A Life In Wine | Hawk Wakawaka Wine Reviews

A Life in Wine: Frederic Panaiotis, Chef de Caves for Ruinart Champagne

Apr 11, ’13 1:54 PM

Talking with Frédéric Panaiotis

“There is a French saying,” Frédéric Panaiotis tells me. “Help yourself and the sky will help you. I like this. This is my motto.”

Frédéric Panaiotis, the Chef de Caves for Ruinart Champagne

I met Frédéric Panaiotis after arriving embarrassingly early to a private Ruinart dinner due to a mix-up with my driver. He and Nicolas Ricroque, the champagne’s brand director, welcomed me warmly and offered bubbles to set me at ease. We began with Ruinart Blanc de Blancs and their dinner’s good view. Later, with food, we’d also step back into older vintages of Dom Ruinart paired with courses made for us by the talented chef Michelle Bernstein.

Ruinart began as the oldest established champagne house in the world, founded in 1729, at a time when bottling the beverage had been illegal. With its forbidden nature, so the story goes, it was desired and enjoyed at the court of Versailles, where the original Ruinart family was friendly. Over drinks one evening with the king, Nicolas Ruinart had an epiphany. His champagne would please. The Ruinart “wine with bubbles” business began September 1, 1729 with the intent of offering unique gifts to Nicolas’s fabric customers–the family owned a cloth company–but within six years of founding the bubbles venture it dominated the family interests and by 1735 they shifted entirely to champagne.

Now, a little less than 300 years later, Ruinart persists, founded on blending strategies with a focus on chardonnay. Today, Frédéric Panaiotis serves as the house’s Chef de Caves, or chief winemaker, in charge of nursing the grapes from vineyard to vin clair (champagne’s first step still blend), to bubbles, all with the intention of maintaining the Ruinart house style.

It is this willingness of the winemaker to give over to something older and longer that gives champagne its persistence and brilliance both. Panaiotis recognizes he is part of this longer tradition. “When you join a champagne house,” he tells me, “it is important to understand my name will not stay.”

Panaiotis emphasizes the importance of this history. “In California, a winemaker can make their mark on a house, and that is understandable. But, in Champagne, it is different.” He continues, “In Champagne, you should never remember who was making the wine 40 years ago. He is just one of the guys making sure the wine style is the same.” The comparison highlights two different models of success–one of persistent innovation, on the one hand, and one of established grace, on the other, both to be valued but for different contexts.

Frederic Panaiotis discussing Ruinart champagne at a special demonstration with Chef Morimoto, Pebble Beach Food & Wine 2013

Panaiotis strikes me as a man full of grace, and gravitas both. As much as he regards himself well integrated into a larger team–both historically and currently–he also acts as the facilitator of that team’s larger goals.

It is in listening to Panaiotis, I am struck by how the two models–California and Champagne–showcase not only different ideas of history, but also differing examples of leadership. He appreciates the value of both approaches, having resided in Mendocino for almost three years between 1989 and 1991, assisting in the production of sparkling wine for a California label.

Now as chief winemaker for Ruinart, Panaiotis emphasizes the strength of the house band. “When it comes to winemaking, a well-honed team is so much more efficient and reliable. There can always be someone that is sick, but not all of us. So, the response, the assessment of the wine has to be done by the team, not one person.”

Successful focus on the group together, however, depends on also recognizing each individual’s talents. Creating that well-honed contingent, Panaiotis explains, comes from smartly utilizing each person’s abilities. “I must understand who on the team is more competent, more sensitive on certain areas than others.” In describing his meaning, Panaiotis uses himself as example. If he is feeling off one day, it’s necessary for him to recognize who around him can be more effective. “Everyone has expertise, skill in something.” He says, “I have to recognize that. Then I can trust you. Then the team responds. Whoever from the team for each part of what we’re doing.” Panaiotis emphasizes the advantage of this approach, “it’s very satisfying and more fun when we all work together.”

Brand manager, Nicolas Ricroque, Chef Michelle Bernstein, and Frédéric Panaiotis doing final preparations for dinner

Getting Panaiotis to discuss his time in California uncovers an aspect of his character I suspect is foundational–curiosity coupled with systematic study. His education focused on the sciences, taking him through a career that has included chemical wine analysis, years of research on cork taint, and several positions making sparkling wine, in both California and Champagne. Talking about his work in Mendocino, Panaiotis tells me about his studies. “I took Spanish while I was working in California. Wine is great. With wine, you learn something everyday.” He references an idea we both agree upon–the more you know, the less you know. “But with me, it is not enough, so I study languages.” Currently Panaiotis is getting started with Mandarin.

It is not just a thirst for more knowledge that drives Panaiotis, it is also an interest in deeper understanding. We touch on the idea of food and wine pairing, a subject common to the world of wine. But with Panaiotis it blooms into a conversation about culture, recognition of values and ideas. Panaiotis’s thinking is multi-layered throughout. To understand food and wine pairing more effectively, he studies other languages.

He explains his reasoning. “Language is a key aspect of learning how people think,” he offers. “I am always interested in food and wine pairings. Language is key to understanding a culture’s ideas.” By recognizing the ideas of another culture, you gain new insight into flavors and food relationships as well. The various forms of study, then, all circle back, even while revealing something new in themselves. It is both that are true.

In discussing Panaiotis’s wealth of experience he reveals again his blend of grace, and gravitas, coupled with what I recognize as genuine humility, a trait he already revealed through his discussion of team work and leadership–a person of genuine humility, I believe, recognizes what they are genuinely good at, while understanding too there is always more to learn.

Through the Ruinart dinner, and the next day’s Morimoto cooking demonstration, Panaiotis showed his talent for pairing food and wine, an ability clear throughout our discussion as well. But he understands the source of his own strengths. “I am not gifted.” He explains. “People think I am gifted in food and wine pairings. No. No. No. I am not gifted.” As he speaks he is utterly sincere and to the point. “I work very hard all the time to keep learning.”

The hard work Panaiotis puts into his job he also does with clear gratefulness and joy. “I don’t make champagne,” he tells me. “I make something to make people happy. Putting a smile on people’s face, that is my job. How many people can say that?”

***

Thank you to Frederic Panaiotis for including me, and taking time to talk with me.

Thank you to Nicolas Ricroque.

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A Visit to Haute-Saône, France: Drinking wine with the Captain at Chateau La Barre, for Annemarie, and Jeremy

Apr 1, ’13 12:00 AM

Touring the Vineyards of Chateau La Barre

climate meter at Chateau La Barre Vineyards

It’s warm when I arrive for the visit of Chateau La Barre. The weather is a relief for the region after fog and cold for several weeks. The area is known for its continental climate but can also get hit with bouts of severe chill due to the mountain influence from the North. Though the Vosges range is in the distance, it still weighs influence on the vines.

My visit to the winery is unusual, as the Chateau owner is known now for his privacy. He’s resistant to interviews but offered to meet me finally in recognition of his family winery’s up coming tricentennial. Owner and vigneron, Jean-Luc Picard, treats his vines now as an homage to his ancestors.

His invitation to meet arrived with a short but direct explanation: We’re not going to talk about his previous career. It’s the Chateau we’re there to discuss, and, though he’d rather avoid interviews, he respects the work of his family and wishes to celebrate their accomplishments. Prior to retiring to his homeland of France, Picard had had a distinguished career as a fleet Captain, but now he sees that recognition as a distraction from the work he’s trying to do for the region.

Meeting the Picards

inspecting the vines with Jean-Luc Picard

Before I have the chance to sit, Picard ushers me out to the vineyard. It’s the vines he wants to show me. The Estate’s recent developments are exciting, thanks in part to Picard’s archaeological and historical interests as well.

Winemaking hadn’t been part of Picard’s imagined retirement. He’d grown up in the vineyards with his father Maurice teaching him vine maintenance but Picard’s passions took him away from home. With his older brother Robert devoting himself to oenology, Picard felt free to follow the decision of a different path. The traditions of the Picard estate would rest in his brother’s family.

Then, almost three decades ago tragedy struck when a winery fire killed both Picard’s brother, and nephew, Réne. The loss was devastating, and the future of Chateau La Barre seemed uncertain. Robert’s widow, Marie, was able to keep the winery operating successfully until a little less than 10 years ago when she fell ill. Around the same time Picard was first considering the possibility of retirement. With the news of Marie’s illness, and clear counsel from his friend, Guinan, Picard decided to take some time in France. Then the visit led to an unexpected discovery.

We’re standing in front of a special section of vineyard Picard wants to show me. What’s unique is that the grapes are entirely pale and green skinned, an ancient variety known as Savagnin. The region has been dominated by red wine production for centuries, more recently practicing in traditional techniques of wild yeast fermentations, and aging in neutral oak barrels. As Picard explains, the style is one resembling one of the oldest winemaking styles in France, with the most delicate of grapes, Pinot Noir.

Generations ago Chateau La Barre was instrumental in helping to restore the style, once called Burgundy, through the work of Picard’s great grandfather, Acel. Though the approach was met with resistance initially, ultimately, the family was lauded for their efforts to return to less interventionist winemaking based on the grape types that grew best on the land, requiring less use of fluidized treatments, and more reliance on the vines own unique ecosystem.

Prior to Acel Picard’s efforts, it was more common for wine to be made with the use of replicated nutrient intervention. Acel’s view, however, was that such an approach created less palatable, and less interesting wine. So he scoured the historical records for evidence of older techniques. In doing so, he found ancient texts left from devotees of an ancient religion known as Christianity in which it was believed that God spoke to them through the vines. Though Acel refused the more mystical aspects of the religious views, he found the vineyard practices of the texts insightful, and adopted the technique of tending and selecting individual vines, followed by simple winemaking. Chateau La Barre’s wines soon became known for their earthy mouth-watering complexity.

Picard’s own work builds on the efforts of his great grandfather to return to older techniques but in researching archaeological sites of the region, as well as ancient texts, Picard discovered a subtle mistake in Acel’s efforts. While Acel worked to restore red winemaking traditions known to Haute-Saône, he actually restored techniques native to an area of France slightly afield from the region. La Barre, it turns out, does not rest within the old boundaries of the ancient wine region of Burgundy, but instead a political shire of the same name. Picard himself does not believe this historical reality lessens the importance of Acel’s efforts, it just changes their tone slightly, but he does want to see what can be done to explore the winemaking traditions that really were found closer to La Barre centuries ago.

Enter Vin Jaune and the Ancient Varieties

Jean-Luc Picard standing in his Eline Vineyard

Through archaeological work Picard preformed a sort of miracle. He was able to locate still intact seeds from ancient vine specimens known once to have covered this region of France, Savagnin, as well as seeds for the red variety that had once covered the wine region of Burgundy, Pinot Noir.

Before the destructive effectiveness of the technology was properly understood, Thalaron radiation was tested as a soil cleaning technique during the last agricultural age. The bio-effects were irrecoverable with vineyards throughout the Vosges zone being destroyed and then unplantable for a generation. As a result, a collection of indigenous grape varieties were believed to be lost, including Savagnin, Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Pinot Noir. Once the soil recovered well enough to replant large interests in inter-global varieties took over and any attempts to recover the original grapes seemed over.

During the Restoration period scientists attempted to re-engineer Savagnin as well as other ancient varieties such as Pinot Noir and Chardonnay but Savagnin proved too susceptible to geraniol instability to engineer. When funding for the project was cut, efforts to restore Chardonnay were deemed the least advantageous and ultimately only Pinot Noir vines were genetically manufactured.

Through intensive research Picard was able to find a cave in the Vosges range containing ancient wooden vessels that proved to have a few small seeds inside. Through similar research he also located similar containers in the area of Gevrey-Chambertin within which he located Pinot Noir. Chardonnay and Cabernet remain extinct.

With the seeds Picard was then able to develop new plantings of both Savagnin and Pinot Noir, and restart sections of his vineyard with them. It is the area with these plantings he has named Eline. It is this he wants me to see.

Thanks to Picard’s efforts we now know there is significant difference in the flavor and aging potential of wines made from the engineered Pinot Noir versus the naturally grown variety. Picard has also discovered evidence from old electronic documents known as The Feiring Line: The Real Wine Newsletter of unique vinification techniques known as vin Jaune that were once used for the grape Savagnin. Through further study he has already discovered the steps to make vin Jaune and is five years into the aging of his first vintage.

I ask if we can taste his Savagnin but he explains it has only been under veil for a little over five years, and needs at least another year before he’s willing to show it. The veil, he explains, is how vin Jaune is made. It’s a film of yeast that covers the surface of the wine and helps it age slowly. When the wine is done it will be named Ressick, he tells me, for a planet that aged too fast.

***

Thank you to Jean-Luc Picard for giving so much of his time.

Thank you to Annemarie for suggesting the interview.

Thank you to Jeremy Parzen for having the background to hopefully get it.

Happy April 1, Everybody!

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A Life in Wine: Stephen Lagier and Carole Meredith of Lagier-Meredith Wines

Mar 26, ’13 8:31 AM

Visiting Lagier-Meredith: Driving to the top of Mt. Veeder

Carole Meredith and Stephen Lagier at their home on top of Mt Veeder

It’s mid-December on a clouded day, the first of several visits to Lagier-Meredith Vineyards over a couple of months. At the top of Mt Veeder, the fog has shielded our view from the other side of the valley. We can still make out the general direction towards the house in which Robert Mondavi once lived, and the nearby (rather flat) peak of Mt Veeder itself, but the Bay, and mountains in every direction hide behind the cold weather. I’ve driven to the house of Stephen Lagier and Carole Meredith after getting the guts to write and ask for an interview a couple weeks before.

The story of Lagier-Meredith fascinates me for multiple reasons. The pair were among the very first to plant Syrah in Napa Valley at a time it was even more defined by Cabernet Sauvignon. When they purchased the land that would become their home and vineyard, Mt Veeder was not yet an appellation (the area still today not burgeoning with development as the creased and rolling tree covered mountain AVA makes too much growth difficult). Before realizing they had fruit good enough to sell wine from they were a two career couple.

Stephen Lagier made wine for Robert Mondavi, after first managing the company’s lab. But prior to that he’d also helped perform research at UC Davis on the chemical effects of vineyard practices before significant knowledge was to be had on the subject. Carole Meredith’s career at the same university focused on the genetic relationships between grape types, leading to the landmark discovery that Cabernet Sauvignon was the off-spring of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc, information now almost taken for granted.

Talking with Lagier and Meredith

art display outside the entrance to Lagier’s and Meredith’s home–Stephen made the frogs, Carole the telephone

Talking with the twosome proves both entertaining and insightful. The couple enjoy not only bragging about each other’s successes, but sharing in the fun of how they met.

In Fall 1980, both began work at UC Davis in the Viticulture and Oenology department. Lagier had done his undergraduate degree in Biochemistry and recognized most graduate students spent their study years broke, often also going into debt. Unwilling to follow suit, he started his Master’s degree in Winemaking (before the program shifted to a single Viticulture and Oenology Master’s degree) with a full-time job. Over five years, Lagier ran the research program for a professor doing chemical analysis of the effects of training vines on grape composition. At the same time, Lagier purchased his own home, then rented rooms out to other students to help with expenses.

The same Fall brought Meredith to the University as a Professor. She’d applied her PhD in Genetics in the private sector, until realizing she didn’t like having a daily boss. At the time Davis accepted Meredith’s application, she was actually a finalist in two different positions in plant genetics–lettuce and grapes. There had also been a third position in beans Meredith didn’t get. The time period marked the start of retirement for men that had returned from World War II, completed advanced science training, and then effectively reshaped American education. Meredith was hired as the start of a new generation of educators. With multiple plants up for research, the hiring committees negotiated to decide who would get which candidate, thus securing Meredith’s future in genetic research history.

Her beginning with the parentage of Cabernet was rooted in first developing the technology and toolkit to do so. She fostered the work of brilliant research students that helped solve how to apply insights from the use of DNA markers in human genetics to grape vines. But she also helped establish a multi-national genetics cooperative through which researchers from all over the world pooled their findings on those same DNA markers in grape vines. Doing so allowed an explosion in both identifying individual grapes genetic identity, and then afterwards the relationships between grape types.

Discussion of their UC Davis years quickly leads to the two of them smiling, telling me about how they met. Meredith was often working weekends to get ahead on some of the lab projects she had operating, and Lagier would be in his office having negotiated to switch his work day schedule so he could downhill ski during the week. Those days the mountain was quieter. He’d often come in showing signs of sun from the slopes, which gave the pair reason to talk. As Meredith explained, she wanted to have fun and go skiing too. So, Lagier invited her to join a group that often went downhilling together. Then, one outing, it turned out the two of them were the only ones able to go. “We had to spend the whole day together,” Meredith laughs. “I wanted to have fun, and Stephen is fun.”

Lagier smiles. “I crack Carole up everyday. I feel like it’s my job.”

looking into the young Mondeuse vineyard at Lagier-Meredith

Lagier’s support of Meredith isn’t limited to his good humor, however. Meredith and I take at least an hour to talk through the work she accomplished in genetic relationships–how she helped find the parentage of Syrah (sire: Dureza, mother: Mondeuse Blanc; thus leading to Lagier-Meredith planting Mondeuse Noir, “Syrah’s crazy uncle,” as the couple call it), how she helped successfully find the original vine and homeland of America’s pride, Zinfandel (it’s the Croatian variety Crljenak Kaštelanski). But when Lagier comes back inside from clearing a tree that’s collapsed from a winter storm, he brings up an accomplishment Meredith hasn’t discussed yet. “Did she tell you about her paper in SCIENCE?”

“We were talking about ZInfandel.” Meredith responds. The Zinfandel discovery was significant for how it brought together people in the United States, in Italy (Primitivo is also of the same original grape vine), with researchers in Crotia. But also because the discovery that Zinfandel comes from the motherland of Croatia actually helped improve tourism to the region, showing that wines and their history from there could deserve respect for higher quality than previously expected internationally. The Zinfandel discovery also stands as significant, however, because it was Meredith’s final large project before retiring to focus on the Lagier-Meredith wine label.

The grape Zinfandel had long been suspected of having International origins. It’s a plant with visible characteristics unlike those native to North America, so it must have been brought in from elsewhere. But at the same time it’s wine history so shaped California it had become the adopted champion of a country’s pride. After completing the research that led to Zinfandel’s proper naming, Meredith had also reached the early cutoff for potential retirement. Ready to shift to their wine label, she stopped her commute from Mt Veeder to Davis, making Crjenak Kaštelanski her genetic’s career swan song, effectively leaving at the top of her genetics game.

Lagier agrees the Zinfandel discovery was significant, but it’s the paper in SCIENCE he wants to make sure I know before we finish our first interview. Meredith’s work on grape relationships led to the discovery that Pinot Noir and Goulaise Blanc together parent at least 16 grape varieties, including Chardonnay, Aligote, Gamay, and Melon. The conclusion was celebrated not only because of its scientific importance, but also because with such popular varieties considered, the discovery becomes relevant beyond the walls of science to other disciplines as well. Lagier looks at me directly and explains, “It was one of the proudest moments for me that my wife got a paper in that magazine. It’s like the Grand Slam of science. It brought tears to my eyes.” Doing a little bit of research, it appears Meredith is the only professor in the history of Davis’s Viticulture & Oenology program to have gotten a paper in the prestigious magazine.

The Beginning of a Wine Label

By Meredith’s retirement, Lagier was already working full-time on their label, having retired from Mondavi in 1999. His time at the company was significant, as he managed the Mondavi winery lab, established their first program to track and determine projected fruit availability from the vineyards, and then served as one of the Mondavi Coastal brand winemakers.

Though Lagier and Meredith had intended all along to plant vines on their hilltop, it took years before they realized they could turn that fruit into a bonded winery. Upon purchasing the property, it had to be thoroughly cleaned and cleared to rid the soils of Oak root fungus that would impact Vitis Vinifera. Once the seven years to accomplish that were up, the twosome placed their first vines in 1994. The year before, one of Meredith’s students, Jean-Louis Chave, the 15th, of Hermitage fame, had agreed the property would be perfect for planting Syrah as “Syrah loves a view.”

The grape was unheard of in Napa Valley at the time, with the pinnacles of the industry almost completely focused on the success of Cabernet Sauvignon. But the pair love Rhone wine and decided to plant what suited the slope and cooler climate of the site, as well as their palate interest. 1996 was their first press. By 1998 friends were commenting enthusiastically on the quality of wine, and the couple realized it was good enough they could consider selling it publicly. In 2000 they released it, inciting quick response that would herald them as one of the first labels in the region to showcase a marriage of French Aesthetic with California fruit.

I ask Lagier about this critical history of their wine, and if they’d intended to make wines that allude to the Northern Rhone. “There are hints of a Northern Rhone character in some of our vintages.” he responds. “To say more than that is just complete speculation.” He continues. “That was not our goal. Our goal was to reduce our influence on the wine, to capture the character of the fruit from here and get it into bottle. We’re just pleased this place makes this wine, and people enjoy it, which allows us to make a living. So pleased.” He pauses, then continues. “I do enjoy the hell out of the wine. Both of us feel incredibly blessed we found this land, and managed to pull this off.”

***
Thank you to Stephen Lagier and Carole Meredith for taking so much time to meet with me. I have plenty more moose meat whenever you’re ready.

***

To read more on Zinfandel, Carole’s work on its genetic history, and Lagier-Meredith’s foray into making it, read the recent article by Jon Bonné: http://www.sfgate.com/wine/thirst/article/History-underscores-Zinfandel-s-new-tack-4321826.php#page-4

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Casa Dumetz: Wines with a focus on Care and Convergence, a conversation with Sonja Magdevski

Feb 11, ’13 10:35 AM

Tasting with Sonja Magdevski

The food has not yet arrived for dinner and Sonja Magdevski, winemaker of Casa Dumetz, has begun interviewing me, though we’ve met for us to talk about her wine. Her work history includes a Masters in Journalism, I discover, and she writes for Malibu Magazine, as well as her own site Malibu Grange. The questions she wants to ask center around the career change I’ve made from teaching and academic philosophy to writing about wine. It leads us through intensive conversation on ideas of faith, commitment, passion, and fear. We both turned from advanced training in one discipline to pursue something different, and it gives us a way to mutually interview each other, both of us getting to talk and listen.

When we meet again two weeks later I discover an interesting correlation in Magdevski’s fascination with journalism and her investment in wine. Both include, for her, a sense of responsibility in freedom.

She explains to me the connection by starting first to describe her work as a writer. “It’s always been fascinating to me, journalism. People spend time with me for an interview, like we are doing now, you and me. After, I get to take all this information, and write anything I want with it. There is a real trust there. I want to show in what I write that I understood and absorbed the conversation. I love the freedom in that but I always ask, what is my responsibility? Who am I responsible to?” Magdevski describes her experience with journalistic interviews like she is being given a gift. She takes an awareness to her work that people are sharing something valuable. The responsibility and freedom both show themselves in her asking what she will do to best recognize that.

Wine parallels journalism, for Magdevski, through a similar process of honoring what she has received and asking herself what she will do with it. “All these hands have touched these grapes in the progress [from vineyard to wine], but in the end the decision [of how to make the wine] is made by one.” In this way, the relationship Magdevski sees between so many layers of human help–nurseries that provide cuttings, vineyard workers that plant and tend vines then harvest the fruit, other winemakers that offer advice and insight, people that later sell and purchase the wine–fuels a passion for her work. Listening to her speak about the process makes clear too that Magdevski has a deep appreciation for what it means to be human, and the value of human life. “In wine I am being given all this time. The grapes, they are a gift of time, and a product, and an experience. People take the time to grow fruit, listen to what I want, and then I get to do whatever I want with that.” She continues, again acknowledging the responsibility of it. “That freedom is exciting, and it is also sort of a test of your character. How are you going to impose yourself or not? The freedom of that is fascinating to me.”

The Wines of Casa Dumetz

In considering how these ideas enter vinification, Magdevski again reflects on the idea of freedom. “I love the freedom of being able to take the wine and make whatever I want, and say, here I am. This is who I am.” She continues, “being able to say, this is what I did. I am open to you now, for better or worse.” What she loves most is letting the fruit character speak through the wine. Still, she gets excited about experimentation in the winery as a way of learning how the different sites show. When we meet the second time it is to barrel taste through her current vintage.

Putting her winemaking in context she tells me, “Viognier is why I started making wine. Grenache is why I keep making it.” We taste through multiple lots of Viognier, Gewurtztraminer, Roussanne, and Syrah. In the midst of the experience, she talks me through five different barrels of Grenache varying by clone and vineyard site. Her original Grenache comes from the Tierra Alta Vineyard in Ballard Canyon, a steep sloped site banded with limestone, but she wants to work with grapes from other locations as well. Her goal is both to see if she might find something else she likes as much, but also to consider more closely what it is she loves from Tierra Alta fruit. In learning about these differences in wine, she realizes she is also learning about herself. She discovers not only what her own preferences are, but also how she wants to express herself, and what she will or won’t do about how others may receive her and her work.

Magdevski describes Grenache’s character as she sees it. “I really love Grenache,” she tells me. “It has a peasant nature. I love the brightness of the fruit, yet it is super complex, and it can be really elegant. I think of Pinot Noir, and Cabernet as elegant wines, and I like that. But that isn’t why I drink Grenache. I am looking for more complexity and beauty of fruit than elegance.”

Talking through each lot with Magdevski I begin to zero in on the peasant nature she describes. The barrel she likes best right now offers a plush convergence of round fruit integrated with spice and stemy hints. The wine fills while floats in the mouth and tasting it I see pink. It’s texture is more rustic, less candied, and less dense than the other lots.

That plush lift characterizes the wines of her 2011 portfolio too. They are round in the mouth with a core of powder touched fruit. Both the Grenache and Syrah rush with complexity and lightness with an subtle edge of wild funk, while the whites–Viognier and Gewurtztraminer–drink with the warm feel of Grandma’s white tile and wood kitchen–clean, comforting, and familiar. The Gewurtztraminer she started as a tribute to her Grandmother and her family in Macedonia, where the grape is traditional.

With her 2012s, she is playing with not only differing clones and vineyard sites, but also varying techniques. Her whites use a blend of skin contact and straight to press juice that offers dimensionality and a multi-note flavoral echo in the mouth. She will also be bottling both a Syrah and a Syrah rosé again, alongside her beloved Grenache.

In considering what she loves about winemaking, Magdevski tells me it is the dance of going deep into “geeky winemaking talk” about science, the process, the fruit, and the numbers–again a recognition of sharing and learning–while striving to make “a bottle of wine that is approachable and not pretentious.” She reflects again, “I never want to take any of this for granted. This is a gift.” She continues. “The goal is to share this with as many people as possible.”

***

Thank you to Sonja Magdevski for sharing with me, and for pushing me too to reflect in conversation. Thank you for taking time to talk with me.

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Escaping Convention: Calibrating to Stark Conditions, a Conversation with Greg Brewer

Feb 7, ’13 8:37 AM

Thank you to the judges of The Wine Blog Awards 2013 for selecting this post as a finalist for the Best Blog Post of the Year, 2013 award.

***

Meeting Greg Brewer

My first step into the vineyard with Greg Brewer I collapse into a puff of sand. The ground is so soft I’ve sunk several inches lower than anticipated and I can’t help but laugh at the surprise.

The Sta Rita Hills are dominated by sand, the entire region previously oceanic bed now full of diatomaceous soils. Diatoms, I learn, are small phytoplankton with cell walls made of silica. As they die they fall to the seafloor and fossilize into sedimentary rock. In the ocean retreating from the Sta Rita Hills, the soils made of these algae were left behind. Now we are walking through their history.

Brewer takes me up to the vines and explains what he appreciates about this vineyard. It is a flat section of land in the midst of a cold, sea blown appellation. The trees lining the front of the winery are taller than the building’s roof, and lean East, a sign of their growing in a persistent inland wind. Common discussion prizes hillside vineyards, and in their proper place they do challenge vines in a desirable way. But Brewer is describing to me the advantages of what Ted Lemon also emphasized, protected vineyards in extreme areas. Brewer adds his own spin to the notion, “it’s like being in the bosom of something. It’s cold outside and warm against the chest.” The vines on these flats, then, are held dear in the midst of otherwise harsh conditions. The sand provides little water or nutrient on its own. The wind pushes against the plants almost continually, and cools what is already a cool climate. With such circumstances the extremity of a slope side is unnecessary for pushing the vines.

The relationship expressed of protection within challenge is the first glimpse of a dynamic I’ll later come to recognize as definitive for Brewer. He loves the subtle complexity exemplified through a delicate circumstance–apparently differing ideas acting in harmony thanks to the right context. The focus on context reveals what seems to me a fundamental value for him, the importance of difference. He comments on this as we look at the winter vines. When it comes to wine “there are so many beautiful approaches,” Brewer tells me. “I like a celebration of difference.”

For Brewer the question of quality wine is not as simple as what your alcohol levels come out at, or if you use new oak. Instead, it’s a matter of a person’s “execution of intent.” That is, new oak or alcohol levels might be a matter of stylistic choice. Within any particular style a winemaker can create quality or not. Brewer turns the attention instead to choice and belief. “If [winemakers] believe in what they do for the right reasons, chances are it will turn out well.” Behind this view is a conception of alignment between intention and action. If a person really means what they do it comes more naturally.

Preparing to Taste Diatom

Two weeks later I’ve returned to Santa Barbara. There are a few people I want to do follow up visits with but it’s Greg Brewer that has stuck in my head. In our first meeting he’d described his winemaking techniques as subtractive in nature. The statement has been echoing for me.

Before meeting with Brewer again I am again researching the Sta Rita Hills and diatoms, the silica based algae. Brewer’s personal label is named for these creatures, an intentional homage to the place from which the wines are grown.

The silica-based ground is of the ocean, now only miles from it. The climate of the appellation is dominated by the ocean as well. Both climate and ground find their origin there in the water. Suddenly I am struck by the intensity of that–in any literal sense the ocean has retreated from the Sta Rita Hills, finding refuge in the deeper places, yet it remains throughout by its vestiges of earth, air, temperature, atmosphere. The region, then, answers a strange riddle–what would it look like for the ocean to retreat and yet remain?

Though they are atypical in their manner of doing so, Diatom wines are a deep representation of the place in which they find providence. It is respect for this oceanic dependence that I believe both characterizes the Sta Rita Hills AVA, and Brewer’s expression of it through his label Diatom.

The next morning I wake up early before my meeting with Brewer and begin eating seaweed.

The History of Diatom

The earliest influences of the Diatom project for Brewer connect to his work with Melville. There he began making an austere, highly focused rendition of Chardonnay called Inox.

In many winemaking traditions the best fruit gets the highest treatment, being given new oak, more aging, a closer consideration of technique in order to be bottled as Reserve wine. Lesser quality fruit, then, would be bottled with less attention to be sold for less. Brewer’s thought though was that in a California climate, where even in a cooler region the vines offer genuine fruit character, the better quality bunch could be left to speak for itself.

In making Inox, then, Brewer keeps the fruit from oak influence, fermenting and aging it instead in stainless steel, and also avoiding malolactic fermentation (ML), a process that in Brewer’s view takes fruit through a secondary stage further from its original form (It isn’t that Brewer is against ML. He uses it elsewhere. He simply doesn’t use it in these more subtractive approaches to Chardonnay). What is left is stark, primary fruit flavor resounding with acidity. The Diatom project carries some family resemblence to Inox.

In the genesis of the Diatom project is a recognition of place. “The landscape is stark. I wanted the wines to be stark.” Connected to that idea of barrenness is Brewer’s view too of the wines architecture. In making Diatom, the goal is to offer “structure found from within, not imposed from without.” The idea is one he compares to sushi. “I like doing something pure and stripped down. With sushi, the fish must stand on its own.” In Brewer’s approach to these wines the idea is to let the fruit stand on its own.

Brewer considers the history of California Chardonnay. Many understand it as a neutral grape, with older winemakers still sometimes calling it a blank canvas. They were able to show their technique intentionally on the fruit. Reflecting on the artistic metaphor, led Brewer to a different insight. What would happen if instead he left the canvas blank?

In this way, Diatom is an attempt to directly experience subtle differences. The art of Udo Noger could be seen as an analogy to Brewer’s wine project, and indeed Brewer himself names Noger as inspiration. Noger focuses on an intersection of light and space to investigate what is possible with something as simple as the color white. The recalibration of awareness offers insight into simplicity. Something otherwise seen as minimal becomes obvious.

In Diatom, Brewer approaches Chardonnay as a parallel to Noger’s method. The wines are fermented slowly and cold for the first months, then warmed only enough to allow fermentation to complete. The process, and aging occur in stainless steel. In such an approach, the wines offer austere presentation with significant structure. The alcohol levels are often high, as is the acidity.

With their focused style, the wines deliver a snapshot of Brewer’s aesthetic of silence and open space. As winemaker, he understands these wines are his particular expression, and names some of the roots of his inspiration in foreign cultures and artists. But standing in the sandy vineyard with him, only a few miles from the ocean, it’s clear his aesthetic is also rooted in the barren places of the California coast. And it’s that conscious intersection in Brewer’s work that fascinates me. He comments, “an important part of site display is allowing the human element to be there.”

Remeeting Greg Brewer

We have gone inside and are tasting Diatom wine. We begin with two from 2011.

The wines are so focused it is hard for me to think words at first. I taste instead impressions. Wind blowing over flat land. Sand. Resonant silence. As flavors unfurl so do feelings. The wines carry emotion. The wines feel at home in silence to me, as if they are focused elsewhere and at ease in solitude. They are structurally lean and energized. The Kazaoto giving flavors of winter forest, pine and menthol opening finally to pink and white grapefruit, followed by a long sandy seaweed finish. All blowing and cool in the mouth. The Miya comes later in winter when the cold is lifting but it is not yet Spring–silent, distant, and focused as well, but wind blowing with a softer voice of white sage and evergreen lifting into pear and hints of beeswax.

We follow our tasting into two from 2006. They are more lush and open, carrying a richness the 2011 does not entertain. Still, to call these wines rich is to mislead, as they may be broader than the 2011s but are still focused and taut on the palate. The wines taste of late summer when we have not yet begun to think of Fall. On the Clos Pepe, citrus oils fall into tall grasses and very light mint. The Huber is slightly hotter with more acidity, carrying dried white herbs alongside dried soils, dried flowers, citrus oils and methol. With these two wines I am grief stricken and honestly feel that pain in my chest. They are a reminder. Summer reaches its zenith only to curl back down to winter.

I turn back to taste again the 2011s and it occurs to me.

Greg Brewer’s work is the answer to a fundamental question. What would happen if we took what we love, what we want to do, seriously and made that love our life?

***

Thank you to Greg Brewer for taking the time to meet with me.

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A Life in Wine: Andrew Nalle: Philosophy, Wine, and Cooking

Dec 10, ’12 9:28 AM

Meeting Doug and Andrew Nalle

from left: Doug Nalle, Andrew Nalle

The Nalle label began in 1984, with Doug Nalle starting to make wine under his own name after over ten years in the industry already. Son Andrew Nalle grew up tasting wine with the family, working with the Henderlong Vineyard (which the Nalle family now owns), and seeing the work his dad did with winemaking. Since 2002, Andrew has been slowly taking over the winemaking in the family after earning an undergraduate degree in philosophy (my favorite), studying abroad in Sydney, and working harvest in South Africa.

I was able to spend several hours each with both Doug and Andrew talking with them about their work in wine. Tomorrow, I’ll share more about Doug’s wealth of experience in the industry (Nalle makes some of the finest Zinfandel), as well as their view on old vines. Today, I’ll post what I learned from listening to Andrew.

Listening to Andrew Nalle

After spending time talking about old vines, and his experience studying philosophy, Andrew begins to tell me what made him turn from the style of life found in university, to what he does now–make wine.

“I like the creativity of making wine most of all, and the self discipline of it seems to work for me.

“I like to travel and see how others do their wine. But I can’t be away too long, now that I’m more involved in the winery. So, on vacation, I always go to a wine area.

“But, we definitely have a system down here. Dad is adamant about how wine should be made. But, the truth is, I agree with him. It matters where the grapes are grown, and the person making it has to really pay attention. You have to know when to rack it, fermentation… pressing… you don’t want to press it too heavy. Someone has to have skill–it matters in fine wine. To start, you need great fruit. Right now people like to talk about less manipulation or intervention, but it’s the wrong word.” Andrew pauses here. He agrees with the idea of not manipulating the wine, but disagrees with the implication that that means you don’t do anything. He starts again, “you need to pay attention”

outside the Nalle winery

“It’s fun. It’s a challenge. If you like to get things just right, and then people come in later and taste with you, and recognize it… it’s really nice.

“Sometimes I feel like, why are you trying so hard? I guess, I want a little more refinement. The kinds of wine we’re making are for people that know their palate. It’s about making a good product that people can enjoy. For me, it’s like cooking. It’s nice when the chef is right out there, and you can see him cooking. But, really, people just want to know it’s a good meal, and then enjoy and talk to each other. It’s about making a good bottle of wine that can be really special to somebody. I worked in restaurants in college. That helped a lot to making me want to come back here. Growing up in it [in winemaking, and the Dry Creek Valley area], you’re used to it. But seeing people in a restaurant get so excited about a good wine with the food…

old vine Zinfandel planted in 1932, Henderlong Vineyard

“Food, it’s everyday. Wine, you have to be way more patient. It’s a slow process of waiting on flavors, to see how it all integrates. In restaurants, there are recipes, but there is also the feel. I enjoy that. How personal it can be. It’s like there is a recipe, but the winemaker does have a huge stamp on it. Like in the Old World, a father does give his recipe to his son [like Doug to Andrew], but everything keeps going, maybe the vineyard changes, but there is also this consistency to it. People can count on that. It’s comforting to people.

“People say all the time, you’re really lucky to be doing this. I am. But I want to keep improving, to keep making the wine better. It’s fun to hear that, but you can’t get too caught up in that. You’ve got to stay hungry. Ultimately, it’s fun to create.

old vine Carignan planted in 1932, Henderlong Vineyard

“If I didn’t grow up in a winery, I’d probably be working in a restaurant, and making wine on the side.

“It’s nice to have put in my apprenticeship now. Because, in the beginning, you have to put in so much patience. It’s not like cooking, in a way, because if you mess up, you can’t just start over. It takes years. You need time underneath you. Older winemakers have time beneath them. Maybe something you make, you put five years into, and then five years later, it’s still good. It takes time to get that. To not worry as much and trust it. You can’t just teach that. You have to put the wine and the time in. It’s always been fun for me, but it’s nice now to have more experience to enjoy it in a new way now, to have more confidence.

Andrew’s dogs (they’re oh my gaw awesome)

“We always say it is about the wine. The wine has got to be good. We’re doing this for people to have a great glass of wine. But it’s clear there is all this other stuff that goes into it too.

“When I’m cooking, every little flavor detail, what kind of rice I’m using, where I harvested the veggies, what spices, and how much… I just want to spend all my time in that. I want to do it again and again. I’m not okay with eating hot pockets every night. It’s like that here [at the winery]. Still, you can recognize that it’s Nalle wine. A lot of why I’m winemaking is really about cooking.

outside Nalle Winery

“I was doing philosophy, and then I realized, why am I looking so hard for what I want to do when it is right here, and I really wanted to work for my family. It is the best. They supported me so much, and so it just seems natural to want to do this for my family. Family is another layer of why I came back. I like being near them.

“Studying philosophy made me acknowledge more how special this is. Not everyone grew up like this. For me, this is how I grew up, so it’s really normal. You know, doesn’t everyone just taste wines at dinner, and travel to all these wine countries? Growing up like this got me into traveling. We’d see all these different wine shops, and restaurants. Then, you see all these people, and places. I realized from that, we’re all so different, and all human. It does have an effect on people–seeing it, the vines, where they grow. They’re taking that with them in the bottle. It’s pretty amazing seeing how excited people get.

“With philosophy, it is so hard. You have to start from the beginning, and there are so many questions. You need a whole life to do it. Wine, this seemed natural for me. But studying philosophy, I realized there are so many questions. And from that I started to think it isn’t about asking why but about how we live our lives. And that made me think about what I can contribute to things. For me, living an authentic, a good life was in making wine. This was more natural for me, and I think maybe I am good at it. I want to make my life better, and I want to make my family’s life better.”

***
Thank you to Andrew Nalle for taking the time to talk with me. I very much appreciate hearing your story. You make a wonderfully vibrant while focused zinfandel.

Thank you to Doug Nalle.

Thank you to Michelle McCue, Anne Alderete, and Dan Fredman.

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Drinking Balance: Considering Terroir, Old Vines, and Natural Winemaking: A Conversation with Paul Draper

Nov 27, ’12 11:00 AM

Visiting Monte Bello Vineyard, Santa Cruz Mountains, with Paul Draper

In considering his mentors in winemaking, Paul Draper of Ridge Wines is clear. His work is done in California, and his influences find their roots in this same state. The important point though is asking when his mentors did their work. As Draper explains, in the 1930s winemakers could be found still producing California Zinfandel in what he calls a traditional method. “They made wine that was still traditional, a straightforward process.” He pauses, “well, natural.” The relevance of this idea for Draper carries into the balance of the final wine, and the quality with which it ages.

Ridge is known for great success and influence in at least two styles of wine–Bordeaux blends, on the one hand, and Zinfandel, on the other.

Starting as Ridge Vineyards’ head winemaker in 1969, Draper was given the charge of increasing the quality of the company’s wines, and its overall business model. The hope was to bring the winery into a long term vision. The original owners had commitment to the idea of creating world class wine but needed someone with know-how to help fulfill the dream. By 1976, the Monte Bello blend had bested first growth Bordeaux on an International stage, the grand Paris tasting. It is these wines that originally secured Ridge, and its winemaker, Draper, its now legendary status. Bordeaux blends are widely considered the pinnacle of caché in wine circles, with even those that may claim to prefer other styles still feeling the weight of reputation emanating from Bordeaux.

I ask Draper to tell me the story of how he started with the company. He was invited by the original three family partnership to taste wines from their Monte Bello property. They poured for him their 1962 and 1964 blends. The site had originally been planted in the 1880s with a first bottled vintage in 1892. By the 1940s a large portion of these vines had been replanted, having seen great neglect during Prohibition. 1962 was the first vintage for the new family partnership relying on these more than 20 years old vines. The family winemakers, however, had no real experience with making the beverage. “They’d made beer once,” Draper explains. “But never wine.”

After a moment, Draper adds another detail–they also poured him a wine spontaneously (and non-commercially) done in 1959, ten years prior to Draper’s meeting with the families. The 1959 vintage had been made almost in error. The family picked grapes from their low yield vines, put them into a bin, and then went on vacation for two weeks, leaving the grapes completely unattended during their absence. When they returned, the fruit had fermented dry, so, they pressed and bottled the resulting wine. By the 1962 commercial vintage, the families had integrated in a purposeful submerged cap technique, and developed a slightly more refined result to the wine.

Draper explains, it was these early efforts, and especially the 1959 vintage that convinced him to join the Ridge family. “These winemakers had no knowledge, no experience. They were utilizing fully natural winemaking. That is, the wine really did make itself” (the truth of that certainly couldn’t be denied at least in 1959). Yet, what Draper tasted in the resulting wines was complexity, and a sense of completeness. “These guys just were not getting in the way.” Draper tells me. “I thought, it must be the site giving the quality.” Draper realized it would be an honor he could not deny to work with such a location. “Plus, I liked the families.”

That experience with the first vintages of the Monte Bello, plus the work he’d already done around old vines in Chile, set him on a mission. To expand the production of Ridge Wines they would seek old vine vineyards. In 1971 they located what is now known as the Lytton Springs site, making their first Zinfandel blend from Dry Creek Valley with that fruit in 1972. The vineyard had been planted in the 1870s and 1880s and at least half of the plants had actually survived Prohibition. In 1990, Ridge bought the old vine half of the Lytton Springs property; in 1995, they purchased the rest. I ask Draper about the about-20 years between when they first started using the Dry Creek Valley fruit and when they finally took ownership of the vineyard. In that case, there was a little back and forth with the previous vineyard owner. But Draper clarifies that Ridge tends to take their time before buying new property.

Discovering Lytton Springs, Dry Creek Valley, and Zinfandel

Draper illustrates what he thinks of as a 50-year plan. The decisions they make today at Ridge are all aimed towards turning these first 50 years of the company’s success into the next 50. One of the primary effects of this view is that Ridge, the company, grows only as it has the money to grow, planting new vines only as it can afford to let those vines develop into greater age, and buying new sites only once the particular vineyard has proven itself with consistency over time. With that in mind, Ridge has worked with more than 50 Zinfandel vineyards throughout California, with all but ten of those being old vine planted, and at least 20 being within Sonoma County. The larger portion of vineyard sites for Ridge, then, is devoted to Zinfandel plantings, rather than Bordeaux varieties.

While Bordeaux blends carry with them a weight of reputation, Zinfandel, on the other hand, was long described as the everyman wine, costing very little compared to the heftier cost of Bordeaux blends. Draper succeeded, however, in showing that even California Zinfandel could be worthy of wider acclaim. In 1983, he appeared on the then-popular show Dinner with Julia offering her a 1980 Ridge Amador Zinfandel, which he described as “a Beaujolais style Zinfandel”, as well as a 1977 Paso Robles Zinfandel (and the 1972 Cabernet Sauvignon–keep an eye out for the Ridge White Zinfandel, which he calls their “essence of Zinfandel”). What is impressive about this, then, is that Ridge has wielded incredible influence at both ends of the California wine spectrum–showing California wine can garner respect at the highest level with Bordeaux blends, and that an everyman grape like Zinfandel can be deserving of a better reputation as well.

Draper tells me that they like to experiment by sourcing around from different sites. “In a typical year, we’ll produce Zinfandel from 12 or 14 sites in very small quantities. We’ll look at the consistency of character and how fine it will age.” Scouting a new site for Ridge, then, depends first on picking a location that shows promising characteristics up front. But the next level of commitment comes not only in working with that site for multiple vintages to see how the wine does each year, but also waiting long enough to see how well the resulting wine does in the bottle. When I ask Draper how many vintages that would tend to mean for him, I guess, maybe five or 6 to show a range of seasonal variation? He tells me, “With Lytton, we purchased it 18 years after making the first vintage with proven quality. We just let go of a good [but not reliable enough] vineyard we sourced fruit from. We made wine from that location 20 years before we dropped it.” That said, the goal for Ridge is to farm 75% of its own grapes, with other locations being experimented with in only small quantites. He tells me why Ridge focuses on having control over their own vineyards, and on only expanding as they can afford. “The heart of the matter is not being driven by what the market will sell, but instead on what the soil and climate will support. That is hard to ask of people.”

In considering the number of vineyard sites Draper has had the privilege of working with, he returns to the idea of “wine making itself.” The reality of winemaking, Draper explains, is that “the wine won’t make itself without you standing there. But, with the right vineyard site it is like it makes itself.” We turn, then, to the topic of terroir, and I ask Draper to describe his understanding of the notion.

Reflecting on Terroir, Balance, and Natural Wine

“Terroir in California,” he begins. “It shows in wines that distinctly offer the same character of place when tasting the wines side by side through different vintages, though the vintage element too will be distinctly different.” Draper says the focus for Ridge is on offering terroir through their vineyard specific wines, because what he wants for Ridge Wines is the kind of complexity and quality that accompanies that sense of place. In order to accomplish this goal, the winemaking team at Ridge (Draper still acts as head winemaker, but now also has a team of winemakers that work with him–located at the three wineries) uses what Draper calls “minimal intervention with very obsessive watching over.” He elucidates, “any tweaking occurs at blending, choosing what barrels, that is, vineyard parcels, we want to include. We avoid mechanical or chemical intervention. The goal is to make the best that vineyard can make.” As a result, Ridge wines also go through both natural alcoholic and malolactic fermenation.

Ridge does, however, utilize “the minimal required amount of sulfur” having tested what is demanded by each site, and by the specifics of a particular vintage. Draper tells me he does know, of course, that some people making “natural wines” go without sulfur as well. But, for Draper, to fulfill his commitment to terroir, the wines require a small portion of the additive. “It takes some SO2 for the vineyard to show its individual character.” I ask him to talk me through this view. He offers me two side-by-side explanations.

First, he offers, “when we talk about terroir, we’re saying the wines are showing the individual character of a site. But,” he goes on, “sometimes the word terroir becomes an excuse, without it being necessarily clear if what is showing might actually be the fault of the winemaker.” This brings him to his second point. “When we don’t use the minimum effective level of SO2, the wine goes off differently every year. It can be fine. Or, it can be off. But we’ve found, what you get is simply not a consistent sense of character from the place it came.” That is, the overall quality and presentation the wine gives you might be pleasurable, but what it isn’t offering is that reliable experience of terroir coming from the vineyard site itself.”

We come around to the idea of balance. It’s a word that has gotten a lot of traction recently in discussions around wine. Zinfandel, one of the primary grapes Ridge works with, for instance, is known for readily growing to produce higher alcohol levels. Some have argued that it is possible to have a quality wine of higher alcohol as long as it works with the wines’ other elements, while others strike the view that only lower alcohol (coming in more like below 13%) should be considered in balance.

Draper offers his view. “When any element is too extreme a wine does not age as well. The elements we can easily name–acid, tannin, fruit.” He later adds the idea of too much oak as another aspect for consideration. “Plus, each of these need to work with what the grape brings to it as far as more complex flavors. For example, when you see a wine that is initially too tannic… yes, it will soften with age. But it will never be as finely balanced if it isn’t in balance initially.” He continues, considering his view in relation to ripeness. “If a wine is really over ripe, or if the alcohol is not carried well enough by the body, then it is out of balance.” He acknowledges such a wine will change over time but clarifies that it is certain types of integration-over-time his view of balance is in relation to. “But how is that wine in ten years? Or, in three years? If you don’t prefer that wine in ten years, then it wasn’t in true balance initially.”

This consideration of aging potential ties back into Draper’s interest in minimal intervention wines, and his reasons for winemakers of the 1930s being his original inspiration. At that time, winemakers were still relying on techniques from before Prohibition, that is, little mechanical or chemical technique, very much using only what was available locally. “One of the effects of Prohibition,” Draper tells me, “is an eventual break from this tradition. [UC] Davis came in post-Prohibition as a kind of reinvention of winemaking by modern chemistry, relying on cordon versus head pruned, clones versus selections.” He clarifies that it isn’t that some portion of such knowledge couldn’t be useful. But he does go on to say that in his view, “newer technique [ie. mechanical and chemically intervened] wines don’t age as well as traditional.” He further clarifies that whether or not a wine ages well can be considered part of the character of a place (depending too though on how interventionist the wine was made).

In one final conversation around terroir, Draper expands on his original comments about the notion. “Terroir,” he tells me, “is also a matter of what grapes grow best in what climate and in what soil. Does the vineyard show consistently? Or, do we have to help it out? Do you have old vines, or new vines? The Geyserville site was originally planted with some Carignan, but at Lytton that other portion is Petite Sirah. We’ve kept that.” Draper’s description, then, implies at least two things. For one, the quality of each site varies. Some produce better, and certainly different wine than others. But, in addition, terroir does not just come down to the rocks and climate of a place. It is also an expression of a vineyard’s particular grape types, and history, and those are both a matter of the people that have worked the site.

***

For more photos from the visit to Monte Bello: http://wakawakawinereviews.com/2012/10/04/visiting-with-paul-draper-at-ridge-monte-bello-vineyards/

To see video of Draper on Dinner with Julia: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffy2xvVksqw&feature=player_embedded

For an interesting consideration of balance in relation to Zinfandel, read Talia Baiocchi on the Wine Spectator blog: http://www.winespectator.com/blogs/show/id/47616?icid=em_com

For more on Dry Creek Valley: http://wakawakawinereviews.com/2012/11/28/touring-dry-creek-valley-sonoma-california/

***

Thank you to Paul Draper for taking so much time to meet with me. I am deeply grateful, and blessed.

Thank you to Sue, Sam, and Amy.

Thank you to Michelle McCue.

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Regarding Rochioli 2: A Life in Wine, Joe Rochioli, Jr.

Nov 20, ’12 1:41 PM

Listening to Joe Rochioli, Jr.

Joe Rochioli, Jr.

“I am always the first one to work in the mornings. I get my men started, and am usually the last one to leave. I don’t know for how much longer.

“From 8 years old, I helped my dad prune, head prune. The vines were all planted in the 1890s. We would pile up brush between four vines and then burn the brush. We’d sulfur the vines with a big sack–put a handful on top of the vine and it would go poof.” His hands lift up to illustrate. “Everything was planted 8 by 8. But then in the 60s, we started pulling them out.

“I went to college at Cal Poly. I started to go to Davis, but then a guy came by, right here to the ranch, and told us at Cal Poly you learn by doing, and I like that model. I was an Animal Science Major to start. I had all kinds of animals here. Future Farmers of America. I won awards. But I sold my bull, the cows, and all 80 sheep, and my dad gave me $350, and I went to school.

“When I was 12 I was already doing man’s work. I grew up fast. But really I hated to pick hops [the ranch had more hops than grapes planted originally], so I talked my dad into letting me work in fields with the men.

“I worked to put my way through school, and I played baseball all 4 years at Cal Poly. It was difficult to work, play baseball, and go to school. While there I was doing all the crops course electives, and working for the crops department. Later I started with vineyards. For 10 years we were on beans here. Then we moved up to grapes.

“I started reading books on French Burgundies. I got it in my head–in France, they can’t produce big [grape] crops… and they’re making the best crops in the world. So, I wanted to plant varieties. Everyone was growing only for bulk wine back then. But I wanted to grow varietals. Dad wouldn’t let me. He made the decisions in those days.

old vine Sauvignon Blanc on Rochioli Estate

“Finally, in 1959 I talked him into Sauvignon Blanc. When I went to Davis I went to get bud wood and they had rows. I started tasting them. They had this one row that had this fig taste to them. So I took all my bud wood from that and planted that. [UC Davis eventually sold all of this bud wood, without record of its origins. As a result, the clone of Sauvignon Blanc located at Rochioli is unknown. The Rochiolis produce an Old Vine Sauvignon Blanc bottling from these vines.]

“In 1961 I tried to talk my dad into Pinot. He said no. He was right. There was no one to buy it then. The wine all went into Gallo. But in 1968, I planted a clone of Pinot Noir. For several years it all went into Gallo’s mixed reds. Same with the Sauvignon Blanc, into their mixed white. But then Mondavi Estate took some. Then Windsor Vineyard. Then Dry Creek Vineyards, in the early 70s–he won a lot of medals for that wine. Then in 1973, I started selling Pinot Noir to Davis Bynum. He won some medals as well.

“In 1972 I planted Chardonnay. Just pulled some of that out. There is still a block of old vines out there.

“I have always been proud of my quality. I started pulling leaves before anyone thought of it. Mainly on the Sauvignon Blanc because it was so bushy no light was getting in. I built a cane cutter in 1960. It was the first cane cutter in the county. I built my own house. It took me two years, but I built it. I built my own bins. Made a hydraulic dumper. That ‘learn by doing’ came through from Cal Poly. I’m still proud as hell. I still want to make the best grapes.

Vivienne and Joe Rochioli, Jr.

“I got remarried, and married my high school girl friend. We ran against each other for Student Body Vice President. She was the first girl to run for that position. I beat her. She said it was the mafia, but I was a pretty good athlete. Football and baseball. I won a lot of trophies.

“I was just a little Italian boy. I couldn’t speak English when I started. My sister and I, we both started at a little one room school house up the road. There were just two Italian kids back then, her and I.

“No one ever came around this area back then. It was really remote. When anyone did, my sister and I would run like hell and get behind the couch to hide. I had to force myself to do a lot of things. I think football helped a lot. I was President of the Grape Growers Association at one point. I forced myself through a lot of things. I was determined. There are a lot of opportunities for people here.”

***

Part 1 of this feature on the Rochioli family: http://wakawakawinereviews.com/2012/11/19/regarding-rochioli-visiting-rochioli-winery-and-their-historic-family-vineyards/

To read more on the Rochioli story, check out this comprehensive history by Prince of Pinot: http://www.princeofpinot.com/article/1124/

The Rochioli family is also featured in the Russian River Valley documentary, From Obscurity to Excellence. The release viewing occurs December 1, 2012. For more on the movie: http://www.russian-river-valley.com/ To buy tickets: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/4754299237?ref=ebtnebtckt#

***

Thank you to Joe Rochioli, Jr. for taking time to talk with me.

Thank you to Kanchan Kincade.

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Working La Uva 1: A Life in Wine, Meeting Fulgencio

Aug 9, ’12 2:15 PM

Thank you to Eric Asimov for mentioning this write-up in the August 13, 2012 The New York Times Diner’s Journal “What We’re Reading”.

***

Meeting Fulgencio

For over fifteen years Fulgencio has worked vineyards in the Willamette Valley. Prior to starting their life in Oregon, he, and his wife, and their two young children traveled from Mexico to be near their family in the Western part of the state.

I ask Fulgencio to tell me about his family. His daughter has now finished her undergraduate degree, and is studying for her Medical School entrance exams. He is grateful, he says, that she will benefit from the Dream Act, if it passes. It is something he is very happy about, he explains, because the Dream Act would give his daughter an opportunity, and, knowing this, she has purposefully worked very hard to succeed in school. His son too has just finished high school, and is on his way to college this fall.

He tells me about his family coming to the United States. First, getting here was very hard, he explains. “But to arrive,” he says, then pauses, and shows me his forearm, telling me he gets goose bumps still when he thinks about it. The hairs on his arm really are raised and on his face he is smiling. He continues. When they arrived, he and his wife had big dreams but, several years ago now, his wife died. He was left with two children, not knowing even how to cook an egg. His eyes begin to fill with water and for a moment he is quiet. He continues. In such a time, he tells me, you can only have a lot of patience, to focus on your spiritual well being, have a lot of faith, and to know all is God willing. He tells me he is feeling better now, but adjusting to the move, and to his wife dying were a lot of work, and very trying.

We are both quiet for a while. I tell him it sounds like his patience has gotten him and his children a long way. He responds. “I have not reached all my dreams,” he says. “But I am feeling at peace because I have fulfilled my duties as a father and as a good human being. From this point it is up to them, my children, and to whatever it is left for me to do.” For a moment we are both silent. Then I thank him for telling me about his life here, and about his family. He smiles at me and nods. “It relieves me when I am able to express myself,” he answers. “Thank you. It was bottled up inside.”

Fulgencio drives a vineyard tractor and is a vineyard mechanic in the Willamette Valley.

***

Thank you to Fulgencio for taking the time to talk with me.

Thank you to Leda Garside for translating portions of our conversation.

I am deeply grateful.

Thank you to Sheila Nicholas.

I was able to meet Fulgencio via ¡Salud! Services. More on the program to follow.

***

Working La Uva 2: Majoring in Community Health, Talking to Estella http://wakawakawinereviews.com/2012/08/10/working-la-uva-2-majoring-in-community-health-talking-to-estella/

Working La Uva 3: Leda Garside and ¡Salud!: http://wakawakawinereviews.com/2012/08/11/working-la-uva-3-leda-garside-and-salud/

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IPNC Day 1: Jadot Retrospective, with (A Life in Wine) Jacques Lardiere, for Melanie, and Randy

Jul 28, ’12 1:32 PM

Thank you to Eric Asimov for mentioning this write-up in the July 31 edition of The New York Times Diner’s Journal “What We’re Reading.”

***

Meeting Jacques Lardiere, Understanding Biodynamics

“We never have the same number of wines every year. Some vintages are less. We reduce the amounts to focus only on the very good villages. We think for our customers to have only the best.” –Jacques Lardière, Maison Louis Jadot

Yesterday afforded the opportunity to listen to Jacques Lardière discuss his philosophy of wine making, as it connects to an entire system of understanding about the differences between Grand Cru, Premier Cru, and Village wines, via the metaphysical forces Lardière recognizes through biodynamic principles. Following is my understanding of Lardière’s discussion.

“On a good vintage, you work less because it matches you. It matches your stomach, it matches you.” –Jacques Lardière

Lardière explains that at Maison Louis Jadot the goal is to focus on a broad range of areas within Burgundy. The focus includes varying places to grow grapes and make wine from as a way to both support the house financially, but also to understand the life of the vine, and making of the wine from different locations. Towards these ends, then, Jadot depends upon two levels of wine making practices. First, the house farm harvests and makes wine from their own land in Burgundy. Second, however, and Lardière emphasizes the importance of this, they also have contracts with vineyards throughout the region. As Lardière explains, Grand Cru and Premier Cru are very small portions of the area. Besides making these more developed styles of wine, he states that it is important also to “make simple wine.” One of the primary reasons includes that in being able to sell it quickly for more immediate consumption, you can support the financial base of the winery. But the reasons are greater. The other sites also offer, what for Lardière is not just a learning experience but also a spiritual opportunity. As he puts it, “we can work on it. It can reveal the mother form.”

Repetition of the word power is at the center of Lardière’s discussion of what wine can do, and where it comes from. In considering where the distinctions between Grand Cru, Premier Cru, Village, etc levels of wine distinction arise, Lardière describes what he calls “lines of power” present throughout the planet. The lines of power seem to fall along geologically important intersection zones, sometimes volcanic, sometimes from tectonic plates rubbing together, or from other forms of land movement and development. As Lardière explains, in such activities the rocks warm, and more mineral molecules are released, thereby being available to the plants in a fuller way. But he says too that there is a sense in which people can feel these lines of power. As he describes it, there are times when you may be walking along a line of power feel its benefit, then as you walk away the positive effect becomes less and less, as you go back, more and more until you are on top of it, like an energetic version of the children’s game Hot/Cold/Warmer.

In Lardière’s view, the Grand Cru sites are directly along these lines of power. The vines are able to work less along these zones to simply receive the benefits of this energetic line, and thereby produce wine that has less undesirable flavor or sediment. But in Lardière’s view the flavor potentials of Grand Cru wine should not be seen as held only at that high level of quality. Instead, his approach to making wine is to study how Grand Cru wine best shows its potential, and from that insight to then turn to less elevated classes of wine. “We start by understanding the top, and then go to the other ones to work with them.” He explains.

In describing how Grand Cru can reveal the potential of other classes of wine, Lardière first describes his view of what impacts a wine’s potential. The place is the first most important aspect of what goes into the wine, as Lardière understands it. But what he also knows is that Burgundy itself is one terroir. The region as a whole offers a similar sense of place. The different villages within Burgundy all live within this terroir, this unique place, but then offer their own differing potentials for aging. The Village is a fine tuning of the terroir as a whole. Then, third, there is the climate that impacts the quality of the wine from year to year. Finally, there are the Grand Cru and Premier Cru sites, which are the most subtle shifts in the development, and potential of the wine.

What happens in the growth of the vine, as Lardière describes it, is the movement of molecules from the ground, up into the plant, and finally out in the flowering. All of life is vibration, he says, as we know from physics. Vibration is how the plants grow, how they exist, what they are, how we receive from them, and what we are, as well. “If you plant the flower, you move the star,” quoting an unreferenced poet to illustrate. The ground, as we know, is full of minerals, but in planting we release the minerality (which Lardière continually references as the power itself). Minerals, Lardière explains, are the life. The quality of the mineral that the plant is able to receive and grow from is what determines how much life the wine will have–both in terms of age-ability in the bottle, and in terms of how well the wine does after the bottle is opened. This is a distinction to be found between the wines of the Grand Cru, and those Village wines, but it is also an insight that can be taken in the handling of making Village wines. The Grand Cru sites, according to Lardière, “match” the plants better. They simply receive what they need, and so grow with this life. Then, the wine, in turn, matches us, as humans, and we receive what we need too. Wine, in general, he reminds us, has medicinal properties. When he was growing up, he says, if a child fell and hurt themselves the parents would give them a small glass of wine. This is true of all wines, but Grand Cru helps us to better recognize it, and so then to know how to make all wines better.

As Lardière describes, it used to be that people only planted in the right places, where plants were best served by the ground. But now people plant in zones that offer not only the purer power of the minerals but also in places where the plants take up aspects that are not healthy for them or for us. What is absorbed in these areas is a denser matter that weighs the expression of the wine down in the glass. What you taste is more of a heaviness, rather than the freedom of the wine. Here one must allow the wine more time before it can be ready to show what it has to offer and, as he puts it, to release the life–the most beautiful wine.

The flavors and quality possible from a wine are the life, according to Lardière. Not all wine is treated in a way that allows this life to be released. It is easier, as he says, to make a wine that has only a couple hundred flavoral components, rather than to take the risk of allowing a wine to have four thousand. It takes time “for the molecules in the wine to be digested, to become mature and deliver the life” of the wine. But to give the wine this time is a genuine risk. To allow it to happen depends on letting the wine close in the barrel, to turn in on itself and hide, in a way. In letting the wine close down, it has the opportunity to work through what is in it and to release the sediment that is denser and not part of the pure expression of what the wine can be. In giving the wine time to work on itself, so to speak, you are taking the risk of having to wait, of losing the wine for a time without knowledge of what it will be when it comes back after. But it will come back, Lardière claims, it will come back having found its freedom by releasing the sediment that had weighed it down. The wine’s freedom is its fuller expression–its life with four thousand flavors.

The process of allowing the wine to transform itself reveals to us, Lardière says, important aspects of our own mortality, and potential. We are almost entirely minerals. “When I pass away” he says, “I will be only minerals, (laughing) oh, and a few other small things. It is important to remember that.” The wine making, it is “a process of transmutation, and it could also be a process of transfiguration,” when you allow it the time to find its freedom and its full expression. The process of the ground growing the vines, the vines then giving the fruit, the fruit then turning into wine–these are all processes of transformation, of one thing turning into something else. But our own involvement in wine making is actually a kind of spiritual training for us as well. In the earliest stages of our spiritual development we are there as the grapes turn in to wine. In this moment, Lardière tells us, “you forget the grapes.” They are no longer there as fruit, we recognize them now as wine. But this is no small thing, he says. In forgetting the grapes, “you become something that has a name.” We recognize the beverage in front of us as a particular type of thing. But our doing so also reflects a stage of our identifying the world around us, and so too ourselves. We are no longer just beings having experiences, we are also interpreting the world around us, that is, naming those experiences. But, this, according to Lardière, is an early stage in our development. It is necessary, but we come to see it is early in our own process of finding our own freedom.

Wine, when allowed to truly go through its process of closing down, so that it can come back later opened up again in its fuller expression, points us to the greater reality of our lives. When the wine is given the opportunity to go through its full process it comes back from its stage of closing down, and has changed its molecules–sediment has settled out, and above it is a purer wine. In Lardière’s view this is when the wine is beginning to deliver its power, and to give the life. It has become something more than we could make. We began the process but to be witness to this greater expression, we had to, in a sense, let the wine go beyond us. In doing so, the wine comes back to show us the insight of the process–it becomes something greater than merely what we have named it to be. It becomes a thing that can out live us, and that carries with it a power that extends beyond whether we, as the wine maker, or any particular individual, are even present. In Lardière’s view, this is when the wine has become even more than us.

***

Thank you to Alder Yarrow for hosting Lardière’s presentation.

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A Life in Wine: Frederic Panaiotis, Chef de Caves for Ruinart Champagne

A Visit to Haute-Saône, France: Drinking wine with the Captain at Chateau La Barre, for Annemarie, and Jeremy

A Life in Wine: Stephen Lagier and Carole Meredith of Lagier-Meredith Wines

Casa Dumetz: Wines with a focus on Care and Convergence, a conversation with Sonja Magdevski

Escaping Convention: Calibrating to Stark Conditions, a Conversation with Greg Brewer

A Life in Wine: Andrew Nalle: Philosophy, Wine, and Cooking

Drinking Balance: Considering Terroir, Old Vines, and Natural Winemaking: A Conversation with Paul Draper

Regarding Rochioli 2: A Life in Wine, Joe Rochioli, Jr.

Working La Uva 1: A Life in Wine, Meeting Fulgencio

IPNC Day 1: Jadot Retrospective, with (A Life in Wine) Jacques Lardiere, for Melanie, and Randy

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