Archive for the ‘Terroir’ Category
Another twitter-driven HASHTAG(Wine) day is upcoming. This one will focus not a varietal wine (a la #cabernet or #PinotNoir), but rather on a region. Specifically the Central Coast AVA in California. The official hashtag for the day is #CCWineDay. The day set aside for this celebration of all things wine and Central Coast is Thursday, March 15th. I'll make a point of drinking a "Central Coast" wine on March 15 and probably even using the #CCWineDay hashtag in order to…
What is the meaning of the "Natural Wine" movement? Why is here with us and why now? How has it slipped up? What kind of opposition does it face? How much support does it have? These are the questions I've been pondering recently as I prepare to go down to World of Pinot Noir this weekend to attend that annual festival of all things Pinot Noir and, in particular, listen to a debate/discussion about Natural Wines. What I'm hoping for…
I can’t recall an example within the wine industry where one product category was largely defined by its proponents’ denigration of competing products. Marketing-by-denigration isn’t actually common in any product category with the prominent exception of politics where candidates for office routinely denigrate their opposition in order to prop up themselves and their own candidacy. Proponents of the Natural Wine movement, however, seem to be the anomaly in the wine business: in order to gain attention for the wines, gain…
I don't like the idea of taking issue with Jamie Goode. He's smarter than me. He's a better writer than me. And he's better looking than me. But on this issue of "Authentic Wine", the topic of his latest book, Jamie gets it wrong. In fact, it's the very premise of his and Sam Harrop's "Authentic Wine: Toward Natural and Sustainable Winemaking" that can't be justified. In their introduction they write: "Wine is now at a metaphorical fork in the…
It's one thing to publish a Top 10 or Top 100 list of your favorite individual wines of the year. My hat is off to those who can determine such detailed conclusions. It's another thing to list one's Top 10 Wine Types of the year. This is merely a matter of determining what category of wines most pleased during the year. I prefer this later approach as it relieves me from having to mention individual wines and it's a far…
