In the past I have poked fun at the European systems for classifying wines. As these offer no guarantee of quality, I wondered whether anyone really benefited from them and their accompanying bureaucracies (apart from the bureaucrats, obviously). I contrasted this system with the more relaxed approach of the New World, which tends to leave the description of wines, and their reputations, to the market.

The contrast was something of an exaggeration. In point of fact, the US does have a wine appellation system. The so-called American Viticultural Areas, or AVAs, are administered by the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, part of the US Treasury Department. The chances are you have never heard of them, and there is no reason why you should, because like all such systems, the AVA classifications are of no use at all to drinkers of wine. Read the rest of this entry »

I have just read The Judgment of Paris, by George Taber. This splendid book tells the story of the 1976 Paris wine tasting, at which a panel of distinguished French critics compared wines from France and California in a blind tasting. To everyone’s shock, the winners turned out to be Californian.

Every aspect of the story was hilarious. The organizer, an Englishman called Steven Spurrier, did his best to stack the contest in favour of France. Mr Spurrier owned a wine school in Paris, and had no desire to upset the people he did business with each day. So he chose the most distinguished white Burgundies (Clos des Mouches, Meursault Charmes Roulot, Bâtard-Montrachet, Puligny-Montrachet) and the most celebrated red Bordeaux (Mouton Rothschild, Haut-Brion, Léoville-Las-Cases), convinced that the judges would recognise them effortlessly. And to be sure, the judges had no doubt about what they were drinking. “Definitely California. It has no nose,” one declared, as he sniffed the Bâtard-Montrachet. “Ah, back to France,” said another, while sipping a Californian Chardonnay. Read the rest of this entry »

The world’s Pinot Noir makers divide into two schools. There are those who say “We are striving for greatness.  The greatest Pinot Noirs are made in Burgundy. Therefore our Pinot Noir will be as Burgundian as we can make it.”  Others say “We too are striving for greatness, but greatness can take many forms.  It is impossible to fake a Burgundy, so we are not going to try. Our Pinot Noir will take on whatever character our location and technique give it. If the results are not Burgundian, so what?  All that matters is that the wine be outstanding.”

The first school contains some Oregon houses, one or two in California, and many more in New Zealand. The second covers just about everyone else, including the Argyle winery of Dundee, Oregon. Read the rest of this entry »

The Mourvèdre grape has a bewildering range of aliases. In Spain, from where it is thought to originate, it is known as Monastrell. In Portugal and much of the New World it is called Mataro, after the Spanish town of Mataró. Most of France calls it Mourvèdre, after another Spanish town, Murviedro. But in some parts it goes by the splendid name of Estrangle-Chien: “dog strangler”.

The grape is prone to rot, and so does best where the summers are fierce and there are strong winds to keep it dry. Windswept southern France is ideal: in the Rhône it is blended with Grenache to make wines such as Châteauneuf-du-Pape; in Provence it is the principal grape of Bandol.

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“What does this remind you of?” I asked Mrs Merry Drinker the other night.

She took a sip, then looked at me doubtfully. “Not . . .?”

“Go on.”

“Uh . . . Margaux?”

Margaux is my wife’s favourite wine, and I could understand her hesitation. What we were drinking was definitely not Margaux. It wasn’t even a Bordeaux. It was from Long Island, New York. Read the rest of this entry »

Some wines are worth trying merely for their curiosity value. Ripassa is one such; this is another. Pinot Meunier is one of the obscurer grape varietals, though it ought to be better known, being one of the three grapes permitted in Champagne. “Meunier” means “miller”.  According to legend the grape was so named because the underside of its leaves seemed dusted with flour. (Do peasants really dream up these fancies, or do marketing men cynically invent them for the benefit of credulous townies? I often wonder.)

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Until recently Howard Rossbach grew no wine. He bought grapes from other people, then had someone else vinify these grapes to his own specifications. In other words, Mr Rossbach was what the French call a négociant. In France this is considered a perfectly honourable calling, requiring business acumen and fine oenological judgment. The better négociant wines (such as this one) are often very good value for money.

But in the United States négociants are not well regarded. They are seen as fast-buck types who buy up unsold wines at rock-bottom prices, adorn them with pretty labels, then sell them on to the undiscriminating. This is probably why none of my reference books mentions Mr Rossbach’s Firesteed house, even though it is Oregon’s biggest, and it has been winning praise and awards since the early 1990s.   Read the rest of this entry »

People need something to fret about. Today they have climate change; in the 1950s they had UFOs. All over the US people claimed to have seen flying saucers flashing through the sky. There were similar sightings in Britain, prompting the government to appoint an official Flying Saucer Working Party. And in France, the Rhône town of Châteauneuf-du-Pape pondered its own response.

Little was known about the “flying cigars”, as the French called these objects. It was not clear where they were from or who was piloting them. But such details did not matter. All that concerned the people of Châteauneuf-du-Pape was their wine. What if the flying cigars had designs on their famous vineyards? The commune had better be ready. On October 28 1954 Châteauneuf-du-Pape armed itself, not with death rays or nuclear missiles, but with an even more fearsome weapon: French municipal law.   Read the rest of this entry »

If you have come across Gewürztraminer, you probably know the Alsace version. Other places do make the stuff: the Italian South Tyrol claims to have invented it, and there are interesting variants from Spain, California and New Zealand. But these wines could never be mistaken for the Alsatian model. Their aromas may be as rich, but they are usually leaner and crisper; no less delicious, but in a different way.

So it is interesting to come across a Gewürz whose makers consciously strive for the Alsace effect. This one is from the Finger Lakes area of New York, the US’s third most important wine-growing state. Read the rest of this entry »

When talking about wine I often feel like the little boy who blurts out that the Emperor has no clothes.

Many houses offer us good budget label wines in the hope that these will tempt us to try their more serious offerings. Needless to say, the serious stuff costs twice, thrice, even four times as much as the cheapo. But the expectation is that on trying it we will nod solemnly, say “Mmm, one does see the difference,” and banish all memory of the budget wine.

Often this strategy works. But now and again I am left feeling that the budget wine is the better bet. Read the rest of this entry »