Balance and Wine

I get a lot of people asking for more wine opriented opinions and info since I am in the, uh, wine business. To honor those requests, here's a little opinion based on a recent experience....
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Balance. Karma. Yin & yang. Whatever you want to call it, the fact that life is always fair and balanced (FOX News notwithstanding) has been proven to me during a trip over the weekend that w, C-boy and I took to meet her family down in the Russian River Valley. As you know carving out time for leisure pursuits with a 17 month old is no easy task. But we did manage to hit a few wineries. One of our first stops was at Joseph Swan Vineyards, one of California's old school and best known zinfandel producers. We went w's sis & bro-in-law and their 2 year old (talk about tempting fate!) and had one of the best tasting experiences in Cali I've had in years. Swan has been around for decades. Their "new" winemaker who took over when Joe Swan died is 60 years old if that tells you anything. The swan zins are all about restraint, pure berry flavors, and balance. Chris in the tasting room couldn't have been more welcoming, and oh, yeah, the tasting was FREE for several generous samples of some truly great juice. Their 2006 "Zeigler Vineyard" was without question the best zin I've had in a long, long time, and it was a quite reasonable $26 a bottle. I happily stuck a few bottles in my shipper to bring back. And as you can see C-boy was quite comfortable in the Swan cellars....

Then, proving life's balance, there was Martinelli Winery (not the apple juice producer) . Not a new producer, but a semi-recent critical darling of Parker's Wine Advocate who always raves about their powerful, extracted, super-intense pinots and zinfandels while showering them with 90+ point scores. I hadn't had a Martinelli wine before, but it was close to the house we rented so we decided to drop on by. We walked in to their tasting room which was over-flowing with hideous, tasteless wine gewgaws. We stepped up to their counter, where pretension was running so thick you could cut it with a knife. They offered two levels of wine tasting. We chose (thank god) the cheaper $5 a person sampling, and proceeded to be served five tiny samples of some of the worst, thickest, gag-a-licious wines I have ever had the displeasure of sampling. A 95 point chardonnay that was so thick and oaky it was virtually undrinkable if you didn't have a lumber fetish. Then on to their two pinots, which the officious tasting room lady, as if quoting directly from Parker described as "powerful fruit bombs". Well, frankly, "powerful" and "fruit bomb" aren't two words I usually want associated with pinot noir, and these 15.5%+ pinots would've been better served poured over pancakes. They finished with a zin that was totally out of balance, too extracted, and my comment to my brother-in-law was "they should be serving cold IPA's on the way out the door to clear our palates". Even with the tiny samples served w didn't finish any of hers. Now the best part, at least for Martinelli, was the wine all ran 2 to 3 times the price of the actually enjoyable to drink Joseph Swan bottles. Which I guess is to Martinelli's credit, since they have ego-driven, palate-impaired wine geeks tripping all over themselves to buy them. Also C-boy had the good taste to not consent to have his picture taken at Martinelli! Joseph Swan and Martinelli....balance achieved.

Cellar report: 2003 Owen Roe "Walla Walla- Isadore Vineyard" Cabernet Sauvignon...drinker beware!

Once again I was reminded of the frailty of the new style American red wine. You know the wine I'm talking about. Those super-ripe, rich, and high octane behemoths that seemingly are de rigueur in the Wine Spectator and Wine Advocate if you have any hope of attaining the 90+ point score that is the holy grail for American winemakers. I get it. A high score leads to two tangible benefits: the wine is so much easier to sell, plus you can jack your prices up because there is a certain sad, needy segment of the wine buying public who just have to have those bottles. And from experience I can tell you that in blind tastings, which is how the Spectator and Advocate supposedly do much of their scoring, these big bruisers will always stand out as impressive over the more nuanced, better balanced, and more age worthy reds.

The downside, as I was reminded last night, is that wines that should easily age for 10+ years are already toppling over the Cliffs of Drinkability at just 6 years of age. I took a bottle of 2003 Owen Roe "Walla Walla- Isadore Vineyard" Cabernet Sauvignon to an otherwise stellar dinner at Bar Avignon (their bavette steak, exquisitely tender and perfectly cooked, may be the current top piece of beef in PDX) last night with my good friend Jake. Now there is practically no one in our local wine biz who has my respect more than Owen Roe's absurdly talented leader David O'Reilly. Which is why it was somewhat shocking that this $40+ cab (back in 2003) was already edging over the freshness line. It was still deeply colored, rich, and quite delicious. But the vibrancy of the fruit was already starting to slip away, and in a wine still to young to develop those treasured secondary aromas and flavors that are the reward for wine dorks like who cellar these bottles for several years. This in a wine that The Wine Spectator rated at 90 points and said "Best from 2007 through 2014." I wish I had popped the cork about 2 years ago and enjoyed it while it was still bursting with youthful exuberance. It was like a 40 year old guy who suddenly starts to develop senility. He's just too damn young, isn't he?

It just proves what I've been discovering more and more, which is that this new style of American red wine, which demands a 14% or 15%+ alcohol level from letting the grapes get so ripe, while undeniably delicious and hedonistic drinking experiences while young, just don't have the acid and tannin balance to ensure longevity. As I tweeted about this one "Great 5 yr. wines, after that, drinker beware!" Which really is a fucking shame considering the prices being asked, which start at $40 and rapidly escalate. No wonder my cellar is filled with southern French and Italian wines. Half the price, incredible food affinity (thank you acidity and tannin and moderate alcohol levels), and possessed of so much more potential.