Dr Vino's wine blog

Wine importer Joe Dressner lost his three-year battle against brain cancer last month. During the course of his treatment, he often posted on his blog that there were others in the world who could not get the treatment he was getting. The Haitian earthquake of last year sparked him to hold several fundraiser tastings for the nonprofit Partners In Health, which fights disease in impoverished countries and areas around the world. The nonprofit spends an impressive 94.3% of their funds on programing according to Charity Navigator.

Starting this coming Saturday, some of my favorite shops (and one restaurant) in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Westchester will be pouring wines from the Louis/Dressner portfolio to raise funds for Partners in Health. The full list appears after the jump; most ask for a $20 donation but contact the shop before attending for complete details. It will be a very worthwhile evening, wherever you attend. Even if you can’t make it to one, you can always make a donation to PIH in Joe’s memory (or not) to PIH. In Joe’s inimitable words, here was a plea of his to give: Read more…

New for the 2009 vintage: Sea Smoke of Santa Barbara is putting “California Grand Cru” on the label.

The term is pure marketing. Needless to say, there is no codified “cru” system of California. However, the term does not fall afoul of the protected terms negotiated in the EU-US accord on place names. The labels previously read “Santa Barbara County California.”

After eyeing it for some time, Bob Davids acquired an apparently gorgeous, 350-acre parcel in the Santa Rita Hills in 1999 for his label Sea Smoke. According to North American Pinot Noir, it was previously a bean field. He immediately developed about 100 acres into vineyards; the first vintage was 2001. The winery produces four pinot noirs and two chardonnays; all bear the term “California Grand Cru” for the 2009 vintage.

Queried about their decision to use their term, Director of Winemaking Victor Gallegos pointed me to this Wine Spectator article ($) in which James Laube called Sea Smoke “an important part of Santa Barbara’s wine scene and one of its ‘grand cru’ properties.”

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I attended a private dinner recently where a Brunello was the main wine. It was big and extracted and I found it fatiguing. I can’t even remember the producer’s name. Of course, the palate fatigue wasn’t helped that the other wines on the table were a primitivo and an Amarone. It was the sort of lineup that made me want to step outside under the pretense of feeding the meter and wander off to find a beer.

A few weeks later, I had another side of Brunello, aptly named Il Paradiso. In 1958, Manfredi Martini bought some land in Montalcino. He worked at Biondi-Santi and converted his seven-acre property from olive trees to a vineyard of sangiovese grosso. When the Brunello de Montalcino DOC became formalized in 1968, there were only about a dozen producers (there are now over 200). Today, the vineyards ekes out a mere 9,000 bottles a year, split between a Rosso and the Brunello. Manfredi’s daughter and son-in-law, Sorella and Florio, continue making old-school Brunello from the organically grown vineyards and raised in barrels as large as 2,500 liters.

When sangiovese is on, it is gorgeous. I tasted the wines at their American launch (Grand Cru Selections is importing them; search for these wines). The 2004 was the richest of the wines I tasted–this is still Brunello, not Chianti, after all–but it was plummy rather than the tiring jam. The thing that got me about this wine was the concentration without being overdone. The 2001 has an alluring aroma of spice, cedar, faint volatility and oxidation with a lovely, appetizing bitterness on the ten-year old tannins. Layered and complex, it is drinking well now. The 2000 Riserva saw more time in large oak barrels but has an old-school charm, redolent of earth, leather, and faint spice. These are distinctive Brunellos–definitely not ones to walk out on.

Has merlot rosé ever inspired anything? Apparently it has: scented nail wraps. The pink appliqués come from Gallo Family Vineyards to support their new merlot rosé in the UK. Rubbing the wraps releases ripe plum, blueberry and hints cranberry, scents allegedly found in the wine itself. Here’s their marketing spokesperson:

Nail wraps are the latest craze to hit the beauty industry. By producing the first ever scented version we have created an innovative marketing vehicle that will allow us to engage with women outside of the wine isle, ensuring maximum visibility for the brand and ultimately driving sales.

Ah, ladies who get marketing outside of the wine “isle” (Madeira? Lanzarote? Sicily?) have all the fun. I’ve heard of brand extensions before, but never as nail extensions.

Although we mentioned it last week in a squib, it bears mentioning again: the French authorities have threatened Olivier Cousin, the horse-tilling vigneron that is a mentor for many younger ones, has been threatened with a $50,000 fine and two years in jail.

His transgression? Goofing around with names. The biodyanamic farmer of 25 acres in Anjou told Jim Budd that he left the AOC system in 2003 because it was too lax. “I stopped because the AOC is for industrial wines as the rules permit everything: weedkillers, huge yields, additives etc.” He thus marketed his wines as vin de table, the category at the bottom of the French administrative category as few are bold enough to do (as I detailed in Wine Politics). He marketed one of his wines as “Anjou Pur Breton,” which somehow made it past the authorities for several years despite containing a place name and a grape name (Breton is a local name for Cabernet Franc).

His distributor wrote “AOC” allegedly for “Anjou Olivier Cousin” on cases of his wines. This, coupled with his refusal to pay obligatory dues to an association, was the straw that broke the administrative camel’s back: He has been threatened with a significant fine, possible jail time, and one of his bank accounts have been impounded. The decision of how to proceed now lies with a prosecutor in Angers.

The crackdown on this sympathetic figure appears to have backfired. Thanks to the global reach of the internet, awareness of his treatment is high. Over 500 people have signed a petition on a French blog, his American importer is also mounting a campaign for signatures, and his UK importer is helping pay his legal bills. It’s sad that the Loire, site of so many distinctive wines that offer France a calling card overseas, is also the site of clashes with a moribund bureaucracy.

YOUNTVILLE, CA
WHAT: A gated, hilltop estate on 56 acres off of Silverado Trail that was the former residence of Robert and Margrit Mondavi.

HOW MUCH: $13.9 million reserve, down from $25 million. Auction to occur next month.

SIZE: Two bedrooms; 11,500 sq ft. Includes 50-foot-long pool in the living room where Mr. Mondavi regularly exercised and a roof that opens up over the pool.

OUTDOOR SPACE: Guest house; two outdoor, lighted tennis courts. No vineyards.

CORBIERES, France
HOW MUCH: Planted vineyards at $6,000 per acre.

BURGUNDY, France
HOW MUCH: Planted vineyards at about $1.3 million per acre, if available.

Gourmet, even though it’s not even in print any more, obviously has been on different winery tours than I have! To wit:

In wine country, pot-infused wines are the open secrets that present themselves in unmarked bottles at the end of winemaker dinners and very VIP tours (it bears mentioning that most winemakers are cagey enough to keep the manufacture of such wines far from winery grounds). The wines range in style and intensity as broadly as “normal” wines and winemakers do. Some practitioners of the fruit-forward, higher-alcohol, New World style take a similarly aggressive approach to infusing wine. “I know a winemaker that takes a couple of barrels a year and puts a ton of weed in it and lets it steep, and that wine is just superpotent,” says a James Beard Award–winning chef, who also asked not to be named. Henry, though, makes more classically styled wines, and with that reserve comes a more subtle hand with the cannabis. Adjusted for volume, “special” wines can range from under a pound of marijuana per 59-gallon barrel to over 4 pounds per barrel. The result is a spectrum ranging from a gentle, almost absinthe-like effect to something verging on oenological anesthetic.

Just reading this is giving me the munchies…what food pairs with marijuana wine (cuvée MJ?)–brownies?!? Where does this weedy wine fall on the natural-spoof wine scale? Marijuanipulated?

PS: has anyone heard of this? How widespread is it?