Worth Reading: The Local Wine Edition

Catching up on the reading, there’s lots out there about local wine:

 

NYT: At Local 111 in Philmont, NY, wine from nearby Hudson-Chatham winery is on the list

Eric Asimov of the New York Times joins the locavore/locapour debate this week with a well-reasoned piece about the reluctance of consumers to consider local wines even as they seek out local produce and meats to support regional farmers.

“Food authorities have argued convincingly that the public benefits politically, environmentally, ethically and culinarily from eating local ingredients and supporting local agriculture,” Asimov writes. “But where does that leave wine, a peculiar example that is surely both a food and an agricultural product but does not fit neatly into any category?”

He lists what differentiates wine from local produce – it’s not fresh, it is portable and can travel, and of course it is limited. “If New York City were to drink nothing but Long Island wine, it might consumer the region’s annual production in a week,” he points out.

But he’s clearly in favor of local wine, as long as the quality is there. He focuses almost exclusively on New York, though he gives a nod to Colorado, where DrinkLocalWine.com recently held its 2012 conference. The Times over the years has been very good to local (ie., New York) wines, with Howard Goldberg providing extensive coverage in its local editions. But Asimov’s recent attention to New York, with a feature last summer on the Finger Lakes and now his essay on local wine in general, gives the issue prominent national exposure. Now if we could just get Jay McInerny to wax poetic about a Michigan pinot blanc …

Joe Roberts, the Internet’s darling blogger at 1WineDude.com, details his experiences at DLW in Denver, with a post about the panel discussion I chaired on “Why Local Wine and Local Food Hate Each Other.” (Spoiler alert – we covered a lot of the same material Asimov did, although he wasn’t at the conference. Next year, Eric!) Joe also posted his thoughts on how Colorado has the potential to produce some world-class wines. He goes on a bit about the bad ones he tasted – no self-respecting writer would rave unconditionally about a new wine region, after all – but hey, California produces some crappy wines, too. He features the almost unanimous favorite of the Twitter Taste-Off: the Guy Drew Pinot Gris 2010. Yum!

And California blogger Mike Dunne travels out of state – at least through his corkscrew – to discover wines from The Other 47. Dunne offers an interesting perspective from someone who lives in the center of it all as he experiences something new.

Cheers!

 

Worth Reading: Provoking Adam Lee

Some fun and interesting keyboard musings this week:

W. Blake Gray indulges in his favorite sport – provoking Adam Lee of Siduri with a post about low alcohol levels. It’s a great way to boost your comment totals on a blog, I guess. To follow the discussion is a bit wieldy – the link above to The Gray Report includes a link to Blake’s column on WineReviewOnline.com in which he profiles Sashi Moorman, who argues for lower alcohol pinots in the Sta. Rita Hills AVA of Santa Barbara County. The comments are back on Blake’s blog. Some strong words and even an etymology debate.

What do you look for in a restaurant wine list? Stephen Eliot on The Connoisseur’s Guide to California Wine offers some thoughts in an age when many restaurants are downsizing from the old standard wine book. Despite a provocative headline that echoes recent blahgosphere rumblings about a “war” between somms and critics, Eliot taps out a well-reasoned argument for “a good mix of well-known wines and those that might be regarded as esoteric. Some nights I am ready for adventure, and on some I would prefer the comfort of a trusted old friend.”

Robert M. Parker Jr. gave a rare interview to Sommelier Journal in which he throws some bombs and brickbats at anyone who dares to disagree with him. The interview is not online except to subscribers of the magazine, but Joe Roberts at 1WineDude.com and David White at Terroirist.com sound off. And Steve Heimoff announces Parker’s retirement -  prematurely, it would seem.

And I would of course be remiss if I did not point you to David White’s column on last weekend’s DrinkLocalWine.com conference in Denver. Jeff Siegel also gives a grand wrap-up on The Wine Curmudgeon.

A superb California rosé

In springtime, a wine geek’s fancy turns to thoughts of rosé, and each year at this time I gorge myself on the new arrivals from Provence, the Rhone, or elsewhere in southern France, branching off occasionally to try some rosados from Spain or Italian rosati. When I draw up my list of favorites, however, there is almost always at least one Californian on the list – the Alexander Valley Vineyards Dry Rosé of Sangiovese. As usual, the 2011 vintage is delicious.

This is what I call an “intentional” rosé, meaning the grapes were grown and harvested with pink in mind, and was not made from juice siphoned off to concentrate a red wine. This year’s version, gussied up in a stylish new label (and still sporting that jaunty screwcap), has a bit of stemmy quality, which could conceivably be a reflection of the tricky harvest California experienced. Yet this only adds interest to the juicy flavors of strawberry and watermelon that follow. The screwcap keeps it fresh, too; a little bit left over was just as good the second night.

At $15, this is not a cheap rosé. But even at that price it is well within the range of the top European rosés, and it is well worth looking for.

Twist it open, pour yourself a glass, and sit back and enjoy our lovely spring weather.

 

Colorado wines impress

DrinkLocalWine.com, an organization I co-founded four years ago with Dallas-based wine writer Jeff Siegel, held its fourth annual conference last weekend in Denver, bringing together bloggers from as far away as New York and California to explore Colorado wine. It’s fair to say this was the best conference yet, and that is saying a lot, as the previous three – in Texas, Virginia and Missouri – were all good. The growth of the conference is evidence that the local wine movement is catching on across the country. Even CNN has noticed!

As in previous years, the highlight was the Twitter Taste-Off, three hours in which we tried to juggle wine glasses, spit cups and smart phones so we could taste and tweet, giving the 23 participating wineries some instant feedback.

There was much fun to be had at the DLW 2012 Twitter Taste-Off!

Overall, the wines were quite good, and if life, love or work ever takes you to Colorado, I encourage you to try the local vino. Among whites, Riesling does very well, and a pinot gris from Guy Drew Vineyards was voted best white wine of the tasting. Several wineries make viognier as well, though I found the quality inconsistent. Perhaps I’m to partial to Virginia’s viognier.

Colorado Guv plugs the state’s vino

At last weekend’s DrinkLocalWine.com conference in Denver, our annual writers’ dinner was held at the Governor’s Residence. The venue alone was testament to how much importance the state put on the conference and the opportunity to showcase its wines to media from around the country. And the dinner itself, cooked by Chefs Eric Skokan of The Black Cat Farm Table Bistro in Boulder and Daniel Asher of Linger and Root Down restaurants in Denver, was fantastic.

Skokan especially impressed the crowd of about 80 writers, winemakers and dignitaries as me described how his restaurant relies on its 70-acre organic farm for nearly everything it puts on its tables. Here was a chef truly living the “eat local” mantra. And he was very appreciative of the support we were giving to local wines.

And so was Governor John Hickenlooper. We weren’t expecting to meet him, but he joined us briefly at our pre-dinner reception before heading off to preside over a wedding. I snuck a quick picture, but of course it’s blurry. No worries – Hickenlooper, who made his mark in Colorado’s craft beer revolution, had just filmed this humorous promo for the Colorado Wine Industry Development Board. Be sure to watch to the end, with an out-take featuring his mispronunciation of a wine grape. He’s um, rather known for such things.

And speaking of the Colorado wine board, our sincere thanks go out to Doug Caskey, its excecutive director, and to Kyle Schlacter of his staff, without whom the conference would never have happened. And we might still be asking, “Oh, do they make wine in Colorado?”

 

DrinkLocalWine.com 2012 – and the winners are …

DrinkLocalWine.com 2012 is over, it was a big success, and now it’s time for a recap. I can’t give you one today, because it’s past 1 am, I’m barely sentient, and the crowd in the Irish pub six floors below is still going strong and loud with a live band. And I don’t think they’re singing about Colorado wine, to be honest.

I will give you this news, in case you weren’t glued to the Twitter feed for the results of our Twitter Taste-Off, sponsored this year by Nomacorc. The crowd favorites, winning our DrinkLocalWine.com decanters, the most coveted prizes in winedom (no, not really) were Ruby Trust Cellars for its “Smuggler,” a Cabernet Franc-based blend, and the Guy Drew Vineyards Pinot Gris. Redstone Meadery also took a decanter as the crowd favorite for its “Nectar of the Hops,” a delightful little fizzy number that tasted as though a master champagne producer had turned his talents to beer.

We tweeted, of course, using hashtags #colwine and #drinklocal. My favorite tweet came from @wineywomen, who wrote, without punctuation, “Best White Guy Drew Pinot Gris.” to which I replied, “The best white guy drew pinot gris? Why not a pinot blanc?”

Well, it’s now 1:30, the band has stopped playing, and the crowd is dispersing from the pub. Even Denver must sleep, and so should I. More about the conference tomorrow. Or today. I have a 3-1/2 hour flight back to reality on which to write.

 

And DrinkLocalWine.com 2012 is underway

DrinkLocalWine.com‘s fourth annual conference got underway today. A few bloggers, including Joe Roberts of 1WineDude.com, David White of Terroirist, David Falchek, Dezel Quillen, and “Chief Wino” Andrew Stover hopped into a puddle jumper for a heart-in-mouth flight over the Rockies to Colorado wine country in Grand Junction. I know there will be stories when they get back, if only from the relief evident in their tweets when they arrived.

 

I stayed grounded in the Denver area, and spent two worthwhile hours with Jeff Siegel, aka The Wine Curmudgeon, and Michael Wangbickler of the DLW board of directors at Westminster Total Beverage just outside Denver. About 100 people showed up to taste four Colorado wines and hear us discuss the local wine movement and our Twitter Taste-Off scheduled for Saturday afternoon. Some of the people who stopped by said they were frequent visitors to wineries around Denver and Boulder, while others admitted they rarely if ever try the local vino. One elderly gentleman lectured us for several minutes on his favorite St. Emilion Grand Crus and groused that he would never buy a wine made in Colorado. Then he tasted them and decided to take home a bottle of Cabernet Franc.

Hey, as Jeff would say, “That’s what the drink local movement is all about. We just want you to taste it.”