well (none younger than 1981). There will be 12
pours, so 2 oz of each wine per pour. There will be 18 wines in all. The
wines are already purchased, so we'll just split the cost, which should
come to around $180 per seat. Venue is not nailed down just yet.
Let me know if you are interested.
thanks,
Lee
wine list:
Flight 0: Cava, 2003 Do Ferriero Albarino "Cepas Vellas",
1976 Lopez de Heredia Vina Tondonia Blanco
Flight 1: Lopez de Heredia 81,78,76 Bosconia, 76 Tondonia
Flight 2: CVNE Vina Real 81, 76, 75, 70
Flight 3: 64 Bosconia, 64 Chateau Pavie St Emilion, 68 Glorioso
Flight 4: 52 Vina Real, 42 Bosconia, 35 Glorioso
Flight 5: 1913 Madiera
Mostly an update. I'm double and triple booked this week, so
may not be on line much.
----- Forwarded message from "Jim L. Ellingson" <jellings(a)me.umn.edu> -----
Date: Tue, 30 Aug 2005 11:45:45 -0500
From: "Jim L. Ellingson" <jellings(a)me.umn.edu>
To: wine(a)thebarn.com
Subject: [wine] Cab's at JP's. BBQ at Gregory's.
Greetings,
Just a quick note.
Wed: 2nd/final Sale Tasting at Liq. Depot. 5-7 pm byocrackers
Thursday Cabs at JP's
JP's American Bistro
JP Samuelson and our friend Karl
2937 S. Lyndale 55408 (612) 824-9300
No idea who's/how many are coming.
bob
betsy
bill
nicolai
karin
jim
ruth_if_its_raining
Friday BBQ at Warren/Ruth's house. Ruth's brother Steve's in town.
Bring a Dish to share, a sufficient quantity and quality of wine.
Hot Tub available....
Janet
Joyce
Warren/ruth/brother steve
the usual suspects
I-94 to Cretin-Vandalia. Go south to Randolph, East to 2139.
Warren, Ruth Gregory 698-5337
2139 Randolph 55105
wrcgregory(a)qwest.net
Next Week: Prix Fixe and Pinot at Bobino
Joyce has the list, menu, etc..
We're at capacity, have a waiting list.
Joyce Hegstrom 781-3599 624-5020 jhegstrom(a)csom.umn.edu
Cheers,
Jim
----- End forwarded message -----
--
------------------------------ *
* Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
Greetings,
Just a quick note.
Wed: 2nd/final Sale Tasting at Liq. Depot. 5-7 pm byocrackers
Thursday Cabs at JP's
Friday BBQ at Warren/Ruth's house. Steve's in town.
Dish to share, sufficient quantity and quality of wine.
Hot Tub available....
--
------------------------------ *
* Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
Here's the original article.
DRAMA IN AMADOR
Great grapes, hard feelings ferment at landmark California vineyard
- W. Blake Gray, Chronicle Staff Writer
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Click to ViewClick to ViewClick to ViewClick to ViewClick to ViewClick to View
In 1992, Scott and Terri Harvey seemed to have everything going right.
They owned and lived on one of the most desirable vineyards in California. Every day Terri tended what are believed to be the state's oldest Zinfandel vines, while Scott walked across Steiner Road to work. He was the winemaker and president of an ambitious new business, Renwood Winery, whose chairman and CEO, Robert Smerling, planned to put Amador County Zinfandel on the world's most prestigious wine lists.
Scott named their vineyard "Grandpere," in tribute to its age. In French, grand-pere means "grandfather."
Desirable land inflames passions. Planted to Zinfandel before 1869, the Original Grandpere Vineyard is the source of some wonderful wines. It is also at the center of a divorce, a nasty business breakup, lawsuits, aerial surveillance and lingering hard feelings and distrust throughout the tight- knit community of Plymouth in Amador County.
The vineyard itself is a marvel. A grant deed in county records proves its existence in 1869, yet the vines look young for their age.
"In 1986, there was a drought here," says Rusty Folena, who worked for Scott Harvey at Santino Winery then and is now winemaker at Vino Noceto. "All the other vineyards looked stressed and yellow. This vineyard looked healthy. Maybe the roots went down to China to get water. It was isolated for a long time, so it hasn't had some of the vine diseases."
Scott considered himself lucky to own such a historic plot of land. He and Terri worked for years to rebuild the century-old house on it, adding a second floor and a wine cellar of which he's still proud.
Now Scott is in that cellar in name only -- Terri, now his ex-wife, has bottles of Scott Harvey Wines, a label Scott started years after his bitter departure from Renwood.
Where did this vintner's dream life go wrong? Did the pressure of Scott being forced out of Renwood ruin the marriage, as Terri says? Or, as Smerling says, did Scott decide on his own to leave Terri for another woman, leaving the winery and Terri in the lurch?
"Scott's got a lot of regrets," Terri says. "He's very passionate about this place."
Scott, who has remarried, says he and Terri married young and may have divorced anyway; he admits having an affair during their marriage. He says he's happy living and making wine in St. Helena. But he also says, "It was hard to leave that place, I'll tell you."
Now Terri owns the house and the vineyard, though Scott still gets some grapes from the property as part of their divorce settlement. But in a twist of law, they lost the trademark "Grandpere" to Renwood. So Renwood makes a Grandpere wine -- without any grapes from the vineyard, because Terri refuses to sell them to Renwood -- and Scott does not.
Through a settlement, wineries that use Terri's grapes can say they're from the Original Grandpere Vineyard, but they have to use the entire phrase or they can't use it at all. Scott, tired of litigation, doesn't use it at all.
"(Smerling) outmaneuvered me," Scott says. "I don't want to promote a wine from a brand-new vineyard that he calls Grandpere."
The relationship between Smerling and Scott is so shattered and litigious -- lawsuits have flown back and forth -- that they don't even agree today on whether Scott quit or was fired when he left in 1995. Smerling says Scott walked out while Smerling was in Boston, forcing Smerling to scramble to replace him. Scott says Smerling had the locks on the doors changed overnight during the 1995 harvest season.
Both agree that Scott challenged Smerling over the direction of the company, and that at a meeting of Renwood's board of directors in New York, the board supported Smerling and ousted Scott as president.
Smerling asked the Amador County district attorney's office to investigate Scott, claiming he embezzled from the company; the district attorney's office did investigate, both Scott and Smerling agree, but refused to prosecute.
As rancorous as their relationship is now, it's a shame the three-way partnership broke up, because each had something to contribute. Amador County has benefited from each of them.
A farm girl and peacemaker
Though she was born in San Fernando Valley, Terri, 45, became a farm girl just months after her father, a Los Angeles firefighter, moved the family to Amador County when she was 11. Now her knowledge and intuition with grapevines make her a good enough farmer to manage three vineyards in addition to her own. Tall and strong enough to lug around heavy equipment, Terri can see from her car when an individual vine needs care, and apologetically pulls over immediately to prop it up.
"You have to respect the vines," she says. "I get out here and think about how long they've been alive. I do all the pruning myself, out of respect. Each one of these old guys has arms going every which way. You gotta study each one and figure out which way to prune it."
Smerling and Scott Harvey are quick to complain about each other, but neither speaks badly of Terri. She often begins her sentences by repeating the last thing said to her, as if to start off by agreeing. Spend a few hours with Terri and she begins to anticipate the end of your sentences and say them at the same time, rather than repeating -- so that she is constantly in harmony with you.
Scott and Smerling are fighters; Terri is a peacemaker. She is the one who brokered the deal for the use of the trademark, walking across the street to Renwood to deal directly with Smerling at a time when Scott and Smerling needed attorneys present for their conversations.
Scott, 51, is a talented winemaker who got his first head winemaking job at age 23 at Story Winery in Amador County. In 1979, he became winemaker for Santino Winery and met Terri, who was working on a farm.
"I knew her father," Scott says. "I waited until she got out of high school before I started dating her."
Scott was able to buy the Original Grandpere Vineyard because the previous owners, John and Virginia Downing, knew him through his work at Santino, which made wine from the grapes.
"John came to me one day and said, 'I'm going to sell you my ranch,' " Scott recalls. "I said, 'Great!' But I couldn't afford it."
Scott and Terri farmed the grapes and paid off the Downings in installments. Meanwhile, they moved from a modern home into one built in the 1880s.
"The first night we slept in that house, the wind rattled through it. You could hear the rats running around," Scott says. "Terri just cried."
But together they rebuilt it. Scott also went through the old vineyard with a chainsaw, cutting off some of the excess growth. Scott wanted lower yields of more concentrated fruit. Downing had been selling the grapes primarily for White Zinfandel; he also sold some to a group of Italian American garbage collectors from San Francisco who made their own wine and who, Terri says, still occasionally call asking about the grapes.
When Scott left Amador County in 1996, he became winemaker and president at Folie a Deux Winery in St. Helena. That brand was sold to Trinchero Family Estates in 2004. Scott now makes wines under his own name and also for St. Helena-based Cloud 9. With both brands, he produces delicious wines with good forward fruit, complexity and lingering finishes.
In 1998, Scott married Jana Litman, who works in sales for Raymond Vineyard and Cellar in St. Helena. (She is not the woman Scott had an affair with during his marriage.) Jana is now a partner in Scott Harvey Wines.
>From venture capital to wine
Smerling, 49, came to the wine industry late in life after a successful career as a venture capitalist in Boston, specializing in biotech. He brought a demanding, scientific emphasis to an Amador County winemaking scene that was still years behind Napa and Sonoma counties in technique when he arrived.
"Everybody in (Amador) County deals with me," Smerling says. "I'm the man. I put the place on the map."
When Smerling and the Harveys were still collaborators, Renwood took grafts of the vines from the Harveys' vineyard and planted them nearby, across a creek. Those Grandpere clones are the source of Renwood's Grandpere wine, and Smerling says he is doing the wine world a service by preserving them from phylloxera, an aphidlike insect that is now spreading through Amador County.
"The original mission of the winery was to preserve vineyards," Smerling says. "When I arrived in Amador, I saw all these incredible gnarly old Zinfandel vines. And then I found out most of them were producing White Zin for Gallo. We control most of the key vineyards of Amador now. We've taken cuttings of the three vineyards we care most about -- Jack Rabbit Flat, D'Agostini Brothers and Grandpere -- and we planted them on (phylloxera- resistant) rootstock."
Obsessed with quality, Smerling has indeed helped raise awareness of Amador, and he's not shy about taking credit.
"The best thing that ever happened to Mr. Harvey was his association with Renwood, because we're a happening company," says Smerling.
Renwood does make excellent wines. Last year in Japan, I took a $20 bottle of Renwood Barbera to one of those blind tasting-dinners where everyone tries to impress their friends with the bottle they bring. As I expected, my friends brought mostly grand crus from Bordeaux and expensive Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignons. My Renwood bottling, which went much better with food than a Cab, came in second overall. First place went to a Chateau Lafite- Rothschild from the 1980s that must have cost more than 10 times as much as the Barbera.
Troubles with neighbors
But despite Renwood's quality wines and considerable charitable contributions in Amador, including sponsoring summer reading programs and scholarships for high school students, Smerling says he is not well liked. He quit the Amador Vintner's Association and blames anti-Semitism for problems with his neighbors.
"The day after Scott walked out, we started having swastikas painted on the building," Smerling says. "We had death threats. The story of Amador is ridiculous hatred, old-fashioned bigotry, scared of the future, scared of change.
"The story here is a story of anti-Semitism in Amador County. The county has a tough time with a Jewish winery owner."
Chaim Gur-Arieh, a former member of the Israeli Defense Forces who owns the winery C.G. di Arie Vineyard & Winery with his wife, Elisheva, says he has not experienced any anti-Semitism in Amador County.
"Robert is a guy that looks for conflict," says Gur-Arieh, originally a food scientist who invented the technology to make Cap'n Crunch cereal. "Maybe some ignorant people were bullied by him and they got back at him in this way."
As the C.G. di Arie winemaker, Gur-Arieh, 71, appreciates the quality of Terri's grapes, and currently makes the best wine available from them (see tasting notes).
"These grapes that she has, they're phenomenal," Gur-Arieh says. "Her grapes have complexity and elegance. I don't know if it's the age or the terroir, but they're wonderful."
But the history of litigation over the name keeps C.G. di Arie from putting the Original Grandpere Vineyard on the wine's front label, even though it might boost sales.
Renwood ended up with the Grandpere trademark because it bought Santino, which had it originally.
"It was going to be our flagship wine," Smerling says.
Scott says Smerling went behind his back to register the trademark. Smerling vehemently denies this, saying Scott was always aware of the status of the trademark because he was an officer of both Santino and Renwood. Lawsuits have gone back and forth, and Renwood emerged victorious.
"Grandpere has value out in the marketplace, and (Smerling) knows it," Terri says.
Terri says she is legally entitled to a limited use of Grandpere as part of a 2002 settlement with Smerling. Smerling says it's his largesse that allows her to use the name. Both Smerling and Terri agree that she must use the entire name, the Original Grandpere Vineyard, or she can't use it at all.
Vino Noceto and Macchia wineries make wines from Terri's grapes that use the phrase on the front label.
Of Vino Noceto's label, Smerling says, "We sent them a letter. The typeface is too big." Smerling says according to his agreement with Terri, the letters of the Original Grandpere Vineyard must be no larger than one-half inch.
Scott doesn't use the name at all. Instead, both the Scott Harvey Wines and Cloud 9 bottlings say the grapes are from the Harvey Vineyard. Harvey as in Terri Harvey -- as part of their divorce agreement, she is buying his share of the house and land through grapes, and she expects to finish paying off Scott after the 2007 harvest.
Terri says Scott has been good about paying child support, but her life supporting three daughters -- Paulette, 23, Michelle, 21, and Victoria, 17, all of whom are still in school -- has still required long hours laboring in vineyards, hers and others. She says she has suffered from lupus and shingles, both stress-related illnesses.
Her boyfriend, Gordon Binz, 49, replaced Scott as Renwood's winemaker in 1996. He is now winemaker at nearby Villa Toscano.
"I fired him," Smerling says. "But we're still chummy."
Binz and Terri started dating in 1996, a few months after Scott moved out for good. They lived together for seven years, though Binz has since bought his own house 12 miles away above Fiddletown.
"I needed a place to go that didn't have grapes," he says.
Binz and Scott both say they are friendly with each other. Binz is wary of speaking of Scott's ongoing animosity with Smerling ("It was like a bad divorce," he says), because Binz was involved in some of the lawsuits through a partnership with Terri in the vineyard.
"I used to pride myself on never having an attorney," Binz says. "At one point I had three."
Terri has also had several attorneys, and helped farm grapes for one. Like Binz, she would love to put the whole long battle between Scott and Smerling behind her.
Scott says, "Between Terri and I, if I had to do it over again, I probably would have tried harder. The tremendous psychological pain of Smerling trying to destroy our lives, our marriage wasn't strong enough to survive it."
Uncertain future
It's hard for anyone to forgive and forget, and hardest perhaps for Terri. Whenever she's out working in the Original Grandpere Vineyard -- pulling out young willow trees that grow back every year, or carefully pruning -- she only has to look across the street to see Renwood's fenced compound.
Smerling is certainly casting an eye her way.
Terri says her vineyard has so far avoided infestation by phylloxera, even though several nearby vineyards have had to be ripped out and replanted. She says part of her agreement with Smerling on use of the Original Grandpere Vineyard name is that 80 percent of the vines must be original; apparently he's counting. She ripped out some vines last year that she says were no longer productive.
"Her vineyard is riddled with phylloxera," Smerling says. "We've got the infrared photos that can prove it."
If Smerling's right -- he could be, as phylloxera is not always detected by the naked eye -- California's oldest vines are living on borrowed time. Phylloxera kills vines quickly, usually within a few years of the first infection; vines that are already weak can die within a single summer. Terri, who already struggles to make ends meet, would have difficulty going several years without income while waiting for newly planted vines to produce saleable grapes.
"He'd love to get this place," she says of Smerling. "But he'll never get it. He doesn't own me."
A taste of Grandpere
The flavor of a particular vineyard is harder to discern when several different winemakers are working with the grapes. The unifying flavor seems to be dry, sandy Amador County dirt -- but my favorite wine on this list, the C. G. di Arie, is not particularly earthy, perhaps as a result of food scientist/winemaker Chaim Gur-Arieh's technical innovations.
The Renwood Grandpere wine is made from cloned vines that are less than 15 years old, the age at which Ridge Vineyards winemaker and CEO Paul Draper, a Zinfandel expert, says Zin vines reach maturity. At this point I prefer the complexity of some of the other wines, but I hope I'm around in a decade to taste later vintages of the Renwood Grandpere against wines made from the original vineyard.
2003 C.G. di Arie Southern Exposure Shenandoah Valley Zinfandel ($30) -- Enticing aromas and flavors of blackberry and raspberry with lots of spice -- cinnamon and clove -- and hints of tar and black pepper. Mostly blueberry on the medium-length finish; leaves a little pepper on the palate.
2001 Cloud 9 Seity Amador County Zinfandel ($35) -- Smells red, tastes black. Aromas of red plum, raspberry, red currant, earth, black pepper and violet. On the palate, it's black plum, juicy black currant, black pepper, earth and a little raisin. More graphite and violet as it gets more air.
2003 Macchia Prestigious The Original Grandpere Vineyard Amador County Zinfandel ($24) -- Big, juicy and alcoholic (16 percent). Flavors of juicy black plum, licorice, earth and huckleberry with additional aromas of earth and black pepper.
2002 Noceto OGP Amador County Zinfandel ($30) -- Very light red color. It feels like you can smell and taste the dry, sandy dirt of the vineyard, along with red plum and roasted red pepper.
2002 Renwood Grandpere Amador County Zinfandel ($32) -- Light red color. Balanced, though somewhat shy, flavors and aromas of red and black plum, earth and roasted red pepper.
2003 Scott Harvey Old Vine Selection Amador County Zinfandel ($25) -- Nice aroma of raspberry, cherry, mulling spices and earth. Complex flavor with raspberry and cherry fruit, a hint of watermelon, a pleasantly smoky note and touches of earth and fresh celery. Very long finish from the first sip. The grapes come from several vineyards; 22 percent are from the Original Grandpere Vineyard.
-- W. Blake Gray
E-mail W. Blake Gray at wbgray(a)sfchronicle.com.
Page F - 1
URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/08/11/WI…
--
------------------------------ *
* Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu *
* University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX *
* Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *
