Author: lgsjr

This Side of the Bar

Part of Power Tasting’s manifesto, as we say on our Welcome page, states: “We want to empower the visitor to get the maximum advantage out of each visit, not to be intimidated by wine snobs on either side of the bar”.  In most wineries, the servers are friendly and in be best of cases, educational.  Some are wine snobs, but fortunately, they are rare.

Photo courtesy of touringandtasting.com

However, the other people tasting wine with you are much more of a mixed bag.  The majority are just folks out for a pleasant day, going about their own business.  However, there are certain types we have encountered who offer both challenges and opportunities.  As a general statement, we see more of them while we are tasting in Napa Valley, because there are so many wineries and it is so well known.  Here we offer some tips on how to deal with the various sorts that you might meet in your wine tasting travels.

  • The Party-ers: If you are in Napa Valley on a weekend, especially at wineries that offer a food menu and tables,  you are then likely to run into a loud group who would rather drink than taste.  If they are not your kind of crowd, maybe you ought to skip tasting on weekends.  But if Saturday and Sunday are your only chance to go, try to get away from them.  The servers are alert to this type and try to isolate them, but it’s hard to avoid them.  So if they are inside, take your glass to the terrace.  If you can’t get away completely, try to find a quiet corner.
  • Bachelorette Parties: A special case of the party-ers is a group of young women who pull up in a limo, previously over-served, celebrating one of their group’s impending nuptials.  (Of course that sounds sexist, but we’ve never seen a bachelor party doing the same thing.  At bars, for sure, but not wineries.)  Our best advice is to give up and go somewhere else, but if that’s not practical then by all means have nothing to do with this group.  They can only detract from your experience and you can’t add to theirs.
  • People You Saw Earlier: It is inevitable that you’ll run into some the same people as you go from winery to winery.  After all, they’re doing what you’re doing, in the same part of the world.  And since they’re going to the same tasting rooms as you are, they are likely to have similar tastes.  It might be interesting to recognize them, ask for  recommendations of other wineries you might enjoy and give them some in return.
  • The Dreaded Wine Snobs: Some people like to share information; others want to lecture.  In a tasting room, a little alcohol loosens the latter sort’s inhibitions as well as their tongues.  The moment you hear something like, “This is good but the tannins don’t measure up to the 1996”, find a reason to do something more important, like examining the t-shirts and coasters.  If you engage these people in conversation, you’ll be stuck for a half an hour listening to someone, no matter how knowledgeable he or she might be, who is more interested in an audience than a conversation.

Wine drinking and tasting are by nature social experiences and for the most part, the people you’ll run into in wineries will be convivial and in some instances informative.  A little conversation can be interesting; too much can spoil your wine tasting experience.

Au Bon Climat

Santa Barbara has two areas for wine tasting.  The so-called Funk Zone is right along the seaside and while there are good wines to be tasted there, the overall ambiance is a little, well, funky.  It’s more a place to party on a lovely warm day than to get serious about tasting fine wines.  A few miles uptown is quite a different story.  There you will find better known wineries’ tasting rooms, more plush in their furnishings, surrounded by ritzier restaurants and shops.  Among the best of them is the tasting room of Au Bon Climat (http://www.aubonclimat.com), also known familiarly as ABC.

The winery is the life’s work of a fellow named Jim Clendenen and everything about Au Bon Climat is a reflection of his philosophy of wine and, to a certain extent, of life.   He has long been portrayed, by himself and by others, as Wine’s Wild Boy, including a very public spat with (of all people) Robert Parker.  He even makes a wine called Wild Boy, with his shaggy face right there on the label.

But what’s in the bottle belies Clendenen’s outlandish reputation.  Au Bon Climat makes California style Burgundian wines, with great respect for the terroir of California’s Central Coast.  Best known for Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, they also make Pinot Gris and Pinot Blanc under the Au Bon Climat label as well as several others that Clendenen has developed.

One of the attractions of tasting at ABC is the rather huge selection of wines available for tasting.  Moreover, the atmosphere of the winery makes you want to stay awhile and taste them all.  The room is well lit, with a large window looking out onto the street.  It has a clubby feel, albeit a club with a lot of wine bottles stacked up on the walls.

Au Bon Climat’s Tasting Room.  Photo courtesy of the winery.

It’s a good idea to let your server figure out what kinds of wine you like and then lead you through them.  There really are too many to attempt to taste them all and the range of stylistic differences argues against trying.  We gravitated towards deeply flavored Pinot Noirs, so we were treated to a sort of tour of vineyards where Au Bon Climat grows and sources grapes.  Their own Le Bon Climat vineyard was not our favorite; Bien Nacido was.  ABC is hardly the only grower in Santa Maria County’s Bien Nacido vineyard, but we were informed that they farm the largest swath with the best sunshine aspect.

Sanford & Benedict is another vineyard where they source their grapes.  It’s an interesting experience to walk a few blocks to Sanford’s own tasting room  and see how two different winemakers treat grapes from the same (or a least similar) terroir.  Surprisingly and rather interestingly are the wines sold under the Barham Mendelson label because they are from Russian River in Sonoma County and not Central Coast at all.

Yet another factor making a visit to Au Bon Climat different is that it has the best positioning in what is effectively a beautiful wine tasting shopping mall called El Paseo.  There are six tasting rooms there, so you can spend a day tasting wines in Santa Barbara and not walk more than 100 yards.

Tired Taste Buds…or Not

A few years ago, we were on an extended wine tasting trip to Paso Robles.  We had been to most of the wineries we knew we wanted to visit, including Tablas Creek, Justin and Adelaida.  We had made some nice discoveries, such as Ecluse and Caliza.  We were fairly intent and the tasting was intense, because the hot growing conditions in the Paso Robles area lead to some very high alcohol content in the wines produced there.  In fact, one winery’s wines were topping out at 16.5 percent. Lucie was constantly complaining about the high level of alcohol in Central Coast wines.

On the last day of our visit, we were just driving along Route 46 stopping rather randomly at wineries along the way.  We had never heard of any of them, so the best that could happen was a new discovery and the worst was learning what to avoid in the future.  But that afternoon just seemed to go from worse to worst.

Now, Power Tasting’s philosophy is not to speak ill of wineries but rather to praise the ones that we believe deserve it, and we’re about the experience, not the wines themselves.  That day, we finally arrived at a winery where the experience was mixed.  The tasting room was tastefully decorated with antiques and the bar was almost unobtrusive in a space that felt like a visit to Grandma’s.  Unfortunately we entered just behind a family with two little boys who, as little boys will, wanted to touch everything.  The servers were in a tizzy, trying to pour wine while preventing destruction of the knick-knacks.   So we have to admit that conditions weren’t optimal for enjoying what was in our glasses.  That said, the wine was simply awful.  We paid our respects and left quickly, hoping not to hear anything break as we departed.

In the parking lot, we looked at each other and said “Maybe we ought to stop.  Our taste buds might just be worn out.”  Perhaps all we had sipped in the past few days had caught up to us and we simply couldn’t differentiate good wine from bad any longer.  There was, however, one winery that we had deliberately left for last because we knew their wines well and liked them very much.  This winery was Turley Wine Cellars (http://www.turleywinecellars.com), famous for their Zinfandels.  We gave ourselves one last try.

Turley’s tasting room in Templeton, near Paso Robles.  Photo courtesy of pairingswineandfood.com

We entered in Turley’s cool, woody tasting room and sipped some Zins.  Hosannah!  They were delicious.  Our taste buds hadn’t died after all.

There are a few lessons to be learned from this experience.  First of all, trust your taste.  Your tongue won’t actually shrivel up and die.  If you like a wine you’re tasting, it’s good wine…at least for you.  And if you don’t like it, it’s not good.  (Of course, if you’re sipping Lafitte Rothschild and you don’t like it, either it’s corked or you need to re-calibrate your taste buds.)

Another lesson is about the purpose of wine tasting.  It’s a joy to taste a famously great wine and maybe even more so to find a wine you’ve never heard of that blows you away.  But it’s also important to find out what you don’t like, to educate your mouth.

And finally, within the bounds of reason and safety, don’t give up.  If you don’t like the wine you’re tasting now, the next one may be the one that makes your whole wine tasting trip worthwhile.

Reader’s Comment: It’s All about the Taste

The following comment was submitted by Paul de (J. P.) Bary, author of The Persistent Observer’s Guide to Wine: How to Enjoy the Best and Skip the Rest.  Paul was a college classmate of Steve’s.

Kudos for your focus on what matters most – taste!

I love Steve’s simple rules*. Most people have an intuition about them, but are misled by all the hype.

Learning to know what you like is all about feeling comfortable with your own sense of taste. You can connect that with the hype once you get comfortable with your own instincts.

Most people get confused about Rule #2, thinking that you have to memorize labels. With all the wines in the world, that’s obviously a daunting proposition…and there’s no guarantee that any specific wine will be available when you want it or that it will be the best choice under the circumstances.

What’s easier to remember is the grape variety (or blend of grapes), the region and the style of the wines you drink and how they fit with the food or occasion.

These are the types of things that are easy to bring home from a visit to a winery and your tips make that experience easier and more rewarding.

Keep up the good work!

____________________________________________

* 1. Know what you like.  2. Remember what it’s called.

Advice for First-Timers

Maybe you’ve heard this question from some friends: “I’ve got a business meeting in San Francisco and my Significant Other is coming with me.  We’d like to spend some time going wine tasting.  You’ve been there a lot, so what would you suggest?”  We’ve gotten that a lot.  In fact, the reason we started Power Tasting, in part, was to answer questions like that.

There are a lot of questions to ask your friend first, among which are

  • Are you driving or will someone else drive for  you?
  • Are you going just for the day or are you staying over?
  • Are there particular wines you especially like or dislike?

So let’s assume that these hypothetical friends are going to drive up for the day and are pretty open about what they will taste.   Moreover, they’re not going to be constrained about paying for top-quality tasting.  We would recommend a day-trip to Napa Valley.  Why Napa?  Because that’s where American wine as we know it today got started.  We love Sonoma County and some parts of Santa Clara County – also short distances from San Francisco – but if your friends have never been wine tasting in California, they really ought to start with the most famous American wine locale of them all.

Photo courtesy of Eater San Francisco.

Here’s how we would respond:

  • Take it easy.  If you’re not used to sipping wine all day, you need to respect your limits –  don’t wait until you’ve reached them.  This is especially true because you’re going to be behind the wheel.
  • Restrict yourself to the southern end of the Napa Valley.  There are a lot of great wineries on the southern (i.e. Carneros and Napa appellations) end so you can minimize your driving time.  That’s doubly important, since you’d like to avoid the traffic and not spend too much time driving with alcohol in your bloodstream.
  • Try to taste a wide selection of wines.  You could do all Cabernet Sauvignon or Chardonnay, but what’s the point?  So, for example, Etude winery is one of the closest to San Francisco and you can taste top-end Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Cabernet Sauvignon there.  Not far away is Domaine Carneros, for more Pinot Noir and especially for sparking wines.  We’d also recommend getting into the main valley; Trefethen is close by and has a lot of top-end wines to offer.
  • Stop for lunch.  For one thing, if you’re tasting wine, you ought to have some food. For another, Napa Valley is almost as famous for its restaurants as it is for its wines.  Mustards on Route 29 has been a destination restaurant for decades.  Or you could drive into Napa town, where there are many places to eat.  There’s also the Boonfly Café on Route 121, near Domaine Carneros.
  • Enjoy the views.  There’s more to Wine Country than wine.  Everywhere you go, it’s beautiful.  If you’ll excuse a bit of American pride, Napa Valley is among the most beautiful.  If you do go to Domaine Carneros, you’ll have one of the loveliest vistas while sipping Champagne…(oops, California sparkling) on the terrace.  Maybe give yourself a little time to drive around on some of the little side roads.  Route 29 is too full of traffic to be taking in the views.
  • And above all else, have fun.  Don’t be over-awed or try to do everything in a day.  You can always come back.

Which One Is the Star, the Wine or the Winery?

In all the years that we have been visiting Napa Valley for wine tasting, a lot has changed.  It’s hard to say whether it has been, overall, for better or worse.  In our opinion, the wines are far improved over what was available in the 70’s and 80’s.  There is more diversity, more top-quality wine makers and (memory may be playing tricks here) the same wines from the same producers are better today that they were then.  More expensive too, to be sure.

But Power Tasting isn’t about wine, it’s about the experience of wine tasting.  In that regard, tasting in Napa Valley today is far different than back in the “good old days”.  In those days, tastings were usually in the barrel room, with nothing of architectural, cultural or sartorial interest.  There are no “two barrels and a plank” wineries left in Napa Valley although there are still some in other wine making sectors of California.

We certainly enjoy sipping wine in a comfortable setting, with a sleek wooden bar and some tasteful artwork on the walls.  More broadly, we prefer wine tasting in a comfortable atmosphere, with attractive surroundings and knowledgeable servers.  These are the types of wineries we seek out when we are traveling and there are many of them in Napa Valley.  Those old days weren’t always so good; a handsome tasting room is better than a barn, capacious glasses that let us savor the aromas of the wines we are drinking are better than the teensy glasses we had then and wine educators are more interesting to chat with than farmhands.

Sometime around the late 90’s or the early part of this century, two things happened.  The pioneer wine makers who established Napa Valley wines as we know them today were bought up by international corporations and these companies discovered that they could profit handsomely by making Napa Valley into Disneyland for adults.  And so they began to build what we term “Napa Palaces” where the objective was to provide an experience independent of the wines being served.

Inglenook winery.  Photo courtesy of the winery.

Some of these drew on Napa’s wonderful history.  For example, the Francis Ford Coppola’s  Inglenook, Beringer and Chateau Montelena are housed in 19th century buildings that have been restored to their former glory.  They would be worth visiting even if there were no wine to be tasted.  And the fact that all three of these do make excellent wines certainly doesn’t hurt.

On the other hand, wineries like Castello Amoroso, Darioush and even the newly constructed Stag’s Leap were built to be tourist attractions.  Regardless of the quality of the wines – and some of these are very good – visitors are unlikely to go away with the thought of the wine foremost in their minds.  They’ll remember the architecture, the shopping, the snobbishness and oh, yes, they tasted some wine too.

Castello Amoroso.  Photo courtesy of the winery.

To be honest, there are some of these palaces we enjoy.  For example, Domaine Carneros is a faux French château (which may be excused by the fact that it is owned by a real French château).  We love their sparkling wines and Pinot Noirs.  But for the most part, we enjoy wineries where tasting their products is given prominence.  Pretty surroundings should add to the wine tasting experience, not overwhelm it.

Napa’s Oxbow Public Market

The Oxbow Public Market’s (http://oxbowpublicmarket.com/) name comes from the shape of the Napa River.  The course of a river may encounter an obstruction, causing the river to bend in a U-shape around it.  This creates a widening of the river, effectively a lake.  This is called an oxbow, because it resembles the U-shaped yolk placed around the necks of oxen.  Such an oxbow occurs in the Napa River, at the town of Napa and this is where they have erected the Oxbow Public Market.

It is various things for different people: a place to buy food and wine, a tourist attraction and a site for casual and slightly more formal dining.  It is a truth universally acknowledged that a person who loves good wine loves good food as well, so the Oxbow Public market has become quite a magnet for those who take a little time away from wineries to venture into town.  As the weekends can be awfully crowded on Route 29 and the Silverado Trail, Napa Valley visitors might find it a good idea to visit Napa instead, making the market quite an attractive stop.

For one thing, the views over the oxbow are quite beautiful.  As you cross the First Street bridge approaching the market, you see the broadening of the river, and the buildings alongside it.  It is a  particularly attractive view at sunset.

The Napa River oxbow.  Photo courtesy of the Iron Pig.

 The interior of the market is a mix of kiosks and booths hosting purveyors of fruits, vegetables, sausages, wines, books, ground coffee, bread and spices.  Local people actually do shop there, but a great number of the people you’ll find in the Oxbow Public Market are tourists.  Of course, the same can be said of New York’s Chelsea Market, Seattle’s Pike Street Market or Victor Hugo Market in Toulouse, France, Barcelona’s La Boqueria, or other urban markets around the world.   For the visitors, ice cream, hamburgers, chocolates, cupcakes and pizza are available.

The interior of the Oxbow Public Market. Photo courtesy of Madison Marquette.

Then again, if you’re a real foodie (and most wine lovers are, so we’ve observed) you like looking at the food available in any city you’re visiting, even if you don’t have a kitchen nearby to cook it in.  It is certainly something we do in our travels.  If nothing else, seeing all the culinary bounty fires up the appetite.  When that occurs, there are restaurants in the market as well.

Of course, there are many restaurants in Napa outside the market, some of them quite good.  The point is, you don’t have to eat at the market but you can.  Much like going wine tasting, it’s as much about the experience as the food itself.  And in this case, the Oxbow Public Market is symbolic of the revival of Napa, which had been left behind as Yountville and St. Helena, up the highway a bit, became meccas for food lovers on a wine tasting vacation.  Those are indeed great destinations, but the town of Napa should be included in your Napa Valley wine trips.  And the Oxbow Public market is fine place to see when you’re in town.

Hagafen Cellars

Levy’s Rye Bread had a famous series of ads showing people not expected to be Jewish (a little African-American boy, an elderly Asiatic, a red-headed Irish cop) enjoying a piece of their bread, with a tag line that said “You don’t have to be Jewish to love Levy’s”.  Well, you don’t have to be Jewish to love Hagafen Cellars, either.

“Hagafen” means “fruit of the vine” in Hebrew and is a word frequently invoked in the Passover Seder, a ceremonial dinner that wine is an important part of.  Hagafen Cellars sits along the south end of the Silverado Trail in Napa.  Except for the fact that all their wines are made in a kosher manner, there is nothing to distinguish it from any other winery in the region.  Nor is there anything about the wines they serve to indicate that they are specifically for Jews.

Hagafen does make an especially wide range of wines, from the usual (Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Syrah, Merlot and several Cabernet Sauvignons) to some that aren’t usually found in Napa Valley (Tempranillo, Reisling).  Quite a few are available for tasting.  One enticing feature of a visit to Hagafen is the gardens surrounding the winery, where you are free to take your glass and wander or just sit on the patio.

The winery itself is a pleasant Mediterranean-style building and the tasting room is simple and wood lined.  You can stand at the bar and taste, but if it happens to be a beautiful day, the friendly staff encourage you to take your wine out onto the patio

As mentioned, there’s nothing particularly Jewish about the wine or the surroundings and people of all faiths or none at all are welcome.  But if you do tell the folks behind the bar that you happen to be Jewish, the conversation steers in a particular direction.  No one asks what your religion is, but if you happen to know what Hagafen means, well, that’s a leading indicator.  You might be asked about where your family is from and especially about the Passover customs in your family.  We wouldn’t say that Gentiles are left out, but rather that Jewish visitors get a little more interaction of a particular sort.

Hagafen is quite justifiably proud of how often their wines are served at the White House.  It seems that whenever Israeli leaders come to Washington, Hagafen Cellars is on the table.

We would not say that Hagafen Cellars is a destination winery.  There are better wines in Napa Valley, although Hagafen’s are enjoyable.  There are wineries with more eye-popping architecture.  But if you are tasting along the Silverado Trail, Hagafen Cellars offers a unique tasting experience of kosher wines

A Trip through the Drôme Provençale

 

Lavender field in Nyons, France . (Proto courtesy of Provenceweb.fr)

 Wine regions around the world all have one thing in common: vineyards, of course.  As you travel in the Wine Country in France, some have more to offer, such as historical villages, unique churches, Roman bridges, mountain views, gourmet food, farmers’ markets, pottery, art, fields of flowers, orchardsand agriculture.   A sector of the southeastern part of France, called the Drôme Provençale, has all of these  things and more; this is where we will take you in this article.

Market day in Nyons, France.  Photo courtesy of francerevisited.com

This part of France is best known for its Rhône wines, lavender fields, but also for its apricot orchards and the famous olives grown in the small village of Nyons, where you can stop at the Cooperative for a taste of their olives and the local wines.  You can drive through beautiful little villages like Sainte Cécile-les-Vignes (where we had a memorable lunch at the small hotel La Farigoule), Cairanne, Rasteau, Gigondas, Vacqueyras, Beaume-de-Venise, Châteauneuf-du-Pape (all Côte-du-Rhône villages).   Then there are Orange and its Roman arena and Suze-la-Rousse with its castle, home of the Université du Vin (Wine University).  Here there are laboratories and tasting rooms that are unique in Europe, offering courses in oenology and management for the wine industry.  All those villages are surrounded by vineyards overlooked by mountains: the Mont Ventoux and the Dentelles de Montmirail.

The Université du Vin.  Photo courtesy of Les Châteaux de la Drôme.

The village of Châteauneuf-du-Pape is the best known Rhône village, thanks to its famous and unique wines.  The village itself is certainly worth visiting.   You can park in the village, have a delicious lunch at an outdoor café and walk to some of the wineries in the village. Other vineyards are just a short drive from the town, where you will find Domaine Beaurenard,  Domaine du Vieux Télégraphe, Château Beaucastel to name just a few of the most famous.

Châteauneuf-du-Pape, France.  Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.com

This is a favorite part of France for Lucie, since she has old friends in Nyons. She knows most of the villages and can drive you around (if you ask her).  Being a member of the Commanderie des Côtes du Rhône (Rhône wine society) as Chevalière (knight), she is quite knowledgeable about Rhône wines and she happens to have some connections in this part of the world, which will bring a few future articles on the subject.

Isn’t the Drôme Provençale inviting?

Clef du Vin

The wine taster’s best friend!  A miracle of modern science!  A tool for bringing out the cork dork in all of us!  It’s the Clef du Vin (pronounced CLAY do van.  For that last word, if you’re American, start saying “van” and just when you get to the “n”, swallow it.)  So what is this wonder?

The original Clef du Vin

It’s a metal gizmo about three inches long when fully opened, shaped a little like a flattened mouse.  The tail of this mouse is a chain about as long as the device itself.  The blade isn’t sharpened; it’s just a thin piece of steel with a small copper disk at the end.  Actually, what we have just described and shown here is the original Clef du Vin; there are versions today that are short steel rods with a bit of copper at the end.  It’s the steel and copper combination that’s key element of the Clef du Vin.

The Peugeot “Travel” Clef du Vin

Calling it the key element is a play on words, since “wine key” is the English translation of Clef du Vin.  But enough of what it is.  What does it do?  Well, it simulates the aging of wine when you plunk the bi-metal tip into wine.  It accomplishes this feat through the laws of physics.  Two metals plus an acid form a battery.  So steel and copper in wine (the acid) creates a very weak battery with a very weak charge.  Each second in the Clef du Vin is in the wine equates to a year of bottle aging, or so it seems.

Of course, the question is: Does it really work?  Well, who knows for sure.  This we can say: wines with again potential do taste better – sometimes a lot better – when treated with a Clef du Vin.  The tannins are definitely softened, the flavors more vibrant, the mouth-feel more mellow.  But if a wine has reached its potential, there is no discernible difference.

One story is enough of an illustration.  In 2013, we were at one of Napa Valley’s most renowned wineries, maker of one of the most highly rated wines in the valley.  The server was extolling the virtues of the recently released 2011 wines.  You may remember that 2011 was an unusually poor vintage in Northern California.  Many wineries did not release their premier wines that year, but this winery did.  At first sip, the wine didn’t seem to live up to its billing, but with five seconds’ use of the Clef du Vin the wine came alive in the glass.  We offered to let the server try it and she called all her colleagues over, saying “You’ve gotta try this!”.

Is that wine going to taste exactly the same today, with five years of aging?  Maybe Robert Parker can remember exactly what a wine tasted like back then, but we can’t nor do we know anyone else with that level of taste memory.  But the Clef du Vin did demonstrate that this was a wine with potential and worth buying.

When first available in the US, the Clef du Vin sold for $100.  Now you can find one on the Web for $50.00 or less.  If you do buy one for use on wine tasting excursions, be sure to bring along a paper towel to wipe it off and a plastic baggie to carry it in.  And try not to make too big a show when you use it; you’ll attract enough attention as it is just dipping something into your wine.  The Clef du Vin certainly adds a layer of interest to your wine tasting experience.