Dr Vino's wine blog

RIP: Jess Stonestreet Jackson
The founder of Kendall-Jackson died last week bringing to a close a remarkable life that included making one of the best-selling wines in America. [NYT, SF Chronicle]

SIPPED: the unknown
Which bubbly will the esteemed quests raise in honor of the Royal Couple? The official wine has not yet been unveiled, but Will Lyons at the WSJ guesses it will be Pol Roger while Eric Asimov goes to England and comes back speculating it will be English sparkling wine. They may both be right as there will be multiple events on April 29 for Prince William and Kate Middleton. One thing’s for sure, it won’t be beer, since it has been banned from the festivities.

SIPPED: corks
A NZ winegrower ditches screwcaps in favor of corks for his China exports. Why? “Prestige.” [stuff.co.nz]

SPIT: A truncheon analysis
French riot police no longer allowed to have wine with lunch [Guardian]

SPIT: Mommy
Two firms are engaged in a legal tussle over the term “mommy,” specifically whether the new “mommyjuice” wine infringes on the mark “Mommy’s time out.” Either way, they’re fighting a rearguard battle: the next front for this demographic is for cougar juice! [ThomsonReuters]

SIPPED: the zany
Hardy Wallace (above) dropped in on the en primeurs tastings and handed out his scores ranging from 101.00 to 102.36 points in .17 point increments. He gets the award for best T-shirt! [Dirty South Wine]

SIPPED: three cask monte
Jancis Robinson provides a primer in the various ways that samples at the en primeurs tastings can be manipulated to show their best.

SIPPED: discrimination
Wendell Lee, general counsel at the Wine Institute, provides a further look into insidious nature of the apparent simplicity of HR 1161, a bill that would drastically affect wine shipping by reverting to regulations that pre-date Prohibition and supersede the Commerce Clause. [ShipComliant]

SIPPED: branding
The Food Network releases their own branded wine. Only question: do you drink it with food, or with TV (if at all)? [Eater]

SIPPED: peace
Serbs and Croats beat their swords in to pruning shears at a winery project in Bosnia. “Working in a vineyard is like therapy, it helps a lot (to forget about the war).” [Reuters]

SIPPED: a big platform
The political and legal issues of direct shipping of wine, specifically HR 1161, got a big airing on today’s op-ed page for the NYT. Hopefully more wine consumers will see the law for what it is thanks to this piece and join the effort to stop HR 1161.

SIPPED: more details
Antonio Galloni‘s recent event, the Festa del Barolo, gave consumers the opportunity to mingle with 15 Barolo producers and taste their wines, old and young, for $900. Mike Steinberger spoke with Galloni at length about the event and how it squares with the Wine Advocate’s ethics policy. (A related discussion popped up on wineberserkers.) Also, if you haven’t discovered Mike’s blog, it’s certainly the best new wine blog of 2011.

SPIT: murder
Vanity Fair has a piece on the attempt to poison and ransom vines at Domaine de la Romanée Conti. Funny, I remember this story from when it happened and it didn’t strike me as worth the Vanity Fair treatment. Apparently Aubert de Villaine didn’t either since he spoke with the author “most reluctantly.”

SIPPED: wine fun fact
Stan Kroenke, owner of Screaming Eagle, owns the Denver Nuggets and 29% of Arsenal, the football club, among other teams. I’m sure they pour Screagle in the locker rooms! [wikipedia]

SIPPED: the life of a wine writer!
Ray Isle, the brightest star of wine TV, writes a terrific “week in the life…” essay for NY mag. Oh, man, do I want to be a wine writer when I grow up!

GUSHED: American pinot
Mike Steinberger rhapsodizes over the pinot noir from Rhys Vineyards, calling them the “best New World pinot” that he’s ever encountered. [Slate]

OPENED: floodgates?
Maryland’s legislature has passed a bill to allow wineries to ship (18 cases a year, max) to Maryland residents. Yay for them! But sad that the legislation did not extend the same right to to out-of-state retailers, which would probably be more useful for more people. [baltimoresun.com] In related news, Rhode Island authorities contemplate tearing down their cork wall. [Boston.com]

NOODLED: green wine
Slate ponders the question: “Is organic wine really better for the environment?”

SIPPED: variety
Aditya Gupta, formerly in my NYU wine class, recently had a wine from Freisa, making it the one hundredth grape variety that he’s tasted. Congratulations, and welcome to the Wine Century Club!

SIPPED and SMASHED: Lafite empties
After tasting older vintages of collectible wines before an auction, the bottles are routinely smashed. Why? An empty bottle of Lafite 1982 fetches $1,500. [CNN]

SIPPED: counterfeit bottle
William Koch, the billionaire wine collector, bought a bottle of 1870 Lafite from a Christie’s auction for $4,200, discovered it was fake, and sued the auction house. A judge has now thrown out the suit, saying that Koch knew the bottle was fake before bidding. Here’s hoping anyone else bidding on it also knew! [Bloomberg]

CHUGGED: Box wine up 18% last year. [PR web]

CUT: subsidies
The Texas wine industry has received $4.2 million in state funds the past two years. However, the subsidy is likely to be cut to zero. Fun fact: there are estimated to be 1.3 million wine tourists a year in Texas. [Dallas Morning News]

DAMAGED: some tentative information on the state of Japan’s sake breweries. [sake-world.com]

SIPPED: a new meaning for, “wine, down the hatch!” [source via reddit]

SIPPED: skulduggery
Alder Yarrow has one of his quasi transcripts up about a fascinating panel discussion on alcohol, levels and balance. The voluble Jim Clendenen of Au Bon Climat had some provocative statements and Adam Lee of engaged in skulduggery with sommelier Raj Parr–and everyone! [vinography]

SPIT: scores
What drives Bordeaux prices? A post on the Liv-Ex blog suggests a change from scores to brands.

SPIT: “Operation Suckling”
James Suckling’s recent promotion with Quebec’s state monopoly draws a raspberry (or was it 51 points?) from a local critic. [montrealgazette.com]

SIPPED and SPIT: chilling reds
Gallo to introduce the masses to chilling reds w new 10.5% abv wine. Wait til the masses discover good Beaujolais! [Marketingmagazine.co.uk]

SIPPED: excellent reporting
Fans of Krug may enjoy this excellent NYT story on LVMH/Hermes protagonist Bernard Arnault. Critics claim he “broke” families he bought from and “compromised the artisanal essence of their companies.”

END OF AN ERA: Patrick Campbell sells Laurel Glen winery in Sonoma to Bettina Sichel. [Decanter]

SIPPED: more Zin Man
The ad about Zin man, riffing on the Old Spice guy, got a big thumbs up from all of you. So I asked the Paso Robles folks for a few more details about their ad. While they wouldn’t provide details about how much it cost, they did say the ad was shot in Paso Robles using a professional actor (not a vintner) as the star. They are planning 8-10 more ads this year.

SPIT: Celebrity status
Out of disbelief, a wine store clerk in Manhattan refuses Matt Damon’s credit card for the star’s impulse purchase of $1,200 of wine, insisting that he pay cash. Which store was it? And which wine was it? [latimes with video]

RUNG: alarm bell
A French researcher warned a Bordeaux trade group this week that the region will be too warm to grow red wine grapes to long-lived wines–by as early as 2050. When will Norway develop a premier cru? [AFP]

SIPPED: foreign takeover
Concha y Toro, Chile’s #1 wine producer, is buying Fetzer’s three million case production for $238 million. How will this affect consumers of Bonterra, or Fetzer’s other brands? Probably not at all. Concha y Toro shares in Santiago were up 7% on the news. The Chilean currency has appreciated by 21% against the greenback in the past two years. Will other domestic wineries be in the sights of foreign companies? [WSJ]

SPIT: critter labels
In case we needed any further indication that critter labels have jumped the shark right off the wine bottle, Yellow Tail is now suing a more recent arrival for infringing on the wallaby. [WSJ]

SPIT: counterfeiting?
The BBC explores laser bottle etching, stealth mineral placement, and bubble codes at Chateau Margaux, all weapons in the current fight against counterfeiting. Whether these measure can outsmart fraudsters remains to be seen.

SPIT: wine shelf
Looks like they’ll need a mega cleanup in aisle 7! [Fail blog/youtube]

DESTROYED: international treasure
In Austria, vandals have uprooted and chopped to bits a 500-year-old vine. Hit the comments on what their punishment should be. [AP]

UPGRADED: the wine blogosphere
Mike Steinberger, wine columnist at Slate.com, has started a new blog. He says it is mostly for tasting notes, but he has already served up some juicy commentary about wine fraud. Add it to your feed reader! [WineDiarist.com]

SPIT: spelling
A BBC story highlights potential counterfeits of $8 supermarket wine in the UK. The tip off? Misspellings on the label.

SPIT: wine in New York supermarkets
Misspellings or not, wine is not likely to be sold in New York grocery stores this year since it was not included in Governor Cuomo’s budget. However, a group is still pushing the legislature to adopt a measure. [NACS]

SIPPED & SPIT: New Zealand’s bountiful vintage
Grape harvest in New Zealand may surpass 300 metric tons this year. Related: as volumes have been rising, bottled prices for exports have been falling. [Bloomberg]