Tasters Guild Orlando Journal

Breaking Wine News Breaking Wine News Archive

Rioja had a banner year in 2006, selling 261 million liters (about 30 million cases) of vino worldwide – an all time record for the Spanish wine region. And starting this year, Rioja will have nine new grapes to play with. Indeed, three non-indigenous white grapes, Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and Verdejo, can now be planted in the region, along with three indigenous Spanish (but heretofore unplanted in Rioja) white grapes, Maturana Blanca, Tempranillo Blanc and Torrontes, and three indigenous Spanish (but again heretofore unplanted in Rioja) red grapes, Maturana Tinta, Maturano and Monastrell. The native grapes can be used to make single-variety wines; but the non-native grapes may only be blended – in a minority proportion – with native grapes.

QRW contributor Michael Broadbent, who turned 80 on May 2, has retired from the board of Christie’s, after 40 years of service with the London-based auctioneer. Appointed head of Christie’s new wine department in 1967, Broadbent single-handedly created the modern-day wine auction, becoming in the process the world’s foremost expert on old and rare wines. He also managed along the way to produce two seminal wine references, Michael Broadbent’s Guidance in the Technique of Tasting (John Harvey, 1963) and The Great Vintage Wine Book (Alfred A. Knopf, 1980, and twice updated).

Castello Banfi, the well-known property in Tuscany’s Montalcino region, experienced an unusual harvest last February, when paleontologists digging on the estate uncovered the skeleton of a 33-foot-long prehistoric whale. The beast dates back five million years to the Pliocene era, at which time all of Tuscany was an ocean.

Saint-Emilion’s 2006 classification has been suspended by the Bordeaux Administrative Tribunal. The classification had been challenged in court by three châteaux – Villemaurine, Cadet Bon and Guadet-Saint-Julien – that were demoted from Grande Cru Classé to mere Grand Cru. They claimed the findings were tainted because the classification jury included two wine brokers and a lawyer who each did business with various Saint-Emilion châteaux, and therefore could not be objective. They also pointed out that of the 95 wines classified, only seven had actually been inspected by the jury. Unlike other Bordeaux regions, Saint-Emilion revisits its classifications every ten years. The next such reappraisal is set for 2016. The much ballyhooed 2003 classification of Médoc’s cru bourgeois vineyards has also been thrown out by the Bordeaux courts. This was hardly unexpected. The classification, whose selection committee included many châteaux owners with evident conflicts, had been questioned from the beginning.

Domaine Clarence Dillon, the owner of Bordeaux’s storied Châteaux Haut Brion and La Mission-Haut Brion, is dropping one of its labels. Starting with the 2006 vintage, the Pessac-Léognan Grand Cru Château La Tour Haut Brion will no longer be bottled as such, and its wine will go instead into other Dillon brands. A 12.4-acre property adjacent to La Mission-Haut Brion, La Tour Haut Brion produces about 4,800 gallons of red wine annually.

Fans of Château d’Yquem can now say ”Super size me“ and really mean it. Starting with the 2005 vintage, Sauternes’ greatest wine will be available for the first time ever in 15-liter nebuchadnezzar bottles. However, only 120 such large-formats are being bottled. Fifty of these will go to the British merchant Bordeaux Wine Investors, 50 to the American importer Bordeaux Wine Locators, and 20 will stay at the Château as part of its library collection. The retail price per bottle is estimated at $20,000-$25,000, with delivery sometime in 2009.

Visitors to the ex-Souverain winery in Geyserville, California will soon be able to have a swimmingly good time. New owner Francis Ford Coppola is building two public swimming pools on the site, along with 31 poolside cabanas swimmers can rent. He is also expanding the property’s indoor restaurant, while adding an outdoor eatery, four bocce courts and a bandshell-cum-ampitheatre replete with dance floor. The winery is getting a new name, too, and henceforth will be called ”Rosso & Bianco.“

Michel Rolland, who consults with over 100 wine producers in 12 countries, is reducing his work load. The controversial wine guru announced recently that he would be dropping 20 of his Bordeaux clients, among them Châteaux Kirwan, Malescot-Saint-Exupéry and Fieuzal. Rolland’s wife and business partner, Dany, said the decisions were based on two things: the fact that her husband is turning 60 this year and wants to slow down; and the realization that the châteaux being dropped are doing well and no longer need assistance.

U.S. consumers purchased a record 300 million cases of wine in 2006, prompting wine industry analyst Jon Fredrikson of Gomberg, Fredrikson & Associates to note that, ”Wine is finally entering the mainstream of American life.“ What a brilliant observation.

It appears that plans to build a super highway through Bordeaux’s Margaux appellation have been scrapped. But Spain’s Ribera del Duero region, home to Vega Sicilia and a host of other top-flight wineries, may not be so lucky. Plans appear to be going forward to widen Spanish highway N-122, which abuts some of the region’s best vineyards. If this happens, say local vintners, 247 prime vineyard acres will be destroyed, and the local microclimate will be dramatically altered. However, there is some good news coming out of Ribera del Duero. The appellation will soon be upgraded from DO (Denominacion de Origen) status to DOCa (Denominacion de Origen Calificada). This official, higher-quality designation is held by only two other Spanish wine regions: Rioja and Priorat.

From the Los Angeles Times (March 28, 2007) comes this novel way to rescue corky wines. Wad up a square-foot of Saran Wrap, stuff it into a large glass pitcher, pour the offending wine over the wrap into the pitcher, and then swish the liquid around for about ten minutes. The polyethylene in the wrap will absorb all of the taint-producing agent – a compound called trichloranisole (TCA) – and return the wine to a drinkable state, says the Times.

The Burgundy producer Maison Jean-Claude Boisset is bottling half of its 2005 Le Chambertin production – 25 cases – with screwcaps. This is the first Grand Cru Burgundy to be so packaged. Boisset will also offer some of its 2005 Beaune Bressandes Premier Cru with screwcaps.

Gary Farrell, who sold his eponymous California winery to Allied Domecq in 2004, is partnering with investment banker and vineyard owner, Bill Hambrecht, on a new Russian River winery that will focus on small-lot Pinot Noir production. The yet-to-be-named venture will produce about 6,000 cases of wine annually.

Establishments J. P. Moueix, the owners of Pomerol’s legendary Château Pétrus, have purchased a one-third stake in Dubois-Challon, the company that owns Château Ausone’s next-door neighbor, the Saint-Emilion First Growth Château Belair.

The 2007 grape harvest in Argentina’s Mendoza Valley was severely reduced by a series of hail storms that began last December and continued right into February.

There’s continuing good news about the health benefits of wine. Men who drink at least a half-glass of wine a day live an average of four years longer than teetotalers, according to a 40-year study of 1,373 subjects living in the Dutch town of Zutphen. A State University of New York at Stony Brook study claims that drinking three glasses of red wine a day cuts the risk of colorectal cancer by 68 percent. And scientists at the Harvard School of Public Health say that men with hypertension are 30 percent less likely to have a heart attack if they drink one or two glasses of wine a day.

U.S. sales of Italian wines surpassed $1 billion for the first time ever last year. In all, Americans purchased 22 million cases of Italian wine in 2006, bringing Italy’s share of the U.S. market to 32.4 percent.

Hubert de Bouard, owner of the Saint-Emilion First Growth Château L’Angelus, is the new regional chief of INAO (Institut National des Appellations d’Origine), the government bureau that regulates French wine. As such, de Bouard will supervise three sizable regions: Bordeaux, Bergerac and Lot et Garonne.

Napa’s Duckhorn Wine Company denies that it’s about to be sold. Rumors that it was on the block surfaced last March, after the company announced it was hiring Credit Suisse Securities to help it with ”long-term strategic options.“ But Duckhorn President Alex Ryan told the St. Helena Star that Credit Suisse had been brought in to advise the company’s board on the best ways of continuing to grow, and that ”Currently, we don’t have a buyer and our company is not for sale.“ Sounds like ”famous last words“ to us.

Seniors who drink moderate amounts of wine (six to 13 glasses a week) are likely to have lower Medicare expenses than non-drinkers, according to a study published last fall in Health Care Financing Review, a U.S. Department of Health and Human Resources journal.

South African wine may be at a crossroads of sorts. Over production, falling prices and diminished demand has put a severe crimp in wine sales, and some 30 Cape estates are reportedly up for sale. Stay tuned.

Here’s one from the ”Wine, women and sarong“ department. A Melbourne, Australia microbiologist cum artist, Gary Cass, has created a woman’s dress made of cellulose slime skimmed off the top of red wine vinegar. However, the dress has to be sprayed on and must be kept wet at all times or the cellulose fibers will break up and fall off. ”This is art – it is not meant to be practical,“ Cass told MSNBC. ”It is meant to be a provocative object, to spark debate about future fashion.“ And we thought clothing made from hemp was off the wall!