This week stories about the 10 year anniversary of Charles Shaw wines began to hit the news. If there is a single wine brand I get asked about by people not into wine, it’s this Trader Joe’s success story. The funny thing is the story of Charles Shaw started over 35 years ago but few have written about it. Look around on the web a bit and you can piece together a tale of a man of vision who made well regarded wines in Napa Valley only to lose his winery and brand. In the end, however, Shaw returns to winemaking in an unlikely appellation. This is his story.
Photo via Napa Valley Wine Blog
Charles and Lucy Shaw settled in St. Helena in 1974 returning from France where he became fascinated with the production of Beaujolais using the whole cluster fermentation method. Back in those days, the Napa Valley was a vastly different place than it is now with perhaps 50 wineries in the appellation (today there are over 450). Like other new winery owners of this era, Shaw and his wife bought land and planted a vineyard just outside of St. Helena in the middle of Napa Valley. In all, Shaw farmed 70 acres of vines with the majority on the valley floor and about 20 acres on Howell Mountain. Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Noir and Gamay were produced garnering accolades for quality.
While the winery made other varieties, it was Gamay and Sauvignon Blanc that were the lynchpins of the Shaw lineup when they opened the winery in 1979. Shaw had developed a love for Gamay while in France, particularly the nouveau style made by carbonic maceration or whole berry fermentation. This technique was not used in California in the 1970′s so Shaw was a pioneer in it’s practice. Beaujolais has always flown under the radar with American consumers and continues to be amoung the best values coming out of France today even with unfavorable exchange rates. But their nouveau style, sold with great fanfare on the third Thursday in November, is viewed by most as a curiosity, others as a marketing stunt and a few as a joke. So hanging your hat on making Napa Valley Gamay Nouveau was not the best business plan. And while a more serious version of the wine was also made getting $8 a bottle proved to be a challenge when well respected Cru Beaujolais was selling for the same price or less. Consulting winemaker Ric Forman, who helped craft the style of Charles Shaw Gamay, summed it up later, “It was unfortunate that his idea didn’t work. It was the wrong product.”
Running a winery is a capital intensive business and by the late 1980′s the Charles Shaw Vineyard & Winery was under extreme financial pressure. These pressures took their toll on the Shaws’ marriage and in 1991 the two were in divorce court. Since Shaw’s wife’s inheritance was used to finance the winery she took over and Charles Shaw left the wine business with nothing more than hard won experience. A year later, Charles Shaw Vineyard & Winery filed Chapter 11 and was eventually sold off in pieces to pay creditors.
This is when the story of Charles Shaw, the Trader Joe’s wine brand, began. Fred Franzia of Bronco Wine Company based in California’s Central Valley purchased the brand name for a reported $18,000 in the early 1990′s. This is not uncommon in the wine business where wine brands with good reputations are purchased and revived later with bulk wines vastly different from their first incarnations. It is unclear why Franzia sat on this brand for a decade before reviving it for Trader Joe’s in 2001.
There are a number of urban legends about Charles Shaw wines that date from the first limited releases in 2001 and 2002. The first anomaly was the 1999, 2000 and 2001 vintages were nearly simultaneously released and quickly sold out. Rumors of fire sales due to airlines selling off stock after September 11 when corkscrews were banned made the rounds. A nasty divorce forced the liquidation at a loss was another story; somewhat closer to the truth but a decade too late for 1999 vintage wines to be sold. The true story is one of wine economics where a huge wine glut created an opportunity in the bulk market that Fred Franzia exploited.
The initial releases of Charles Shaw wines created a sort of reverse wine snob cult. I remember hearing stories from friends in Southern California of people showing up at Trader Joe’s, buying a bottle of each variety in stock and immediately tasting each in the parking lot before buying what they liked by the case. In those days Trader Joe’s had some fairly drinkable private label wines but it was their branded wines sold at closeout prices that were the real values. I once bought some Ridge Merlot at $4.99 a bottle when we lived in LA in the early 1980′s that was an extremely good value. So the use of the Charles Shaw label and not Trader Joe’s was a stroke of wine marketing genius. And from memory the first vintages of Charles Shaw were actually pretty good, most likely the result of savvy bulk wine purchases and good blending. Today the wines are less exciting but certainly more consistent in style made from mostly Central Valley grapes Franzia grows or controls. Highly mechanized agriculture combined with highly mechanized winemaking keep cost low. Selling directly to Trader Joe’s also eliminates another cut of the profit which keeps the selling price at $1.99 or $2.99 a bottle depending on where you live in the U.S.
The result is over 50 million cases of Charles Shaw wines have been sold in the past 10 years. For many this is their everyday wine and while the wines are not very exciting to a lot of us wine geeks they are certainly almost always worth the price charged. And they have created a market for other extreme value brands such as Cameron Hughes and Castle Rock to bring vastly better wines at somewhat higher prices.
And Charles Shaw did get back in the wine business a few years ago making Riesling in Michigan under the Oerther Vineyard label. Let’s hope this venture works out better for him than his experience in Napa Valley.
It’s rare when network TV and wine come together but when it does I take a look. I’m not a regular viewer of Undercover Boss but might be after this episode at Kendall-Jackson Wine Estates. New President Rick Tigner works at the bottom of this organization and learns a lot. And he does the right thing after these experiences.
K-J is a very savvy marketing organization and in one episode really humanizes the brand. I think they will sell a lot of wine this week as a result.
Rick Tigner, President of Kendall- Jackson Wine Estates, causes a shutdown when he struggles to maintain pace on a bottling line, and is shocked by comments made by a delivery driver.
This podcast predates iTunes so when it started only a portion of my shows appeared on the feed. After I posted my latest podcast I decided it made sense to consolidate all the shows into the iTunes feed with all future podcasts published in mp3 format. Down the feed to Winecast 33 are enhanced AAC versions; below that are again mp3 files. All will play on your iPhone or iPod and many other devices.
So far 98 podcasts have been published with the 99th slated for next Sunday.
Winecast is a podcast aimed at promoting the enjoyment of wine for both beginning and more experienced wine lovers. Each show focuses on a wine variety, region or producer and provides listeners with background, tasting notes and related subjects.
This is the premier episode of This Month in Wine, a monthly discussion about what is going on within the wine world from a consumer and insider perspective.
Hosts: Tim Elliott and Jeff Lefevere
Topics
What’s up with Good Grape?
Is wine blogging on the decline?
Wine Trends & Predictions for 2012
Value Replaces Cheap
Wine Regulation Reform Continues
Sweet Wines Continue Growth
Blends Come Back in Vogue
Green Packaging Booms
Chinese Wine Market Continues To Show Influence
Recovery of Wine Market
Low Alcohol Wines
Natural Wines
Events
Wine Blogging Wednesday 74, Feb. 15th, Value Sparkling Wine
Dark & Delicious, February 17, 2012, Alameda, CA
San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition Public Tasting, February 18, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco
While searching for something else this week I came across this random video of an Italian blogger who did a short video interview with Michael Mondavi. Mr. Mondavi’s answer to a simple question about wine bloggers shows he really gets how we fit into the wine conversation. The best part is the last 10 seconds so I won’t spoil it. Worth a minute of your time.
One of the wine trends from 2011 is the rise of Champagne with American consumers up over 20% from 2010. Another trend was Moscato coming out of nowhere to become nearly an overnight success. This could be in part due to the charms of the lightly sparkling frizzante made from this grape in Italy.
Sparkling wine is one of the most versatile at the table with styles to pair with nearly every dish. From bone dry to sweet, single variety to blend, sparkling wine is something we should all drink more of. And it’s made all over the world using the classic process perfected in Champagne. In Germany it is known as Sekt, Spain calls it Cava, in Portugal it goes by Espumante, and in Italy Spumante covers a lot of ground. But great sparkling wine is also made in the New World with world class wines coming from California, New Mexico and Australia. I even hear some very nice sparkling wine is being made these days in England, the country who started the style back some 400 years ago.
So the theme of Wine Blogging Wednesday 74 is Value Sparkling Wine.
There was a good story in the Wall Street Journal recently about the rise of Muscat, the sweet white wine made all over the world but closely associated with Italy where it is called Moscato. Last year this grape took off growing nearly 80% in sales from the year before. Nobody in the wine business saw this coming and prices for Muscat grapes and wine have gone through the roof.
Have wine consumers switched from dry wines to sweet wines nearly overnight? Is this a sign of The Apocalypse?
Looking a bit deeper into the story there have been signs of consumer preference for sweeter wines. A decade ago tankers of Australian Shriaz with a slight addition of concentrate to add residual sugar weaned Americans off Coke and into wine. If you browse your local wine store or supermarket you will also notice more “sweet red” blends on the shelf than ever. And I’ve seen a rise in sweet Riesling lately as well.
One ray of light in Lettie Teague’s article is that, “The biggest audience for Moscato is the ‘Millennial’ generation between 21 and 30 years of age,” according to research from Gallo. Further, these new young consumers, “found their own way,” and were not converted by any marketing push for the grape. As I wrote earlier in the week, my wine journey started with Muscat when I was in my early 20′s. Once wine became a part of my life I wanted to learn more which led to other grapes like GewĂĽrztraminer and Riesling. Eventually not all of these wines were sweet and I got into Chardonnay, and later, Zinfandel and Cabernet Sauvignon.
I think Millennial consumers are just getting started with wine and will move past this sweet Muscat phase in a year or two. Until then we will see sweeter wines continue to grow as wineries jump on this trend. The sky isn’t falling; the wine market is expanding and for the first time the Millennial Generation is showing its impact.
I first found out about Wine Blogging Wednesday in late February of 2005 when Andrew from Spittoon sent me an email inviting me to participate in WBW 7. Back then the wine blogging world was a small group of sites and we frequently commented on each others posts and traded emails. I was intrigued with the idea of a monthly virtual wine tasting event and have participated in 46 of the 72 past events, hosting 4 times. This month’s host, the writer behind the Corkdork blog, has asked us to revisit the wine that first sparked our interest in wine.
My story starts in 1979 when I was in college. At only 19, I was under the legal drinking age in California where I was born and went to school but I spent summers in upstate New York where the drinking age was 18 at the time. Over the summers of 1979 and 1980 I tried just about every form of alcohol but settled mostly on beer as mixed drinks never appealed much too me and the wine I had locally was mostly from Taylor and not very appealing. Since I was summering in Rochester, New York just a short drive to the Finger Lakes AVA you might think it was this regions’ wines that sparked my interest first but, sadly, it was not. But my early experiences while in New York did plant the seeds that bore fruit when I turned 21 and was back in California.
Months past and we revisited Napa Valley a few more times. As we gained a bit more knowledge and confidence we visited new and different wineries. One of these was Grgich Hills Cellar right off the main highway that runs north to south on the western side of Napa Valley. This was in early 1982 and the winery had only been open for 5 years. I remember entering the nondescript tasting room and tasting their Chardonnay. And while this wine was very good it was their Zinfandel that first sparked my interest in wine. Poured by a jovial man in a beret, the wine burst with red fruit on the nose and in the mouth finishing with supple tannins that seemed to melt like bittersweet chocolate. I had tried Zinfandel before but this wine was the first that truly spoke to me and compelled me to learn more about the variety. It was a couple years later that I figured out the man in the beret who poured me this Zinfandel was none other than winemaker Mike Grgich.
Four years later the second wine spark happened. By then I was working for Kodak and we had lived in Rochester, New York for a year and a half. This was the time I first discovered Finger Lakes Riesling and we spent many weekends tasting along the wine trails there. But it was not the local wines that produced this second spark but a well-known Napa Valley Cabernet. Over the previous 4 years I had read several wine books and had tasted a lot of wines. And while I still liked Zinfandel quite a bit drinking Lytton Springs vineyard as often as I could afford it, Cabernet Sauvignon was my latest obsession. I read all about the top Napa Valley Cabernets and drank Bordeaux as often as I could. I had received an award at work that was a gift certificate to a nice local restaurant with a very good wine list. I thought I might find a nice red Bordeaux to match with my prime rib as there were not a lot of California Cabernet on upstate New York wine lists even in the mid-1980′s.
So imagine my surprise when I saw Heitz Cellars Martha’s Vineyard Cabernet from the 1974 vintage on the list. And it was even available by the glass at the absurd price of $25 for a small pour ($52 in 2012 dollars according to WolframAlpha). It took me only a millisecond to order this glass since we were spending Kodak’s money and I couldn’t imagine ever seeing this wine by the glass again (I haven’t). And the wine didn’t disappoint. I still remember the aromas of mint and eucalyptus that this vineyard is known for along with tobacco and a pleasing earthiness. In the mouth this wine defined Napa Cab to my developing palate. Cassis, blackberry, and spices finishing long with great balance. I can’t remember the level of tannin but I think they were still settling down as the wine was only 12 years old at the time I tasted it.
I would have liked to have revisited one or both of these wines but I’m afraid the Heitz Cab is selling for $800 a bottle and I would bet the current vintage of Grgich Hills Zinfandel is vastly different than the 1978 or 1979 I tasted at the winery. But I don’t think this matters much as these wines live in my memory as turning points that made me want to learn more about wine. Eventually this led me to start this blog in order to have a place to send friends who were always asking about which wines to buy.
Without Wine Blogging Wednesday I probably would not have told this story. Thanks go to the Corkdork for hosting and for a great theme. A lot has changed in the nearly 7 years I have participated in Wine Blogging Wednesday but there is nothing like it. Hopefully this will again be a monthly feature here if we get enough bloggers participating.
Whatever sparked your deeper interest in wine, please join us on January 18th for the next edition of our monthly virtual tasting. All you need to do is post your thoughts and/or tasting notes somewhere online (your blog, Google+, Tumblr, Posterous) and let the host know. I hope we will find many great stories of wine enlightenment in the process.
I have written quite a bit here about Sideways, a rare film that somehow combines wine, humor and middle age crisis into an Academy Award winning package. But until recently I had no idea how close Sideways came from never being made. In a series of posts by author Rex Pickett over at the Stage 32 blog he recounts the twists, turns and luck required to get his book published and the film made. Five parts have been posted so far with the final post coming this Thursday.
This is really not a wine story but one of perseverance and the inner workings of Hollywood. But I find the story absolutely fascinating. It also appears this story might be told in a documentary film; I have embedded the spec trailer below. If you are a fan of Sideways, I suggest you check this series out.
From what I am reading, this week will make or break the year for retailers. So I don’t think it’s too late to post some gift ideas for wine lovers. We are a difficult bunch to buy for with the most obvious gift — wine — somewhat intimidating for our friends and family to gift. You could get around this somewhat with a gift certificate to a favorite wine store or producer but half the fun of the holiday season is the instant gratification of opening a well chosen present.
So I offer a short list of last minute gift ideas sure to bring a simile to the face of wine lovers in your life.
Corkscrews: While some wine lover collect corkscrews most of us accumulate them over time. I just went around the house and counted 10 corkscrews of various kinds in drawers. So clearly I don’t really need any more corkscrews but like with cars appreciate design and elegance. The BMW or Mercedes of corkscrews are made by Chateau Laguiole in France. They are literally works of art made from fine materials and well balanced. Go to most any fine restaurant and 9 times of out 10 the sommelier is wielding a Laguiole. Like many luxury goods there are Laguiole-style corkscrews for as low as $20. The genuine article starts at $140 and goes up to over $200 depending on the materials used.
Decanters: There are a plethora of wine aerator gadgets on the market and I have tried nearly all of them. Some are nicely designed and look cool while you pour your glass out of the bottle. But none of them in my testing has really done the job of opening up a young wine like a plain old decanter does. And that same decanter does double duty of making a vessel for fine old wines who require separation from their sediment. No wine lover can have enough decanters and they don’t have to cost a lot of money. Here are a couple of options to get you started.
Books: No wine lover can have enough books on our favorite subject and I have several listed on the right sidebar of my blog (just scroll down). The most essential is Jancis Robinson’s Oxford Companion to Wine which is my go-to resource for any wine subject. There have also been several well reviewed new wine books published this year such as Authentic Wine and Naked Wine which are on my reading list.
Wine Away: Wine lovers eventually spill red wine on clothes, furniture or carpet. Wine Away makes these inevitable disasters easy to clean up.
Cleaning accessories: I use a brush and cleaning solution to care for my glassware but a lot of people this time of year use their automatic dishwasher. To give wine stems a chance of survival you need something like the cool looking Tether stemware preserver.
Whatever gift you choose, you best get it ordered soon since we have slightly less than 6 shopping days left until Christmas and Hanukkah begins on Tuesday!
Disclosure: There are a ton of Amazon affiliate links on this post. Help a blogger out
Preserving an open bottle of wine is one of those things wine lovers don’t talk a lot about. For many of us a bottle is not open long enough for the exposure to air to spoil the wine. But there are those times when you open a special bottle or, in my case, 4 or 5 bottles for a tasting when preservation becomes a necessity. Over the years I have tried a lot of different approaches to preserving open bottles for longer than a day or two with mixed results. After swearing by Vac-u-vin and refrigerator storage for years I most recently have used Private Preserve to displace the air and preserve open wine bottles for 2 or 3 days before oxidation is apparent. A new product called Wine Shield claims to preserve open wines up to 5 days which I put to the test with 2 red wines.
The idea of Wine Shield is so simple I’m surprised it wasn’t invented a long time ago. Essentially it’s a round disk made from food grade plastic with a decorative grape design stamped into the middle that doubles as its mechanism to assure the disk floats on the top of the wine. An obvious and brilliant idea to protect the wine from oxidation. And my testing confirms the claim of protecting wine for a full 5 days before the effects of oxidation can be detected. In fact, I got 6 days from a robust Napa Valley Cabernet that tasted as fresh as the day I opened the bottle on day 6.
The only flaw I can see with Wine Shield is how you put the disk into the bottle is an acquired skill. You can see how this works about 17 seconds into the Wine Shield promotional video embedded below and it is a lot more difficult in practice than it looks.
I will definitely be ordering more Wine Shield disks to have on hand for special bottles but will continue to use Private Preserve for most of my wine preservation needs since I rarely keep an open bottle more than a couple days and using gas is still quite a bit less expensive per bottle than Wine Shield. But for many wine lovers who only occasionally drink wine or restaurants who don’t have an expensive gas system already something like Wine Shield is a no brainer. If it was closer in price to gas, I would use Wine Shield everyday. But I will be using it the next time I open 5 or 6 bottles for a Twitter tasting.
Update December 18, 2011: In preparing my gift round up post I noticed Wine Shield had significantly lowered their prices to be much more competitive with gas preservation solutions so I have changed the end of my review and have updated the Amazon affiliate links.
It doesn’t seem possible that it has been nearly 7 years since I started participating in Wine Blogging Wednesday our virtual wine tasting event which has been infrequent for the past 18 months or so. And that’s a shame since the wine blogging community seems a bit more fragmented than back in 2005 when I posted my first entry in the series. With Twitter, Facebook and now Google+ there are many ways for bloggers to interact and talk about wine but these events disappear over time while what is posted on our blogs endures.
Luckily my enthusiasm for Wine Blogging Wednesday is shared by other bloggers and I’m pleased to report that the event will return on January 18, 2012 hosted by the Corkdork. And the theme our host has chosen is one that should produce a lot of interesting posts: what wine sparked your interest in wine? For me, that would be a wine from a certain vineyard in Dry Creek Valley but since I have told that story here before I will revisit another tale from my path to wine geekdom with stops in the early and late 1980′s. The wines are long gone, or prohibitively expensive, but I will track down some more recent bottlings of these wines to share.
I hope to see a lot of wine bloggers participating this time. Join us if you can next month with your own story of what your wine “spark” was.
Last evening I participated in a Twitter tasting of Bordeaux wines. One of the producers in the tasting had acted in a short film and a link to it was tweeted out. I bookmarked the link and returned to it today for a look mostly out of curiosity and was pleasantly surprised with what I found.
Unlike nearly every movie where wine plays a central role this 17 minute short film did not treat wine as a prop or the obsessive vice of the protagonist. In short montages invoked by wines from a single estate over a lifetime a dying old man and his daughter share one last blind tasting. A thoughtful and simple story is told not unlike the grace and harmony of the best wines of the region.
It is well worth your time to have a look and if you don’t understand French there are English subtitles.
At today’s Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco, Digg founder and serial entrepreneur Kevin Rose announced a new iPhone app called Oink that looks like a mash-up of Foursquare and Digg. The premise is simple; check in things you like and then the community on Oink will vote your item up or down. All of this happens on the iPhone with a simple to user interface that most people will get the moment they open the app.
Like other iPhone apps, Oink integrates the camera and location services allowing the user to tag items that interests them. Rose used food and drink as the main application in his demonstration which included tea, sushi and even wine. Future enhancements include recommendations so the app will point you to other things you might like Amazon-style.
I think this app looks very interesting for rating and sharing wines. Once it is released I will take a look and post a review. In the meantime you can see the full presentation in the video below and read more about it at the source link.
Most of the time wine lovers take corkscrews for granted. We regularly take them out and open bottles without incident. But there are times when special weapons and tactics are needed to prevent wine disasters.
Such an event occurred here this evening when I was opening a double magnum. Large format bottles are always a problem with corkscrews (the ones with actual screws, that is) but I was hopeful nothing out of the ordinary would occur. After all, the wine was from the 2005 vintage and has been in its 3 liter bottle for only about 4 years now. But my confidence dissolved to concern when my trusty waiter-style corkscrew shredded the large format cork. Usually corks that disintegrate like this are dry or old but this bottle was shipped by the winery 3 years ago and has been cellared perfectly since I received it.
So I went to my arsenal of corkscrews and chose my weapon. I had bought it in the early 1980′s and have rarely used this corkscrew but it seemed perfect for the challenge. My ah-so corkscrew.
First, forget using this thing with synthetic corks as it will likely result in another type of disaster: the cork pushed into the bottle. But for natural corks of all kinds I have found this corkscrew useful. And it has earned its place as my corkscrew of choice with old, brittle corks. The two prong design doesn’t pierce the cork but contains it along two sides. While twisting and pulling the cork is extracted cleanly from the bottle. I have used this over the years several times and consider it the leader of my personal wine SWAT team.
The double magnum tonight was opened via this method even after my first corkscrew utterly destroyed the cork. It’s nice to have a wine gadget watching your back for just such occasions.
It has been nearly three years since I last hosted Wine Blogging Wednesday but my choice of theme was easy. Wines made from RhĂ´ne varieties are among my personal favorites and I was hoping to learn about many more new wines from participants this month. There were 25 bloggers posting reviews from all over the world. Thanks again to all who took the time to participate and here they are in the order I learned about them:
The first post came two weeks early from Karla at Sol Wine & Film. An overview of the Curtis Winery of Santa Ynez Valley in California, the subject fit the theme perfectly but somehow didn’t mention WBW. But Karla used the WBW hashtag so is included in this roundup.
New entrant Rags, the Kenyan Wine Brat, posted his video review of CrossRoads Winery Syrah from Texas. While he is no Gary V, his use of “refrigerator smell” to describe the Syrah near the beginning made me think of the famous New York Jets fan. Nice start, man; looking forward to more!
Next up was Lisa from Wine Muse posting a review of a 2009 Rutherglen Estates “Shelley’s Block” Marsanne Viognier from her native Australia. Made from 70% Marsanne and 30% Viognier, the wine sounds wonderful and a great value at $15AUS.
Joe the Suburban Wino posted a long and somewhat rambling post about RhĂ´ne styled wines that begins with a rant about how difficult the circumflex over the “o” in RhĂ´ne is but then uses that word about a hundred times. No review here but there is some serious RhĂ´ne knowledge thrown down within Joe’s hilarious rant prose.
Another video review was posted by Aleksi who selected two wines for his tasting. The first is the Bellingham, The Bernard Series, Grenache Blanc Viognier (no vintage mentioned) which proved to be an interesting wine despite some metallic flavors. His second selection seemed more successful, 2006 Spinifex “Papillon”, a red blend made from Carignan, Cinsault and Granache.
Next up was Bob from 2001 Bottles – A Wine Odyssey with a 2006 Church & State “Coyote Bowl” Syrah from British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley. It’s not surprising to me that such a nice Syrah could come from Canada as most of the best examples of this variety come from cooler sites. Also tasted was 2009 Twisted Tree Rousanne/Marsanne which was also a winner.
Richard, The Passionate Foodie and next month’s WBW host, tasted a 2007 Sutton Cellars Carignane “Piferro Vineyard” and found it to be an, “easy drinking wine, but with appealing character, and would be an perfect pairing with burgers, pizza, or even pasta.” Count me in to pick up some of this to try soon.
First time WBW participant Jason from The Ancient Fire Wine Blog was next with a 2007 Penfolds Bin 138 GMS blend. Made from Grenache, Mourvedre and Shiraz, the wine proved to be, “assertive, but not abusive.” Hope to see you next time, Jason!
The VA Wine Diva was next with a trio of Rhone-styled wines from Virginia. The first was a 2009 Veritas Vineyards Viognier which was overall a nice wine marred a bit on the finish with a touch of heat. This was followed up by an earthy and leathery 2005 Ingleside Vineyards Syrah. The tasting was capped off with a 2008 Pollak Vineyards “Mille Fleurs” fortified Viognier dessert wine.
Matt posted next over at A Good Time With Wine tasting a 2007 Liberty School Cuvee, a blend of Syrah, Petite Sirah, Grenache, Mourvèdre and Viognier. Although Matt prefers the leaner French style in his Syrah, he did like this California wine.
Next was Magnus posting a bi-lingual review of a 2007 Annie Camarda Syrah from Washington State, quite a find in his native Sweden. And the wine was, “Well balanced, big and juicy with a nice acidity that bring excitement and sophistication – this is good and I am willing to buy me some bottles for the summer as well as for the future.” Magnus was the only person this month to accompany his review with an Iron Maiden video, a trend I’d like to see continue
Ryan from Catavino in Spain posted next tasting a 2006 Cellar Malondro red blend. A blend of 50% Garnacha and 50% Cariñena from D.O. Montsant, I recalled my trip to the region in 2007 which Ryan commemorated with an archive photo on the post.
Next was Michael, The Wine Undertaker, who tasted a 2008 Sterling Vineyards Roussanne from Carneros. The wine was the first taste of Roussanne for him but will not be his last given how well this bottle performed.
Colin from Grapefan passed along a tasting note on Adegga as he took a week long vow of no wine. The wine sounds like a winner, though, a 2006 Syrah from Napa Valley’s Hyde de Villaine.
Frank from Drink What You Like posted another Virginia Viognier, this time from Jefferson Vineyards. From the 2009 vintage, the wine sounds very interesting and one Wine Blogger Conference attendees will no doubt taste as it’s made in Charlottesville, the site of the 2011 event.
Next up was Sebastien at downcellar who posted a pair of Mourvèdre from the New and Old World. First was a meaty and dark Spice Route Mourvèdre from Swartland, South Africa. The Old World entry is a 2007 Juan Gil Monastrell from Jumilla, Spain. Both sound like excellent examples of Mourvèdre from outside The Rhône.
My own entry was next, a tale of two Rhone-styled wines from California. In the end, the Steele “Writer’s Block” Roussanne delivered the goods for a steal of a closeout price.
William from Simple Hedonisms was next with a review of Wesley Ashley “Intelligent Design Cuvee” Red Rhone Blend. The blend of Carignane, Grenache, Cinsault, Petite Sirah and Mourvedre sounds outstanding.
Next was Remy at The Wine Case who posted a nice write-up of a 2009 Â Edmunds St. John “Wylie” Syrah. The effort from this venerable producer of California Syrah proved very nice but made Remy wish he had a bit more patience to see what the wine would evolve to with further cellaring. That’s why you buy more than one bottle, man
Andrea from Wine Skamp posted next with a review of 2008 Santo Cristo Garnacha, a decent sounding quaffer from Spain’s Campo de Borja.
Megan was next from the Wannabe Wino blog with a review of a 2009 Hahn GSM blend which sounded like another winner from California.
Rain followed next from Teach Us Wine with a cautionary tale to always check the seal on your bottle particularly if it’s a screw-cap. Her tale is full of fail but I’m sure she will come back strong next time.
On Wine Blogging Thursday, WBW founder Lenn Thompson posted his entry;Â a well-chosen 2005 Doon Vineyards “Cigare Volant.” And it seemed worth the wait.
And last, but certainly not least, the fabulous Thea posted her entry at Luscious Lushes, a tribute to winemaker Kevin Hamel. She pulled a bottle of 2002  Hamel Wines Syrah, Westside Hills from her cellar to share but also recounts experiences with the 2001 vintage and some other favorite Syrah’s.
So that’s it. I count 25 bloggers and 28 wines tasted. Most of these were red but 8 whites were also reviewed. If I somehow missed your entry, please let me know in the comments and I will update this post.
Thanks again to Lenn for letting me host once again. And without further ado, I pass the baton to Richard from The Passionate Foodie for a very special edition of Wine Blogging Wednesday next month.
When Wine Blogging Wednesday founder Lenn Thompson asked me to host this months’ tasting I was both honored and nervous. What theme would spark new participants to join the monthly virtual tasting? How could I come up with something original after 70 tastings? But after sharing three ideas on Twitter direct messages, we were set on, “Rhones Not From The RhĂ´ne.” When I announced the theme 3 weeks ago, I even put a bit of a spin on challenging tasters to look beyond the widely available Syrah/Shiraz and Grenache to try something new. How hard could it be to find a wine that matched this theme?
Well, as it turned out, somewhat more difficult than I had imagined when I came up with the idea; at least here in suburban Minnesota. After visiting a few stores in my area it was clear the selection was limited for Rhone varieties outside of Syrah/Shiraz. Sure I could have picked up any number of Viognier from California or Australia. Or some Mourvèdre. There was plenty of Grenache also on offer, most of which coming from Spain. But I was in the mood for something a bit more obscure so I could hold my head high as this months’ host. That’s when I spied a bottle of Cline “Ancient Vines” Carignane. “Perfect” I thought as the California producer makes a number of Rhone-style wines that are widely available and usually reliable choices. And Carignane is one of my “underdog grapes” that I don’t drink enough of. To top it off, I’ve never had Cline’s Carignane before.
So last night I opened the bottle and was immediately put off but the nose which was lean and, frankly, stinky. And not in a good way. Something was definitely wrong with the wine but I couldn’t put my finger on it. In the mouth the wine still had plenty of fruit but lacked the varietal character of the grape. And the finish was off. Since the wine was from the 2007 vintage and was purchased at a wine warehouse-style store, I chalked this up to bad storage. So I decided not to review that wine tonight and find another selection.
A visit to yet another wine store yielded several options; all white. After considering a couple Viognier/Marsanne blends, I settled on a Roussanne under the “Writer’s Block” brand. I know every winery has to find an angle to sell their wines at retail but I almost didn’t pick this wine due to the label featuring William Shakespeare. The nonsense on the back label which didn’t really relate to the wine directly also didn’t help. But the attractive $7.99 close out price was the difference here as I’ve never tasted a sub-$10 California Roussanne before.
A bit of Googling turned up that Writer’s Block is a brand from Steele Wines and is almost exclusively focused on Rhone varieties (had the store stocked their Counoise, I would have been all over that wine). Steele is a moderate sized winery in Lake County started by Jed Steele after a nine year tenure at Kendall-Jackson. Steele makes a wide assortment of red and white varieties from vineyards in Sonoma, Santa Barbara, Mendocino and Lake Counties under the Steele, Shooting Star and Writer’s Block brands.
Tasting Notes:
Steele Wines “Writer’s Block” Roussanne, Lake County 2007 ($14) – Golden yellow in color with aromas of pear, honey, green tea and oak toast. Rich and oily in the mouth with green apple, orange and butterscotch flavors finishing with a nutty note and good acidity. A well made Roussanne that will continue to be interesting for some time to come. A great value at their standard $14, but a steal (pun intended) at the $7.99 closeout price I paid.
13.5% ABV
Composite cork closure Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Score: 88
Thanks once again to Lenn Thompson from the New York Cork Report for coming up with the idea for Wine Blogging Wednesday and for allowing me host a 4th time. Be on the lookout for the announcement of WBW72 from Richard at The Passionate Foodie which will include a fund raiser for Japan relief efforts.
View Channel
This is the premier episode of This Month in Wine, a monthly discussion about what is going on within the wine world from a consumer and insider perspective.
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It doesn’t seem possible that it has been nearly 7 years since I started participating in 
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A visit to yet another wine store yielded several options; all white. After considering a couple Viognier/Marsanne blends, I settled on a Roussanne under the “Writer’s Block” brand. I know every winery has to find an angle to sell their wines at retail but I almost didn’t pick this wine due to the label featuring William Shakespeare. The nonsense on the back label which didn’t really relate to the wine directly also didn’t help. But the attractive $7.99 close out price was the difference here as I’ve never tasted a sub-$10 California Roussanne before.