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Harcourt Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2007
I’m in fine health but I’ve had a bad run with the wines I’ve opened today - I wonder if, on the biodynamic calendar, it’s not a tasting/root day? In any case this was one of the wines to show better than most.
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Evan Dawson Becomes LENNDEVOURS’ Finger Lakes Editor
Long-time readers of this blog will remember the days when there was one lone voice represented here -- mine. When this blog was founded over 5 years ago, that was the intent, the goal really -- somewhere for me to share my passion for wine, particularly New York wine. What once was a solo performance has become a bit of a chorus with new voices bringing texture and layers to my coverage of New York wines. LENNDEVOURS has evolved and grown to become the premier source for real, unbiased news, commentary and reviews of New York wines. That evolution continues today. I'm happy and excited to announce that Evan Dawson, who has attacked the Finger Lakes beat for LENNDEVOURS with intrepid energy and vigor over the past several months has agreed to expand his role.
Blind Tasting of Finger Lakes Pinot Noir Reveals Progress, Challenges
On Wednesday night, on a rain-soaked evening on the southeast side of Seneca Lake, a group of grape growers and winemakers met to taste through a line of 2007 pinot noirs. Many of the wines were made in the Finger Lakes; a few came from the American West Coast, and some from Burgundy. Tom Higgins, winemaker and owner of Heart & Hands Wine Company, organized the event because he wanted to know: Where does pinot noir stand in the Finger Lakes? Is it truly a recalcitrant mystery, yielding near-constant mediocrity at best? Or is there evidence that the great grape of Burgundy can produce some stunning wines here? "I think by the end of this tasting we'll have a much better idea of what's going on with pinot in the Finger Lakes," Tom said as the group took shape inside the Stonecat Cafe. Higgins set out the brown-bagged bottles, numbered 1 through 19, on several long tables. Finger Lakes pinots included those from Heart & Hands, Sheldrake Point Vineyard, Wagner Vineyards, Atwater Estate Vineyards, Dr. Konstantin Frank Vinifera Wine Cellars, Billsboro Winery, Ravines Wine Cellars, Fox Run Vineyards, Damiani Wine Cellars, and Hosmer Vineyard. French wines included two lower-level Burgundies. From the West Coast, one bottle came from the Oregonian producer WillaKenzie and another from Carneros. For nearly an hour the group tasted and scribbled notes. Some discussed the aromatics and flavors during the tasting; others, including Ravines' winemaker Morten Hallgren, preferred to taste in solace -- perhaps to avoid confirmation bias that arises during tasting discussions. Higgins did not ask the group to score the wines. From the Finger Lakes, pinot noir proved to be a mixed -- but undeniably intriguing -- bag. The local producer that won the most kudos was Damiani, and grower Phil Davis explained that one of the wines (he brought both the 2007 and the 2007 Reserve) was unfiltered and unfined. In fact, the 2007 Damiani Pinot Noir was the cloudiest red wine I had ever seen in a glass, and yet it was seductive and complex. That's no surprise, as Davis keeps yields painstakingly low and brings a passion for pinot that has shown up on other visits to the winery. The 2007 Ravines Pinot Noir came off as tight as a drum to me, which again was no surprise. I recently drank a bottle of the Ravines 2005 Pinot Noir and it was positively glowing, evolving aromatically over the course of several hours and offering gorgeous length. Winemaker Morten Hallgren called his 2007 "an infant," and I wondered if the table had just committed infanticide. In fact, as a group I found the 2007 Finger Lakes Pinot Noirs to need more time to properly consider. Most of the industry professionals agreed, and they resolved to try the same flight of 2007 wines again in a year's time. That, I am sure, will be much more instructive. Wagner's Ann Raffetto disagreed, saying that Finger Lakes Pinots need to be drunk young, but she was alone with that opinion. Other wines of note included the Heart & Hands 2007 Barrel Reserve Pinot Noir, which my wife was able to pick out of the lineup of 19 wines -- an impressive feat, and a sign that Higgins is already crafting memorable wines! Fox Run's 2007 Reserve was showing very nicely -- I thought it might have been the inspiration for John Mellencamp's song "Cherry Bomb" -- but the Fox Run 2007 regular release was disjointed and awkward. "We've experienced some variation," assistant winemaker Tricia Renshaw explained. "There are times we taste the wine and want to get rid of the entire barrel, and at other times it moves in the direction we want to see it go. But certainly it's still a bit young to know for sure." The Dr. Frank 2007 Pinot Noir was greeted favorably, but no one from the winery attended the tasting to explain more about the wine. Some of the wines were rather bizarre to my taste. I found a strange amount of citrus and pineapple in some, and underripe green notes in a handful of bottles. But this might well come down to cropping, which has been a persistent problem in the Finger Lakes. The best producers are now demanding fewer clusters per vine and lower tons per acre, but some winemakers at the tasting last night admitted they had no idea what kind of cropping was going on. That, to me, is a big problem still. Noted pinot noir skeptic Dave Breeden, winemaker at Sheldrake Point on Cayuga Lake, was not moved by the tasting. Higgins asked him, at the conclusion of the event, if he had changed his mind regarding Finger Lakes Pinot. "I think I'll keep making riesling," Breeden replied dryly. But his pessimism is thankfully not shared by the wider group. I wonder why anyone would attempt such a difficult task as making pinot noir in the Finger Lakes if they weren't thrilled by the prospect every morning. Winemakers like Higgins, Hallgren and Renshaw clearly are, as are growers like Phil Davis. "What I learned tonight is that Pinot Noir has a true personality in the Finger Lakes," Higgins said, clearly satisfied with the results and eager for the challenge ahead. "When it's made here it doesn't show that overbearing jam that you find in other parts of the country. It has elegance and a unique profile. We'd be making a big mistake to give up on it, but we'll need to keep working hard if we want to do it well."
Gallup: “On Mars, They Drink Beer; on Venus, Wine”
In their annual survey of how and what American drinks, the smokin’ pollsters at Gallup point to a gender gap where men prefer beer and women prefer wine. (For beer-wine-spirits preferences, men are 58-19-18 while women are 21-50-24. Click through for full summary and charts.) How does this square with your experience? In my own, I find a lot of enthusiasm for wine among them there young folks. And men and women seem equally into wine. But my evidence is purely anecdotal!
Out of Africa with the Wine Book Club in July: Africa Uncorked
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I've been away on a little vacation with my awesome almost 7 year old son. We flew out to Edmonton, Alberta and enjoyed most of the time - spent in Whitecourt and a couple of trips, one through Fort Assiniboine and then one to Jasper. Not wine making country - but I do enjoy Alberta very much.img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Home_Wine_Making/~4/f2dtiyREaIw" height="1" width="1"/
By Lenn Thompson, Founder and Editor-in-Chief
As you can see, the story includes Matthews scoring at\ Lenz Winery 2005 Old Vines Chardonnay 90 points. Morgen has done a great job getting Finger Lakes producers editorial coverage in the Spectator over the last year or so -- mostly by submitting a boatload of wine to the magazine (both current releases and library wines). In her words, "The formula is simple. Wine submissions = editorial coverage. End of story." We discussed, all via Twitter, the advantages of her organization coordinating mass submissions (are you listening, Long Island Wine Council?), the differences in the two region's sizes and how great (and I agree) James Molesworth has been for the Finger Lakes. He covers the Finger Lakes for WS, by the way, with enthusiasm and fairness.
This too is wild yeast fermented with no fining or filtration.
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I’m a fan of McLaren Vale cabernet but I rarely fall for this wine - just one of those things. I like Shingleback too.
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It was a cool year in Canberra (2008) and here it’s produced a lovely riesling.
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Many wine lovers early in their education (and in their earning power) are often flummoxed by prices for wines that start to head north of $80 or $90 per bottle. Should they pursue their love of wine long enough to really learn (and see for themselves) what kind of work goes into some of the world's best vineyards, and to taste the wine that they produce, such prices no longer seem outrageous. Indeed, there are some wineries and vineyards in the world that seem to produce wines of such quality and consistency as to be nearly magical. In Europe, and especially France, such pieces of land are often given special designations, such as Grand Cru, to signify their quality.
Philip Lobley’s vineyard is at the northern end of the Yarra Valley at Glenburn. This sauvignon blanc though is from a mature vineyard at Dixon’s Creek. Lobley has a lot of wine industry experience so it’s no surprise that this wine shows such a sure hand. There’s only 25 dozen of it. If you want [...]
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It’s already July??
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Pouring at Goooooogle (includes top secret drawing)
A winery doesn't have to be around for very long before opportunities to pour their wines at public and private events start arriving. Participation in one will probably spur several more invitations. When we first started, I said "yes" as often as possible figuring that we had to get the word out about our wines. Now, 4 years after our first release, I'm still not sure I've got it figured out where it makes sense to invest our time and wine.
Sauvignon Blanc Bloom at Hyde Vineyards
Mia and I went to Hyde Vineyards to check out how the Sauvignon Blanc had set during bloom.
The weather so far this year has been a little cool, and uneven. One week it’s warm, the next it’s cold. So it’s good to get out to different vineyards and see how the weather this spring has affected bloom and ’set’ of the fruit.
The vines look really good, even down by the creek.
Mia says the clusters look small and loose. But in the next breath, she said they always look that way, and end up plumping up.
The good thing is all the clusters look even. They all bloomed at the same time, meaning there aren’t some clusters behind others in maturity. We stopped and talked with Larry Hyde, and he indicated that he thought they looked small too, but they look that way every year, then plump up.
6/18/2009 What do your clusters look like?
Baconbrook Vineyard
Butterdragon Hill Vineyard
Barbour Vineyards has just come through and leafed back the vines on Butterdragon Hill. Looking very clean.
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06/05/2009 What do your clusters look like?
6/5/09 Starting to get berry formation at Butterdragon Hill
Getting close to time to leaf the vineyard to bring back that canopy a bit on Butterdragon Hill Baconbrook is further along Baconbrook shows less vigor, undoubtedly due to less water retention in the soil
Shipping… what a pain
It just got even tougher for over 200 Napa Valley wineries. On June 1, Wine Business and others reported that New Vine Logistics (NVL) in Napa suddenly suspended operations because it had "abruptly gone into a state of financial crisis." Those 200 wineries who depended on them for order fulfillment suddenly were left in a lurch. Not only was NVL not taking any shipping orders, but even orders in process where stopped. Most of those wineries probably even had some level of inventory with NVL too. What would happen to that inventory?
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Ask any winery to identify their biggest headache and you're likely to get the answer "shipping." Shipping and fulfillment of direct sales cost more than customers think it should. It is tough to get accurate service from 3rd parties. Wineries must depend on mother nature to not freeze or boil the wine in transit. And finally, compliance with all the state and federal laws provides a minefield that is difficult to negotiate without a specialist.Copyright 2007 -ewinecentral.com. All Rights Reserved.