Tonight is the 4th anniversary of Wine Blogging Wednesday, our monthly virtual tasting. And for the 48th edition, founder Lenn Thompson has asked we go back to our wine roots and taste wines we drank when we first got into wine.

Like many wine lovers, my journey started with California jug wines. Since I came of age in California during the early 1980’s, many of these jugs accompanied meals through my last couple years of college. Brands such as Almaden,  Italian Swiss Colony, Paul Mason and Inglenook were regulars but the first jug to become a “house wine” were from Gallo.

The first wine book I picked up, for a whopping $1.95, was the Signet Book of Inexpensive Wine by Susan Lee. My original copy was thrown away many years ago but I picked up another copy at a used book store earlier this year as part of my research for my book, And browsing the “United States” section of this book tonight, I see Gallo’s Hearty Burgundy in the “Best Buy” category (3 stars). This was my go-to red and the first wine I picked up for our roots tasting tonight.

Today Hearty Burgundy is part of Gallo’s “Twin Valley” brand while it’s white cousin Chablis Blanc is now in the ultra-budget “Livingston Cellars” brand. Since the latter was only available in 1.5L and 3L bottles, I passed on trying this wine tonight but did get a bottle of Hearty Burgundy; my first in over 20 years.

Gallo Family Vineyards, “Twin Valley”, Hearty Burgundy NV ($5) - Deep garnet in color with aromas of red raspberry, geranium and fennel. Bright red fruit flavors with cherry pie filling in the mid-palate finishing with moderate tannins. Clean and state of the art for industrial wine blends but seems unnatural (what Gary would term as “fakey-fake”).

13% ABV
Synthetic cork closure
Score: 77
Rating:

Since my former house white of Chablis Blanc was only available in industrial quantities, I decided to pick up my first house Zinfandel. Back in 1981, this was from Sebastiani which I bought on sale for $2.50 a bottle.  Since Sebastiani has since rebooted their brand as a limited production, premium product, I settled for my second place Zin from the 1980’s: Sutter Home.

Yes, from the house that was built from white Zinfandel but back in the early 1980’s, they made some pretty interesting red Zins. My favorite being their reserves tasted on my frequent visits to Napa Valley during my college years. But their regular release was also pretty good from memory so I thought it would be interesting to revisit this wine.

Sutter Home, Zinfandel, California 2005 ($5) - Medium ruby in color with aromas of black cherry, strawberry and sage. Fresh red cherry and strawberry fruit flavors, some black pepper, finishing with supple tannins. A very light style of Zinfandel but a decent red for pizza and pasta dishes.

13.5% ABV
Composite cork closure
Score: 81
Rating:

An interesting tasting that shows how my tastes have evolved since the days of the first Reagan administration. But it’s also good to see both wines being clean, fresh and drinkable… although I would not drink these wines daily as I used to.

Thanks to Lenn for his leadership over these last 4 years and I’m hoping to blog WBW 96 with him and other friends in 2012.

If there is a single wine that I could name that pointed me onto the path of becoming a wine lover, it’s the Zinfandel made from the Lytton Springs vineyard. I’m not exactly sure why this wine made me sit up and take notice, but it did, and remains today one of my sentimental favorites. So when Joel from Wine Life Today announced the theme of Comfort Wines for this month’s Wine Blogging Wednesday, I knew there was only one wine to fill the bill: Ridge Lytton Springs.

It must have been late 1981 or early 1982 when I stumbled across a small winery named Lytton Springs in my search for the best Zinfandel. This variety had already become my favorite most likely due to the forward fruit in most bottlings that was noticeably different from the Bordeaux and Napa Cabs I was mostly drinking at the time. Since I didn’t yet read any wine publications, I must have chosen Lytton Springs Zinfandel from the recommendation of a wine merchant or, more likely, just at random. From my first experience with the aromas of dark fruit offset by spices and cedar, I was hooked. The layers of flavor and impeccable balance also didn’t hurt either and this became my “benchmark” Zinfandel that all others were judged against.

The Lytton Springs Winery was founded in 1970 after Richard Sherwin purchased the old vine vineyard near downtown Healdsburg, California. The vineyard had been planted around the turn of the 20th Century on lands owned by a Captain Litton who many years before built a hotel catering to Bay Area visitors to the local hot springs. By the time of the vineyard planting, the spelling of his family name had evolved to Lytton.

The vineyard is a classic “field blend” of inter-planted varieties with about 70% Zinfandel, 20% Petite Sirah and the remainder split between Grenache and Carignane. As early as 1972, Ridge Vineyards winemaker Paul Draper made wines from this vineyard but it wasn’t until Ridge purchased Lytton Springs Winery in 1991 that the entire 35-acre property was devoted to Ridge wines. There is a great interview with Richard Sherwin over at Gang of Pour if you are interested in more background on Lytton Springs Winery.

I can’t recall when I made the switch to Ridge Lytton Springs but it was most likely in the early 1990’s. The grace and even elegance of this wine made it stand out to me over another favorite Sonoma vineyard, the famous Ridge Geyserville most recently tasted on my birthday last year. So I was looking forward to getting back to Lytton Springs 2004, a wine I last tasted about 14 months ago but failed to blog here for some unknown reason.

Ridge Vineyards, Zinfandel, Lytton Springs, Dry Creek Valley 2004 ($34) - This wine still displays a youthful purple-ruby color. The aroma profile is classic Lytton Springs: black raspberries & blackberry with fennel and cedar. The flavors are also a mixture of dark fruits with the addition of some blueberry, black pepper and minerality that finishes long with great balance and moderate tannins. Although this wine weighs in at 14.5% ABV, there is no hint of heat on the palate or in the aromas. This is clearly still one of the best Zinfandel’s produced today and is in wide distribution due to production of over 10,000 cases each vintage.

14.5% ABV
Natural cork closure
Score: 92
Rating:

Buy this wine online

When I taste this wine today, it takes me back to my earliest memories of noteable wines. In fact, Lytton Springs Winery Zinfandel was the best wine I had ever tasted until it was upstaged by a glass of 1974 Heitz Cellars “Martha’s Vineyard” Cab that I had in 1986. But I still have a warm place in my heart for Lytton Springs Zin that will never be changed.

Kudos go to Joel from Wine Life Today for a great theme and congratulations on the birth of his second child just a few days ago. I’m hoping he can find some time to recount all the stories this month in between his fatherly duties.

Next month some guy from New Jersey named Gary is hosting. Should be fun to see what he’s got in mind.

Longtime readers and listeners know about my love of Zinfandel. In fact, the most reviewed varietal here is this California transplant from the Old World. My love for Zinfandel started right when I got into wine in 1982. Most of the first wines I tried were either from Napa Valley (Cabs and Merlot) or Bordeaux (indifferent bottlings of third rate wine). While I liked some of what I was drinking, I gravitated toward wines with more fruit. Then I had a Zinfandel from Lytton Springs Vineyard. This was before Ridge bought them and I was hooked. Sebastiani Zinfandel became my house wine for all of $2.50 a bottle; ah, the good old days…

Aside from Ridge and Sebastiani another name stood out for Zin in my formative wine years: Foppiano. A family winery for more than 100 years, this Sonoma winery produces some of the best Petite Sirah and Cabernet in Sonoma. I’ve also enjoyed their Zinfandel over the years but have not had the opportunity to taste a recent vintage until they sent me some samples recently. And I’m glad they did as this is one of the better Zins under $20 now in wide release.

Foppiano Vineyards, Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley 2004 ($15/sample) - Medium purple in color with aromas of blackberry, black raspberry, fennel and vanilla. Nice dark cherry and blackberry fruit flavors with cracked black pepper and moderate tannins. Textbook, old-school Sonoma Zin.

14.5% ABV

Natural cork closure

Score: 87

Rating:

Buy this wine online

When the wine bug first bit me back in the early 1980’s, Zinfandel became my favorite varietal in large part due to the wines of Ridge Vineyards. Their field blend from the Geyserville vineyard in the Alexander Valley AVA of Sonoma County soon became the benchmark that other Zinfandels were judged.

Although I also greatly admire the Ridge Lytton Springs bottling, I always come back to Geyserville for the power and elegance that could only come from old vine Zinfandel, Carignan and Petite Sirah grown in this vineyard. Over the years the wines have been distinct and very malleable to the vintage but the layers of dark fruit flavor is always represented. So this wine was the natural choice for me to pickup to celebrate my birthday this past weekend.

Ridge Vineyards, Zinfandel, Geyserville 2005 ($34) - A field blend of 77% Zinfandel, 17% Carignane and 6% Petite Sirah. Very deep black-purple color with aromas of blackberry, kirsch, sage, fennel and cedar. The palate is classic Geyserville, with layers of dark fruit — blackberry, black cherry, black raspberry — supported by black pepper and spices. The tannins are firm but nicely integrated making the wine well balanced and very enjoyable right now. I would also expect this to age well over the next 8 to 10 years.

14.6% ABV
Natural cork closure
Score: 94
Rating: 4/5 stars

Buy this wine online.

Wine: Peterson, Zinfandel, “Tradizionale” 2002

Added on: 06/20/2007

Notes: This Zin from one of my favorite Dry Creek wineries is a traditional “field blend” where other varletials are intermixed in the vineyard and fermented together. This practice dates from the 19th Century where Italian immigrants practiced techniques similar to their homeland. Over 90% of this blend is Zinfandel with Petite Sirah, Alicante Bouschet, Carignane, Semillon, Palomino and Chasselas mixed in. The last three varieties are whites which is used to add aromatics and help extract color during fermentation from the red grapes. The Peterson’s like to season their reds with a fair amount of American oak but this wine seemed to have a lighter hand in this area; perhaps it’s also the age of the wine where the oak component is nicely integrated.

Tasting Notes:

Deep ruby in color with aromas of black raspberry, sage, vanilla and licorice. Well balanced bramble fruit with black pepper and spice finishing with moderate tannins. Very nice, old school Zin and a good value.

14.7% ABV
Natural cork closure
Score: 87

Comments:

Rating: 4

I’ve been meaning to mention that ZAP is not just about their big tasting in San Francisco in January or their other events in California, but they take their wines on the road and visit a number of cities across the U.S.

Their spring tour is in full swing this week with stops in Austin, Texas on May 8th, Phoenix, Arizona on May 10th and my hometown of Minneapolis on May 11-12. Get all the details at the ZAP website. If you are a zinophile like me, you will want to attend these tastings.

For Twin Cities readers and listeners, I’ll be at the Zinposium and Grand Tasting next Friday evening. Feel free to interrupt my spitting and scribbling anytime… and, yes, that long delayed ZAP podcast is in the works for posting next weekend. Think of it as the best of ZAP, coast to prairie

The theme for this month’s virtual tasting seemed deceptively simple. Find two wines from the same producer, varietal and vintage; one the regular release, the other the “reserve” and compare them. Is the reserve worth the extra money or not? Nice and simple but the only problem is finding synchronized vintages in the stores which I think will be a problem for a lot of participants this time.

In the four stores I visited, I only found a couple of options (ironically in the same store). The first were a couple of Rosemount Chardonnays from 2005; the regular Diamond label, the other their “Show Reserve”. I’ve had the “Show Reserve” Rosemount wines in the past and thought they were generally worth the price difference but trying a $25 Chardonnay against their $8 Chardonnay didn’t seem too interesting to me. And the bottles were standing up on the shelf for who-knows how long. The second choice ended up being my selection here. Two Rancho Zabaco Zinfandel’s from Sonoma’s Dry Creek Valley. Although the regular release was the 2004 vintage, I was able to spot a single bottle of the 2003 in the bottom of the bin to compare with the ‘03 “reserve”.

The term “reserve” is used by many wineries but in my experience there are two usage methodologies. The first is just branding to imply higher quality for lower-end wines. You’ll see term this used on Yellowtail, Columbia Crest and other popular brands to separate those from their entry priced wines. Many times the wine in the bottle is not that different from the regular release. The second methodology is used by several established Napa Valley wineries where “Reserve” or “Private Reserve” is used to designate their best wines. At one of the better local stores they stocked nearly a complete 1990’s vertical for Beringer Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, for example, but were selling the 2003 vintage of the regular release (the reserves were also $95 a bottle and up so I probably would not have gone in this direction had they stocked the 1999 Beringer Cab to match with the youngest reserve in stock). The wines I ended up with are probably somewhere in between these two usages of the term so I thought it was a pretty decent choice. I also like Zinfandel quite a bit and haven’t had this brand recently.

Rancho Zabaco is one of the many Gallo sub-brands used for Zinfandel, Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc and Syrah. Their ubiquitous “Dancing Bull” bottling gives the Ravenswood Vintner’s Blend brand a run for the money in the $8 and under range of Zinfandel. But they aspire to higher levels of Zin and each of the wines I selected tonight is from this upper tier.

Tasting Notes:

Rancho Zabaco, Zinfandel, “Sonoma Heritage Vines”, Dry Creek Valley 2003 ($15) - Dark garnet-purple in color with aromas of black raspberry, sage and vanilla. Rich in the mouth with very ripe blackberry fruit, black pepper and spice finishing with supple tannins. A very nice soft and jammy Zin for the money.

14.3% ABV
Natural cork closure
Score: 87

Rancho Zabaco, Zinfandel, “Sonoma Reserve”, Dry Creek Valley 2003* ($22) - Dark purple-black in color with aromas of blackberry, sage and spice. Blackberry, black pepper and spice flavors finishing with medium firm tannins and a bit of heat. More structured than the regular release with nice body but not nearly as jammy in the fruit department. The heat is the main difference here.

14.5% ABV
Natural cork closure
Score: 85

So is the “reserve” better than the regular release? Not in this tasting although the wines are very similar. The regular release is a softer wine with less of a tannic backbone but a lot more ripe fruit. The reserve is more of a structured Dry Creek Zin with hard angles but some heat on the finish. Each wine is recommended but the regular “Heritage Vines” release is the best value here as for $22 there are much better Zin’s to be had on the market.

Thanks to the folks at the Wine Cask blog for an interesting theme and I’ll see you all next month for what I hope is a bit easier theme

* The first bottle of this wine was corked so I only tasted this wine over one night. The other wine was tasted over two nights and the notes and score was a composite.

Quick Picks rolls into 2007 with a look at the standout Zinfandels from Chase Family Cellars tasted at last month’s ZAP tasting in San Francisco.

Tasting notes:

Chase Family Cellars, Zinfandel, Hayne Vineyard 2004 ($45) - Ruby-purple in color with aromas of raspberry, blackberry and spice. Ripe blackberry and black cherry fruit flavors with black pepper finishing elegant and very balanced with medium-firm tannins. A real fruit bomb but has enough structure for further aging.

Score: 91

Chase Family Cellars, Zinfandel, Hayne Vineyard “Reserve” 2004 ($75) - Dark purple in color with intense aromas of blackberry jam, raspberry and licorice. In the mouth, there is rich blackberry and black cherry fruit along with white pepper and spices finishing very smooth and long with well integrated tannins. Perhaps the best Zinfandel I’ve ever had. Only 100 cases produced.

Score: 95

Show Notes:

00:04 - Welcome and winery background
01:30 - Chase Family Cellars, Zinfandel, Hayne Vineyard 2004
02:12 - Chase Family Cellars, Zinfandel, Hayne Vineyard “Reserve” 2004
03:29 - Contact details

Feedback: winecast@gmail.com
Copyright 2007 Acan Media, Inc. Licensed to the public under Creative Commons.

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I’m back across the street at Starbuck’s after 6 hours of tasting and wanted to post a short note on my first impressions of this years ZAP tasting.

I had high hopes that my new strategy of tasting on the floor during the trade tasting then switching to the media lounge would allow me to taste over 100 wines like uber wine blogger Alder of Vinography (who, unfortunately, missed the tasting sick with the flu; get well soon, man). That proved not to be the case as I tasted and reviewed “only” 70 wines today. I think this was due to my pacing, longer conversations at the tables and how crowded it was but overall I’m very pleased with the result, as I didn’t taste any marginal wines this time. In fact, nearly all of them were very good or excellent with styles ranging from elegant to hedonistic fruit bombs.

In order of tasting, here is my first cut at standouts; full reviews later in my full roundup:

- Chase Family Cellars, Zinfandel, Hayne Vineyard, Reserve 2004 ($75)

- Carlisle Winery, Zinfandel, Pietro’s Ranch 2005 ($38)

- Robert Biale Vineyards, Zinfandel, Grande 2005

- Benessere, Zinfandel, Black Glass Estate Vineyard 2004 ($40)

- Ballentine Vineyards, Zinfandel, Pocai Vineyard, Block 11 2005 ($25)

- August Briggs, Zinfandel, Napa Valley 2004 ($30)

- Downing Family Vineyards, Pelissa Vineyard, “Fly by Night” 2004 ($30)

- Dashe Cellars, Zinfandel, Louvau Vineyard, “Old Vines” 2004 ($28)

- Dashe Cellars, Zinfandel, Todd Brothers Ranch, “Old Vines” 2004 ($28)

- Hendry, Zinfandel, Block 28, Napa Valley 2003 ($30)

- Turley Wine Cellars, Zinfandel, Hayne Vineyard 2005 (Barrel Sample/$75)

- Trinitas Cellars, Zinfandel, Russian River Valley 2004 ($26)

- Edmeades Winery, Zinfandel, Perli Vineyard, Mendocino 2004

I’m sure I missed a couple wines here but will present my full notes and scores for every wine I tasted in tomorrow’s post.

Now it’s off for dinner and hopefully some Pinot Noir

It doesn’t seem possible that a year has passed since I made the trip to San Francisco for my first Zinfandel Advocates & Producers (ZAP) tasting, but I’m here again to do my best at tasting 125 Zinfandels (I did 90 last year and have a few new strategies this time). Unlike last year, I’ll be covering the event much more here on the blog and on my podcast. If there’s WiFi access in the media lounge, I’ll post some notes during breaks; if not, I’ll come back to the Starbuck’s across the street and post (where I’m posting this right now).

I’m meeting some other wine bloggers, podcasters and Wine 2.0 folks at the tasting and if you are there, send me an email to meetup. I’ll be in town until Tuesday, so much tasting and many meetings are on my schedule.