Your Very Own Barrel of Wine

A few months back in my weekly column Serious Grape, I was lamenting the fact that nobody was exploring the use of barrels as a way to reduce wine's carbon footprint. Lots of explanations were given as to why we don't go back to the barrels--from storage space to licensing laws. None of them struck me as insurmountable.

Happily, the folks at Red Truck Wines have decided to see just how far they can push alternative packing forward--by going back to barrels. This makes huge sense to me. And hopefully it will to you, too.

For just $29.99 (suggested retail), you will soon be able to get your very own barrel of 2007 Red Truck Red Wine, a blend of Syrah, Petite Sirah, Cabernet Franc, and Merlot. I haven't had the 2007 (yet) but previous vintages have struck me as the perfect, easy-going, fruit-forward house red. The mini-barrel, as they call it, holds the equivalent of four 750ml bottles of wine. I'm not a math whiz, but I think that works out to $7.50 a bottle. There is a tap on the side that keeps air out of the wine and the barrel is equipped with a special gizmo that means you don't have to tilt the barrel to get the last of the wine out of it. And it even has little feet, so it will sit on your cool, dark counter without rolling around. How long will the wine stay fresh? The winery says 40 days--a claim I'm eager to put to the test (although I doubt the wine will last that long).

The mini-barrels will debut this month in Sam's Club stores, and be available through other retailers within the year.

Who's headed straight to Sam's Club with me?

Wine Book Club and Wine Blogging Wednesday News

Just a few news updates today, so get out your calendars and mark down these online wine blogging events.

First, on Tuesday, October 28, we'll have the Back to School/Politics 5th edition of the Wine Book Club. Join in as bloggers and readers throughout the blogosphere review and discuss Tyler Colman's new book, Wine Politics: How Governments, Environmentalists, Mobsters, and Critics Influence the Wine We Drink (University of California Press; $18.15 through Amazon) You may know Tyler Colman as Dr. Vino, who is hands down the best wine blogger out there. But the reason to read this book is not just that he's a wine blogger--he's an expert on this subject, and I can say (halfway through the book) that his writing is every bit as engaging and provocative here as it is on his blog.

It's easy to take part--get yourself a book, read it, and join in the conversation by posting a review on your own wine, food or book blog. You can also chime in the comments here at GWU$20 or any other site taking part. Or, you can post reviews on our sites at the Wine Book Club and Shelfari. For more details, check out my announcement post.

If you are a food, wine, or book blogger, I could use your help to post a reminder about this event. Participation has really dropped off since our bang-up start in January.

In other news, the theme for Wine Blogging Wednesday #51 has been announced by our host, Joe the #1 Wine Dude. The theme involves dessert wines, and Joe would like us to find something "baked"--as in Madeirized. In Madeirized wines have been intentionally oxidized to make them brown and nutty. Because they can be hard to find (except in Hungarian and Iberian bottlings) Joe has expanded "baked" wines to include wines that have been fortified (like sherries, ports, etc.) Reviews are due on November 12, and should give us all great ideas on what to serve for holiday dinners throughout the depths of winter. Here at GWU$20 you can look forward to some reviews of rare sherries that I tasted as a guest of Bodegas Osborne this summer, as well as a dessert idea using a "baked" wine.

Have a good week everybody, and see you back here tomorrow with a new white wine review--actually, two!

Today on Serious Grape: Back to the Barrels?

Today over at Serious Grape, my weekly column on Serious Eats, I've been inspired to think about wine and the environment by fellow wine blogger and author Tyler Colman of Dr. Vino. (photo by brewrat)

I find myself much more sensitive to wine's environmental impact these days because of Colman's work. As a historian I am intrigued that we've been thinking about boxes and other new forms of packaging that might leave less of a carbon footprint than wine bottles when it comes to shipping--but we haven't been thinking as much about the very old-fashioned alternative of buying wines straight from the barrel.

I buy all kinds of things from big, bulk containers in Whole Foods that I would never imagined I would buy this way ten years ago. I can even make jam and take it home in a plastic container if I'm really serious about lowering my carbon foot print!

Why not wine?

Of course, there are probably laws standing between me and taking a clean jug to Whole Foods to be filled with red table wine. But they can be changed. What do you think? Head over and join in the discussion. If you could, would you buy wine from the barrel? If not, why not?

When Smoke Gets in Your Grapes

This summer, a series of wildfires swept through parts of California. Triggered by extremely dry conditions and dry lightning, the fires raged through parts of Northern California where grapes are grown. I was on the Mendocino/Sonoma border throughout this summer's fire season, and though were were tens of miles from the fires, we woke every morning to the smell of smoke in the air and that persisted all day. (photo of the fires in Mendocino by shellove)

At the time, I thought it was highly unlikely that the taste of the grapes would be affected by the smoke. It looks like I may be wrong.

In a story in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, Kevin McCallum reports that growers are worrying because their fruit is giving off unusual odors. Scientists are currently analyzing the juice from Mendocino grapes to test for smoke taint. There is some concern that even low levels of smoke taint in the grapes will be amplified in the flavors during fermentation. While winemakers can use all kind of sophisticated filtering to get rid of some of the undesirable flavors out of the wine, at this point no one is clear about the extent of the problem or what--if anything--to do about it.

One of the questions I have is about how our famously subjective tastebuds will factor into this developing situation. Are some people going to taste smoke when they taste 2008 Mendocino and Anderson Valley wines? Will these tasters be in the majority? Or, like cork taint, will smoke be something that many tasters can't even detect in the wines?

It's too early to tell at this point. What I know for sure is that there's not much that will keep me away from continuing to buy North Coast and Mendocino favorites from vineyards like Navarro (which was only a mile and a half from some of the worst fires this summer). If anyone has any thoughts on this issue from a scientific, tastebud, or environmental perspective, please share them. I'm still kind of amazed that the grapes weren't able to flush any smoke that got into their tissues back out again over the course of the growing season.

A Glimpse Into the Future of Wine at Taste3

Wondering what the future of wine might look like?

I recently applied for and received a fellowship to attend Taste3, the annual meeting at Copia sponsored by Robert Mondavi Winery that celebrates food, wine, and the arts. This year's conference was bittersweet for many in attendance, since it was the first conference to take place after the passing of Robert Mondavi just a few months ago. I listened to presentations by people who are shaping the future of wine right now, and wanted to share my reaction to their presentations while they were still fresh in my mind. I'm sure I'll be returning to many of these topics in greater depth in upcoming months. (photo of Barry Schuler and audience members after his presentation in the Copia Auditorium at Taste3)

I've categorized the wine message of Taste3 into four themes: tradition, sustainability, science, and activism. Not surprisingly, these were also the take-home points for the food and art portions of the program as well.

Tradition: There is a real interest in preserving traditional ways of growing and producing food and wine, which is not surprising. It's also something I applaud wholeheartedly -- I am a historian, after all, and I hate it when the past is forgotten. I am profoundly grateful for people like Serge Hochar of Château Musar (pictured to the right) who play a key role in preserving and maintaining wine traditions that might otherwise, through neglect and ignorance, fall by the wayside and be forgotten. Drinking old vintages of Château Musar from 1970 and 1975, and listening to Mr. Hochar talking about emptying a bottle of wine while bombs fell all around his house in Lebanon just a few years ago brings home the lengths to which people will sometimes go to preserve what they value and love. Hochar views his wine as a miracle, and the direct descendant of Biblical miracles, which is why he was not at all surprised the next morning when he went out of his house and saw that it was one of the few that wasn't damaged by the fighting--the wine had miraculously saved him.

Science: What is surprising to me is that wine traditions are so often seen as antithetical to science. This viewpoint is framed by a false nostalgia for a viticultural past that never was. Winemakers, grape growers, and merchants have always been profoundly interested in "science" (or what constituted it at the time). By setting up a "winner takes all" situation where we must choose between science and tradition, I wonder if we are dooming ourselves to even more trouble.To really move forward we are going to have to sort out the vexed relationship between tradition and science--not just when it comes to wine, but food as well. I found myself with a strange case of intellectual whiplash after being both attracted and repulsed by Barry Schuler's discussion of wine and genomics. (image from PinotBlog.com) Schuler was one of the people who told us that the internet would change our lives and he was right. Now he's telling us that mapping Pinot Noir's genome is going to change our lives, too. He's got a good track record in the predictions department, but I wonder if these changes will be for the better. He likened the mapping of the genome to the monolith moment in 2001: A Space Odyssey, and suggested that mastering the blueprints of living organisms was the next step in humanoid evolution. Schuler argued that no one wanted to produce what he called "Frankenoir," but that we can and will be able to improve vinifera stock, make them more disease resistant, design varieties for higher yields, expand their climate windows, and modify them to produce better flavors and aromas. Hmm. If that's not Frankenoir, I'd like to know what would qualify. His most provocative statement came near the end, when he stated his belief that mapping grape genomes will enable us to scientifically isolate and characterize "terroir" which he feels is lying there in grape gene adaptations, just waiting to be sequenced.

Sustainability: Barry Schuler introduced the issue of climate change and grape growing in his talk about the Pinot Noir genome, and that conversation continued in presentations by UC Davis professor Roger Boulton and Southern Oregon University professor Greg Jones. In a nutshell, climate change foregrounds the problem of sustainability in grape growing and wine making. Growing grapes and making wine, as Jones reminded the audience, are intimately connected to climate and are influenced by climate variability. As this map made with Jones's data shows, with temperatures continuing to rise throughout the world, grapes such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Sangiovese, and Zinfandel will continue to be grown because they like warmer temperatures. (map from newscientist.com) Riesling and Cabernet Franc (both of which have thrive in a wide variety of climate ranges) may grow in popularity as once beloved grapes fall out of cultivation (this was my conclusion, not his). But wineries are going to have to think about how to sustain their production at a time when climate and water are raising difficult issues. Boulton's presentation on sustainable wineries pointed out the huge amounts of water wineries use in tasks you and I aren't even thinking about like washing equipment. He also highlighted the enormous carbon footprint left by making glass wine bottles. When we think "sustainable" we may think using organic growing methods but we had better start factoring glass and water into the equation as well. The time for packaging alternatives, systematic water reclamation, and the use of alternative energy sources in wine production is NOW.

Activism: Which brings us to you, and me, and the choices we make (or refuse to make) when choosing wine to put on our tables. After seeing artist Chris Jordan's provocative and inspiring work that puts our single, individual decision to take a paper bag at the grocery store or a plastic cup on an airplane and multiplies into a more global perspective, I came to the realization that none of us has to do a giant thing to make a difference. When it comes to preserving tradition, or figuring out where we stand on science, or promoting sustainability, all we have to do is a small thing. We just have to do it consistently. Some of us will find that our one little decision will go on to change hundreds of lives. This is what Bruce Gutlove discovered when he left Napa to consult for a few days at the Coco Farm and Winery in Japan, which was started in the late 1960s to give mentally challenged youth and adults a chance to work on a collaborative project and lead productive lives at a time when their only alternative was a state-run institution with bars on the window. Gutlove departed from Napa in 1989. He's still in Japan, he's still at Coco Farm, and he's still working with his students to make wine now served at official state functions in the building pictured above. The importance of individual decisions was driven home by Benjamin Wallace, known to most people as the author of The Billionaire's Vinegar and the GQ story where he tracked down "the very best" in everything including cars, toilets, and wine. Both of those stories, in his retelling of them at Taste3, served as cautionary tales for what happens when we mindlessly assume that the most expensive thing on the shelf is actually worth it, and that we must have it to prove our own importance. Bottom line: it's usually not worth it. If you're spending $30K per night on a hotel room, perhaps you could find something more productive to do with that money such as donating it to Coco Farm and Winery?

I left Taste3 fired up and inspired to learn more about how people in the past had grappled with sustainability issues, make a difference in the growing crisis of climate change through small changes in my daily wine life, and address (rather than avoid) my fears about genetically modified grapes. And I left with a renewed commitment not to waste money needlessly on things that don't really matter when there is so much wrong with the world that really does matter. The future belongs to us and to our children. And everything we do and don't do now shapes that future--and that includes the wine we buy and drink. That was the take-home message of Taste3.

Anderson Valley Fire Update

The sun wasn't orange today at 7 am, which was the first sign I had that things may be improving on the weather/fire front in Mendocino County and the Anderson Valley. When I took my walk, the sky was blue and the purple marine layer was sitting out on the horizon.

Yesterday I talked to people from several Anderson Valley wineries, including Londer and Handley. They said that so far everybody is ok in and around their immediate area. The tasting rooms are open, and though the air is likely to be smokey through Thursday the situation in the Anderson Valley is improving. Boonville, at the southeastern edge of the valley close to Highway 101 is a bit congested with firetrucks and there was a road closure last night related to fighting the Mountain View Road fire, but that situation has eased as of noon today.

At present the Mendocino fires are 38% contained, and the number of fires burning currently is down to 123. A red flag warning for the county, which was posted for fear there would be more dry lightning strikes, was recently lifted. The 100% containment of the large Walker fire in Lake County has freed up firefighters for Mendocino County. That extra manpower, combined with the colder temperatures and higher humidity, is making the difference.

If you are traveling to any vineyards in the area over the next few days, it's best to call ahead and make sure that all is ok before heading out. Fingers crossed that the situation will continue to improve over the next few days. Thanks to everybody for their messages, and their good wishes.

Fire Report: Mendocino, Anderson Valley, Lake County

We woke up once again to a thick, orange haze and the smell of smoke in the air. It is our 2nd day of air quality warnings. And we're not even in the fire zone--we're in the evacuation zone.

For those of you who haven't heard, lightning strikes over the weekend set off more than 100 fires in the region, and they spread due to intensely dry conditions and stiff winds. More than 19000 acres have been burned in Mendocino County, and another 9000 have been burned in Lake County. And there are more fires (842 at last count) throughout northern California, as this map shows:


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Here in my part of the world, the northern Sonoma coast where it touches Mendocino County, volunteer fire crews and California Department of Forestry firefighters have been working to battle the blazes in nearby residential, agricultural, and viticultural areas.

If you are a wine lover and have ever had a wine by Handley, Esterlina, Claudia Springs, Husch, Roederer, Pacific Echo, Londer, Navarro, Standish, or Greenwood Ridge--please think good thoughts for these families and businesses since they are within 3 miles of the 1400 acre/5% contained Navarro fire.


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Wherever you are, consider supporting your local firefighters and their efforts today. It only takes a strike of lightning to make you realize how much depends on them and their professionalism in a time of crisis.

Those of you interested in following the story can keep track of recent developments via the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat, which is providing excellent coverage.

Organic Wine Week, Part 2: Pinot Noir

My second organic wine pick for this week involves Pinot Noir--which still seems to be everyone's favorite red variety. There's a lot to like about it, so it's not surprising. They're flavorful, rich without being heavy, and pair well with a wide variety of foods.

So when the folks at Cooper Mountain asked if I'd like to try their latest vintage of Pinot Noir I said yes. Cooper Mountain Vineyards are in the Willamette Valley, perched on the slopes of an extinct volcano in Oregon. Robert and Corrine Gross started the vineyards in 1978 and began bottling their own wine in 1987. Robert Gross always explored alternative methods of treating his medical patients--he's a psychiatrist, a homeopath, and an acupuncturist--and his fondness for the road less traveled in his career can also be seen in his wine work. Within a few years, Gross became interested in sustainable, alternative farming and began to convert the vineyards to organic methods. They were certified organic in 1995 (the second vineyard in Oregon to achieve this status), and four years later received their biodynamic Demeter certification.

The wine I sampled, the 2006 Cooper Mountain Vineyards Cooper Hill Pinot Noir, was a light bodied, cheerful wine with excellent QPR. ($15-$17 through online merchants) Made with organic, biodynamic grapes, the wine tasted very pure to me, with lots of cherry and raspberry aromas and flavors that were intense and lively. The wine had Pinot's distinctive silky character, and after you swallowed down all those fruity flavors there was a nice fresh taste in your mouth that reminded me of the smell of a wet garden. Like most Oregon Pinot Noirs that I've tasted, this wine is not opulent and rich but cool and restrained--like Grace Kelley. It's a young wine, with refreshing acidity at its core and I found that the cherry had turned to black cherry and the raspberry to blackberry after I recorked it and left it on the counter for 24 hours. This suggested to me that this is a wine that will continue to develop with age. But it's delightful right now, so you shouldn't wait to try this one. And the price is amazing for a wine that is organic, small production, and so darn tasty.

We had the Cooper Mountain Pinot Noir with some BBQ shrimp and cheese grits made with shrimp tossed in some homemade red sauce with bourbon and spices and some creamy grits laced with extra sharp cheddar cheese. The acidity really cut through the red BBQ sauce, and the purity of the fruit flavors didn't clash with the spices. This summer, if you've got plans to BBQ, get yourself some of this wine.

Cooper Mountain makes a wide range of organic, biodynamic wines including Pinot Gris, Malbec, and several different Pinot Noirs. If you want confirmation from another blogger that Cooper Mountain is a winery to watch, check out Jeff Lefevere's review over at Good Grape. This is a winery that may not be on your radar screen, but it should be. Their wines are further proof of the numerous affordable, delicious choices that are out there if you would like to make organic and biodynamic wine choices.

Organic Wine Week, Part 1: Chardonnay

This week I'm focusing on a pair of organic wines to highlight the increasingly wide range of options consumers have if they want to drink wine that has been made with organic grapes.

There was a time when wines made with organic grapes were difficult to find, but that is certainly not true any more. In fact, you are probably drinking wine made with organic grapes and not even realizing it. One of the things that has struck me is that some wines don't identify themselves as using organic grapes on their labels.

One of the reasons for this may be that current regulations require that a wine labeled "Organic" must not only be made with organic grapes, there must be no added sulfites. Sulfites are added to wines to help stabilize them for shipping and storage, so it's pretty hard to find a wine that is "Organic." It's far more common to find a wine that is made "with organic grapes." If you look at the tiny type at the bottom of the Jeriko label, you will see that it indicates that organic grapes were used. Wines labeled in this fashion have been made with certified organic fruit, but do have sulfites added for stability. If you want to find out more about organic wine, visit the Organic Wine Company and read up on their notes regarding how wines are classified.

My latest recommendation for a white wine made with certified organic grapes is the 2005 Jeriko Estate Chardonnay. ($19.99, WineQ) Jeriko Estate now uses only certified, organically grown grapes in their wines, all of which are grown in vineyards in Mendocino County. This was a creamy chardonnay that gets its body from partial malolactic fermentation in oak, and its crispness from a majority of fermentation time spent in stainless steel tanks. It was a pleasant bright straw in color, and had aromas of summer orchard fruits like pear and apple, and some late summer hay. The flavors you will find in this wine are of apples and cream, with a faintly buttery aftertaste. All in all, I found this a nicely made example of a creamy, California Chardonnay with good QPR. It will appeal to anyone who likes a richer style of chardonnay, but one that is still fresh and crisp.

With a wine like this, there is nothing better (in my opinion) than oven-fried chicken and slaw. I like the recipe for buttermilk-dipped, pan-browned, and oven-fried chicken from Cooking Light which tastes every bit as decadent as the real thing but leads to only a fraction of the guilt afterwards. The creamy, tangy buttermilk and caramelized flour coating is a perfect pairing for a creamy Chardonnay like this one. And for the slaw, do yourself a favor and try this one with dried cherries, sweetly spicy pecans, apples, cabbage, and a vinegar-based dressing. I cheated and picked up a package of already sweet and spicy pecans from Trader Joe's, and only used green cabbage, by the way, and it was fine. The apples in the slaw really pick up the apple notes in the Chardonnay.

As I get older I'm finding I care more and more about the environment. I stopped drinking bottled water, I'm buying a hybrid car, and I'm eating more organic, locally produced food. It's a good thing to be able to extend this philosophy into my wine drinking, with such tasty results.

How Green Is Your Wine?

Wine leaves an enormous carbon footprint each time we drink it--unless we try to drink more locally- produced bottles. That's what blogger, teacher, author, and now NYTimes op-ed writer Tyler Colman contends in his thought-provoking piece on wine and environmentalism. (photograph by Andrea S. Neumann)

I find that I am not sad to see wines with Stelvin closures, but I must confess that I will be sad the day (and given the carbon footprint issue it seems inevitable) when wine is not bottled any longer, but Tetra-paked.

We can stave off the inevitable a little longer, however, by doing what Dr. Vino suggests and trying to drink more local wine. Everybody has vineyards near them--trust me. I grew up in suburban Philly and there was a winery outside New Hope, PA. Not the epicenter of the wine universe, but still. The point remains that we could all do something to offset our foreign wine purchases by seeking out, and then supporting, local wine.

If you are on the west coast and want to know more, why not sign up for Tyler's class at UC Berkeley on February 23? He'll be discussing just this issue, and leading you to some great new wines that just may help to save the planet.