Did Somebody Say Free?

Hey now. It’s contest time. There’s a new Simple Math 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon coming on board, which is a reflection of luck. Don’t ever say you can’t get something for free any more. Here’s the deal. Come up with a fanciful name for this new wine and we’ll send you a 6-pack of this fantastic new addition to the family.

Here’s what it’s all about:

Carneros/Napa Valley
Concannon clone planted at 660 vines/acre on St. George rootstock. A nose of eucalyptus, chocolate cake and raspberry jelly translate smoothly to the palate in a very delicious sense of pure, graceful cabernet sauvignon. The texture is mighty soft, even pillowy, and the finish goes on for about 25 seonds.
It’ll retail for about $50/bottle.

Come up with a nickname for this bad boy, to wit: Simple Math Cellars 2008 “_______” Cabernet Sauvignon – Napa Valley
This contest lasts through the month of February. The winner gets a 6-pack of “_____”, shipping included. Spread the word, and good luck. You’ll need it. But then, we’ve already given you some.
All the best,
Christian

Published in:  on February 1, 2010 at 1:56 pm Leave a Comment
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Buffaloed

There’s a lot for me to say about buffalo, and I love the word for its flexible application. You get opportunities to diddle with parts of speech at almost every turn but the magic happens when you can find a personal application with each. In my world, it goes like this:

- Buffalo as a proper noun is where I was born.
- Buffalo as a common noun is an interesting animal. I once had an unspoken conversation with a buffalo, and that’s just some information for another type of blog. As an erstwhile Denverite, I was introduced to buffalo as a dish – I enjoyed the occasional buffalo burger – but then, that was prior to the conversation. The American buffalo is once again facing extinction, so it is a topic of responsible conversation nowadays. But again, not in this blog.
- Buffalo’s Shipping is a long-time wine shipping company in Napa populated by some bright, helpful and cheery folks. About 2 weeks ago, I popped over to drop some samples in the mail for a friend and learned that just that morning they’d received an ugly little memo from the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board. The hammer dropped, coated with seasonings such as cease and desist, which invariably spoil one’s dinner plans if one is to pair the wrong wines with their cheese sandwich waffles and shoofly pies. You know what I mean if you’re reading from the relevant geography.
- Buffalo as an adjective – or, here: buffaloed as a past participle – is my state of being when I consider the numerous driving forces in life that collude to make me who I am, chiefly a person so influenced by food, wine and culture. From the standpoint of psychology and matter-oriented (hard) science, I’m a product of my environment. Aren’t we all? Doesn’t the idea just subdue you by inspiring awe? Does it stymie, perplex, bewilder or befuddle you? You, then, have been buffaloed.

One additional thing that buffaloes me (verb tense, there – we have such flexibility in our language!) is that, as fun as this act of writing about wine is for me, we’re losing wine writers all over the place, in one sense. Not only has there been an outlandish number of newspaper closures and bankruptcy filings from Chicago to Karachi, with the incumbent industries (packaging/fulfillment/transportation) suffering alongside the press, but writers are losing their jobs as well. To make things worse, I’m referring to wine writers. Yikes. New York and Los Angeles newspaper readers can now say farewell to viniferous prose, not to mention the fun and practical guidance of venerable writers such as Dorothy Gaiter, who taught me and thousands of other people how to make an occasion out of the average Tuesday night in order to justify opening the ’92 premier cru before it turned to swill. So the idea is Twitterization? That’s like replacing cork with silly putty in order to cut costs and frame wine closures in a publicly accessible format.

I’m not in the business of instigating, so there’s no call to action embedded herein. What I will say, though, is that if losing your wine writers to ten-word regurgitations (see the Silly Tasting Notes Generator ) ticks you off, make your voice heard. Do the writing yourself, send a letter or email, or lodge a voicemail with the editor of your local newspaper that dropped the wine journalist you revere. A colleague once said to me (when selling wine): “In selling cabernet, smoke and olives will get you all the traction you need.”

Untrue.

Published in:  on January 19, 2010 at 4:38 pm Leave a Comment
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Tasty Mistakes For a Hasty Bay State

If any of you Napa locals know about Lawler’s Liquor Store, give a shout. It has a staggeringly poor wine selection, a great liquor selection, and a nifty twist to the LQ business plan. Locals know – and I found out on December 30th, a day late – that Peter and his brother have institutionalized Italian takeout in the most Regularian way. Props to these guys. It’s a Napa tradition to bring some Tupperware, a saucepan, a crockpot, or whatever you please – in to be filled with some yummies for New Year’s Eve. The yummies in question are terrific red sauces, lasagnas and pastas. A unique bit of food they’ve been offering for several years is a century-old mistake called “malfatti” which is no mistake at all. Apparently, as the tale goes in Peter’s words, some guys in the Bay Area were in the business of making their own ravioli from scratch. If you’ve ever tried it, you’ll know where I’m going. The pasta didn’t cooperate on this fine day, which wasn’t the luckiest one of the month. The delectable little pillows didn’t seal properly and the pesto-based stuffing ran amok in pots of boiling water. Someone in the group ate one when the water was drained and decided to toss the idea of the pasta envelope process for the next batch – just roll up some of the stuffing between two palms, toss it into the water and enjoy. The little wads were named malfatti (the first syllable being a prefix denoting “bad” or “poor” in most Romantic languages; “fatti” has parallels with our English verb “to form”). Malformed. Malfeasance. Malfunction. Malpractice. You see what that prefix means in other circumstances and how it can change an innocent Saturday in a kitchen or on an operating table. The malfatti caught on, and Lawler’s serves them piping hot on demand. They’re quite good, reminiscent of gnocchi. I liked the general flavor profile, but as Peter warned me, the texture might be an acquired preference. He was right. I told him so, with the additional catch that I was anti-Scotch as well for the longest time until something clicked one night.

I wish for you the Lawler’s malfatti experience. I think they’d be a good foil for a young Barbaresco or cabernet franc. If you live in Massachusetts, perhaps one day I’ll be able to air-mail you a half dozen malfatti and a 6-pack of Gaja. No, you say? Ahoy, yes, I respond. It’s true. The federal courts have once again ruled in favor of the grape. I won’t go into all of the details as though the matter is news, but just understand that for the longest time (it feels eternal when you want to get wines on tables all over the US and can’t), states have been engaged in a battle royale on behalf of wine enthusiasts. It’s a big economic fight, in the end, but the first step in keeping wine consumers happy and able to order their favorite wines from other states is to have the shipping legalities taken care of. The federal government is the overseer in ensuring our Constitutional rights. It is then up to each state to pass legislation in its own way to simply get with it and figure out how to make the state budget numbers work while maintaining a happy, wine-loving populace. The morality card is the one in effect since Prohibition, but if we face up to the truth, we realize that it’s about the shekels.

So let’s celebrate the fact that the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals determined yesterday that a 2006 law that created a challenging multi-tiered system in Massachusetts violates the state’s Commerce Clause in today’s world. Prior to yesterday, the law affected large (30,000 case) wineries’ ability to operate smoothly in a competitive environment. It’s not a done deal. Again, the Massachusetts legislature has more work to do, but this is a lobbying opportunity for wineries to obtain the right to ship to Bay State consumers’ office or homes in a totally compliant manner.

It’s a complicated issue – retail/wholesale, small wineries/large wineries, two-tier/three-tier…..but just know that there are people working day and night to improve how much great wine you can mail-order, no matter where you live. If it means a lot to you, your freedom I mean, check out www.freethegrapes.org from time to time. It’s a fascinating repository of matters related to wine shipping, and just another way to get a barometer reading on this great country in which we live. (foreign readers, pardon me, but I don’t feel syndicated at this juncture)

Published in:  on January 15, 2010 at 8:50 pm Leave a Comment
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Cheap Wine and Cheap Shots

I went thrifting this weekend. Thrifting defined for the non-Regularian is tooling around in search of second-hand stuff that you want, need, or don’t really need but might relegate to a burgeoning supply of extra crap in the garage that one day may be put to use but will probably clutter the sidewalk with a “free” sign stuck to it with duct tape. (Note: If you’ve got something hot, use Freecycle.org knowing full well that you’ll get all kinds of phone calls or emails explaining extenuating circumstances and overwhelming needs that dictate your moral responsibility to defer relinquishment of aforementioned crap to the person whose tearjerker takes the biggest slice of cake. I posted a bunk bed and met all manner of mothers with post-chemotherapy children, special-needs family situations and heart-wrenching drama sufficient to put the writers of After School Specials on furlough for a year.)

The point is that I went thrifting, and other than the odd crystal decanter, the mint-condition martini mixing kit, circa 1925 in leather valise (nabbed it, so come over for a negroni), and the wine aeration device for $1.50 (ehh – they strip aromas away, in my opinion), it was a chance to stock up on batteries and toilet tissue. But a memory came back to me – there’s this one “dollar store” that occasionally pulls in a couple pallets of uber-plonk that sometimes is actually drinkable. I have a contact who has a contact who has another….let’s start again. Agent A notifies me when Agent B spots the plonk and notifies Agent C to buy a case (cases only); then, when Agent C gives it a reasonable thumbs-up (you can pour it at parties and not get the stink-eye), (s)he reports back to Agent B, who inevitably buys a boatload and leaves little for Agent A, who then may get around to notifying me that the stuff ain’t bad and will be gone the next day. I’ve scored before. Again – it is super-cheap and nothing but cooking wine or stuff to pour at the block party whilst trembling over the good stuff you’ve got breathing in the kitchen all the while. So my pals and I stop in at the dollar store and ask after the plonk of the week. Alas, no dice for the past 6 weeks or so. It’ll be back. But it’s out of my way now, with my schedule and inclinations, so no foul, but it woulda been fun for my pals who, incidentally, don’t know pith from pow. I love everyone, so long as it’s a humane, simple kind of love that doesn’t cloy, burden, or play the “mwah ha ha, now I have you where I want you” game.

Speaking of which, there’s something else to discuss when it comes to the ol’ “mwah ha ha”…That’s the subject of who to love and how much to cuddle. This is an interesting state to live in, California. The beaches, the produce, the ability to grow produce nearly anywhere, the cultural diversity, the manifold opportunities, the countless ways in which to exercise one’s freedom to prosper, learn and enjoy the one life given. There’s something to be said for life’s journey. One can stop here, stop there, sniff here, rest there, work here, play there. And once one jumps back onto the freeway, one would think a chapter has passed and that it’s possible to wave “hello” to anyone from earlier in life with nothing but gratitude for what warrants it and a tale of what’s transpired since.

What we find occasionally, though, is that some people we’ve met have a dragon’s mentality that manifests itself as rage, jealousy and a petty dependence upon its own perception of dominance in matters not only dragonly but deerly, fishly and even treely. “Come on,” one says to the dragon, “move on with your life. You don’t even recognize me for my change of hair color. I never even cared about your gold. I prefer silver and I found my own.”

Another way to put it is that when you take intermediate tennis classes, your instructor shouldn’t hate you because you knew how to play before you showed up. And he shouldn’t forbid you to take the advanced class from someone else.

Almost two months ago, the Second Appellate District published a decision about the enforcement of non-competition clauses in California. In Dowell v. Biosense Webster, Inc., 09 C.D.O.S. 13991, it was decided that non-compete and non-solicitation agreements not narrowly constructed only to protect trade secrets are void under California law. The question remains: are the even narrower non-compete agreements legal in California? It’s been an ongoing controversy, and I must admit to rubbernecking.

I learned tennis in New York. Get it? Where did you learn the game? Is your intermediate tennis instructor threatening you or claiming that he invented the game and that if you don’t pick up a new sport he’ll bring the whole sporting world to a screeching halt? …and how does it make you feel? Violated? Aggravated? It should. For now, however, I don’t see teeball or squash leagues springing up like all the rage, so all I can say is that one day we’ll go to Wimbledon and laugh about it all like it never happened, darling.

Published in:  on January 10, 2010 at 7:18 pm Leave a Comment
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Hug or Haircut?

So I’m going “over the hill” to earn my daily bread. I’m on Adobe Road, that handy way to make the jump from Petaluma to the Carneros Highway. There’s a double-yellow line, and the road’s not exactly a butter-smooth speedway. And what to my wondering eyes should appear in the rearview mirror but a big, white rig much larger than the average sleigh strapped to eight (or nine) mongo-sized reindeer (tiny ones can’t really do the job, one realizes logically) – climbing right up into my sphere of influence. It’s veering over the double yellow a good 4 feet, jockeying for the right time to pass me and the Saab thirty feet ahead. Yeah, I’m originally East Coast, but here we go again: California road etiquette. The guy either wants a hug or a haircut. I just want to enjoy the gorgeous strains of “Birthday” by the Sugar Cubes that are streaming from my cerebellum. That was one of the greatest songs ever created, and I’m thankful that on my 39th, I can remember it well enough to sing it on my morning drive. Suddenly, the truck finds a left turn and heads toward Glen Ellen. Whew.

This is a great time for reflection. I mean, I’m driving 50 miles to my day job. You’d think I could reflect. So I do. Starting with the most recent memories, there’s some practical wine advice I want to impart, this being a wine-related blog…. You may have heard of Monticello (Napa Valley). It’s a second label project (re: bread ‘n’ buttah, keep-the-lights-on and keep the payroll account full to prevent a tasting room uprising). The chief cook would be Jay Corley and the Corley family, who landed in the valley in ’69 to pave a better way in the wake of some awesome viticultural discoveries from Rubicon to Trefethen to Joe Heitz’s property. There was much more to be learned and, since the Napa Valley was at that point still fairly pristine – no land rape evident yet – the alluvial fans and eucalyptus groves had much teach us about how big ol’ rocks, sunshine and fog could make for the most successful winegrowing region on the West Coast. The Mission grapes had become part of a robust, transcontinental trade but the magnificent cabernet sauvignon was yet to find really good footing. Groan. This is looking like history – gotta stop that.

Point: Corley is a good winery. The ’07 chardonnay from Corley’s Oak Knoll estate property goes like this….
Corley 2007 Chardonnay – Estate Oak Knoll District, Napa Valley
½ hour – 2 hours of air: Slightly hot immediately but blows off to curd, popcorn, white pepper. Viscous, memorable. Overripe pineapple finish, low acid.
24 hours of air: Nose: Toasty balsa wood, lettuce. Palate: Lemon, lime, mouthwatering slate. Lost weight. Finish: Oaky banana.
I like it. I’m getting away from higher acids and rejoining where “yum” left off. But then I love Batard-Montrachet. Don’t you??

Also, notes on a red, with the incumbent culinary experience to go with it (one you wouldn’t expect):
Corley 2006 Proprietary Red – Napa Valley
½ hour – 2 hours of air: Color: Bricky. Nose: Nutmeg. Feel: Astringent, light-bodied, empty, cottony leather-raspberry fruit in a wire cage of large tannins.
5-7 hours of air: Mouthfeel plumps out with striations of spicy bramble, round and classic merlot and a raspberry-zap dialect to the cab franc. Much improved.

** Kitchen caveat: I came home late and needed to don the mantel of chef. Thankfully, the fam was patient, so I par-boiled some baby taters, pearl onions and French shallots. Then I grilled them while I sautéed tofu, shrooms and fresh OG broccoli with poultry seasoning, in EV olive oil, with a new pepper sauce I hadn’t used before. It’s made with soy and garlic, and sounded good. (I want to use more sauces to improve my life and the lives of others, but cannot invent them from scratch yet. Hooray for Trader Joe’s.) The stir fry rocked and the kabobs rolled. I like to pronounce “kabobs” like “kebabs” to sound British. Don’t you? Isn’t Ben Kingsley iconic? Anyway, this food paired with the Corley Prop Red sucked. You never know. I stretch the rules as often as possible to see what holds water and what needs to be reinvented. But that pairing failed because the tannins set fire to the black pepper. Too much, Pedro, too much. If I’d only had the courage to pop a Rieussec – but it wasn’t Birthday Night yet.

Regularians don’t maintain 5000-bottle cellars – they visit or design them. Can I get a holla?

Another thing about the wine tasting game. That Corley Estate red wine clearly evolved over time. Go back and read my notes, won’t you? The same held true with the chardonnay; again, see those notes? What we can cull from this is that, naturally, the pop-n-pour first impression is rarely the one to go by. We know this. But as a friend told me he learned from Andre Tschelitcheff (re: granddad of California wine production, period.) the best thing you can do to learn about a wine is to taste it every two hours all day long, as well as revisiting it the next day. I used to do this with every new vintage of Bryant cabernet when I was in the flow with the broker. Ah, the golden age of yore… But since joining the wine biz, I have been milking every wine I can for at least three days, either sucking the air out or just dropping the cork in. If you don’t, you can and should. That way, when you taste aluminum, cranberry, dog breath or cat pee, you know you were a cheapskate when buying that bottle. (( Shopping strictly for the deal will get you exactly what you requested: a reject, a bottle-shocked flagon of plonk, a stinker. Drink Campari instead. ))
Similar to this Corley experience and nearly every other positive one I can relate if you ask me to…. a culmination comes to this conversation. Simple Math chardonnay is this type of wine. I’m eager for you to experience it, particularly on the second day it’s open. It goes from fresh, cuddly and toothy to straight cush. Just how I like it, and anyone who enjoys Russian River Valley fruit will find oodles of merit in this juice. It is dirt cheap but it ain’t marked down, cowpoke. Ne’er shall it be besmirched with an orange sale sticker. If the Gary Fisher’s out of reach, Huffy is still completely reasonable until you hit it on the slots. We’ll keep making it and we’ll keep the lights on for you.

Until next time I have anything to say about wine (heh – ask my wife to refute that one; she’ll take you up on it)…peace and wellness.
C

Published in:  on January 6, 2010 at 2:20 pm Leave a Comment
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More on those Simple Math pinots ‘n’ that Simple Math chardonnay

Now is the time, as I’ve been known to say in another life, wearing another hat, beating a different drum (which I still beat with my left hand concurrently with wine in the right). The luck just keeps coming. We are in the midst of a grand new year, a fresh decade.

There does happen to be a viral YouTube video someone just turned me on to, one that describes the true happiness we all can foment by choice in the face of the uglinesses that some would have us buy into (re: doomsday, 2010=2012, Hollywoodization of our own dark fears). I would recommend searching it out – it’s easy to find as a “2010 predictions Eskimo” query. Not the most academic or content-laden clip, and a titch long, but worth it.

My point is that we’re swimming in the happy pond if we choose to see things that way. Let’s get down. I don’t know about you, but what I have cooking now is some abso-fab-yumtastic wines to bring on board. On the one hand, there’s a Simple Math Cellars 2008 Chardonnay chiefly from Sonoma Coast fruit, with Sebastopol as a focus. This is the kind of beverage that brings pure, pure chardonnay to the forefront – where lemon and honey meet a crisp yet applesauce-y mouthfeel. The most judicious use of oak comes through but, believe it or not, not until Day Two. That’s right, open a bottle and keep it around for over 24 hours. Delicious stuff, and that’s why I chose to make it part of the repertoire. Wine like this has been going for $35/bottle, but since that’s unnecessary according to both the Simple Math outlook and the Regularian Manifesto, the price is much more gracious. Enjoy.

Next up is a duo of pinots. Not because “everybody likes pinot now” – come on. I’ve done the Burgundy thing and get it. Before any sort of movie prodded me, I might add. And mi partnero has been a pinotphile since before I even bought a bottle of Woodbridge and then swam my way through the Kosta Brown, Red Car, Cargasacci, Nuits-St.-Georges, Clos Vougeot……Pinot noir is a lovely thing. If you like it, then wonderful. That’s another reason you won’t have to take the math test. Simple Math is presenting both Napa Valley and Sonoma Coast ‘08 pinots because there’s much to offer on each side of the hill. The Napa wears a cherry crown and the SoCoast brings you flowers. They’re both mighty wines and terrific values the way Simple Math is selling them. I would encourage further investigation while the getting’s good.

In fact, there’s not much Simple Math to go around. It’s like the analogy I use: when you want a breakfast pastry, a doughnut made in the bakery at 4 AM is far more satisfying than a mass-produced donette (or Suzie Q, or what-have-you). When you go to where a human being placed a lot of energy into that morning treat, you can taste the difference. Thus, with wine. As above, so below. And as in the morning, so at night – assuming you enjoy wine at least after lunch….

There’s a Simple Math Cellars tasting in Windsor, California at the end of May. More info to follow. But for now, there’s some more work to be done. So hang in there and stay tuned for announcements of releases and tastings. And please drop a line so we can keep you in the loop.

All the best,

Christian

Published in:  on January 3, 2010 at 9:06 pm Leave a Comment
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Simple Math Pinot Noir and Chardonnay

Simple Math is doing Sonoma Coast pinot and Sebastopol chardonnay! MOVING BARRELS IS FUN. MOVING BARRELS IS FUN, I try to tell myself. These are going to be just ridiculous wines, so watch for more info.

Published in:  on December 23, 2009 at 7:34 am Leave a Comment
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Grand Cru Tasting – Part Two (at long last)

“Better to be disinterested than disingenuous.” ~Christian Lane
It’s good to know that while standing outside, wearing slippers in an acid rain pouring down sheets of bad news and crippling doses of negativity, there’s a haven near my house where there’s a portion of the good life notwithstanding. Really, it’s a sweet spot for the Regularian, that being the person who knows how to find joy without necessarily shooting for the moon. When the tragically ordinary looms as just one more of a series of similar rest stops along the raceway, I keep my hand on the throttle and zoom on by with one eye peeled for anything of note. Well, the shiny squirrel bait glimmered – a happy accident, you can call it – in the form of wicked good wines from several sources under one roof. Not another trade tasting, but something more direct and certainly more relaxed than the cafeteria feel those gatherings can evoke.

This is a simple bit about a project on the south side of the Russian River, the side I like. It’s sunny, not nearly as moldy/mossy down there, and there are some superb vineyards in a kind of isosceles triangle between Forestville, Graton and Duncans Mills. RRV, as we call it. In the American Wine Building, where a century ago our local wines were made, now lives a tribe of experts creating syrah, grenache (garnacha en Espanol), and mourvedre (mataro and monastrell elsewhere). I add the varietal variants as a kind of clue into what this Regularian loves, so that when you see them on wine labels you can intuit my joy for yourself and perhaps join me vicariously in a bout of sipping something gorgeous while reading a paranormal mystery novel or something. Hey, it’s like being in my world without being on my couch. That way, my wife doesn’t get worked up about whether you can hang without lamb shanks and my cats don’t say “Oi, what’s with the new guy? He moving in?” Anyway…

What we have here is Wind Gap Wines as well as as Pam & Pax Mahle’s Pax Wine Cellars. When I walked into the building, I was just knocked out by the look and the vibe. Erin and Ben from Twomey were there (amazing pinot noir, reader), and I met Erin’s new bundle of joy whose name I can’t remember but whose cute little hat and most excellent papoose-carrier I wished was around for me in ‘71. It was punchdown time, so Ross Hallett was pushing down syrah caps in tanks about 7 feet tall. Pax was hanging out in the next room with one hand on a hose and the other on a forklift, about to mount his steed and shuffle some bins around. The smell of must was in the air – and Ross was dappled with deep purple juice – with nary a fruit fly about. I was gathered there with a few associates from around the country, having converged in the Bay Area for bit of a corporate confab. So as Lee I and rolled up, Ross comes over, grabs a glass, smells it and says, “Oh, goodie. Leflaive. ‘03, love it.” Yeah. We’re hanging in the right spot today. A guy under 25 that can identify a producer and vintage rather than the vineyard is my kind of wine geek. But mind you, just as regularian as any due to the absence of snob factor. Might I mention – yes, mention I will – that the way the building was set up and the vibe of its denizens was much like an art gallery/performance space I once was a managing partner/resident artist of. Oil paintings on the walls, a living loft upstairs, members buzzing around in a co-op atmosphere, including a wine glass blower named Chris…So imagine my feeling of having arrived home.

Anyway, what we took a look at, in addition to some whopping Burgundies, was a little bit of Twomey (pron. “too me”), some Pax and a dollop of Wind Gap wines. I’ll let you follow the links yourself. Not because anybody’s paying me to promote them – I do that of my own volition – but because all I want to say to you is that if each winery’s website information gives you the steam enough to go ahead and plunge forward to try some of their wines, believe what you read and see. I am telling you that among the droves of options for special occasion pinots, Rhone varietals (roussane & syrah), chardonnays and blends of grenache and mourvedre (pron. “mo-VED”) – these guys all have it in spades. Of particular note are: Twomey merlot, Pax Wind Gap Vineyard syrah and Wind Gap Griffin’s Lair Vineyard syrah. Trust me. Or don’t. But ha – I caught you trusting me just now, didn’t I? You’ve followed this post for 789 words, and I would assume that by now we see eye to eye.

Not gonna go on further. Not gonna do it. (Spool Dana Carvey’s George Bush through the mind’s eye. That was fun, yes?) For now, it’s time to bid the dog adios and hit the highway to present a Simple Math tasting. Wish me luck! These aren’t stodgy critics I’m going to visit, but they don’t want want to be occupied with the ordinary. That’s why I’m dropping by with a cure for boredom. Seriously, peace to all. If you celebrate a holiday at all (yesterday being the Solstice and today being Look On the Bright Side Day), Hanukkah underway and Kwanzaa on its way, not to mention Christmas….just have a wonderful time and know that we’re all lucky in one way or another. Life’s about what you’ve been given and how you’re going to turn that into something that you can give right back. Let’s get out there and do it, team, alright? BREAK!

Published in:  on December 22, 2009 at 8:13 am Leave a Comment
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Simple Math Cellars Has Arrived

When in the course of human enterprise it becomes necessary to diversify, there exist certain survival tools one may employ in order to thrive among disheartened throngs, and to deliver fabulous goods and services to one’s friends and associates who crave bang-for-buck returns and immeasurable pleasures related to wine. Hear the sounds of hooves trotting along the road. Keen to decode the message of goodwill. Embrace the good news of Simple Math Cellars.
This is the age of the negociant reborn. Regularians, here’s a definition in case you need it: a negociant is a travelling sourcer of fine grapes and wine ageing in barrels that is found to be of adequate quality to label, brand and purvey, most likely at delightful prices and chiefly of top quality. This is a French term, used for a long time, and it’s a practice employed all over Burgundy and Bordeaux. Often, it connotes the work of winemakers in the “AP” or “custom crush” arenas of the wine business. There are small differences between all three, but suffice it say that I am now a negociant and will be grabbing up ridiculously premium wines without homes and selling them for fairly absurd prices under my Simple Math Cellars label. For the love of it, and for the fun.
The first tranche is becoming available in February or March, depending upon when the numerous and varying components of the business are completed. This isn’t too difficult but it takes time. All the while, I shall advise you to the best of my ability. But as we gear up for an inaugural release, here’s what’s cooking: Simple Math Cellars 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon – Mayacamas Mountains (Sonoma County). The grapes were farmed organically at about 1600 feet above sea level, enjoying a truly unique microclimate – terrific directivity and duration of sunshine, cooling fog and rugged volcanic soil. The vines are stressed, irrigated quite sparingly (nearly dry farmed) and sprayed only with fungicide three years prior to this vintage. The flavor profile is of dark berries, currant, cassis, cardamom, molasses and truffles. The acidity is “drink me with steaks, grilled peppers and eggplant”, and the structural/textural outlook translates to medium tannins rounding out to fine grain by 2010, ripe-round by 2011 and hitting a Medoc depth by 2014. This is big wine, really delicious and complex, and built for the long haul. One of the better Sonoma 2007s you’ll find under $60 and the best one you will get access to for under $45.
At about 70 cases, this $40 bottle is a no-brainer. If you’re looking for chewy chocolate brownies, look for Coombsville ’07s but if you’re looking for Left Bank Bordeaux lookalikes, come by Simple Math and have your mind blown. Keep in mind that I’ve tasted all over California and, maybe I haven’t gotten access to an overwhelming amount of fruit but this juice is a gold mine. It was crafted by Randall Watkins and Tom Garrett (skill sets having been Watkins, Chappellet, Moon Mountain, Revana, Bugay) and aged for the better part of 20 months in French oak. I think you’ll really enjoy this as a special event wine without having to spend Saturday night money. Make an occasion and share in the luck. Visit Simple Math Cellars and drop me a line. Pre-ordering is casual; we’ll do this via messaging for the time being. Shipping concerns are also handled on a case by case basis. Thanks for stopping by and make a great day.
Christian

Published in:  on November 27, 2009 at 4:54 pm Comments (1)
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Patel Winery – Napa Valley Is Freshening Up Its Culture A Bit

In the ongoing quest to try to make a difference, I stumbled upon a like-minded individual who made me feel as though there’s more to the dog-n-pony show. I mean, I knew there was, but I’m talking about another facet of the underground, if you will. And I’m not referring to life in the caves because that’s just not so Regularian, now, is it? I speak of a guy who does what he does because he likes what he does, which has become increasingly hard to come by. And it’s all about wine, and you know how I spend my time, so…

Raj Patel was born in a small village in the Indian state of Gujarat, 80 or 90 miles northwest of Mumbai. His aunt was one of five siblings, and her brother-in-law immigrated in ‘23 to the central valley area and took work as a migrant agricultural worker – the first Patel in the United States that we know of. Raj came to California at the age of six. He has family in Canada, South Africa and England. He went back to his home town in 2005 and, just like we’ve all suspected, he found a huge middle class and a much huger gap between the upper and lower classes. In India today, those that have the means really dig wine, and big wine at that. Raj works today in the corporate sector to fund his fledgling winery but won’t need to for very long, I suspect.

We were rapping about Indian music and culture, and came to the conclusion that the closed-door mentality of Napa Valley is opening up to Indian culture. Hell, one of Denzel’s flicks features the Bollywood musical flair, and an Indian proprietress has a high-end restaurant project in the valley nowadays. But the thing about Raj is that he’s not interested in building a “token” identity or in getting famous. He parallels more with the Stones (fame by virtue of great music) rather than with Britney Spears (crazy capers + dumb stunts + wild shenanigans / questionable talent = publicity agogo). His goal is to just – and get this, it’s just like my man Lou Kapcsandy – to just make great red wine. Huh. No marketing, no overpricing, no positioning or gladhanding. He is a bit dependent upon ratings, I might add, but he knows their function, and he realizes that it’s kind of asinine to charge $100 for an 89-point wine. Whatever. That’s for a rainy day. Don’t uncork that bottle just yet, Christian.

He was a CrushPadder but not any longer. That operation was pretty good, but a teensy bit pricey, and working there prevented Raj from joining the Napa Valley Vintners’ Association because of the location requirements. So he’s over at Silverado Studios, buying some grapes from Premium Pacific’s Coombsville Vineyard (can you say Kobalt-Merus-Mark Herold?) and some juice from Andy Beckstoffer – yup, ToKalon juice! The Beautiful. The flippin’ sweet, Pedro. He also has some rows leased within Max McKenny’s vineyard nestled between Chappellet and Gemstone. Needless to say, there’s plenty of “good material” to work with, as those deep in the wine biz would say. Actually, comedians say the same thing but only in reference to assessments of inferiority, stupidity or backasswardness.

Raj is a step ahead of me in the wine game because I’ve spent so many hours and taste buds figuring wine out, whereas he’s in there deep – pruning, blending, pressing and getting purple. I’m a mere negociant. But hang on, Regularians, the day of the Simple Grape will come (eh? bookmark me and you’ll find out) in another year or so. But this is about Raj Patel, the innovator. He’s not afraid to jump into the game but he’s also largely true to his own palate. He loves Pomerol, loves Bond, likes Ghost Block, was impressed by a Screagle he bought about 8 years ago for under $100 (that’s what he said, I promise). Again, a little heavy on the points game, but he’s particular about making the best damn red wines he can. We talked about the World Wine Homogeneity Organization (don’t bother looking it up – it’s on-the-fly and fake) and I wanted to get his take on something: are we still moving into an era of all wines tasting uncomfortably similar? Are winemakers gonna keep sending their samples to the lab behind the curtain to get tweaked for Parker points? Or can we expect a return to when it wasn’t so difficult to identify a wine’s place of origin by tasting it blind? He responded in an interesting way, telling me that there won’t be so much choice with the ‘09 vintage around these parts, what with that nasty rain storm that clobbered us before most cab/merlot/petit verdot, etc. could see 23 Brix. Meaning this: Napa/Sonoma alcohol levels are going to have to be more European this year. Acidity may be another cat to tangle with but can be handled much more easily than low sugars. Boo hoo, methinks as I consider the marketing gurus flurrying to convince the Ubercritics to make concessions and keep the tasting rooms hopping. Anyway, not my worry – it may make some of the top-tier wines’ inevitable price increases plateau for a year, allowing more Regularians access for the sake of palate education. Which leads me to another interesting point: Raj is in a solid position of not needing to panic at all in “this economy” because his personal income has funded all production costs. So if his constituents – those with the passion and resources – know his good thang when they see it, they will buy it. If not, c’est la vie. There are only 4-500 cases among three wines available anyway, and those aren’t going to do anything but take off based on mailing list and word-of-mouth, the winery owner’s dream. It’s crazy-curious to me: Raj copyrighted the name “Patel” and ever since publishing his website in April and pimping the Facebook game a little, he’s been pinged from 13 countries and 38 US states. Everybody wants onto the bandwagon. I don’t get it, but I’m inspired by it. Raj is (pardon me, Gary V, but I did buy your book) CRUSHING IT.

I recently tasted one of the remaining bottles of Patel Winery 2007 Dry Creek Valley Zinfandel (under 15 cases left). I told Raj I’d review it here but I just don’t feel like doing that in depth because it’s Sunday and I’m drinking Bordeaux and I have to commute 50 miles to work in the morning. I will say this. The zin rocks. At $30, it drinks like 45 bucks to my sensibility. No lie, no fluff, and no kickback. I’m sending Raj a bottle of my cab, so we’re even-steven on that. Go search Patel Winery and buy 3 bottles. Drink two with friends; don’t bogart. Then hold one back for 6 years and tell me I steered you wrong. I dare ya.

So I says to him, I says what’s in your cellar that you need/want to get rid of? He tells me it’s the green wines, the Cask 23 and Fay. And that’s as far as that conversation goes.

I asked him, “Orange County or Manhattan? San Luis Obispo or Mendocino? Little Rock or Houston? Yountville or Santa Rosa? Who’s your network and what’s the style and image you think you’ll resonate with?” He assured me again that it’s not about getting famous but that based on who’s contacting him and ordering his zin, sight unseen, it’s very cool to think about making hay in places like Rhode Island, upstate New York (my old stomps, BTW), Chicago and the like. He’s very childlike and adventurous in that regard. It’s not about market penetration or channels or any of the corporate gumbo that refers to wine as a SKU or a product. It’s just vibing the scene in a way that makes sense, whatever that scene may be. I love it – grassroots, boutique, micro, Raj Patel is a man of character, anything but ostentatious. A real guy. I daresay, a Regularian, ‘cept I didn’t run that word on him because I want him to read this later and go huh, you know what? I am one of those.

So what’s coming up? A merlot-based blend, a cabernet-based blend and perhaps a vineyard-designate cab. Plan on releases in the spring and in the fall. Plan also on huge wines, aged 18-24 months in French oak and 18 months in bottle. I’ll let ya know when I taste the samples and will render some reasonably accurate tasting notes at that point. Cripes, maybe I’ll even come back and say something about that 2007 zinfandel, but only if the mood strikes. This is near 1500 words, so in the interest of some new friends who complain that they either can’t swim through my vocab or just don’t have the time to read my posts all the way through, I will remind you all that I don’t pity you your limited time but I respect it. So it’s a wrap. Love ya. Until next time….

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Published in:  on November 22, 2009 at 8:36 pm Leave a Comment
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