Exiled to Wine Siberia

The last post on Shiraz noted that forums were discussing the news that wine importer The Grateful Palate (TGP) was trimming it portfolio of Australian wines. At that time it was not clear which producers would be affected by the reorganization. The lists of who is still in and who is out were revealed by Dan Philips in letters to his distributors (August 7th) and suppliers (August 14th).

Those still in:
Ashton Hills Vineyard, Ballycroft Vineyards, Battley, Buckshot Vineyard, Burge Family Winemakers, Clarendon, Glaymond, Greenock Creek, Hare’s Chase, Hazyblur, Hobbs Wines, Kalleske/Pirathon, Kay Brothers Amery Vineyards, Lengs & Cooter, Lillypilly, Loan Wines, Majella, Noon Winery, Paringa, R Wines, Red Edge, Ringland Vitners, Rudderless, Samuel’s Gorge, Schutz Barossa, Tim Smith Wines, Trevor Jones, Tscharke, Whistling Eagle, William Downie, The Willows Vineyard

Those out:
Betts & Scholl, Cape D’Estaing, Clos Clare, Digger’s Bluff, Geoff Weaver, Gibson, Henry’s Drive, Hutton Vale, Lashmar, Longhop, Lunar, Mclean’s Farm, Nurioopta High School, Old Plains, Oliver’s Taranga, RBJ, Rockford, Rusden Wines, Scarpantoni, Shirvington, Silesian, Teusner, Torzi Mathews, Troll Creek, Two Way Range, Wild Duck Creek Estate

Philips notes that TGP’s portfolio now consists of “about 25 producers including R wines”. This is a considerable reduction from the zenith of some 70 producers in 2004, and does suggest that the market for Australian wine in the United States has contracted significantly over the last few years. The possible reasons for this loss of interest have been discussed ad nauseam on wine forum and won’t be repeated here. However Dan Philip’s communication to his distributors is worthy of examination because it smacks of a superiority which could lead one to think that Dan Philips has more control over the Australian wine scene than just his current portfolio.

Writing about the wineries that are no longer part of his portfolio Philips noted, “Some of these departed months ago, others in the past days or weeks, but all have been exiled to wine Siberia and will no longer enjoy life in the Distributor Collective of Fine Wines at The Grateful Palate.” Reading this I was immediately struck by three things. The references to loyalty suggested that producers may have left TGP, rather than being purged. And what did he mean by producers being exiled to wine Siberia, and what was this Distributor Collective? Then there is the reference to “party official Robert Farver”! Is Philips trying to establish his own little egalitarian experiment in the world of wine? Does being exiled to wine Siberia mean that producers outside of the collective can expect attempts to freeze them out of the US market? Or is it just an attempt at humor? If the latter is the case then it really is a joke that is in poor taste. Through TGP Dan Philips has been responsible for a considerable growth in imported Australian wine, but that has not come without some criticism. A number of the wines imported by TGP (and others) experienced significant mark-ups on the US market, especially if they received high scores from wine critic Robert Parker. Because of the three tier system in the US its highly questionable whether the Australian producers of these wines received a fair remuneration for their wines. Those profits would have been more likely to go to the importer and distributors with most retailers having to compete amongst themselves to sell wines being offered at, often, ridiculous prices. It is no wonder that the portfolio reduction came about “due to market conditions and a very clear message from virtually all of our distributors”; that reads to as “we have overpriced these wines and so the ones that you can’t distribute we’ll just dump”!

There is something else here that is a little worrying. Through TGP Dan Philips is very generous to those individuals who sell the wines he imports. Its not unusual for him to take a large group of individuals to Australia to explore the wine regions and to taste wine. There is nothing wrong with this. But there is a perception that he is too friendly with some wine critics, particularly a wine critic that has always claimed that his organization always pays it own way and avoids conflicts of interest. There are also rumors out there in the wine world that if you leave TGP then the scores you receive from a certain wine critic may not be all you expect. You have to wonder just how big that wine gulag is in Siberia? It will be interesting to see what scores the critics give to the wines that have ended up in Dan Philips’ wine Siberia. You can be certain that there will be more than just a couple of people following that story.

Fortunately all is not lost for the producers that have been exiled. Some, like Rockford, can’t even satisfy their Australian consumer base. Others have begun new relationships with importers and have seen significant increases in sales. What is more telling is that Australia has over 2,000 wineries and so if you only have 25 of them in your portfolio you might be more out in the cold than you think.

Major Importer of Australian Wines Trimming its Portfolio?

Just a week or two before we left for vacation in July I was offered deep discounts on wines from several Australian producers including J P Belle Terroir, Kay Bros, and Rusden. The reason given for the deep discounts was that the distributor was dropping these wines. I bought a few 6-packs and thought nothing more about it. Then today a thread on eRobert Parker’s Bulletin Board has become embroiled in a discussion about how many producers Dan Philips’ Grateful Palate, a significant importer of Australian wines, is dropping from its portfolio. Guess who imports J P Belle Terroir, Kay Bros, and Rusden?

The discussion on eBob suggests that some 18 brands would be dropped from the Grateful Palate (GP) portfolio. At present its anyone’s guess as to which brands are being cut but the non-GP brands being kept likely include Kalleske, Kays, Tscharke, Noon, Greenock Creek, and Majella. There may be others as well as the Grateful Palate portfolio of Australian producers imported by Dan Philips is long and includes many small wineries that make some outstanding wines. A sampling includes Burge Family, Glaymond, Tim Smith, Scarpantoni Estate, Shirvington, Samuel's Gorge, The Willows, Tim Smith Wines, as well those mentioned above.

The reason for this possible slashing of products is not clear, but both Michael Opdahl (Joshua Tree Imports) and John Gorman (Southern Starz) have contributed lengthy posts on the current difficulties being experienced by those trying to sell Australian wine into the US market; “Australia is one seriously screwed up wine category right now and desperately in need of a major make over.” John Gorman.

I certainly agree with some of the major concerns including the influence of the dramatic increase in the value of the Australian dollar against the greenback over the last 4-5 years and the confusion produced by the sameness of many Australian wines especially those in the $25-50USD price range. Another important concern, reflected somewhat in the sameness of many wines, is the limited exposure of the US market to the diversity of Australian wine. There many be millions of cases of Australian wine brought into the US each year but much of it comes either from the amorphous wine region called South Eastern Australia and/or reflects the lack of knowledge about Australian wine by the American wine consumer. Educating and refining the wine palates of a population as large as the US is a daunting task. For example, here is simple question. How many wine regions (called geographical indicators, GI) are there in Australia? Ten, twenty, thirty? Try 64! Next question – How many can you name?

Wine Australia has made some attempt to expand knowledge of the diversity of Australian wine with their Regional Heroes program but the audience that has some knowledge of how this works is abysmally small. More importantly even if consumers can describe the most important varietal or style from a region and its recognizable characteristics they may still be unconvinced as to why they should pay $50 for a Barossa Shiraz when they can get a Shiraz for $10 from South Eastern Australia. What is needed are clear definitions of why some wines are superior to others. A good example of how this can be achieved is the definition of wine styles for Rutherglen Muscat. If you appreciate this type of wine (as I do) then just a little reading makes very clear to you what defines a Rutherglen Muscat versus a Rare Rutherglen Muscat. A similar type of definition (and code of practice) could be applied to other wine styles. For example the spectrum of Barossa Shiraz could include generic Shiraz that comes from multiple vineyards versus that from single vineyard sites. The age of the vines could also be used to further refine the style. Selection of parcels of grapes or certain barrels could be used to highlight wines that are a wineries’ best exemplar of the region.

A good example of how selection of vineyards and barrels can be used to identify wines of increasing superiority is that used by Wayne Dutschke of Dutschke Wines. The St. Jakobi Shiraz is a single vineyard wine, the "Oscar Semmler" is a blend of the best structured and most mouth filling parcels of Shiraz from the St Jakobi vineyard and represents "the best of the vintage”, while the “Single Barrel Shiraz” is the best barrel from the harvest of the St Jakobi vineyard. That is an easy system to understand both in terms of what each wine represents and why each is priced differently. And no where near as confusing as the R wines of the Grateful Palate.

Striking Terror in the Heart of the Wine Drinker

Last Wednesday night I opened a bottle of Yangarra Estate Vineyard 2005 McLaren Vale Shiraz. A big, powerful wine, heady stuff, but with an unnerving streak of upfront acidity that cut right through the wine to the finish. On Thursday night that acidity made the wine unapproachable and I discarded it in favor of something more suitable for dinner. The Casa Quemada 2004 Syrah from Spain. Uh, oh. The cork came out with a red streak along its length. Pouring the wine into a glass revealed burnt, pruney, notes and a sharp acidity with a distinct note of oxidation on the palate. OK, I thought, its just a poor cork but Miranda’s comment of “It tastes like vinegar” didn’t help. Let’s open something else. How about a Chateauneuf-Du-Pape? The cork on a bottle of Domaine Pontifical (Francois Laget-Royer) 2003 came out stained red all over and the wine, even with its whiff of barnyard, also carried a dominant acidic flavor that sliced the palate to pieces. Simply not a pleasant drink. This was getting worrying. Two wines with evidence of leaking corks, both overly acidic and a third that developed the same character overnight. All three looked like they had prematurely aged. Has the cooling unit in my cellar failed? Normally its not a concern because I’m in and out of the Vintage Keeper almost daily, but we had been away for a month. Had the unit overheated during that time, shut down but then recovered before we came back? Foil cutter in hand, I went back to the cellar, that question gnawing at my gut. The tops came off four random bottles and all showed no signs of leakage. Feeling only slightly less concerned I wandered off to bed, only to lie there wondering if I shouldn’t go and open a couple more bottles. A little flash of wisdom came to me. If the cooling unit had failed and the cellar had heated then the corks on my bottles of vintage Toro Albala Don PX should have leaked because they are pushed in only three-quarters of their length and held there by string. Back to the cellar. Yes, the wine was along the full length of the cork inside the bottle, but there was no leakage. Maybe I’m OK. Let’s sleep on this and open some more wine tomorrow.

Next day. Crunch time. If this wine is stuffed I’m really going to be pissed-off. Encouragingly, the foil cutter crisply cut the top of the capsule and every turn of the Screwpull brought out more and more of a pristine cork marked only the words Penfolds St Henri 2002. Beautiful, but the faint orange/brown edge wasn’t cheering. A little riper and richer than the normal vintage of St Henri but all is in balance. Its not falling over prematurely, in fact, the depth suggests this will keep until the cooling unit does fail! I’m not going to need the Tums tonight. Even more encouraging was a glass of the Domaine Pontifical. Reaching past the poop and the drying tannins, it was now quite drinkable, the acidity subdued by twenty-four hours under vacuum. It looks like I just had a bad run of a few wines. That’s a relief because we have guests this weekend and I’m planning on opening some nice bottles. Still I wish that gnawing in my stomach would go away!

How Do You Select a Wine?

A recent report by Dr. Liz Thach (Professor of Management and Wine Business, Sonoma State University) suggests that the most important criterion in selecting a wine is having tasted it before, while the least important aspect is an alcohol level that is below 13%. What is interesting about these criteria is that they are almost universally consistent across the globe.

The study was done by universities in Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, New Zealand, United Kingdom and the United States, and was funded by the Grape and Wine Research Development Corporation (GWRDC) of Australia.

Your Chance to Influence My Wine Drinking

Our annual trip to Oz in early November is in the planning stages. This year its going to be somewhat of a marathon endeavor because we want to see what is left of the Murray River (at least the part that still has water) and so we plan on a road trip visiting NSW, Vic and SA. Naturally wineries will be on the agenda and I’ve put the early list below. We usually aim for about 4 wineries a day simply because I try to organize to spend a couple of hours with the winemaker/cellar door staff to talk about the wines; rather then just belly up to the bar for a few sips and talk about the weather.

There are gaps in the list, especially for Orange and Canberra; and the Clare list is probably too heavy with red wine makers. So if you feel like adding a few names, and the reason why you think we should visit, please do. (NOTE: The numbering is not in any order of preference and we haven't yet make enquiries to the wineries so its not a list of the order we will visit either.)

Orange wineries
1) Canobolas-Smith
2)
3)

Canberra wineries
1) Clonakilla
2)
3)
4)

Rutherglen wineries
1) Buller and Son
2) Campbells
3) Chambers
4) Morris
5) Stanton & Killen

McLaren Vale wineries
1) Marius
2) Mollydooker
3) d’Arenberg
4) Redheads Studio
5) Mitolo

Barossa wineries (Day 1)
1) Dutschke
2) Trevor Jones
3)
4)

Barossa wineries (Day2)
1) Seppeltsfield
2) Tuesner
3) Winter Creek
4) Red Nectar

Clare wineries
1) Kilikanoon
2) Neagles Rock
3) Tim Adams
4) Pike
5) Jim Barry

Australian Wine Reviews Get a Needed Boost

Two of the more active online sites posting reviews and commentary on Australian wines have announced that they will merge to form what will arguably be the internet site for information on current wine releases and wine news from Australia. The new partnership will be under the banner of Campbell Mattinson’s THE WINE FRONT which came into being in 2002 and has steadily grown to be a major resource for content on Aussie wine, winning the 2005 Wine Press Club Wine Communicator Award, as well as being a two-time finalist at the World Food Media Awards. The other partner is Gary Walsh’s Winorama which over the last three years has achieved the reputation of being a major source of (free) reviews of current release Australian wines. Mattinson and Walsh believe they can publish between 200 and 500 wine reviews each month in addition to the ongoing news and feature articles/videos that formed the foundation of THE WINE FRONT site. There is no online, or even printed, resource which I can think of that has this level of focus on Australian wines. One other feature that will be unique to the new site will be the “Double-Take” review where Mattinson and Walsh review the same wine, side by side. Some examples of this novel format have already been posted.

The merger of these two online sites is excellent news for lovers of Aussie wines. Both Mattinson and Walsh are well known and respected within the Australian wine community with Mattinson in particular being that rare breed of accomplished and enthusiastic wine writer with an excellent palate, and a true if somewhat biased fervor for all things Australian in wine. Walsh, an Englishman, has an excellent palate and his well crafted reviews are often infused with wit. His love of wines from that often neglected wine region, the Hunter Valley, adds a depth to the appreciation of Australian wines that is missing in much of the online and print media.

Subscription to the new site will be $39.95AUD per year. This is an extraordinary value when compared to other media that publish regularly on Australian wines including Winestate, Wine Spectator, Wine Enthusiast, Decanter, Australian Gourmet Traveller – WINE, Jeremy Oliver, etc. The only possible competition in the near term would be James Halliday’s Australian Wine Companion because of its wealth of reviews from Halliday’s yearly review of thousands of wines. However the new site, with its reviews of current releases should soon rival Halliday and will be more useful to those wishing to obtain reviews before buying a current release. The site should also eclipse Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate which only publishes once a year on Australian wines and now has a reviewer with far less exposure to the Australian wine scene than either Mattinson or Walsh. The only thing THE WINE FRONT might gain from the Parker model would be a search facility similar to that used on his online site.

Save Miguel?

The Portuguese cork industry has begun an ad campaign designed to argue for the greenness of corks versus screwcaps. But you would be hard pressed to figure that out from the internet campaign which has actor Rob Schneider searching to discover who Miguel is and how to save him.

In Australia the campaign will include a letter to winemakers from cork maker Amorim extolling the ethical virtues of cork. But with 70% of wine bottles in Australia already under screwcap it is going to be hard sell, even if the Girl Guides are onside!.

Perhaps the better question might be - Is Miguel worth saving?

Wine, beer, sausages…….and lots more

The last month was pretty slow here at the Shiraz eBlog. Well, working for a living does have its down side. But a 12,000 word book chapter (no, not on wine) was finished, as were three internet courses at UCSD (no, not on wine), and a new research grant (no, not on wine) has been received. The last means even more time will have to be devoted to non-wine endeavors. But before I get down to working on cutting edge immunology I believe a little R&R might be in order. And so July has been filled with a jam packed agenda.

First we will be jetting to Chicago to (briefly) check out some Frank Lloyd Wright architecture. Nope, sorry. No wine there either. Then it will be off to St Louis to cross the swollen Mississippi into Illinois for the July 4th family reunion. There is a nascent plan to visit a few Illinois wineries, and taste wines from some of the less well known varieties, and native American grapes. Expectations that we will find great wine are not high, which is why there is a plan to travel with a case of wine from the cellar. I’m hoping we do find some drinkable Illinois wine because that box of wine is really destined for London, England where we will consume some with friends and then take the rest on the Carnival Splendor for a cruise to St Petersburg, Russia. Of course traveling does make one thirsty and its quite possible that we will consume all of the box of wine in London. In that case there will be nothing for it but to visit some of the local wine shops to restock. Plans are being laid for visits to Philglas & Swiggot (in Marylebone), Berry Brothers & Rudd, and Fortnum and Mason.

Naturally one cannot visit England without sampling some sausages and so while we are in Marylebone we will also be dropping by Biggles Gourmet Sausage shop and The Ginger Pig to purchase some bangers, snags and mystery bags. I’ll bet there are some that go with a big Aussie Shiraz and a BBQ! But BBQ or no, one cannot sample sausage and mash without the presence of a cleansing ale and so at some point I’m hoping we can fit in a trip to The George Inn to do just that. And while we are there we might as well pay a visit to the nearby Market Porter; after all its real close to the Borough Market where The Ginger Pig has a stall of all its current sausages. And just to be true to The Thirsty Traveller we will complete the trifecta by visiting The Lord Clyde.

Now it has come to my attention that others (notably my wife, Miranda) are laying plans of their own. These include various London Walks, and a visit to Bath, as well as dinner with Irish cousins. The latter group is not known to appreciate BIG wines, but with pleasure there is always a little pain! Basically that means me offering everyone a monster alcohol wine, just on the off chance that someone might like it!

The cruise highlights will probably be finding time to read several wine books, including Benjamin Wallace’s “The Billionaire’s Vinegar”, George Taber’s "To Cork or Not to Cork" and Alice Feiring’s “The Battle for Wine and Love”. The cruise will not disembark us at any notable wine destinations and even though the ship does have a wine bar I’m not expecting any wine epiphanies onboard, that is unless we can get enough wine in our luggage and the luggage of friends to make the dinners just that little bit more out of the ordinary.

And who knows, I might even blog about some of this!

New High-tech Wine Cap Design: An advance, Or...

A competition, called Big Bang, founded in 2000 by students at the UC Davis Graduate School of Management has awarded its top prize of $15,000 to a design for a new wine bottle closure that would allow the wine to breathe much like traditional bark corks.

The folks behind this certainly seem to have all the knowledge and experience needed to do this.

Their team, Advanced Enological Closures, set out to design a better bottle cap because cork taint, a byproduct of a fungus that infects cork and makes wine smell like moldy mop water or sweaty gym socks, now contaminates the corks of an estimated one in 20 wine bottles on store shelves, ruining billions of dollars of wine annually. Although synthetic corks have been developed in response to the problem, they allow too much oxygen into the bottle, according to Keller. Overly oxidized wine has a shorter shelf life and can develop a fingernail-polish odor. Screw caps -- another alternative to bark corks -- are a viable option for wine white, but do not allow in enough oxygen for fine red wines, Keller said. Without enough oxygen to draw on, red wines start to smell like burned rubber or matchsticks as they age. LINK

But wait! The idea does seem a bit strange, especially given that oxygen is the enemy of wine.

The team's design, a "breathing screw cap," has small vent holes and is fitted with a liner made of alternating layers of thin metal and a porous polymer. The liner can be customized to allow optimal oxidation for specific varietals, something that is impossible with bark corks. A patent is pending for the design.

"If you open up lots of bottles of the same wine, you'll notice variability from bottle to bottle because of differences in the amount of oxygen that gets in," Keller said. "With cork, you just never know. Our product will give a level of control that the wine industry has never had."

Then there was this.

Keller's design offers the prospect of a cap that eliminates the worry about taint while still letting in oxygen.

His team's patent-pending design – which so far lacks a catchy name – is a 5-cent disc that fits beneath a screw cap. Made from alternating layers of polyethylene – the same material used to make sandwich bags – and perforated aluminum or tin, it can be fine-tuned to match the oxygen demands of different varietals.

"Pinot noir needs a little, cabernet sauvignon needs a lot," Keller said. LINK

That last statement sounds just a little, no make that a lot, like rubbish. It is known that oxygen levels can vary among different grape varieties, but that has been demonstrated during the winemaking process. To my knowledge there is no evidence that different grape varieties require different levels of infusible oxygen during aging. To reconfirm just how important a lack of oxygen is to wine I turned to the best source of knowledge on screwcaps, Tyson Stelzer. Here is a little of what he wrote in 2007.

The question of the ageing rate of wines in screw cap has been a hot topic of late. It is my belief that the rate at which mature notes (or "characters," as we say Down Under) develop in screw-capped wines is in fact absolutely no different to that under traditional closures. This is evidenced by the fact that wines under screw cap age at a similar rate to those with the very best corks. For a wine under an average cork, however, oxidation effects give the impression of accelerated ageing, which has led to the notion that wines mature slower under screw caps. I believe that the absence of oxidized characters in screw-capped wines gives the mistaken impression of slower ageing.

...................................

More criticism has been levelled at screw caps by the media in relation to reductive characters than any other fault. I encourage you to view these accusations objectively and judge for yourself. If there is a causal link between screw caps and reductive characters, as some claim, then we should be tasting more reductive wines under screw cap than under cork.

Check it out for yourself, but my experience, and that of hundreds of experts with whom I have had this conversation, is quite the opposite. In my own tastings in recent years, comprising thousands of predominantly Australian and New Zealand wines, I have encountered more reductive wines under cork than I have under screw cap.

The managing director of the AWRI, Professor Sakkie Pretorius, commented recently that "The idea that there is a high incidence of post-bottling reduction in wines sealed with screw caps is a false premise. With Australian wines, where the AWRI has particular expertise, this is demonstrably not the case…. Our position, which we believe is undeniable, remains that the propensity of a wine to develop 'reductive' aromas post-bottling is a function of the wine, and that post-bottling reduction is not the 'fault' of the closure but may be exacerbated by the closure if the wine has a propensity for such aromas to develop."

"In his Screw Cap Symposium presentation, Peter Godden discussed data from one of our AWRI Advanced Wine Assessment Courses which indicates a higher incidence of reduction in wines sealed with cork compared to wines sealed with screw caps. Two subsequent courses have provided similar data." LINK

That seems pretty clear to me.

The Len Evans Tutorial

In a previous post I mentioned that one of the major (and hopefully) lasting contributions of the great Len Evans to Australian, and indeed world, wine was a five day tutorial. Held annually since 2001 The Len Evans Tutorial hosts 12 selected scholars to a stunning array of wines. But its just not about drinking fine wine. Each day starts with the blind tastings, and judging, of 30 varietal wines. In the afternoon there are masterclasses focusing on recent vintages of the greatest wines of France, Italy, Spain and Germany. Dinner is a more relaxed affair comprising five or more brackets of wines, some 40 or more years old. On the final morning the six red Burgundies of the Domaine de la Romanee-Conti are presented blind, and each scholar has to identify the vintage, and the six Appellation Controlees from which they respectively come. The complete wine list for the 2007 tutorial was an amazing collection of wines.

Want to be part of what James Halliday has called "the most exclusive wine school in the world"? All you have to do is apply to be one of the dozen selected.

Think you know Australian Wine?

Consider yourself an expert on Aussie wine? Able to identify the characteristics of a Rutherglen Fortified, an Eden Valley Riesling, or a Semillon from the Hunter? Think you know the difference between a Shiraz from the Barossa, McLaren Vale and the Grampians? Then you should be a star when you take Wine Australia’s Regional Heroes Tasting Challenge.

If taking the challenge is a little too daunting, or you don't know all that much about Aussie wine then click on the Taste Chart and drag and drop the different wine styles to learn about their characteristics.

UPDATE: I made one error for each of Barossa Valley GSM, Adelaide Hills Sauvignon Blanc, Margaret River Chardonnay, Grampians Shiraz, Yarra Valley Pinot Noir, and Great Southern Riesling. Not bad but 14/20 correct ain't fantastic. I take some consolation in the fact that my errors are with wines that I have not seen a lot of, except what's with not knowing Margaret River Chardy?

Does Aussie shiraz taste different from different regions?

Its unfair, but irrespective of its diversity Australian Shiraz very often gets tarred with the same brush. More often than not they are called big, oaky, fruity wines that have outrageous levels of alcohol and come in bottles invariably labeled with some animal. Those with this opinion almost always have very little knowledge or experience of the diversity of wines that the Shiraz grape can produce in Australia. It is also quite obvious that those who hold this truly naïve opinion do not live in the land down under. That gives them an excuse because only a few rays of the full spectrum of Aussie Shiraz ever leave the shores of the island continent.

Fortunately attempts are being made to change this narrow perception of Australian wine. You can navigate your way around Wine Australia’s discussion on the Regional Heroes of Australian wine. Its not specific to Shiraz but you are guaranteed to learn something about Australian wine, or you can listen to Australian wine writer Campbell Mattinson talk about the regional characters of four Shiraz wines from different regions. The best part is that all four are under $20AUD. Less exciting is the possibility that most are unlikely to be available outside Australia. It can’t be helped. Australia does not export all its best wines.

Robert who?

To be quite honest I have tasted few Mondavi wines and purchased even less and have none in my cellar. On my few trips to Napa we have driven by the Robert Mondavi Winery, admired its singular presence in the valley, but never ventured past the gate. But then I must also confess that I never had many wines from the Rothbury Estate, the Hunter Valley winery which once had the famed and much loved Len Evans as its Chairman. I was never fortunate enough to meet either of these giants of the wine world. Actually that should really be giants of New World wine because both, pretty much over the same time period, were intent on advancing the growth of wine and wine appreciation on either side of the Pacific Ocean. Mondavi built Robert Mondavi Winery in 1966 and in 1962 Evans had become Australia’s first wine columnist. As the Mondavi reputation grew in the 1970’s so did the Evans’ wine shop and restaurant Bulletin Place; where Jancis Robinson noted “the people who by now constituted the beginnings of the Australian wine mafia” would gather.

There are great similarities between these two men. Both labored against significant odds in their quests to have the wines of their country recognized as world class. Both had their wine endeavors disrupted by those searching for the quick buck rather than the accolades of wine drinkers. Both saw wine as a world wide enterprise. Most importantly, both had the foresight to realise that education was the way of the future for wine. Mondavi’s ventures in this sphere eclipse those of the more pragmatic Evans. Mondavi played a significant role in the establishment of Copia: The American Center for Wine, Food and the Arts, in the city of Napa, and was the major benefactor for the soon to open Robert Mondavi Institute for Wine and Food Science at UC Davis. Evans was a major mover and shaker in the revamping of the Australian wine show circuit, leading to great improvements in Australian wine. But perhaps his most lasting contribution will be the Len Evans Tutorials at which carefully selected young Australian wine makers/tasters are expsosed, over a number of days, to some of the finest wines of the world so that they can appreciate not only the world of wine but Australia’s place in it.

Robert who? There will be those who ask that question. They won't be the same as those who asked Len who? None of us can know all that there is about wine or the individuals involved, but as the giants who carried much of the weight of bringing wine to the masses leave us, the question must be asked. Who will replace them?

On the Internet Vine

Being too busy with non-wine related work at present I can only find time to post on a couple of interesting little gems from the internet. I know they are low hanging fruit, but sometimes that is all there is time to pick!

I guess we will have to wait to see how big the hole is that Eric Asimov has dug for himself in his hasty criticism of "The Wine Trials". I'm sure it was a little bit unnerving to find not only have you dined with the target of your venting, but that the study in question has actually produced a scholarly article. It really is time for everyone to take a step back and wait for the book to make its way into the hands of interested readers.

On another tendril of the internet vine Dan Berger seems to be coming around to the idea that our genetics may contribute to our appreciation of wine and influence the wines we prefer to drink. Maybe this is the first step on the road to allowing all wine drinkers to drink the wines they have a preference for. That would certainly be preferable to attempting to impose ones’ own preferences on others.

The Flowering of Wine

When contemplating the question, what does good pinot noir smell and taste like, it is extraordinary how when you look through a couple of dozen reference sources, so few actually have anything substantive to say on the issue at all. Most immediately slide into the history and geography of Burgundy, the classification of the vineyards etc etc. Sometimes they mention in passing that burgundy/pinot noir is different from bordeaux/cabernet/merlot, but they do not try to put into words why. Few come to the point of characterising the wine. Geoff Kelly, Geoff Kelly Wine Reviews.

The many and varied perfumes of flowers are used frequently in descriptions of the aroma and bouquet of wines. The words used range from the somewhat generic descriptor floral to specific types of flowers like Violet or Géranium. Tom Stevenson lists 15 different flower aromas in his mind-jogging list of aromas and flavors, and that list is by no means complete because it seems that each wine critic has his/her own terminology. One very famous critic uses the term “white flowers” for Australian Shiraz, White Burgundy, and even French Riesling. Doesn’t seem very specific does it? Having spent part of last weekend helping Miranda trim and weed our, sorry her, garden I can state that white flowers, as an aroma, is almost as generic as floral. I smelt white flowers on arugula that needed to be trimmed so it would not go to seed, on several of our citrus trees and even some of the flowering weeds that I was told to remove from a neighbor's yard; with permission, of course. Not a Shiraz among them!

Why the seemingly sudden interest in floral descriptors? Well it is all the fault of the latest article on Geoff Kelly’s Wine Reviews web site. Geoff is, to my mind, the most analytical of all wine critics/writers. He goes after the minutiae of wine especially the smell; for me this is an excellent quality in a wine drinker. And to him “the key factor in fine pinot noir is the quality of bouquet, and in particular the precise floral qualities”. The problem is that Geoff has his own descriptors for Pinot Noir like buddleia in the lighter styles to boronia in wine from riper grapes. I’m no gardener, just the gardener’s helper, so I asked Miranda what was the smell of buddleia and boronia. She said she had heard of them but did not know the smell. I was nosing a 2005 Russian Hill Meredith Vineyard Pinot Noir * at the time and it really would have been helpful to know if the aromas were anywhere near what Geoff seeks in perfect Pinot because this wine was overflowing with what I call the typical aromas of this variety. But I’m like Michael Broadbent when it comes to describing the aroma of Pinot, I find it impossible and I usually resort to something like “spicy Pinot Noir”, and then go looking for forest floor or mushrooms because I’m pretty sure I know those smells. OK, reasonably sure! At least I think………

Now I don’t know whether Geoff is correct in his floral descriptions of Pinot but I have a sneaking suspicion that he’s not likely to be too far wrong. He’s also not wrong in another comment that he made regarding Pinot – “what does good pinot noir smell and taste like, it is extraordinary how when you look through a couple of dozen reference sources, so few actually have anything substantive to say on the issue at all.” I don’t disagree at all. In fact you could replace Pinot Noir by Merlot or Syrah or Tempranillo or Malbec, or just about any grape variety and the conclusion holds true. Most grape varieties don’t have distinctive aromas especially if you look at them across broad geographical regions. For example, the aromas of Syrah/Shiraz from the Rhone and the Barossa can be astonishing different, and even within those two regions, the wines can show an amazing spectrum of aromatic characters.

Is it really necessary, in the appreciation of wine, to correctly identify the smell of a particular variety such as Pinot Noir? Well if charming or ethereal or even feminine fit with how you see Pinot Noir, then I guess not. Me? I’m going to take Geoff Kelly’s advice and spend more time in gardens. Not only will that please Miranda but I might just learn quite a bit about the smell of wine.

* Disclaimer: My wife Miranda has a long standing friendship with the wife of the winemaker for Russian Hill Estate winery, and we consider both personal friends. For me to review their wines may be perceived as a conflict of interest by some which is why I try not to mention the wines on my blogs. I make an exception in this case because the wine mentioned above was the wine that stimulated, in part, this post.

How Much Can You Drink?

There is considerable evidence that consumption of alcohol can have beneficial health effects, however as we have seen the recommended consumption differs between countries. Here in the USA it is two standard drinks for men with a standard drink being 13.7 grams of alcohol; this is often rounded out to 14. But not all wines have the same alcohol content, usually expressed as percent alcohol by volume (ABV). How much does alcohol content affect the volume of wine that I can drink to get my two standard drinks, or 28 grams of alcohol?

Calculating the volume of alcohol in milliliters (mls) in your wine is quite simple. If a wine is 12.5% ABV that means that 100 mls of wine contains 12.5 mls of alcohol. If its a 14% wine then it will contain 14 mls of alcohol/100mls of wine. However the volume and weight of alcohol are not equivalent; alcohol is less dense than water. So to get grams of alcohol you need to multiply the volume by the density of ethanol (0.789 grams/ml). So 100 ml of a 12.5% wine contains 9.86 grams and for a 14% wine it will be 11.05. The table below shows how much you can drink in standard drinks (5 ounces or 150 ml) or in volume (in mls) to reach that magic number of 28 grams of alcohol for wines between 12.5 to 16% alcohol by volume.

Alcohol by volume*	Alcohol by Weight**	Standard Drinks to reach 28 grms	Volume (mls) to reach 28 grms
12.5	9.86	2.8	420
13.0	10.26	2.7	405
13.5	10.65	2.6	390
14.0	11.05	2.5	374
14.5	11.44	2.4	360
15.0	11.84	2.35	352
15.5	12.23	2.3	345
16.0	12.62	2.2	330

*mls/100mls; **grams/100mls

But what if you want to exceed 28 grams? How much can you consume before your blood alcohol content (BAC) exceeds the legal limit. There is absolutely no doubt that equivalent consumption of higher alcohol wines will increase your blood alcohol content but what are the limits with wines of different alcohol content? For these calculations I have used the BAC from Celtic Kane simply because it allows input of a number of variables including alcohol level of the wine, number of drinks, time elapsed during drinking,etc.

Warning: BAC calculators are an estimate only and no one should assume that they are absolutely correct as they do not consider all factors involved.

As a 750 ml bottle contains 25.4 fluid ounces let’s say that a half bottle is 12.7 and if we pour a 5 ounce glass (150 mls) then we would consume 2.54 glasses; these numbers are all for convenience, anyone can add their own numbers to work out their BAC under different situations. I’ll use my weight (170lbs), a metabolic rate of Frequent Drinker, and an elapsed time of 2.5 hours; roughly a glass an hour which is about the speed I drink while having dinner or watching an hour or two of TV or doing some reading.

If I’m drinking a 13% alcohol wine my BAC would be 0.019. For a 14.5 %er it would be 0.027, and if I’m sipping on a monster Zinfandel or a high octane Shiraz of 16% my BAC would be 0.035. The difference between the 13 and 14.5 % wines is not that large; for example the time to achieve complete sobriety differs by less than 30 minutes. As expected the 16% alcohol wine will raise my BAC more but I’m still not legally drunk and in less than 2 hours I should be completely sober; with the 13% wine I’ll be completely sober in just under an hour, and in less than 1.5 hours for the 14.5%er.

If I drink 4 glasses at 5 ounces a glass then the 16% will make me just legally impaired at a BAC of 0.084, while the 13 and 14.5 % wines will not. But we are talking about daily wine drinking that uses commonsense rather than consumption for its own sake.

Of course all this assumes that the wine level on the bottle label is even close to being correct. A wine labeled below 14% can have a 1.5% variation over or under, while a 14% wine can have a 1% variation. So a 13.9% wine could be a 15.4%er, and a 14.5% wine could be a 15.5% wine.

Considering my own experience I don’t suffer any ill effects from consumption of between 2-3 glasses of (dry) wine per day; I’m sure everyone’s mileage varies on this point. However I would not drink three 5 oz glasses of some of my favorite Australian fortified wines that can be 18% alcohol, even though my BAC would only be 0.063. The reason? As much as I love them, sometimes too much of a good thing does dull the appreciation.

Is Food and Wine Pairing Just a Big Scam?

Alder Yarrow, of Vinography, seems quite convinced that it is. On one level I’m sort of surprised that Alder didn’t receive a flood of criticism about this stance; the majority of comments actually support his view. Now to be fair to Alder I have to note that he is not totally against wine and food pairing. He is more concerned with the idea that one individual’s wine/food pairing is not necessarily going to be universally acceptable. Its not an easy task to convince folks that differences in sensory perception between individuals is a significant argument against finding universally appealing wine and/or food. Pairing the two only compounds the problem. It all comes back to that basic tenet of wine appreciation - drink what YOU like. Or in the case of food eat what you like with whatever wine YOU feel is appropriate.

On a lighter note. As is always the situation in discussions on wine and food, the food friendliness of wines with higher alcohol was raised in several of the comments to Alder’s post. I liked his response

This may be the subject of a future rant, but the only people who seem to really
dislike high alcohol wines are some super high-end wine geeks, some winemakers,
and the wine journalism establishment (many of whom I think secretly like those
wines but are now being pressured into saying they don't).

I’ll be interested to see what he writes on this.

Does wine have a future?

Here in the USA the future is called The Young Winos of LA, and if you read this you just might believe that they will change the world of wine.

An excerpt: The Millennials popped onto the wine industry radar in 2003 as drinkers remarkably different than those of previous generations. They like to learn through experience, by drinking instead of reading or tracking point scores from big-name critics such as Robert Parker. They glean information through Internet search engines rather than from books, magazines and newsletters aimed at people who aspire to be collectors. "They don't go for any of the folderol," Gillespie says.

The statistics bear that out, he says. Of the wine purchased by the 70 million Americans ages 21 to 30, 40% is imported. That purchasing tendency has been credited with pushing the rate of growth in sales of imported wines ahead of domestic wines, Gillespie says. Gen-Xers (the 45 million people ages 31 to 44) buy imported wines 32% of the time, whereas imports account for only 26% of wine purchased by 77 million baby boomers.

Are you drowning in high alcohol wines?

The alcohol debate resurfaced this morning in my copy of the San Diego Union Tribune. Much of the information in the article is old news. But it, again, raised the question in my mind of just how many wines have high alcohol? According to some we seem to drowning in high alcohol wines. Are we?

Its not a simple question to answer. First you have to define high alcohol; I’m not going to go into the speculation about how or why alcohol levels have been increasing over the last few decades. Some would argue that anything over 12.5% is extreme. Others, like Darrell Corti, put the limit at 14.5%. For me there is no cut-off level. I agree with my wife, who after looking at the article in the Union Tribune said, “Isn’t it simply a matter of whether the wine tastes good?”

Second, once you have set your limit you need to start counting wines. However most of the critics of increasing alcohol don’t seem to do this. Instead they simply note that average alcohol levels have been increasing (usually over the last few decades). But I’d like to see some real numbers. Are we (actually it really should just be you) up to our butts in high alcohol wines? Our chests? Our heads? Or are they just nibbling at our ankles? Well again it depends on your definition but fortunately we can get an idea by using the numbers in a recent post by Alan Goldfarb on Appellation America. Goldfarb wrote "At the recently concluded ZAP (Zinfandel Advocates & Producers) annual Zin Drench at Fort Mason in San Francisco, an informal survey by this reporter of about 140 wines revealed some startling statistics. Of the approximately 140 presented at the event exclusively for the press, 54 Zinfandels stated on their labels that they contained alcohol levels of 14 to 14.5 percent. Another 11 listed their alcohol content as less than 14 percent. That’s an astonishing 46 percent of wines that have relatively low levels of alcohol in a varietal category that consistently registers alcohol percentages to the 15 to 16 plus mark. (For the record, five of those 140 wines indeed had stated alcohol numbers of 16 to 16.9 percent - yikes!)"

So how drenched in alcoholic Zins are you? If you are Darrell Corti your about up to your waist because 46% (65 of the 140 wines) were 14.5% or less. If you draw the line at 16% then you only have a few ankle biters to worry about because about 4% were 16% and above. But if you draw the line below 14%, like Randy Dunn, then you better start swimming because 92% (129/140) of the wines were higher than your definition. Me? I’m on dry land enjoying the view. There is no way I’m going to drown over the alcohol in wine. And neither should you.

Drowning image Copyright 2008 iStock International Inc.

Able Grape - a wine knowledge search engine

The ever expanding world of cyberspace is truly a spider’s web. Probe it for items on Shiraz and you are just as likely to be stuck with hits for Shiraz, Iran as you are for the grape of the same name. If you want an example of this just click on the Google SHIRAZ NEWS tab to the right of this page. Wouldn’t it be handy if there was a search engine restricted to wine related material? Well there is, or at least there is a site that is in Beta that proclaims to be a wine search engine for learning and research. Called Able Grape it came about through a need to have up-to-date, trustworthy wine information from the web that would help in passing WSET exams. Still a work in progress, Able Grape consists of 32,000 sites and some 10 million pages. That’s serious wine content.

Just how friendly and effective is Able Grape? When I first tried to search its contents I was led to a page with the following -

You are getting this message because your browser is not a supported configuration. At present, Able Grape supports:
• Safari 2.0/3.0 (best experience; Mac)
• Firefox 2 (best experience; Mac/PC)
• Internet Explorer 7.0 (good experience; PC)
Javascript must also be enabled in your browser. We truly apologize for the inconvenience. As we grow, we hope to support additional browsers more gracefully.

After updating to Version 7 of IE I was off and running. The search mechanism is still a little clunky, which is why there is a help page. I found the best approach, at present, is to type in your search word(s) and then refine the search using the TOPIC and REGION filters on the left of the page. My first attempt was with decanting Shiraz, which brought up 1,779 hits. That is a lot, but its way less than the 80,000 hits on a Google search. Refining by limiting my search to South Pacific reduced the number to 241. Then I got serious and limited myself to Australia (215 hits; I guess they don’t do a lot of decanting in New Zealand – must be all the Sauvignon Blanc), then South Australia (72 hits), and then Barossa Zone for 25 hits. Most of the hits were for Jacob’s Creek Centenary Hill Shiraz. But the link I found the most satisfying was the very first hit on my initial search. It was The Frugal Oenophile’s post on The Great Decanting Debate. I particularly liked the conclusion -

So what do we make of all this? First, decanting is not a fool-proof solution to anything except the elimination of sediment. Also, aeration appears to negatively affect the nose of the wine, making the wine dumb. Aeration will not necessarily soften tannins or make the wine rounder either. Although a two-hour rest may appeal to some people, no aeration period seems to be ideal; anything from 0 to 24 hours appears to pass muster.

This experiment involved one wine, from one maker, from one region, from one vintage, decanted according to one person's idea of how it should be done. At every turn I tried to eliminate variables, and yet the results were far from conclusive. My tasters managed to come up with a definitive answer. After a brief discussion (while I was out of the room), they decided: There is no answer. Not what I was hoping for.

So it would seem that decanting is not a given. There are no clear-cut reasons for doing it, but apparently no real reason not to. I will continue to use my decanter for cut flowers, as I've proven to myself that I don't like what decanting does to wine, unless I hit some sediment, of course.

I finally know what to do with the decanters I have!