Vol 5 No 1 Take your rating and shove it!

(Postscript added. Also correction on The Wine Gourd link. See below)

Okay, that’s a bit strong but what does a single point score (or from several critics) mean? That THEY liked or disliked it which doesn’t translate to YOU liking it! Why do Americans have so little confidence in their ability to discern quality in a wine while Europeans trust their palate? Have you ever bought a wine with a high (90) rating and just thought it was okay after plopping down $50 or more (since Parker left the Wine Advocate more 90’s are being awarded and for wine priced down to the $25 range). Then there is the WIne Spectator who recently listed 400 Oregon Pinot Noir’s with an amazing number at 90 or higher. TB won’t get into comments I have heard from several sources on how many of those ratings were achieved.

With so many raters, it seems that if you can’t get a 90 rating from one of them, you might as well get out of the business. TB has discussed ratings several times over the four years since he started the blog, and they have all been less than positive.

Did you hear about the guy who went into a wine shop during a tasting. He said, “this wine tastes terrible.” The clerk replied, “really? Parker gave it a 90!” To which the guy said, “I’ll take a case!”  While I haven’t experienced a terrible one, I have had some with that I regarded as mediocre. As an author friend titled one of his books, “you don’t have to be wrong for me to be right.” We all have different tastes. Do you prefer Coke or Pepsi? Seven-Up or Ginger Ale…you get the picture.

Remember too that these ratings are not on how well they pair with food, and how many of you take the time to check what pairs well with your special eggplant? When we travel in Europe outside the major cities, we always drink the local wine. Several times I have bought the wine and later wondered what the hell was I thinking. In many areas of the world they have only one or two grapes varieties and thus can do little to the flavor of the wine, especially with primitive equipment and no temperature controls. If you can’t make the wine go with the food, make the food go with the wine. Adding certain ingredients, spices, and others can make most any wine go with it…well, usually.

Rather than rehash my prior articles on ratings, I would like to call your attention to a very different type of wine blog: The Wine Gourd (www.winegourd.blogspot.com). I highly recommend it. The author is very quant oriented but in a good way. His posts take a topic and then graph the variables to prove whether the reporting is accurate.

The last three posts have been of particular interest to me. The first discussed a fundamental problem with wine scores. To simplify, imagine a 20-point system (like UC Davis uses). The purpose of this is to break down the wine into characteristics such as color, clarity, aroma…you get the picture, with just two points for overall quality. Let’s say two wines each scored an 18. Doesn’t it matter which categories got the maximum scores? You bet it does. What if one wine had one point each for clarity and aroma but scored higher than another wine in two other categories? Now that we have seen it in basic form let’s consider the Parker created, but widely differentiated scales. Specifically, Parker has 20 points for subjective evaluation while some have 25. So just in this one category there could easily be a 10-20 point difference…let’s say from a 70-90!

Ah, but it gets worse. You can take your wine to a lab that specializes in telling what you have to do to make it a 90-point wine. Is that what you want? All cabs, chards, or pinot’s, to all taste the same? Not for me or the winemakers I admire. They want a ‘sense of place’ or terroir. Now it is different for a 2,000 case winery from a 100,000 case winery, the latter where people are expecting the wine to taste the same from vintage to vintage. But, as my friend, Carlos Pastrana of Priorat, says, “then why put the vintage on the bottle?” I, and many others feel the same. But for most, given that the average life of a wine is less than an hour: the time to get from the grocery store to the dinner table.

Now let’s look at the tastings held at state and county fairs with perhaps six tasters. The wines are usually tasted ‘double blind’. In other words, after tasting the all the wines of a class they are tasted again in reverse order and the scores of each judge are averaged. What could be fairer than that? Well, it is fair but it usually results in a wine of good overall quality exhibiting the characteristics of a given varietal getting the gold, while the outliers may have characteristics of the others may turn off some of the judges. Again, we would like to know how the individual wines did in each category scored. But get a gold and the world will beat a path do your door, so that is what you should shoot for if volume selling is your bag.

That is why it is important for a small winery to develop a group of loyal followers who will buy the wine for its merits and because of warm feelings they have for the staff, the winemaker, the blend, etc.

Next comes descriptors…something every somme can provide you in great detail. Some of them are freshly cut garden hose, cat pee, a broad range of fruits and berries (I don’t believe grape is one of them), and I have always been embarrassed that I can’t make those descriptions, but then I learned neither can a lot of winemakers. TB once took a winemaking course from a man who later became a Master of Wine…one of the few in America. We nervously brought our finished product to class, and if he liked them he would say, “that’s wine”, if not, he just passed on by.

In  1981, having recently moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, I was fortunate enough to attend a Bordeaux tasting at the Clift Hotel, hosted by Anthony Dias Blue, and “the maestro”, Andre Tchelistcheff. A fantastic experience for the paltry sum of $25! In every case, Tony’s comments were more elaborate than Andre’s. After tasting one of the wines, it was Andre’s turn to go first, and he said, “this wine is mousey”.  Tony quickly jumped in to add,”what Andre is trying to say is it smells like a room that has been closed up for awhile and a mouse was in it.” Andre immediately cut him off with “no Tony, this one had his whole family with him and stayed there for a long time.”

Andre hated descriptives…well, unless they related to the feminine. He once listened to a young well known winemaker describe a wine breaking it down into its components, and interrupted with “that is disgusting…who would want to drink that? When I taste it I think of the breast of a young woman in winter, surrounded in fur.” That, my friends, is sensual wine tasting, although few could get away with that today.

As for me, I love wines that bring back a memory of a dinner, event, or a great wine I once tasted. Isn’t that what we all want…really? Do you want a somme to tell you what you are about to taste? Doesn’t that just eliminate you? Perhaps you should just say, no thank you, that provided all I need from that wine.

The latest Wine Gourd ended with a survey of wine buyers on what influences their purchases. Basically, it asked what influenced their wine purchases the most on a scale of 1-7 . The results are the percentage in each category who gave it a 7:

Advice from a knowledgeable family member: 42%!; 90+ point score: 25%; recommendation from store staff: 31%; tasted wine in store 60%!; wine from a country or region they like 45%; positive review read in print or online: 21%; wine on sale for 10% or more off 13%; recommendation from a wine ap 8%; wine is on display 5%.

With only 25% relying on a 90+ rating, it seems like use of descriptors and numerical ratings might just be spinning wheels. TB will close with a comment from a wine retailer:” I can get all the 89 point wines but I can’t sell them, and I can sell all the 90 point wines but I can’t get them.” Are you capable of discerning a one point difference?

Whew…TB is exhausted…needs a glass of one of his 89 point wines. Maybe even an 88!

Happy Wine drinking…why taste when you can enjoy a glass instead?

TB

Update 1/30: Would you go to a museum with a pencil and paper and rate artists? Hmmm, Rembrandt is an 89; Picasso 92. Stupid, unfair, and downright silly. Yet, a small group of people believe they can do that with wine. So? There is a cost: do you want all cabs, or chards, to taste alike? Doesn’t technique or terroir matter? Perhaps not to you, but TB says: no, and hell no!

 

(c) traderbillonwine.com 1/29/2019

 

Vol. 4 No. 10 My wine resolutions for 2019

I run across lots of stories and facts while working on my book project: Wine and Passion. So, in keeping with that theme, I will share some thoughts I have about what wine to buy, where to buy it, and some shocking data. Here goes:

For the past five years or so, the only price group for wine that is growing is the $10-20 range. If I had a winery and it was economically feasible I would set a list price of $19.95. According to website Morning Consult, and reported on Wine Industry Insight, 62% of Americans spend between $8 and$15 on a bottle of wine and only 6% spend more than $21!!! It breaks down this way: 18% spend $3-8; 35%  $8-12; 27% spend $12-15%; 15% $16-20; and only 6% spend more than $21. Think about that. One of my tips is this: one night a week if you are drinking Two Buck Chuck, try a $10 bottle of wine; if you like it better start drinking that, and now try a $20 bottle of wine. Again, if you like it more, make that your regular wine, but next try a $30 wine, and so on. My guess is you will max out around $35 and if you can get one of those on sale for say $25 Voila!!!

Why not more? Mainly because over 80% of wines are consumed with 48 hours of purchase! So you won’t get the higher quality you are paying for without letting it at least ‘rest’ for a month or so before drinking, and the highest priced wines are made to be cellared (temperature controlled or at least a stable passive), for a year or more.

I discussed this with Kevin Zraly, author of The Windows on the World Complete Wine Course and he shared his formula with me: I want to drink a $10 bottle of wine that tastes like a $25 bottle; a $25 bottle that tastes like a $50 bottle; and a $50 bottle that tastes like a $100 bottle. It can be done!

There is also a saying: we drink white wines too cold and red wines too warm. It’s true! A cold rather than chilled white will not release its aromatics fully. That is why it is generally recommended that you chill them for no more than twenty minutes. As for reds where cellar temperature is normally 54 degrees, somewhere around 60 is better but they should also be decanted to let them open up. Older vintages if decanted for too long with lose most of their characteristics.

Next, is buying wine from dedicated wine shops rather than the supermarket. You have no idea how long the wine has been on the markets shelf and most people pick the varietal and then a nice label. A wine shop will have people who will listen to what you like in a wine and steer you (hopefully) towards one that you will love or at least like. You are likely to pay a little more in these shops unless they are having a sale but you will know you are getting a quality wine. Large ‘big box’ wine stores like Total Wines or Beverages and More may offer a better price but does it matter that much if you are buying a single bottle? Perhaps for a case where it might equal a free bottle, but don’t we want to support our friends and neighbors? I think so!

Then there is buying wine from a big winery that might produce 50,000-100,000 cases vs a small one that might make 15,000 or less. You may pay more but you will again be supporting a small producer who likely pays more attention to details. A corollary to this is visiting the wine country and choosing one of the big name wineries to visit. There, you will likely have a student or other part-time worker pouring as opposed to a small winery where you will meet a full-time employee who isn’t reading from a script, and you might even meet a winemaker or owner. Their passion will vastly improve your impression of the wine you are tasting.

Following that thread, consider that just two distributors (Southern Glazer Wine Distributors which represents 1,178 wineries sells and Republic National Distributing  which represents 7,581 wineries, and have revenues of $16.5 billion and $6.5 billion respectively according to Forbes Magazine and represent over 50% of all wine sold in the U.S.! Pity their small wineries who get lost in the shuffle as happened to a friend of mine’s wine. State laws are restrictive too, one of which says that you can’t ‘fire’ a distributor if he has any of your wine in inventory…so keep ONE case and you’ve got the winemaker…how unfair is that to both the winery and customers.

For this and other reasons, small wineries are trying to sell more of their wine thru wine clubs or the tasting room. Unfortunately, they have to sell to you at the retail price they listed, but at least you know the wine has been stored properly. Shipping can be expensive, even prohibitive but at times like the holidays, many offer free shipping, a way to get around the selling at retail laws. Only when a wine is in short supply and not being offered to distributors can they reduce the price to clear inventory. This is the trick with Total Wine’s ‘winery direct’ program. They buy up all of the wineries inventory of a varietal or vintage at bargain basement prices, then offer them to their customers at a low price but with a huge markup! Again, you don’t know how the wine has been stored or if it is fading (aka over the hill).

Here is one last statistic for you: three big wine companies, Constellation Brands, E. and J. Gallo, and Vintage Wine Estates, represent 70% of all wine purchased in the U.S. Combine this with the price profile and the future is not bright for small producers, and that is a tragedy.

Lastly, millennials price preferences are lower than their baby boomer parents who are retiring and therefore not spending as much for a bottle of wine. 2019 will definitely be an interesting year for the wine industry.

TB wishes you all a Happy New Year and a prosperous 2019.

(c) traderbillonwine.com

Vol 4 No 9 Tarrytown and Beyond

Tarrytown sits right on the Hudson and is a quaint town but also is home to Marymount College, and the Rockefellers who have clearly left their mark. Dobbs Ferry, established in 1698 is there and from it you can see the entire Manhattan skyline and to the north the Tappan Zee Bridge. There is also a non-denominational church there, the Union Church of Pocantico Hills, a tiny church funded by the Rockefellers and built of river stone. Originally it had no windows but then they attempted to commission Henri Matisse to come and do a glass window. Due to his age (82) and health, he declined however, he did create the forms for the window in his bedroom. Those were then made into glass and shipped to Tarrytown for assembly. It isn’t an impressive window, about a three-foot oval over the altar, but Matisse died two days after finishing it. Over time, seven windows were installed in memory of various members of the Rockefeller family. All were creations of Marc Chagall, and they are magnificent.

The wedding was fantastic and held at Tarrytown Estate, just down the road from Washington Irving’s home where he wrote The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. All the streets have names that those who have read it are familiar with. As an aside, when we lived in the San Francisco Bay Area, we lived in Orinda in a section called Sleepy Hollow and even lived on the Lane of that name, and again all the streets were from the book. Tarrytown Estate is on Sunnyside Lane, coincidentally the same street the bride’s parents live on in Orinda!

The wine for the wedding was from Vietti in Barolo, Italy. They had secured a Balthazar (2400ml) of their 2015 Nebbiolo (Perbacco) – that’s 16 bottles. It was the first to be shipped! The bottle was decanted and all the guests signed it. A nice touch! Vietti is especially meaningful to me because in 2004, my son-in-law (a chef at a Northern Italian restaurant, Prima, in Walnut Creek, CA) and I took a 10-day trip to Italy visiting wineries and fine restaurants. We called it two guys, ten days, twenty meals, fifty bottles of wine. The highlight was that when we arrived at Vietti, Alfredo Currado personally gave us the tour. Normally his wife did because Alfredo didn’t speak English well, but here sister had fallen ill so he had to do it. It was amazing but troubling as he kept apologizing for his English. Finally, we saw his son, the winemaker, and told him to please have his dad stop apologizing as it was an honor similar to having Robert Mondavi give us the tour. He stopped and said, “my English is not so good but when I drink wine it get’s better.” However, when we got to the tasting room he did something every host did that we visited. He poured a taste, then filled all three glasses but never touched his again. The significance of that was that we were his guests but this was business…a nice touch. That is why the wine, which was wonderful, meant so much to me personally.

One last thing at the Estate. Over the fireplace is a painting and I was curious. It turned out that it was a portrait of Major Andre, a Brit who was captured by the patriots and although he was in civilian clothes they noted his beautiful boots. They removed them and inside were the plans to West Point that he had just received from Benedict Arnold. Both men were later hanged., Why was it there? Because when the Estate was purchased it hung there so they decided it was only proper to leave it ‘hanging’.

From there we drove down to the Greenbrier in Lexington, West Virginia (not to be confused with the town of the same name in Kentucky). The Greenbrier is a beautiful southern mansion style hotel with a golf course, but is also famous for the bunker that was built there to house members of Congress if there was a nuclear war. It is now just a museum.

The next day we ‘found’ the Bourbon Trail in Kentucky and visited one of my favorites, Woodford Reserve (would also have like to visit Pappy Van Winkle but they weren’t open that day – drat!). From there it was a long but beautiful drive home that totalled 3,650 miles, almost all of it in good weather, thankfully!

Trader Bill

(c) 2018

Vol 4 No 8 A Short Drive to Canada and NY

The short drive, 3,600 miles, or as I affectionately call it, the great circle route, went this way: we left Minneapolis on Oct. 9th, driving north and into Wisconsin to the town of Bayfield, gateway to the Apostle Islands. The problem was the ever increasing rain! By the time we reached our destination, not only was it pouring but there were 12 foot waves on Lake Superior…scratch the Apostle Islands. But the bright side was the fall colors, some of the most beautiful of the trip! It finally began to clear but we had to leave as the purpose of the trip was to get to Tarrytown, New York, for my goddaughter’s wedding. We will be back however!

Our next stop was Sault St. Marie which is on both sides of the border. We chose the U.S. side, crossing Lake Superior into Canada the next morning. SSM marks the convergence of Lake Superior and Lake Huron through a series of locks mainly used by ore ships. In case you don’t know, Superior is the largest and deepest of the Great Lakes. From there we circled Lake Huron to Toronto which is just east of Lake Erie, and on the shores of Lake Ontario. It is a strange but exciting city of exotic high rise buildings with no particular pattern. We spent two nights there, the highlight being the CN Tower where we had a long lunch as the restaurant rotated 360 degrees for spectacular views. After lunch, we ascended 33 more stories to the spire for even more spectacular panoramas. (Helpful hint: to visit the tower costs C$30 per person plus another C$20 to see the spire, BUT you can avoid the basic fee if you have a reservation at the restaurant which significantly decreases the cost of the experience. Highly recommended!)

From Toronto we drove the less than two hours to Niagara, but having visited the Falls before we focused on the Niagara-On-The-Lake region which is chock full of wineries. The number has increased dramatically since our visit a few years ago. There are now over a hundred of them of varying quality. I had hoped to visit two from our first visit, Malivore, which makes a really good Gamay, surprising given the latitude and lack of hot summers, and Stratus, a modern steel edifice that is also producing fine wines. The nearly 30% discount due to currency conversion makes them a great buy. Note that virtually all the wineries produce good to high quality whites but very few produce great red wines, and Ice Wines (Eiswein in Germany). Inniskillin is the best for ice wine (traditionally made from Vidal grapes), and in 2006 was purchased by Constellation Brands, which also bought another very good producer, Jackson-Triggs, which is much cheaper and a best buy.

The one winery we revisited was my favorite, Coloneiri, which is the most spectacular in the region. Imagine driving past fields and vineyards, seeing a sign to the winery, turning in and seeing a beautiful, and huge, chateau-like building, and there you have it: Coloneri! The family came from Italy and began building the estate over ten years ago and it is still not complete. At the time of my first visit I said to my host, “now I know what they mean when they say ‘if you cant to make a small fortune in wine, start with a large fortune’.” He immediately corrected me, saying, “a very large fortune”. The two sons and their wives continue to run the winery and produce a full line of red and white wines, all of which are very good. But it is the fullness of the reds. so reminiscent of wines from the Valpolicella region, especially Amarone’s, that got my attention, along with their motto, “it’s not just love, it’s passion.” I love that word and those who have it.

Realizing that it wasn’t hot enough to make vibrant, they take from 25-50% of the red grapes and dry them in racks in a greenhouse, a method known as ‘appassimento’. Trust me: it works!” Fantastico!

We would have liked to spend more time in the area but had to move on to the Finger Lakes where we stayed in Hammondsport, on Keuka Lake. Some of the best wineries in the region are there including Dr. Konstantin Frank, Ravines, and a new, small winery, Weis Vineyards. One I didn’t visit this time was Wagner which is on Seneca Lake. All are highly recommended!

I visited Dr. Konstantin Frank’s winery, my second time. Fred Frank, grandson of the Doctor, and I have been communicating since the last time I visited and met Meaghan, the fourth generation, rare in American winemaking. This family takes winemaking seriously along with carrying on the legacy of Dr. Frank, a Russian who emigrated here in the 1920’s and proved that vitis vinifera grapes, not just native vitis labrusca, and vitis riparia grapes or French hybrids, could be grown in the cold climes of upper New York state. These wines made wines from here unpalatable to those outside of the East Coast who had not experienced the great wines of France, and California. I vividly recall tasting some of them (and you still can today), and passing on them entirely. But Dr. Frank, despite tremendous opposition, persevered, and as a result of his passion, New York wines, both in the Finger Lakes, and on Long Island are high quality and able to compete with wines from California and other regions. Like I witnessed in Canada, there has been an explosion in wineries in the state, as elsewhere in the United States.

Dr. Frank also developed a lasting friendship with Andre Tchellistchef, who is regarded as the father of American, especially California winemaking. My book project, Wine and Passion, is dedicated to them and their legacy. Whereas Andre’s biggest battle was with the owner of Beaulieu Vineyards, Dr.  Frank’s was with the state authorities and local wineries, both of whom resisted his advice. Their friendship also resulted in some California winemakers coming east, first and most notably Eric Frey, the Frank’s first non-family winemaker. One last contribution Dr. Frank attempted to make was to convince UC Davis that the AxR1 phylloxera resistant rootstock, wasn’t. He knew that since the deadly mite came from America that only American rootstalk would be resistant, not the AxR1. Their failure to accept this cost the industry millions of dollars when, as Dr. Frank predicted, the mite appeared in California. Like his friend, Andre, Konstantin was a remarkable man who won despite formidable odds against him. As a result their Pinot Noir vineyards and other vines are among the oldest in North America.

Many winemakers since Eric Frey have had their start here and gone on to work for other wineries in New York, California and other countries, so they now have a team of winemakers to insure quality and continuation of their passion for making fine wine.

It was with a sense of sadness that we left the Finger Lakes but we had to move on to Tarrytown for the wedding, but along the way I met with Kevin Zraly, one of the most influential people in wine today and one who has an enormous passion for wine. Kevin ran Windows on the World restaurant and has taught and published (with several revisions), the wine course of that name, the most purchased book on wine of all time.

Kevin’s passion and friendliness cannot be overemphasized, nor can his knowledge of what makes a good or great wine. If you live in New York and want to learn more about enjoying wine, I highly recommend his Advanced and Master’s Wine Classes. They are an incredible bargain and value, where tasting is key to your understanding of wine.

Well, friends, I have gone on far too long but will pick up rest with the rest of our trip.

Trader Bill

(c) 2018

 

Vol. 4 No. 7, Judgment of Chaska 5/24/18

In Minnesota, and this may surprise you, we have a plethora of good privately owned wine shops, within the greater Twin Cities region. Among the ones that TB likes and frequents are  (in alphabetical order): Excelsior Vintage, France 44, La Dolce Vita, Solovino, and Wine Republic. All have their special interests. Note, TB did not include chains especially perhaps the largest in the U.S., which shall not receive mention.

Surprised? You shouldn’t be. Afterall, In I’ve Been Everywhere, Johnny Cash names Minnesota in the first verse and Chaska in the last. One email recently caught TB’s eye: a tasting based on the original Judgment of Paris tasting that elevated American wines to world class forty-two years ago. TB has written of this tasting and the book on it by George M. Taber, a journalist for Time magazine stationed in Paris  He, like other reporters received a notice of this tasting to be held at the Intercontinental Hotel, a short distance from Time’s offices. Having nothing better to do he wandered in just before the tasting was to begin (for more details read the post, Vol. 3, No 16).

The idea to ‘recreate’ the tasting was the brainchild of Troy Seefeldt, who along with his wife Jen, did an exceptional presentation at La Dolce Vita wine shop in…Chaska, MN…exactly forty-two years after the famous event!

It was a blind tasting, with no clues, other than I and a few others who knew of the tasting. We were poured blind tastes in pairs, a French and an American. First, Sauvignon Blanc, then Chardonnay, then Merlot, and lastly Cabernet Sauvignon.  To cater to novices (and I will be the first to state that I am not an expert on wine, but a lover and advocate of the noble grapes), a five category scoring sheet was provided, that made it fun for all with scores of 1-5 on each, and a 25 point perfect score:

CLARITY: All but Opaque; Polluted Lake; See Through; Translucent, and Sparkling

NOSE: Rotten Eggs; Vinegar Medley; Inoffensive; Impressive; Freudian Complex

BODY: Needs a Workout; Skinny & Flabby; Proportionate; Lean + Sinewy; Boldly Muscled

FLAVOR: Oenophilic  Ick; Too Sweet; Amply Acidic; Balanced; Romancing the Tongue

FINISH: Bitter Swallow; Callow Gustation; Small Parting Gift; Extra Stamina; Dream Worthy

See…that isn’t so hard is it? Scores came in amazingly similar! This happened to TB when he took people whose idea of wine was followed by ‘cooler’, when he moved to Reno – the same year as the Judgment! Using the UC Davis 20-point Scoring System , they were amazed at how well they did, as was I, although the overall winner was a ringer I put in: Gallo Hearty Burgundy, but you can’t deny it was well made wine. Contrast to the 100-point system created by Robert Parker, which may have done more than anything else to improve the quality of wine than anything else I can recall. The downside to this was conformity for those coveted 90 point ratings, eliminating the artistry of the winemaker, and destroying any semblance to terroir. Note also that there are literally dozens of 100 point systems, having from 25-30 subjective points. Parker is very clear in what he likes: huge fruitbombs with tannins (yes, even for the subtle Pinot Noirs, which is why he was banned from Burgundy tastings). Others not so much and many of them promoting wines they are directly involved in or being compensated to evaluate.  Let’s banish ALL 100 point systems…period! As a San Francisco wine critic once wrote: how can you trust my ratings if you don’t know what I look for in a wine? (For more on ratings see Vol. 3 No 6).

Lastly, note that the actual Judgment used 20 point scoring, however there were no rules on how those points were to be calculated. Since all ten judges were French, (sponsor Steven Spurrier, and his pupil, Patricia Gallagher scored the wines too but they weren’t tabulated…wouldn’t you?)  there was a huge variation, much more than one might expect from experienced wine evaluators, since several tried to ‘game the system’ and mistook the French wines for the Americans, causing one judge, Odette Kahn, who gave obscenely low scores to the French wines to demand that her scores be removed…they weren’t! Also, I had the country wrong on one of the four pairings…and felt lucky on that.

Back to the wines for the tasting (of course, the cost of the original wines would have been prohibitive – if you could find them), so proxies were provided as follows along with my total points:

Sauvignon Blanc: Coteaux Du Giennois, 2017, 18; Grgich Hills Fume Blanc, 2014, 19

Chardonnay: Ch. Montelena, 2015, 17; William Fevre, Chablis, 2015, 18 (I did really bad in this category!)

Guillemin La Gaffelieere Grand Cru St. Emilion 2010, 16; Freemark Abbey Merlot, 2013, 20

Chateau Aney 2015, Haut Medoc, 22; Stag’s Leap Cabernet Sauvignon 2014, 23

So, for better or worse, those were my scores. Like the original Judgment, it was a great experiment and loads of fun! Try it, you’ll like it!

©Traderbillonwine.com 2018

Vol 4 No 6 What’ll you have? Red, White…or?

Oldtimers like TB recall Boone’s Farm which probably got more people interested in wine than anything else. Credit Ernest and Julio, Gallo that is, for that. Then they came up with Madria Madria Sangria. Nobody had had sangria at that time and suddenly it was all the rage. But here’s the thing: Cesar Chavez was leading the farmworkers protests at the time, so what did Ernie and Julio do? They ran commercials with a latina spouting on the wonderful sangria “my hussband and his oncle” made.  One has to wonder how many people who supported the farmworkers were duped into buying it.

One year, watching the World Series, I saw several commercials for Carlo Rossi Wine. Huh? Never heard of it…how can they afford to do it. Well…Carlo was a distant cousin and voila! Gallo paid for the commercials and of course owned the winery (?) – probably made at the Gallo winery.

Lastly, they came up with Bartles & Jaymes wine coolers. They even had a phone number you could call and hear the boys talking to one another…and a house with a sign out and two guys rocking on the porch. At the time, Gallo owned the largest intra-state trucking company.

They were nothing if not innovative and once you got past the ‘pop’ wines, dollar for dollar they made the best wine in the U.S., dollar for dollar. Hearty Burgundy was the best of the bunch…even though it contained no burgundian grapes!

Then Julio died in 1993 in an accident when a vehicle (jeep?) he was driving veered off a farm road leaving it all to Ernest to run the company. About this time, Gina Gallo bought land in Dry Creek Valley and wanted to make a premium wine. The catch was she had to use the Gallo name. Now imagine an enophile having a dinner with a bottle of Gallo on the table! BUT, she overcame that and produced a respectable table wine.

What next? They decided to buy up wineries around the world. Do you like Albarino? Martin Codax. Rather than list them all consider Apothic, Edna Valley, William Hill, and a flock of others. Here is a link: Gallo portfolio You will be amazed as TB was. They are now the largest wine producer in the world.

Now back to the winery. The great Andre Tchelistcheff’s son, Dimitri, went to work there. Why? Because he couldn’t stand the way Madame treated his father at Beaulieu Vineyard. He then hired Richard G. (Dick) Peterson as a chemist, introduced him to Andre and eventually Dick left to work under Andre. Then, when Heublein bought B.V., Dick ascended to being winemaker with Andre leaving to become a consultant. Note that Heidi Peterson Barrett, his daughter, became one of the top winemakers in America.

TB refers back to his early comment that Gallo made the best wine in America, dollar for dollar. Don’t underestimate them…many have and were proven wrong.

So why all this about Gallo? Because they were single-handedly responsible for introducing young people to wine coolers, pop wines, and finally table wines. Finally, we are back to the title of this edition. There has always been, and continues to be a ‘logical’ (?) progression from sweet white wines to dryer whites, to rose’s and lighter reds to full-bodied reds. Here is a link to a new study that confirms this:  WineBusiness.com   Note that the study also shows a preference for organic, sustainable, and biodynamic wines but a willingness to pay a few dollars more for it.

TB has to end this now…off to a tasting of organic, sustainable, biodynamic wines!

(c) traderbillonwine.com 2018