Fermentation: The Daily Wine Blog

FERMENTATION Readers Don't Like Strawberry Ice Cream

Just who are you readers of FERMENTATION?

-You are overwhelmingly male
-Spread across the age spectrum
-Make pretty good money
-Are very well educated
-Probably married
-There's a 50/50 chance you work in or around the wine industry
-Are heavy wine drinkers
-Are likely to spend on average more than $15 on a bottle of wine
-Don't really like your strawberry ice cream
-Prefer imported autos
-Are likely a dog, rather than a cat, person
-Prefer substantive reading over gossip

Not that surprising, but interesting.

We received a total of 157 responses during the week-long survey of FERMENTATION readers.

You can see the results by clicking here.

Among the deeper and more interesting findings:

-DAILY WINE DRINKERS are more likely to be older, own more wine and prefer Paris over the beach.

-DRINKERS SPENDING $20 OR MORE ON A BOTTLE have higher incomes, more education, less likely to be in the wine business, like their Mercedes and prefer the beach over Paris

-VANILLA ICE CREAM LOVERS tend to be more educated, less likely to work in the wine business, are dog people and are twice as likely to prefer People Magazine

STRAWBERRY ICE CREAM LOVERS tend to be older, less educated, less likely to be married, spend less on wine, more likely to be cat people, and more likely to prefer Paris over the beach.

CAT LOVING  READERS tend to be older, more likely to live on the West Coast, have slightly more education, own more wine, prefer Paris and are decidedly New Yorker readers.

DOG LOVING READER are much more likely to live in fly-over country, Spend more on their wine purchases, more likely to prefer vanilla and more likely to read Time Magazine.

I want to thank everyone who took the time to complete the survey. Interesting stuff. I'm trying to get to know FERMENTATION readers better. This helps. THANKS!

Champagne that Glows as Well as Sparkles?

I'm not sure what to make of this:

"Greenpeace today revealed that France's iconic sparkling wine, Champagne, is threatened by radioactive contamination leaking from a nuclear waste dumpsite in the region. Low levels of radioactivity have already been found in underground water less than 10 km from the famous Champagne vineyards....The Champagne producers are facing two nuclear timebombs - one already leaking at Soulaine, and one planned at Bure. The wine producers in the Rhone region stood up to the nuclear state in France and won. The Champagne region needs to act fast before it's too late,"

Essentially, Greenpeace is suggesting not so subtly that Champagne is about to glow as well as sparkle if something isn't done about the nuclear waste sites in the Champagne region.

If learned one fundamental truth in my years working in wine PR it's "Vintage Champagne=Good" and "Radioactive Champagne=bad".

However, I've also learned that the best way to get a people's attention, after offering them free money, is to scare the shit out of them. Though I"m not a scientist, I get the funny feeling this claim is the latter.

In California we've not had a debate on nuclear energy or nuclear waste in a couple decades. Nuclear Energy simply isn't politically viable in California. That may change if the price of energy continues to rise in the state. Yet if this happens, I'm pretty sure Napa, Sonoma, Mendocino, Santa Barbara and Monterey's wine regions are likely safe.

A Witness to the Tasting

I suspect we'll be seeing more of this in the wine writing world in the weeks to come. Scott Tracy is the sommelier at La Toque in Napa Valley and very well known for his expertise. He also maintains a blog and has written about his experience at the recent re-enactment of the Paris Tasting. It turns out that Scott poured and worked the tasting.

Scott's a pretty astute guy and mentions something that I never thought of when writing earlier about the run up to the tasting and the controversy surrounding it (some didn't want the tasting to be done blind): Scot speculates that some very high end CA wineries didn't want to participate, not because they didn't want to be tasted blind against the French wines, but because they didn't want to be tasted at all against their own CA comrades in winemaking.

This makes perfect sense. Why would Screaming Eagle under any circumstances want to be bested by a CA winery that sells its Cab for $100 less? It's the same reasoning that keeps the big name, big prices wineries from entering the many well run wine competitions across the country.

In any case, Scott's post, and blog, is well worth a read if you are interested in an insider's view of the re-enactment. Also coming in to print this week is Dan Berger's article in his Vintage Experiences newsletter. Dan was a judge at the tasting.

Wine Law Heftyman Takes to Blogging

If you are a wine blog reader you've probably noticed that most of what's being written in the wine blog world is mostly produced by wine lover, rather than wine insiders, let alone wine insiders of any heft. We have few blogs that are written by wine writing pros and some winemaker blogs. So it's nice to see an insider with great heft contributing to a blog.

The heftyman is Corbin Houchins.

Corbin is one of America's leading wine lawyers. He's one of the two or three lawyers and experts on goes to if you want to understand no merely what the law is, but how the law is likely to be made. Hutchins is guest blogging now and again at the Ship Compliant Blog where issues of wine shipping and consumers sales across state lines is explored in great depth.

Houchin's most recent post there concerns the implications of a preliminary junction handed down in a Texas cases in which the nations wine retailers are looking to open up that market, and the national market, to direct sales from retailers.

In nearly every case and every political battle that concerns the ability for consumers to buy wine direct from out-of-state entities retailers have been left out of the fix. Corbin address the legal and precedent complexities of  the recent Granholm V. Heald decision as well as past precedent setting decisions by that court. If you are in the wine industry or have an interest in the state of the legal wrangling surrounding this issue, this is a must read.

EncycloWine

I'm a fan of Wikipedia. I like the idea of a constantly updating encyclopedia at my fingertips, despite the rap that it gets from some (traditionalists?) that it's not accurate. While my go to source for general wine info is still the Oxford Companion to Wine, edited by Jancis Robinson, as well as a few other atlas', Wikipedia has begun to take over some of my mindspace.

It has its downfalls for sure. For example, it can't come close to Appellation America as a reference for North American wine growing regions or for information on grape varieties. Where Appellation America's cataloging of North American wine growing regions is broad and deep, Wikipedia's wine section is merely broad while the Oxford Companion is deep on only certain areas.

So, I was very intrigued when I saw Encyclowine.

Encyclowine has only launched in the past week. It is, essentially, Wikipedia for wine...a user-created and edited encyclopedia for wine. It is not filled out as yet. Also, I've noticed over the past  couple of days that the site has been both up and down at times. So what we are talking about here is potential. However, the potential IS exciting.

As with the Wikipedia, Encyclowine is meant to offer deep content on everything as long as there is someone willing to write it and others willing to edit it later. Like Wikipedia, the hope is that a collaborative effort will help create an Online index of everything-wine.

There is a great deal already on Encyclowine for the person researching varieties, regions, wines, production, etc. The question that Encyclowine has to answer is why create such an open-source encyclopedia of wine outside Wikipedia or try to compete with Appellation America's headlong dive into deep/broad info presentation? One answer, which seems to be a regular refrain among optimistic web developers, is "because we can"

If you visit Encyclowine give it a chance. Surf around. Explore the potential. Because it is there. If you are very knowledgeable on a particular wine subject, register and write an entry. This is how this source will grow. It could, if they play their cards right and spend their marketing dollars and time correctly turn into the kind of source that replaces the print world's Companions.

This Article Will Not Be Stolen

In response to my post yesterday about an Internet Site that was apparently lifting entire articles from wine blogs and posting them in their entirety on their own site, I received this e-mail:

"Tom,

I just saw your posting made here (http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/2006/05/this_article_wa.html). Most importantly, I have removed the Fermentation articles from TheWinery.  However, I did want to clarify the situation.  We *DO* request permission from bloggers -- by no means do we want to steal anyone's content.  That said, clearly some blogs -- such as yours -- have slipped through the cracks, and for that I apologize.  We don't want to have anyone's content on the site that doesn't want to be there.  Luckily, at least 95% of the bloggers that we contact are happy to join our network and recognize the value we provide.  Right now that value is limited to helping readers filter through articles using "tags" that we have labelled articles based on our analysis of their content -- however, we plan to continue adding features that add value for readers.  Importantly, this arrangement has generally benefited bloggers by opening up their content to a larger audience, and built up awareness for their own sites. 

I felt that it was important to clarify this because I think that there was a misunderstanding.  We DO seek out permission, although clearly in the case of your blog something went wrong.  Once again we have removed your articles from the site, and I apologize for this error.

Thanks for your understanding,

Mario Grech
http://wine.nimbleferret.com"

My response to Mr. Grech was:


I’m sure bloggers see the value of your site.....the value to you.

You are offering no incentive to have a reader return to the site that actually created your content. Zero reason. Your site exits merely to reap income from google ads based on your lifting of work from others.

The problem is that most bloggers don’t have the financial ability to sue you. This is of course why you’ve never made a mistake and accidentally had a New York Times of Washington Post article “slip through the cracks” and appear on your site.

Thank you for not stealing FERMENTATION’s content anymore.
Tom Wark...

The Definition of Taste

What is "a taste" of wine?

This is the issue that the Director of the Alcohol Beverage Control office of the State of California is clearing up.

In a memo from the Directors office to it's division and branch offices, the Director has made clear that

"Since the Legislature has determined that a 1 ounce serving is sufficient and reasonable to acquaint a consumer with the qualities and characteristics of wine in an on-sale environment, it is reasonable to conclude that the same size taste is appropriate for a winegrower offering tastes of its wines in a wine tasting. As such, the Department has determined that a single “taste” which may be given away or sold as part of a “tasting” by a winery under its Type 02 license should be approximately 1 ounce."

One ounce!

I can live with that. Most tasting rooms pour somewhere between that and three ounces. However, it's unlikely that many of the sparkling wine houses will have a more difficult time living with this definition. At many sparkling wine facilities one pays, say, $5, and they give you a glass of sparkling wine....far more than one ounce. Then they send you out on the veranda to appreciate the view of the vineyards and sip your sparkling wine. Limiting this tasting to a one ounce pour is going to seriously diminish the experience.

It will be interesting to see if this new interpretation of the statues on the books will be enforced. I can see it now, an ABC agent comes into a tasting room, takes a pour from the person behind the bar, takes out their beaker and measures. 2.5 Ounces!! That's a fine!!!

Again, I don't think too many wineries will have a difficult time staying close to this requirement. But others will.

California Wines Best The French

Well, it appears California bottlings walked away the big winner at the 30th Anniversary Celebration of the 1976 Tasting of Paris held in Napa Valley and London. Only the original reds tasted in 1976 and a new collection of reds from Bordeaux and Napa were compared against one another.

The winners are:

Ridge Monte Bello Cabernet Sauvignon 1971

Ridge Monte Bello Cabernet Sauvignon 2000

In what must be a real surprise to many, California wines took the top five spots among the older wines in the following order:

Ridge Monte Bello 1971
Stag's Leap Wine Cellars 1973
Heitz Martha's Vineyard 1970
Mayacamas 1971 (in a tie for 4th)
Clos du Val 1972.

The tasting of the newer white wines from Burgundy and California were not compared against one another. I can't imagine why that determination was made.

This sort of reenactment also occurred before on the 10th anniversary of the original tasting. Again, it was Stephen Spurrier who organized that tasting. Eight judges evaluated 9 of the 10 original wines tasted in 1976. Those results were:

Clos Du Val Winery 1972
Ridge Vineyards Monte Bello 1971
Château Montrose 1971
âteau Leoville Las Cases 1971
Château Mouton Rothschild 1970
Stag's Leap Wine Cellars 1973
Heitz Wine Cellars 1970
Mayacamas Vineyards 1971
Château Haut-Brion 1971

I'm not sure what all this means except that the 1971 Ridge Monte Bello will leap in value in the auction and rare wine market. I do have one comment however that deserves consideration. Here we have five California wines, all over 30 years old that apparently tasted pretty darn good. I wonder  what their alcohol content was? Certainly not 14.7%. More likely they are in the 12.5% range. I wonder if there are any winemakers out there who want to make a wine for the ages and I wonder what this tasting might say to them.

This Article Was Stolen

Robbers. Thieves. Unethical. Without Merit.

There's just no other way to describe an organization that steals content, then represents it as their own.

This is the case with a website called "THE WINERY".They describe themselves as "part magazine, part newspaper, dedicated to wine.

What they do, is this:

-Surf Wine Blogs
-Post 100 words of an entry from a Wine Blog
-Create a link that says "Read More"
-Take the reader to the entire entry....located on their own site.

In other words, they are representing the content as their own. If I ever do this on FERMENTATION, someone call me on it in the harshest words, then never read this blog again.

But I thought I'd do a little experiment to see if they are actually reading the blog posts they are stealing for just automatically posting them without looking at what their computer program goes out and picks up. Hence, the title of this blog posting.

My suggestion to other wine bloggers whose work is being stolen and misrepresented is to see if this little test works, then do it your self.

The New Paris Tasting Wines...what's being tasted?

Today is the day of the 30th Anniversary Celebration of the 1976 "Tasting of Paris". A new taste off will occur in France and in Napa Valley. The orginal tasting helped put CA wines on the map when CA took top prize among whites and reds. There has been a great deal of controversy surrounding this new tasting, particularly over whether or not the wines will be tasted blind. That said, we should have the results today.

I came across a listing of the wines to be tasted at a French wine blog.

Here is the line up

The Whites
CALIFORNIA CHARDONNAYS
Château Montelena 2003
Mount Eden 2002
Patz & Hall "Hyde Vineyard 2004
Peter Michael Point Rouge 2003
Ramey "Hyde Vineyard 2002
Talley "Rosemary’s Vineyard

WHITE BURGUNDY
Louis Latour Bâtard-Montrachet 2002
Domain Drouhin Beaune Clos de Mouches 2002
Louis Jadot Chassagne-Montrachet Premier Cru Les Caillerets
Domain Laflaive Puligny-Montrachet Les Pucelles 2002
Domain Bonneau Corton-Charlemagne Grand Cru 2003
Domain Roulot Meursault Premier Cru Charmes 2002

The Reds
CALIFORNIA CABERNET
Clos du Val 2000 Reserve
Joseph Phelps Insignia 2002
Ridge Monte Bello 2000
Safer Hillside Select 2001
Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars Cask 23 2001
Staglin Family Vineyard 2001.

BORDEAUX
Château Haut-Brion 2000
Château Margaux 2000
Château Montrose 2000
Château Rausan Ségla 2000
Chateau Latour 200
Chateau Leoville Las Cases 2001

It all seems like a reasonable selection of CA wines to me. It is interesting that two wines from the Hyde Vineyard are represented in the white tasting.