The “Just Right” Temperature!

 

I have written before about the importance of serving temperatures for wine but I had two experiences last week that made me think it was time to bring the whole subject up once again.  While I was enjoying two wines on two separate occasions the circumstances around enjoying each of them meant there was quite a bit of time between the first glass and the second.  The second glass was so profoundly different in taste compared to the first glass due only to a little breathing time and a change in temperature. And while I know very well how temperature can dramatically change the taste of a wine -so much so that the subject of temperature is a big part of our wine education when touring with clients - it had been a long time since I had been in a position to taste a good wine at the wrong temperature.  Wow what an eye opener!

In both instances they were  local wines.  One was a Syrah and the other a Sauvignon Blanc.  In the case of the Syrah it was first tasted  at 55 degrees and by the time I got back to the wine it was now closer to 65 degrees.  I usually like my reds a bit cooler but in this case this wine really popped at the warmer temperature!  The bold fruit was bright and concentrated and the smoky black pepper nuances were a wonderful contrast with the sweetness of the fruit and made the whole wine sing in my mouth.  The way the wine sat on my tongue was almost like velvet and I savored every sip allowing each mouthful to spend ample time saturating my very happy palette. In the case of the Sauvignon Blanc my first taste was at about 58 degrees and the second taste was a good 15 degrees cooler. I like my whites - providing they are well crafted wines as this was -a bit warmer then most wine drinkers.  Usually around 55 degrees.  In this case the first glass was silky smooth and had the most beautiful nectarine and honey combined with the typical grapefruit taste characteristics you get with Sauv Blanc. The first glass had so much going on and there was layers of flavors and aromas that were just delightful. The whole wine was well balanced with just the right acid and fruit. I thought the wine was at the perfect temperature and not wanting it to get any warmer, put it in the fridge for what I thought would be just a few minutes, but by the time I got back to enjoy another glass, the wine  had cooled significantly.  The wine was now almost all grapefruit and acid and the interesting, subtle, softer flavor nuances of honey and nectarine were just a memory.  Wow! This wine had gone from a really interesting wine with so much to enjoy to a one dimensional taste experience!

Little things matter when it comes to getting the most out of your wines. Temperature is so important and easy to manage and serving our wines at the best temperature is of the things we can do to really make our quality wines shine! 

40th annual Greatest of the Grape Awards

Last Saturday, the 40^th annual Greatest of the Grape event was held at the Seven Feathers Resort in Canyonville and as usual everyone had a great time. Sometimes at events like this I wonder who has more fun and who comes to the event with more anticipation, the ticket holders or the exhibitors.

This is the biggest wine event of the year for the Umpqua Valley and Southern Oregon and after 40 years it has the reputation as a not to be missed party. For the wine makers and food purveyors who are involved, it is a chance to show off their talents and hopefully receive some recognition for their artistry, creativity and just plain hard work! The goal is for the wineries to showcase their best wines and local chefs to pair their best culinary treats to specific wines. The result for attendees is a sensory overload  calling for a day or two recuperation.   For those chefs and vintners who particularly please, awards are given and bragging rights determined.

The awards given at this event fall into two categories. The peoples choice awards and those awards given by a panel of guest wine judges. The wine judging by the professionals is done a few weeks before the event and the results tallied and kept secret. The peoples choice awards are voted on right there at the event. The results from both judgings are announced at the end of the evening so the entire four hours, 7-11 is filled with anticipation and excitement.

This year some of the most notable awards are as follows:

UCC Culinary School won the Judges Award for the best food and Tomaselli's came in second place. The professional judges awarded Spangler Vineyards a Platinum for their 2008 Malbec. Gold medals went to Giardet for their 2008 Zinfandel and to Bradley Vineyards for their 2008 Dry Riesling. Silver medals were awarded to Brandborg Vineyards & Winery 2008 Pinot Gris, Anindor Vineyards 2007 Pinot Gris, Misty Oaks Vineyard 2008 Pinot Gris and Melrose Vineyards 2008 Viognier.

The peoples choice awards for best white was award to Trium Winery located in the Rogue Valley for their 2008 Pinot Gris and the second best white wine choice by the people was for Becker Vineyard 2009 Muller Thurgau. The peoples choice for the Best Red was Palotai Vineyard's 2008 Atilla and Abacela Winery 2005 Tempranillo Reserve came in second place. The top honor of the event, The Greatest of the Grape Award, went to Spangler Vineyards 2008 Malbec.

Huge congratulations to the award winners. And to all of those who worked so very hard to put this event together. Keeping the Greatest of the Grape tradition alive for 40 years is a huge accomplishment and speaks to the commitment of our wineries and restaurants. Not to mention the commitment of those wine lovers who can not imagine missing the yearly event! For those who did not attend,  make a trip to the wineries to sample these award wining wines. And you might want to hurry before they are sold out!

Show some support

Visiting a tasting room to sample wine is a very unique experience.  Certainly each winery has a different personality and each vintner has a different wine making style but the winery experience is unique in another way as well.  It is one of the only places you can go and sample a consumable product before buying.  And here in the Umpqua Valley very often this can be done for free.

The purpose of a tasting room is to sell wine. For most of our local wineries the winery is the only place you can buy their wines.  In this day and age when everything is expensive, this tradition of free samples at the winery can only be found in smaller wine regions.  Complimentary tasting in Napa and most parts of California is just not available anymore.  With an insiders knowledge of just what it entails to produce a bottle of wine, most would be asking why any winery can still be this generous. 

The process of producing wine is lengthy and expensive.  Here in Douglas County all of our local wineries are vineyards too.  To begin the process of selling a bottle of wine, one must first purchase the land.   The land then needs to be cleared and made suitable for planting. It is at least three years before the vines are mature enough to produce grapes ready for wine and after the laborious and sometimes expensive chore of picking the grapes, it is several months before the whites are ready and up to several years for the reds. The equipment used to make wine is extraordinarily expensive with barrels commonly used for aging reds costing between $400.00 and upwards of $1000.00.  Stainless steel tanks often used for whites are thousands of dollars and the farm equipment for the managing of the vineyard is another expense. For at least the first five years and in many cases longer there is a huge investment in both time, money and energy.  Our farmer/ wine makers are up to the whim of mother nature and she can present a whole range of difficulties which translate into less fruit for wine, cutting in to the potential return on investment.

If you consider the going rate for all the man hours that go into the production of just one bottle of wine and add that to the cost of the equipment necessary in the wine making process, a bottle of wine here in the Umpqua Valley  easily costs over $100 to produce.  Considering most wines range from $15-$40 this is an unbeatable value.  It is the free time and labor of the winemaker and his family and the focus on the long term that allows us the consumer to get such a bargain!

So for those of us who visit a winery and are offered and accept complimentary tastings remember just what is being served to you.  This is some ones life.  There is a saying in the winery industry that is common knowledge among wine makers and it is no joke, “If you want to make a small fortune in the wine industry start with a large one.” You may ask yourself why they do it. And that would be a fair question.  The answer is just one more unique part of the winery experience.  These wine makers are absolutely passionate about what they do.  Winemakers look to the future and  hope the investment pays off and in the mean time continue to practice their art and love of making wine.  We need to be mindful of this when we visit.  And we need to show our appreciation as well as our support for their hard work and generosity by purchasing a bottle of two.  Proper tasting room etiquette suggests when tasting for free a purchase of at least one bottle is appropriate. If we take their passion and generosity for granted, it might just disappear.

From Vine to Bottle

 

Last Thursday  was a  terrific day!  I was invited to attend the bottling session at Spangler Vineyards in Winston.  A number of Spangler wines were ready for the final step in the process of turning fruit to wine and the bottling truck had been ordered for the day. 

Some wineries have their own bottling equipment but many especially smaller wineries where winery space is at a premium opt to hire a bottling truck when the time comes for this important step.  This mobile assembly line is housed in the back of a big truck  that can be driven to any winery location at any time. Contained inside is the equipment necessary for getting the wine into the bottles, the corks inserted, the capsules on top (that’s the foil that covers the top and neck of the bottle) and the labels adhered to the front and back of each bottle.

I arrived late morning and by the time I got there things were well on their way.  Volunteers were scattered about in the truck along the assembly line each with one job assignment. Some were responsible for putting a cork atop each bottle and others were packing the completed bottles into cases while others were sealing the boxes and stacking them on to pallets.  I could not help envision that famous I Love Lucy episode where she and Ethel are working in the candy factory and the assembly line starts to speed up way beyond their ability to keep up. Candy is flying and Lucy and Ethel are in a panic! Of course nothing like that occurred this time and I am happy to report everything appeared to go off without a hitch.

After I spent some time witnessing the well orchestrated bottling, Pat Spangler was able to slip away for a bit and we ended up in the tasting room to try a few wines.  I am a huge fan of Pat’s wines.  Big, bold well rounded reds and lovely, well finessed, fruity whites.  I so appreciate the attention given to subtle oak and in some cases as in his Chardonnay, no oak at all.  Pat is a master blender and over the years honed his craft of bringing just the right wines together in just the right amounts to really take them to a world class level.  The medals, awards and accolades his wines realize are too numerous to mention here but are evidence of his talents.  I went home with Malbec, Petite Sirah, Cab Franc, Syrah, Cabernet Sauvignon and his beautiful Sauvignon Blanc.

And to top off the wonderful time spent at Spangler Vineyards, my husband and I had another terrific experience.  Needing lunch and wanting to try something new we stopped at the new Indian restaurant, Flavors of India, located right by Big Lots in Roseburg.   With the guidance of both Jessica our delightful waitress and Raghu owner/chef we ordered several different dishes and each one was excellent.  We had enough left over for dinner that night so we were able to take our delicious day into the evening.

I can not tell you how happy I was to hear of an Indian restaurant opening here.  Growing up and living in a more diverse area finding restaurants featuring foods from all over the world was as almost as easy as finding a Mc Donalds.  And I took advantage of the availability of such culinary diversity by making Vietnamese, Korean, Indian,Thai and Japanese foods, mainstays in my diet. For me I feel very much about food as I do about wine.  Variety is the spice of life.  We certainly have that in our wines.  So glad to see us moving in that direction with our restaurants.

Wine or Weddings?

Most of us have never really given much thought to winery zoning and all that these regulations entail.  We visit a winery to taste wine or to attend an event  and we enjoy the uniqueness of the winery setting often as much as we enjoy the uniqueness of the wines. But for some, the consideration of what constitutes wine related business and farm use and how different wineries are adhering to the zoning laws has weighed heavily on their minds.

It seems there has been much confusion within the winery industry over what types of events Oregon wineries are legally allowed to host and what percentage of a winery’s revenue can come from non wine events such as weddings and parties. So last week the Oregon legislature passed the bill 1055 which will bring uniformity to a patchwork of local and state regulations spelling out what events are allowed at wineries and how much nonwine sales are permitted. 

Over the years farm and environmental groups  have expressed concern that events such as weddings and concerts were not part of exclusive farm-use zoning.  The worry was that as the wine industry grows and the popularity of the winery setting as a venue for all sorts of different gatherings - many unrelated to winemaking or grape growing -would quickly begin to erode the specific intent of exclusive-farm-use zoning.

In working on the bill, wine growers said they wanted to preserve the time-honored nature of rural vineyards and wineries and prevent them from becoming event centers, yet also provide opportunities for creating a sustainable bottom line.

All three interests — agriculture, environmental and wine growers — had  a say in crafting the bill which defines "incidental activity" at wineries as private events that promote the sale of its wines. It also limits sales of catered food and nonwine items to 25 percent of on-site retail wine sales.

I think it is a good thing to have clarification on the subject and it sounds like the bill was a darn good compromise between all those with an interest in the outcome.  No doubt there will be wineries who will take issue with the restrictions.  Some of the bigger, more commercial and corporate owned wineries who depend heavily on the revenue generated from events but are not zoned for commercial/tourism,  will certainly have to make changes. But for those vintners who are truly committed to the craft and art of winemaking this will have little to no affect.  Especially here in the Umpqua Valley where our family owned wineries devote their time to the production of quality wine and not to the production of…productions!  Here in our magical world of the small winery and the hands on winemaker, wine life continues on just as before.  And we like it that way!