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2008 Bonneau Petit Sirah, 2006 Silverado Merlot, 2006 Fantesca Cabernet Sauvignon and 2007 Krutz Family Cellars Stagecoah Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

May 20, 2011

The Negress lined up these four wines because she wanted to share a few thoughts about them before she completely forgot she had drunk them. This is how you can tell she writes drinking notes, not tasting notes.  Most these wines met their end when she cooked a Rick Bayless tomatillo salsa verde braised pork loin so note the pairing for those of you who note such things. Anyway, She was charmed by all of the wines for different reasons. First the 2008 Bonneau Petit Sirah is a big but graceful wine that doesn’t pitch off the cliff into jamminess. As is usually the case, you won’t easily find this outside of California but a quick click over to Cellars of Sonoma (full disclosure: I belong to their club) can remedy that.  The Silverado 2006 Merlot is also a club-only wine with a little being sold direct at the winery. The Negress is ferociously partial to the North Fork Merlots and usually finds their Cali counterparts to be blanketed with fleecy tannins and very little structure. Well, not this Merlot. It’s got structure, some blackberry and is, well, a bright and happy wine.

The Negress is nursing shoulder injury (not sure what it is but it seems to be improving thanks). She might have gotten it lifting the Fantesca bottle. The bottle feels full even when it’s empty. Perhaps this weightiness is a good match for a Spring Mountain Napa Cabernet, but methinks it just adds to the price. The Negress brought this wine back from a Wine Writers Symposium a coupe of years ago. A little more bottle age seems to have been OK, but the Negress felt this wine was just OK. She loves some of the wines from the Spring Mountain AVA and expected to love this one. Place it under the usual suspects category.

Lastly, the 2007 Krutz Family Cellars Stagecoach Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon is a bottle from the winery’s limited edition artist’s series. The Negress got hers from Cellars of Sonoma, and it made sense why they would feature this Napa cab in their club. The wine was supple, nimble and exciting with nice but not engorged fruit. Not sure how much of this is left, but it ‘s worth seeking out.

All of these wines weigh in at between 14.5 and 14.8 percent alcohol bu volume. As has often been said, 14 is the new 12.

Not long after you read this, the Negress is heading off to the National Restaurant Association show here in Chicago. You can follow her doings there over at FoodserviceDailyNews on their Twitter feed @FoodTalkToday.

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Jack Stuart of Benessere Vineyards and the Napa Vintage Perspective tasting

March 20, 2011

The Negress finished up her time in Napa by avoiding some of the usual pitfalls of the pre-Premiere Napa Valley events. She could have gone to all the AVA tastings, greeting the sheep at Spring Mountain, straining to hear over the throngs tasting auction lots. But this year, it was time for a change. She did start off by doing the Pinot Noir division of the Napa Vintage Perspective tasting at the Rudd Center for Wine Studies at the CIA. Then she ended up chatting with Jack Stuart over at Benessere Vineyards. Stuart had been the winemaker at Silverado until 2004. In short, more perspective. Some of the Pinot vintages were oaky fruit bombs. One producer, I just wrote “indifferent across the board.” Life is too short to drink indifferent wine. The Negress brought up her disappointment with the tasting to Stuart, and he offered the following: “I think some of the young wine makers haven’t been around long enough to know what a traditional Pinot Noir tastes like. American new oak is too much for Pinot. It’s a more delicate wine.”

Wine writers tasting Pinot Noir at the Napa Perspective tasting

All work and no play makes for a dull wine life

At Benessere, which took over the old Charles F. Shaw winery (yeah Chuck’s old haunt before his name was sold and slapped on oceans of plonk), they made 124 cases of 2008 Pinot Nero. But the majority of their 4,000 to 5,000 case production is Sangiovese, Zinfandel and Pinot Grigio. The half bottle of 2006 Sangiovese the Negress took with her back to Meadowood paired nicely with a venison entrée. She’s waiting to try the Zins, regular and the Black Glass, on a suitable occasion. She tasted the regular Zin at the winery, but only remembers that it was light on its feet.

We also sampled the 2010 Pinot Grigio, which is the first vintage that is Stuart’s from start to finish. Most people’s gateway Pinot Grigio is Santa Margherita, and that’s deeply unfortunate. The wine is crazy out of balance and almost syrupy. When Stuart arrived at Benessere, his goal was to make the Pinot Grigio less sweet. He has succeeded and maintained the varietal’s distinct minerality.

Stuart took his cue from the climate of the Alto Adige in Italy, where the weather is cool. His Pinot Grigio is on 42 acres in Carneros, which is also a cool growing area thanks to the moderating influence of San Pablo Bay. The juice is cold temperature fermented in stainless steel, and then spends some time in old barrels.

One thing Stuart was conscious of when he came to Benessere was that he was coming to a place where he admired the wines they were making, but he knew that he couldn’t make any sudden changes. He did ended up toning down the sweetness of the Pinot Grigio, but it was, “a controlled evolution.”

During his days at Silverado, Stuart supervised some replanting of the vineyards, especially after a 1986 phylloxera outbreak. Current Silverado general manager Russ Weis said the wider spacing of the vines was a leftover from the old days, but Stuart said they used 4×6 and 6×8 spacing and it was relatively recent. “They’re not as narrow as some, and we did change to headtrained, cane-pruned vines from the cordon and spur training.”

The Negress threw out an analogy to winemaking and Oscar fashions. In the days of Bjork and her swan and Kim Basinger and her mermaid tail, errors in judgment shone out like shook foil. Now, with everyone being guided by stylists, the jaw dropping miscues are gone, but blandness has seized the day. Isn’t this as true of wine where “meh” has replaced “Ewwww” as the watchword?

Stuart  stopped judging wine competitions because of the “Ewwww” factor.

“When I did judge, out of tasting a dozen wines, the most powerful, odd wine made the strongest impression and they would usually get acknowledged,” Stuart said.

But Stuart also acknowledges the difference between tasting professionally and drinking.

“I had a nice spatlese Riesling when I was out for dinner the other night and it went well with the chicken and couscous. But I was also with good friends and it was a lovely night. When I was working on the Pinot Grigio, I shut the door of my office and tasted without any distractions. I was looking for flaws and ways the wine was off-kilter. But you have to separate work from play.”

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Wine Writers Symposium 2011: the wine part

March 6, 2011

OK. Most of us were at this year’s Symposium for Professional Wine Writers to polish our writing, search for a niche (there’s one blogger who does nothing but rate the wines at Trader Joe’s. Bless his heart, as they say down South), and find an audience for that niche. But, of course, there was wine provided by the Napa Valley Vintners. The Negress always enjoys the night when they break out the ports and the dessert wines. However, this year she was more cautious than usual. Instead of tasting through everything, she merely drank three wines and stopped. She also took no notes really, figuring that the really memorable wines didn’t need notes. Of the 15 wines served at the fellowship dinner, the Negress remembers one that was a spiky mess, out of balance and just plain funky (and not in the George Clinton sense). Alder Yarrow of Vinography is a more diligent taster than herself, so check out his blog if you crave details.

Benessere winery

a little powerhouse winery tucked away

So, that didn’t tell you much, did it? Well, there’s a reason for that. After the fellowship dinner on Thursday, she and several top tier wine bloggers (the Negress was most definitely the ringer here) broke out a stash of Unauthorized Wine in a series of Undisclosed Locations. There was Vouvray, a cheeky Australian shiraz minus the usual bombast from Down Under and a pleasant late harvest Gewurztraminer. The wine of that night was without a doubt a 6 puttonyo Royal Tokaji supplied by Ben Weinberg of the Unfiltered Unfined blog. The Negress loves tokajis, but had only ever had a 5 puttonyo before this one. Well, she shall never forget this particular honeyed nectar. Dessert wines can be an acquired taste, and the Negress thinks they should replace dessert in the way that sparkling wine should be an everyday wine and break free from the shackles of Champagne marketing. The Tokaji slid down her throat elegantly with honey and some pear flavors. She thanks Ben profusely for sharing it with the gang.

The runup to Premiere Napa Valley also features gang AVA tastings. The Negress skipped those too. She headed over to see Jack Stuart, former Silverado winemaker and current winemaker at Benessere, which is housed in the former Charles F. Shaw winery. If that Shaw name sounds familiar, it’s because it’s the official name assigned to various “buck Chucks.” When Shaw got out of the wine business, the name got licensed. The winery, however, is being put to better use methinks.

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Wine Writers Symposium 2011: the audience part

March 4, 2011

As you may have figured out from the most recent post, the Symposium for Professional Wine Writers was about writing. But what’s writing without readers except a solitary exercise in frustration? The Negress prefers solitary exercises that relieve frustration preferably without involving a Sawzall (All right, she digresses. But that happened close to home.)  Alder Yarrow of Vinography, Doug Cook, formerly of Twitter and currently overseeing AbleGrape, a wine search engine and Joe Roberts of 1winedude, did a panel on using search engines. You may have noticed the

Doug Cook, founder of Able Grape search engine

Doug Cook of Able Grape

somewhat orderly titles here in Negressland of late. They are due in part to what this trio told us about how people search for information online. There are 131 billion searches performed online annually and that figure is increasingly by 46 percent every year. All of our panelists suggested when writing blog posts to put yourself in the searcher’s shoes. Search engines already do that and Google and its ilk have tons of people tweaking search algorithms so they behave more like humans. Of course, repeating “Lady Gaga” or “Justin Bieber” over and over in posts seems like a strategy, but guess what? The search engines are onto you and will banish you from search results for such obvious gaming of the system. One myth for web presences is that more traffic is better. What your goal should be is to connect with people who are interested in what you have to say and nobody else. You want

Joe Roberts of the 1winedude blog

Joe Roberts of 1winedude (pic courtesy of NY Cork Report)

to maximize meaningful interactions. Tag your posts (the Negress does that). Encourage comments (please feel free but no spam. She has an app for that.) Also, limit your blogroll. Yarrow related that he was kicked out of search results because he had a page of links to other wine bloggers. Most search engines see this as a shameless ploy for traffic and will ban you very quickly. Vinography got reinstated to searches but it took some work.

Also, while search engines like repetition, remember readers are drawn to good writing. You may move up in the ranks by repeating “Trimbach Alsace Riesling” 12 times in a 500-word post, but your readers will flee clutching their heads. The Negress admits she knew a bit more about this than some of the Symposium attendees, but she was grateful to the trio for pulling it all together in a coherent fashion. You might have been over your head if to you a computer is just a typewriter with annoyances and think MS-DOS and xywrite are still viable, but let’s hope that’s a decreasing minority in the wine blogging world, Cook has posted the Power Point. Take look for yourself.

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Wine Writers Symposium 2011: the writing part

February 28, 2011

This year’s edition of the Symposium for Professional Wine Writers was more reality-driven than some past years. Trying to summarize the event can overlook some of the best stuff that shakes out. So the Negress has resorted to an organizing principle she thinks might help. This post will focus on how we wrote. Subsequent posts will focus on the wines official and unofficial (Many thanks to Jon Bonne for enabling the unofficial wine gathering after the vintners’ dinner and apologies to the Meadowood guests we woke up.

Gerald Asher noted wine writer

Gerald Asher at work (photo courtesy of ciaprochef)

More about that later). Our opening speakers were longtime wine writer Gerald Asher

Dominique Browning (courtesy of vanguardscouts.com)

Dominique Browning (courtesy of vanguardscouts.com

and former House and Garden editor Dominique Browning. Each had useful advice for anyone writing about anything. But since a lot of wine writers need their natural inclination to pompousness amputated, this was especially valuable. Browning, who admitted falling into something of a depression when her gig was euthanized, admits she edited wine writing but never did any. She recommended loving what you’re doing and going where that love is. “The only reason to write about wine is to connect others to your particular form of worship,” she said. “There’s no such thing  as being a writer. There is only writing.” Words to live by. She is one of many people who suggested reading your work out loud. She also suggested walking away from the topic if you become stale. You should labor over writing and wear your heart in your copy.

Asher encouraged more reporting. “Writing is the best kind of conversation. You can’t get interrupted,” Asher said.  He also strongly urged the writers to have references, sources and history at their disposal. “Have more than you need.” He also strongly suggested that tasting notes move away from the fruit salad mode. Wine writers should keep more objective notes about tannin and acidity and refer back to those. Focus on the distinctive elements that calls you back to your mindful notes. He cited a recent Eric Asimov piece that questioned the usefulness of fruit-driven tasting notes but noted that Asimov then dug himself a pretty big hole after the sound premise. “Help people understand that wine is a pleasure,” Asher said. He then read a piece of his about the soil specifics of Sancerre and Pouilly-Fume on the myth of gunsmoke that was lavish, smart and compelling. The Negress felt humbled.

Corie Brown, former wine writer for the LA Times and proprietor of Zester Daily, a site the Negress isn’t cool enough to be part of, joined Jack Hart formerly the writing coach of the Oregonian for a writing exercise on how to write a narrative piece, in this case a profile. Brown interviewed winemaker Michael Honig, and then set us all to writing the opening of a profile using the material her questions elicited and what we observed about Honig. You  can find the Negress version of  Honig here. You can also read her take on food and wine pairing there to from an exercise conducted by Karen McNeil.

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Wine Writers Symposium 2011: One more stab at ethics

February 27, 2011

The Negress had vowed she would bury the topic of ethics at the Symposium for Professional Wine Writers forever  last year’s version of it (see her version of events in 2010). But this year brought some new faces with rule changes about fellowships and what have you. One of those new faces is W. Blake Gray, who runs the Gray Market Report. Gray is funny and knowledgeable, and does a wicked imitation of video wine twit James Suckling. We were chatting over a glass of wine (shocking for wine writing symposium, right?) when the Negress brought up the FTC ruling about disclosure on blogs of policy on freebies, junkies, etc. Gray doesn’t like this, he said, because newspapers and magazines don’t have to do it and they do a lot of the same stuff bloggers do. He cited sportswriters, saying they got to go to games for free. The Negress used to be a sportswriter. We went around on this for a while with neither side drawing blood and remained chatty through the rest of the symposium.

But, via l’esprit de l’escalier (big French for the extremely delayed riposte), the Negress has come up with a complicated retort that she thinks is effective. First of all, with legacy media (a slightly less depressing term for newspapers and magazines than dead-tree media), there is an implied contract with their readers that has evolved and devolved continuously. Most readers know the guy covering their teams gets to go to games, but it’s not like he or she is eating bonbons and relaxing with a brewski. You write a game story, keep up with team developments and, increasingly,  write blog posts and update a feed nearly constantly. This is work and the access to do it isn’t a perk; it’s a necessity. There was a time when some magazine and newspaper reporters did collude with entities they covered, hiding arrests and drug problems. That happens less and less now, though, a lot of entertainment journalism is constricted by publicist’s demands and reduced access.

Bloggers are not always journalists so fact checking, confirming rumors and being scrupulous aren’t necessarily guaranteed. My policy regarding what I do and don’t do is on this site. I do agree with Gray that more disclosure is needed since, as one dead-tree vet and I discussed, newspapers are increasingly buying pieces from freelancers who take freebie trips while still forbidding their own reporters to do so. Not to mention the increasing practice of health “reports” assembled and paid for by local hospitals appearing on local newscasts with no indication that this is advertorial, not independently reported data.

So, in short, the Negress urges thoughtful skepticism and paying attention. As has always been the case, much is not what it seems.

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Blending my own Napa Cabernet at Conn Creek Winery

February 26, 2011
Blending the 2008 vintage at Conn Creek

Topping off their very own bottle

The  Negress started her Wine Writers Symposium 2011 journey at Conn Creek Vineyards doing something she thinks everyone would love to do and thinks they can do better than anyone else. No, it wasn’t managing a baseball team or running a corporation. She had the opportunity to blend her own signature Cabernet-dominant Bordeaux-style blend using juice from all of the Napa AVAs (the American version of appellations). Her Perry-stroika 2008 was heavy on Spring Mountain fruit with a little Calistoga and Yountville fruit tossed in for grins. Also part of the mix were a touch of Petit Verdot and Cabernet Franc. She was pleased with her efforts. However,  when she shared a glass with her fellow fly in the buttermilk Wine Chef Tony Lawrence, he noted she had made the kind of wine she would normally beedistressed by. The Negress noted she didn’t intend to pair this wine with any particular food, just enjoy it after a long day of selling insurance. Lawrence is a wine idea mogul (The Negress loves his winemaker speed dating concept) and has forgotten more wine than the Negress has drunk. So his opinion had meaning to her. But the exercise brought her back to the gulf between a professional wine life and the life of a drinker. When we taste, delving for items on the flavor and scent profile checklist, are we really drinking or are we back in junior high science? In short, do we taste as wine lovers drink? The Negress knows her palate was slapped back to rigor by being in the company of her fellow wineaux (she and 1winedude feel as though the event is a support group, allowing the attendees to geek out and then go back to their normal friends cleansed and able to talk about other stuff). But she admits when her shoes are off and a long day has ended, she abandons the search for damson notes.

By the way, if you want to do this, Conn Creek charges $95 and that includes the bottle you make and keep. If you join their wine club, the cost is 30 percent less and you get the opportunity to compare your efforts their winemakers.

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Fellowship at Silverado Vineyards

February 22, 2011

The Negress believes in full disclosure so she will note here that she is only at this year’s Symposium for Professional Wine Writers thanks to the generosity of the folks at Silverado Vineyards. She was delighted to find out that the winery is friendly with Gary Fisch of New Jersey wine retailer Gary’s  Wine and Marketplace (if you live in New Jersey near Gary’s and aren’t shopping there, you must be a glutton for abusive customer service and high prices). Fisch may have been relaxing in the Silverado guest house while general manager Russ Weis and winemaker Jon Emmerich  were letting her taste some barrel samples.  It doesn’t matter except to note that the Negress likes their taste in retailers.

Silverado Cabernet sampling

Silverado winemaker Jon Emmerich samples some Cabernet

She also liked their wines. In fact, her relationship with Chardonnay was irrevocably altered by their 2009 Vineburg Vineyard offering.  She had tasted barrel samples from their stainless steel barrels as well as the older oak barrels. Emmerich said he used mostly the INOX wine in the ’09 with a touch of the juice that had seen oak. The wine was lean  but well-structured with a touch of pineapple and honeysuckle but a nice hint of minerality. Consider the Negress sold. She will buy some to take home with her. Other faves included the 2006 Zinfandel from Silverado’s Soda Canyon vineyard. at 14.6 abv, it’s nearly ethereal as Zins go but still has the plummy quality that the Negress favors.

Silverado makes an excellent case for blending, a practice the Negress thinks got shoved aside a bit unceremoniously in post-Mondavi American wine. Some wines need a helping verb and a good example of this was a comparison of a barrel sample of Silverado’s 2010 and 2009 Miller Ranch Sauvignon Blancs. The 2010 has about 4 to 5 percent Semillon, and is slated to be bottled in the middle of next month. It’s somewhat more lemony than the ’09 and a bit green. Emmerich noted that the vineyard workers grow tomatoes on some of the unoccupied land and thinks this is a great indication for soil that is SB-friendly. The 2009 has 8 percent Semillon and has more notes of green apple and pear.

Emmerich and Weis went over their learning curve that led to the 2007 Mount George Vineyard Merlot. They only make about 5,000 cases of it, and it’s the antithesis of every indifferent Merlot that leaves your palate feeling fuzzy and dull (The Negress has likened drinking substandard Merlot to chewing on an Army blanket). The Silverado duo realized they had spent a very long time trying to make Merlot behave like Cabernet Sauvignon. Upon changing their thinking, their Merlot became brighter, with red fruit  and a delicacy that’s addictive. The Negress rates this a strong buy, but that’s only likely if you’re in the Silverado wine club. Production is only 5,000 cases.

Her tasting closed with the 2007 Solo, a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon grown on different parts of the property. It runs about 14.9% abv, which makes it a lightweight compared to some Napa heavyweights. But this wine can cozy up to food and not instantly induce a headache. Well-balanced and with enough tannin to guarantee some real aging potential, this one is also a keeper. Bad news for the Negress’ Chicagoland pals, Binny’s doesn’t carry Silverado wines. Call them up. A lot.

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In which the Negress attempts to earn a living and help people

February 20, 2011

The Negress had to do something. Her money was dwindling and being out of work for a nearly two years was dulling her ability to embrace reality without sweating and wincing. So she started going to gang interviews with insurance companies. Insurance agents are salespeople, and she had done some of that in Maryland while working for the state’s oldest winery. She also knew the writing thing was not exactly a way to earn a living anymore with content mills and people writing all over the Internet in a masturbatory, worthless fashion that had reduced payments even for those who knew better. Knowing better doesn’t seem to count for much these days. So now the Negress is selling insurance and spends much of her time with the people who keep the country running –home caregivers, bell operators, sheriff’s office people, day care providers. Many of them are union folks, and their friends and family are also part of her daily landscape. The Negress hears heartbreaking stories and hopes what she’s selling can help. In some cases, she knows for sure that it can.

My home away from home

A place of good food, fine wine and great use of space

The hours are long and, perhaps a related event, she’s on new medication which requires liver function tests every now and then. Fatigue is a companion but she works for people who deride yawning and want her to work very hard so she can kick back in 10 years on her residuals. The Negress would love to do that, but some days she’s not sure she will live long enough to make it happen.

As Livia Soprano would say, “Oh. Poor you.” Clearly, a renewal of purpose was essential. So the Negress decamped to California since she won a fellowship to the Symposium for Professional Wine Writers. Her liver has mixed feelings about the trip, but her spirit is soaring even though she is exhausted. She’s been to the Ferry Building, eaten at Gott’s Roadside (a turkey burger this time since her butt is now spilling over into neighboring airline seats), had that amazing chicken coconut milk soup at Manora and is resting comfortably at the Palace, which is responding to the recession by deeply discounting its lovely rooms. The Negress hasn’t had much wine since the Equality Illinois gala  and a trip to Gino’s North for yummy thin crust pizza (thin crust is the real food of Chicago, not that deep dish crap). She did manage a pair of Pisco sours and a $6 margarita and they felt lovely. But she’s conserving her strength to the point of even having a Diet Coke at Gott’s.

She returned to the Palace using her Muni transfer to take another of those lovely historic trolleys on Market Street (the Negress passed two from Milan, which kind of made her want to knit something) . Well fed and dosed with Peet’s Coffee, a nap was in order. There’s also a larger question to ponder in the next post, which will most likely be from the Silverado Vineyards, the sponsor of my fellowship.  Do my liver’s misgivings need to be taken seriously?

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2010 in review here at Chronic Negress

January 2, 2011

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

Healthy blog!

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.

Crunchy numbers

Featured image

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 5,800 times in 2010. That’s about 14 full 747s.

 

In 2010, there were 40 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 152 posts. There were 42 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 195mb. That’s about 4 pictures per month.

The busiest day of the year was January 5th with 156 views. The most popular post that day was When keyboards drink Zinfandel.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were facebook.com, twitter.com, wineblogawards.org, cheapwineratings.com, and mutineermagazine.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for chronic negress, whale bones, negress, andre mack, and deception island.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

When keyboards drink Zinfandel September 2009
2 comments

2

Andre Mack, Thomas Keller’s Invisible Man March 2010
9 comments

3

Antarctica: Mikkelson Island January 2009

4

About April 2008
1 comment

5

2008 Bastianich Vespa Bianco and Flying Dog Raging Bitch May 2010
2 comments

 

 

So now we celebrate. This photo is to scale. Thanks for stopping by this year and Happy 2011.

It was this or the gift set

This should be enough for some time to come.

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