I won’t say that great pinot noir can only be made in Burgundy nor will I assert that a strict Burgundian interpretation of the grape is the only legitimate course to follow. Yet there is a greatness and fineness about the best models of the pinot noir grape from the Premier Cru and Grand Cru vineyards of Burgundy that examples produced in other parts of the world seldom achieve. Still, who would decry the fresh, pale, astringent pinot noirs of the Jura mountains, or the uniquely rooty, earthy pinots of Oregon’s Dundee Hills or the bright, fruity pinots of Carneros? One of the most transcendent pinot noirs I have ever tasted hailed from Tasmania. Obviously we must allow room for variation and individual style, yet most important is the notion that place matters; geography, friends, is a dear teacher, and whether in warfare or winemaking only fools will fail to pay heed to its lessons.

The responsibility of the winemaker is to produce a wine that exploits the grape’s best and most expressive character. The first exercise of that responsibility lies in planting grapes in the right location. Soil composition, sub-soil, underlying strata; the folds in hillsides, exposure to the sun and its duration, the ability of the ground to absorb or shed rainwater; the direction of prevailing winds and their distant source; the seasonal range of temperatures throughout the day and night; all of these factors and more coalesce in that precisely measurable yet somehow mysterious notion we call microclimate or terroir. Five hundred years have proven that a group of lamentably tiny vineyards in central-eastern France form the perfect terroir for the pinot noir grape, but that fact will not hinder prophets and pioneers from seeking a similar salubrious combination of effects elsewhere in the world.

The winemaker’s next responsibility is to allow a grape variety to seek its most natural level of eloquence; such a wine must be made without ego or agenda. Excellent grapes picked from a great vineyard need little help in accomplishing this goal, yet winemakers are an interfering lot. All details and variations of place and year aside, the pinot noir grape does not express itself best when the alcohol level is high, when the grapes are extremely ripe, when through deep extraction and oak aging the winemaker tries for size, voluptuousness and power. Let me state my feeling clearly: A pinot noir wine that, because of its size, its extraction, its power, reminds the taster, even in part or in passing, of, say, a syrah or a zinfandel, is a flawed wine, is, frankly, a failure, and it has been made in bad faith. The compact was been broken between the winemaker and the grape, and the wine amounts to an act of betrayal. I’m not saying that a pinot forced into larger-than-life dimension could not be enjoyable, match well with certain foods and so forth; I’m saying that it’s not pinot noir, and you might as well be drinking something else.

Over the past two or three weeks, I tasted 30 to 35 pinot noir wines from various regions of California; all are from vintages 2007 and 2008. I present my findings in a three-part series beginning today. A few of the examples displayed exactly what lovers of the pinot noir grape hope for, that ineffable marriage of delicacy, elegance, earthiness and authority that no other grape can offer in the same balance or proportion. More, however, and sadly, seemed heavy-handed, over-wrought, stridently-oaked and burdened with alcohol. Of course the pinot noir grape is not alone in such misfortune.

Image of pinot noir grapes from bighandsome.com.
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Benovia Winery was founded in 2005 by Joe Anderson and Mary Dewane, with winemaker Mike Sullivan as co-owner. The wines produced are chardonnay and zinfandel and a variety of single vineyard or proprietary pinot noirs. New French oak ranges from 53 to 60 percent; fermentation is induced by indigenous yeast.

The Benovia Savoy Vineyards Pinot Noir 2006, Anderson Valley, is pure and intense, rooty, loamy and minerally in the graphite sense. Scents and flavors of macerated black cherries, currants and plums are full-blown and spicy, yet the wine retains a tinge of reticence and austerity. Ten or 15 minutes in the glass bring out hints of pert cranberry and mulberry and burgeoning spice, but you feel the oak too, a tide that pushes against the swathing of fruit. The “Savoy” is the most sinewy, the most powerfully structured of this trio. 14.1 percent alcohol. 372 cases. Excellent. About $58.

The Benovia Cohn Vineyard Pinot Noir 2007, Sonoma County, is a little warmer, a little spicier and certainly more exotic, with notes of sassafras, sandalwood and cloves. The texture is satiny, almost plush, but with a backbone of rigorous acidity and shale-like minerality. The black fruit flavors become rather marinated and roasted and hints of rhubarb and fruit cake seep in. Again, one feels the oak from mid-palate back, drying the finish. 14.4 percent alcohol. 372 cases. Very Good+. About $58.

One notices immediately that the warmest, the most generous and multi-dimensional of these pinot noirs is the Benovia Bella Una Pinot Noir 2007, Russian River Valley, for which grapes are drawn from the Martinelli, Dutton and Manzana vineyards. The wine is also the earthiest, with layers of a moss-like Oolong tea, and traces of tobacco leaf and sandalwood. This is frankly a big mouthful of pinot noir, and fortunately it possesses a core of delicately wrought black fruit flavors to play against the forceful oak and tannic structure, offering convincing balance. 14.5 percent alcohol. 195 cases. Excellent. About $58.

Samples for review.
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Davis Bynum, who could be counted among the Sonoma County pioneers, founded his winery in 1975, concentrating on chardonnay, pinot noir and sauvignon blanc. Well-known winemaker Gary Farrell came aboard in 1986 to bring some steadiness to the label, before starting his own winery. The label is now owned by Tom Klein and is part of Rodney Strong Wine Estates. Winemaker is Gary Patzwald, for whom 2007 was the first vintage.

Fine so far, I suppose, but I have to say that the Davis Bynum Pinot Noir 2007, Russian River Valley, is one of the most un-pinot-like pinot noirs I have experienced, and I have to wonder what good ol’ Davis Bynum, with his label in other hands, thinks of it. The color is a deeply extracted dark ruby-plum hue; aromas of plum and black cherry, fruit cake, lavender and rose petal (some dark, heady damask-like rose) seethe in the glass in a promiscuous smoky, fleshy welter. The wine is dense, succulent, almost viscous, and the intense ripeness pushes the fruit toward boysenberry, just as the 14.9 percent alcohol shoulders through the finish as a kind of sweet heat. Is it zinfandel? Is it shee-razz? The grapes, we’re told, are pinot noir, but the effect is bizarre. Not for this boy. About $35.

A sample for review.
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Donum Estate occupies the former Tula Vista Ranch in Carneros, which the Racke family held onto after selling the Buena Vista Carneros Winery to Allied Domecq in 2001. Buena Vista traced its origin to 1857, when it was founded by the Sonoma County wine pioneer, Count Agoston Haraszthy, so even peripherally, there’s a lot of history here. President of Donum is Anne Moller-Racke, who came to California from Germany in 1981 and by 1997 was vice president of vineyard operations for Buena Vista; Moller-Racke is highly regarded as a grower, and her experience with the vineyards from which Donum draws its estate grapes goes back 20 and 30 years. I understand how meticulously the estate is run, how thoughtful and careful the vineyard practices are; I comprehend the innumerable questions and details that Moller-Racke and winemaker Kenneth Juhasz address in trying to achieve what the winery’s website calls “the purest possible expression of site and vintage.” So why do I find this trio of pinot noirs not thrilling? These are large-framed, packed-in pinot noirs, very Californian in tone and presence, and there’s nothing wrong with that nature, necessarily — all pinot doesn’t have to be Volnay or Chambolle-Musigny –but the persistent presence of new French oak in these wines is distracting, distancing and, particularly in one case, unbalancing.

The color of the Donum Estate Pinot Noir 2007, Carneros, is medium-darkish ruby. Scents of black and red cherries and cloves with a touch of cola and rhubarb burst from the glass in a welter of macerated and slightly roasted fleshiness; this is heady stuff, indeed. The spicy black and red fruit character continues seamlessly through the mouth, ensconced in a satiny texture that flows smoothly and lushly across the palate; the wine is substantial, even weighty for the pinot noir grape, and you feel the pull of the oak — 11 months, 70 percent new barrels — as it takes over the finish. 14.4 percent alcohol. 800 cases. Very Good+. About $65.

Even more seductive and exotic is the bouquet of the Donum Estates West Slope Pinot Noir 2007, Carneros, a seething cauldron of red currants and black cherries, sandalwood and ashes of roses, lavender, rhubarb, sassafras and smoky Oolong tea, like some hippie cologne concocted in Kathmandu. The wine is smooth, silky, plush, dense and dusty with moderately chewy tannins and a touch of slate; altogether, it takes the grape’s sensuous possibilities almost to the limit, that is to say, almost beyond a sense of natural pinot noir-ness. In quite a feat, Moller-Racke and Juhasz pulled off a minor miracle by putting the wine through 16 months in French oak, 70 percent new barrels, and not overwhelming the wine (and its drinkers) with too much wood. Try through 2013 to ’14. Alcohol content is 14.4 percent. 150 cases. A grudging Excellent. About $70.

Beyond the pale for this palate, however, is the Donum Estate Pinot Noir 2007, Russian River Valley, a wine that opens with sweet succulence and quickly proceeds to display the tangible panoply of its oaken arsenal. The regimen was 11 months in French oak, 75 percent new barrels; the result is very foresty, very briery, with dry woody spice and dusty austerity. Where’s the fruit? 14.4 percent alcohol. 500 cases. Not recommended. About $65.

Samples for review.
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In 1998, Bill Foley, who has deep pockets, founded his winery in the Santa Rita Hills, a sliver of Santa Barbara County’s Santa Ynez Valley. Not long afterward, he swung into acquisition mode, and now Foley Wines owns 16 wineries or labels, including the venerable Firestone and, as of December 2008, the even more venerable Sebastiani. The Foley label itself focuses on chardonnay and pinot noir from the estate’s Rancho Santa Rosa vineyard. Winemaker is Kris Curran, who before she came to Foley established the very successful pinot noir program at Sea Smoke Cellars.

Lord have mercy, the Foley Pinot Noir 2007, Santa Rita Hills, is lovely. Despite 16 months in French oak, the wine is a model of subtlety, poise and elegance. Poignant aromas of red and black currants and cherries are married to piercing slate-like minerality and a wafting of cloves and the slight asperity of allspice. As is the case in great pinot noir, slashing acidity cuts a swath on the palate, so the wine’s luxurious satiny texture does not overwhelm or turn into exaggeration; the wine is so fresh that even the spare tannins feel clean and wholesome. The bouquet’s heady perfume increases as the moments pass, while the ripe black and red fruit flavors deepen and darken. A wonderful amalgam of grace and authority; close to perfection. 14.3 percent alcohol. Drink through 2012 to ’14. Excellent. About $40, but prices on the Internet can be as low as $32.

Tasted at a trade event.
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Rich Frank — no pun intended — sough relief from the stress of the Hollywood media industry by buying a house in Napa Valley in 1990. He had been chairman of Disney’s television and telecommunications division and president of Walt Disney Studios. In 1992, he and a partner — subsequently bought out — purchased the defunct Kornell Champagne Cellars on the old Larkmead Winery near Calistoga. Larkmead had been established in 1884. Frank Family Vineyards concentrates on chardonnay, cabernet sauvignon and zinfandel, and though I have liked the cabernets and chardonnays, I have found the zinfandel overbearing. The pinot noir discussed today is the first pinot that the winery has released for national distribution; a Reserve Pinot Noir is sold only in the tasting room. Winemaker is Todd Graff.

The Frank Family Vineyards Pinot Noir 2008, Napa Valley-Carneros, is one big snootful and mouthful of pinot noir. Scents of red and black cherries and plums are dominated by ripe, earthy, fleshy elements and by piercing slate-like minerality and spicy oak. The treatment is entirely reasonable — 11 months in French barrels, 25 percent new, 75 percent one- and two-years-old — yet wood pervades every aspect of the wine, building from mid-palate back through the finish and providing, paradoxically, a sort of robust balance between voluptuousness and austerity. A few more details emerge in hints of cherry cola and briers, rose petals and licorice, but this is a wine primarily dominated by structure. 14.5 percent alcohol. Production was 954 cases. Very Good+. About $35.

A sample for review.
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The Gainey family hails from Minnesota, where they built Josten Inc., a company devoted to academic and athletic products and services, into a Fortune 500 company, while, at the same time, dedicating their lives to the raising of Arabian horses. That avocation brought them to the Southwest and then to Santa Barbara County’s Santa Ynez Valley, where Daniel J. Gainey, son of the family patriarch, in 1962 purchased 1,800 acres of farmland and open range. Grapevines came later, and in 1984 Gainey Vineyards released its first wines. The ranch is the largest diversified farming operation in Santa Ynez Valley, with 1000 acres for cattle, 600 for organically cultivated farmland, 100 acres for horses and 100 acres of sustainably farmed vineyards. Winemakers are Kirby Anderson and Jon Engelskiger.

The Gainey Pinot Noir 2007, Santa Rita Hills, offers lovely balance and integration, with delicately wreathed notes of smoky black cherry, red currants and plums, touches of orange zest and lapsang souchang tea and an intriguing back-tone of spiced apple. The wine drapes the mouth like satin, and then pulls out the panoply of dried baking spices and subtle hints of blueberry, cranberry and dried currants. A modicum of briers and brambles testifies to the presence of firm but unobtrusive tannins, while the oak influence, probably inescapable after 16 months in French barrels, 30 percent new, hews a dry, slightly woody path through the finish. I personally would rather see a tad less oak on the finish, but this is by and large a very warm and appealing pinot noir. Alcohol is 13.9 percent. production was 450 cases. Excellent. About $32.

A sample for review.
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In Part II of this post about California pinot noir, I’ll review wines from Hahn and Hahn SLH Estate, three pinots from La Crema from 2008, two single-vineyard pinots from Lucienne (2007), three from MacMurray Ranch and the Meiomi 2008 from Belle Glos.
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July 14 being Bastille Day, we went out to eat steak frites. Completely logical, mais non? Somewhat illogically, the restaurant which we went to, while having a French chef and serving mainly Euro/bistro-style fare, features almost all California wines on its list. The chef told me, in an interview at the beginning of this year, that he would like to have French wines on the list but that he couldn’t afford them. The thought-cloud hovering over my head pleaded, “Let me do your list!” Anyway, that’s not the point.

We ordered our steak frites and two glasses of Ridge Lytton Springs Zinfandel 2008. Our waiter was a cheery, eager young woman, what my mother would have called “bright-eyed and bushy-tailed,” an expression that always puzzled me when I was a child; I got the bright-eyed part, but bushy-tailed? Was she talking about squirrels? The waiter brought the glasses of wine, and here’s where the problem started. Now I haven’t tasted a Lyttons Spring Zinfandel in a while, but over the years I have tasted and consumed many examples of the zinfandel wines, including Lytton Springs, that emerge from the Ridge winery. After a few sniffs and sips of this wine, I was convinced that, unless Paul Draper and the team at Ridge have completely changed the philosophy and methodology of their decades-old practice, this was not a Ridge Lytton Springs Zinfandel. What I was smelling and tasting seemed to be the super-ripe snap and spicy toasty overlay of an over-oaked merlot or cabernet sauvigon.

Of course I couldn’t prove my theory because, as happens in about 95 percent of the cases when one orders wine by the glass in a restaurant, we didn’t see the bottle from which the wine was poured. I could have asked the waiter to bring us the bottle but we have to remember that it’s usually not the waiter who pours the glass of wine, it’s the bartender. So the waiter could have been completely innocent.

So, we chowed down on our delicious, medium-rare strip steaks and terrific frites and so forth and mutely drank the wine. The waiter came back to the table after a while and asked if we would like another glass, and LL said yes she would and I said no, not for me, but I reminded her that we were drinking the Ridge Lytton Springs Zinfandel, and she was like, well, yeah, duh, of course. Still, the waiter misunderstood and brought two glasses anyway, and I thought, swell, O.K., this will give me a chance to compare the wines, but before I could say, whoop-de-doo — and I have never seen this before in a restaurant but perhaps I live a protected life — she took the old glasses and poured the remaining wine in them into the new glasses of wine. So much for comparison.

Here’s the point.

Anything that happens to the wine that diners order in a restaurant, whether full bottle or by-the-glass, should happen in front of the customer. A bottle of wine, it should go without saying, should be opened at the table. Is the wine a precious bottle that the wine steward or sommelier thinks he or she should taste to see if it’s up to standard? All right, fine, but only with the permission of the diner and done at the table. Does an older wine need to be decanted? Sure, go ahead, but decant the wine at the table or at a nearby waiters’ station in view of the patron. And if wine is ordered by the glass, the waiter or wine steward should bring the bottle to the table and pour the glasses right there in front of the customers.

Such transparency can only promote the sense of goodwill and trust that form the bedrock of excellent service.

July 4 is our country’s Independence Day. How about on July 5, we declare independence from oak.

Yesterday, as befits a patriotic mood, I made a tomato salsa and then fired up the old Weber and grilled some split-open bratwurst and wedges of baguette; LL made potato salad. Voila! A very nice Fourth of July supper, which we ate on the back porch with the increasing sounds of firecrackers and the distant dull boom of pyrotechnics burgeoning round about; and the dogs exhibiting nervous jitters by twitching ears and soulful restlessness.

In sly-boots mode, I opened a bottle of The Federalist Zinfandel 2007, Dry Creek Valley, which bears, as you can see, the familiar visage of Alexander Hamilton from the U.S. $10-bill, based on the portrait executed by John Trumbull in 1805, except that on this label the figure faces to the right instead of to the left, as it does on the good old sawbuck.

Someone writes on the back label: “As leader of he Federalist party in the late 1700s, Alexander Hamilton was also a founding father and ally of the Declaration of Independence,” which is rather like saying that Benjamin Franklin was an ally of electricity, but what one must vehemently take issue with is this statement: “Around the same time, the roots of Zinfandel were beginning to grow and expand out of Europe and into the U.S.” Similarly, the wine’s website says: “The History of Zinfandel dates back to the 1700s, when farmers in the northeastern United States attempted to cultivate this as yet unknown varietal.”

Bad history, class, produces bad karma, just as lazy logic proceeds to ignorance.

In the excellent and highly readable Zinfandel: A History of a Grape and Its Wine (University of California Press, 2003), Charles L. Sullivan documented with meticulous research the zinfandel grape’s entrance into the New World in a batch of cuttings sent in the late 1820s or early 1830s from Vienna to George Gibbs of Long island, an amateur and fairly obsessive horticulturist, and from his care to Boston. These grapes, under the name “zinfindal,” became popular in Boston in the 1830s and ’40s for hot-house growing as table grapes. They were not intended as wine grapes because two centuries of experience had taught the colonists and recent Americans that the climate of New England was not amenable for European (vinifera) grapes in a vineyard setting. All of this took place some 20 or 30 years after Hamilton died on July 12, 1804, from wounds inflicted by Aaron Burr in their famous duel, not in “the 1700s.”

Another misleading statement on the back label is this: “Our Dry Creek estate-grown Federalist Zinfandel is hand crafted to bring out the true individuality of the Zinfandel grape.” If only that were true, or, at least, if only it had worked out that way, because in fashioning this wine, its makers succeeded primarily in bringing out the toasty, spicy, deeply vanilla-tinged aspects of oak barrels. I kept looking for, hoping for, some element, some feature that would relate the Federalist Zinfandel 2007 to the character of its grape, to zinfandel’s innate briery currant and brambly plum scents and flavors, to its peppery flair, but no, the wine continued to express its oak-infused personality, making it just like scores, if not hundreds, of other indistinguishable red wines from California, enjoyable perhaps, if you don’t mind that spicy vanilla, but inauthentic. 14.2 percent alcohol. 2,570 cases. Very Good. About $25.

A sample for review.

So I open this nifty bottle of $20 cabernet from, say, Napa Valley and, let’s see, the alcohol is 14.5 to 15 percent, it has dollops of merlot and cabernet franc and a touch of syrah — people are so clever nowadays! — it smells like vanilla-laced, toasty oak and cassis and, you know, it’s fine, just fine, but nothing very special or exciting. But, hey, we’re just talking about 20 bucks, so do we care?

Then I open this bottle of cabernet that costs $45 or $60 or $75 from, oh, just about anywhere but let’s say Tuscany, and the alcohol is 14.5 to 15 percent, it has dollops of merlot and cabernet franc and a touch of syrah — people are so clever nowadays! — it smells like vanilla-laced, toasty oak and cassis and, you know, it’s fine, just fine, but nothing very special or exciting. And, come on, we’re talking real money here, wine-wise.

I’m so tired of this crapola. I just want to pour out these damned wines. I’m tired of interchangeable cabernet-based wines that could have been made in Napa or Sonoma, Tuscany or Piedmont, Barossa or Coonawarra, Rapel or Mendoza or Walla Walla because they all look and smell and taste and feel the same. Lord, I’m so weary of carefully-calibrated, committee-made cabernets that toe the line of all the popular, 95-point conventions and cliches. Have mercy, I’m exhausted by the sleek, slick debut cabernets that cost $75 or $100 a bottle right out of the starting gate, with no track record except the promise of a winemaker’s name. Criminy, I’m sick unto death of the press releases that inform me in exalted, ecstatic tones of the owner’s vision and the winemaker’s passion and the integrity of the land and the absolute sustainable architectural treasureness of the winery.

And speaking of the integrity of the land, the notion of terroir and single-vineyard wines don’t matter a rat’s ass when the finished wine is sodden with oak and hot with alcohol. Don’t spin me the hype of how important yer little microclimate and soil and organic philosophy and vineyard practices are (not to mention all that vision and passion) when you clobber the wine with wood and eradicate any terroir-like character it might have had. What a waste!

So stop it. Right now.

Broken wine glass image from apartmenttherapy.com.

I received some wine samples from Freemark Abbey not long ago, and I thought, “Gosh, how nice to hear from this venerable Napa Valley winery,” and then I remembered that Freemark Abbey is owned by Kendall-Jackson. Same thing happened with Matanzas Creek and Murphy-Goode. Other labels owned by the Jackson Family Wines division include La Crema, Stonestreet, Byron, Lakoya, Verite, La Jota, Edmeades and Cambria. Kendall-Jackson itself, which started producing the well-known Vintner’s Reserve line with chardonnay in 1982, has several tiers of labels to accommodate many price points. Though at 5.5 million cases a year in 2009 (according to San Francisco Business Times), K-J doesn’t compete with Diageo, Gallo, The Wine Group or Constellation, the company makes and sells a hell of a lot of wine.

So why does billionaire owner Jess Jackson — or to be realistic, his marketing honchos — need more labels?

Just released are two wines in the new Jackson Hills label, intended to fit between the K-J Grand Reserve and Highland Estates tiers. The basic label, the ubiquitous Vintner’s Reserve line, consists of 11 wines priced between $14 and $18. The Grand Reserve roster includes 14 wines that cost from $15 to $25. The limited edition Highland Estates label offers 16 wines priced from $30 to $75. Obviously there was a crying need for a niche right there between the $15 to $25 range and the $30 to $75 sequence, and the Jackson Hills label is it.

Another new label from Jackson Family Wines is Acre, a line that focuses on grapes from the Central Coast, a vast “appellation” — it covers seven counties south of San Francisco — about as useful as two left arms on an infielder. Since the Acre Chardonnay 2008, for example, derives completely from Los Alamos Valley in Santa Barbara County, why not label it Santa Barbara instead of Central Coast? The narrower the appellation, the more impressive it is (though not necessarily a better wine). In terms of price — $16 — the Acre wines seem redundant; they fall smack in the middle of the Vintner’s Reserve line-up. All right, so I’m skeptical about American Viticultural Areas (AVAs) — or AOCs in France — that encompass extensive geographical realms, though the Central Coast is distinguished by proximity to the Pacific and its morning fogs and by its inland mountain ranges, but saying that chardonnays from Monterey and San Luis Obispo share a “Central Coast character” is disingenuous. As far as usefulness is concerned, of course the Central Coast designation serves a purpose when grapes from more than one county go into a wine.

So, how are these new wines in the Jackson empire?

With the exception of the Jackson Hills Chardonnay 2008, Santa Barbara County, they’re not particularly compelling, or, to put the case another way, I don’t recommend them with much confidence.

The Jackson Hills Chardonnay 2008, Santa Barbara County, is a clean and bright chardonnay fashioned in an expansively fruity style that’s neither tropical nor too oaky. Typical pineapple and grapefruit flavors are set into a fairly opulent texture deftly balanced by bracing acidity and keen limestone-like minerality. The wine is quite dry, moderately spicy and a little austere on the finish. Does it sound familiar? Yes, this is an exemplar of a specific style of California chardonnay, tasty, sleek, sensually satisfying and undemanding. Very Good+. About $25.

A bigger deal is the Jackson Hills Cabernet Sauvignon 2007, from Knights Valley, the northern section of Sonoma County noted for cabernet production. How big a deal is it? So big that it feels as if woody tannins and dusty oak are sifting through your teeth. This wine is very intense, very concentrated, and if there’s fruit in there somewhere — and there must be, right? isn’t that the point? — I couldn’t find it. I whomped the cork back in the bottle and left this wine to try the next morning; rising fresh from my guileless repose, I was greeted by a mouthful of austere and astringent tannins. Perhaps I simply disagree totally with the way this wine was made, but it gets no nod from me. About $40.

Nothing quite so drastic mars the three Acre wines that I tried; their flaw is to be merely ordinary and free of varietal quality. (Well, the chardonnay is pretty darned flawed.) The Acre label was launched in May 2009 by White Rocket Wine Co., a division that Kendall-Jackson created in Oct. 2006 to create and market “fun” brands aimed at a younger generation of wine consumers; several existing labels, such as Tin Roof, Camelot and Pepi, were shifted to White Rocket, which was based in Napa. I say was because White Rocket was absorbed by Jackson Family Wines in August 2009 and some staff members were laid-off. Other “fun” labels developed by White Rocket included AutoMoto, Dog House, French Maid, Geode, Horse Play and so on.

Anyway, the Acre Chardonnay 2008 is fermented half in oak and half in stainless steel, goes through full malolactic, ages four month in French oak sur lie with frequent stirring of the lees, and boy does it show. This is a very bright, boldly oaky and spicy chardonnay made in a style that does not marry its extremes; on the one hand, its vivid baked pineapple and grapefruit flavors grab your palate with succulent lusciousness, while on the other hand the excessive dryness and woody austerity sear your taste-buds. Unworkable; unbalanced; a Big No. About $16.

The Acre Merlot 2007 and Acre Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 are not unbalanced or unwieldy; they merely feel interchangeable. These truly are cross-county wines: The Merlot ’07 derives 72 percent from the small Hames Valley AVA in Monterey, 20 percent from San Benito County and 8 percent from San Luis Obispo; the blend is 80 percent merlot, 15 percent cabernet sauvignon, 5 percent petit sirah. The Cabernet Sauvignon ’07 originates from Raso Robles in San Luis Obispo (68%), San Benito (20%) and Monterey (12%). These geeky details may be tedious to peruse, but they indicate the level of thoughtfulness that went into assembling these two wines, though perhaps “assembled” isn’t the method we most seek in the wines we admire.

The problem is that these two reds feel more generic than individual. Each is quite brambly and berryish, bursting with spicy oak and etched with mocha; each is earthy and minerally, in the graphite-tinged area; each has a circumference of dusty, slightly charcoal-like tannins. The cabernet does offer a hint of black olive and cedar to differentiate it minutely from the merlot, but I don’t call that enough. I’ll give these Good+ and say that wines costing $16 should deliver more personality and dimension.

Now, not to be a complete curmudgeon, I’ll say that I was delighted with the Kendall-Jackson Vintner’s Reserve Summation 2009, California. Introduced to the line-up last year for the 2008 vintage, this wine is perfect for sipping throughout the summer into the fall. It contains a smorgasbord of grapes — sauvignon blanc (33%), viognier (27%), chardonnay (15%), semillon (9%), roussanne (6%), pinot blanc (6%), riesling (2%) and muscat canelli (2%) — from five counties dominated by Lake (63%) with major contributions from Mendocino (23%) and Santa Barbara (21%). The result is a winning and very pretty wine that offers a seductive bouquet of jasmine and honeysuckle, pear and lychee, with hints of almond and just-mown hay. The wine is quite crisp and refreshing, with cheeky acidity to tantalize the palate and lovely flavors of roasted lemon, melon and pear imbued with quince and cloves and an energizing element of chalky limestone. The finish is dry and limestony and brings in a bracing touch of grapefruit bitterness. This would drink nicely with grilled fish and seafood or summery salads and pastas. Very Good+. About $17.

In fact, it seems to me that the most reliable wines for the regular consumer in the extensive Kendall-Jackson line-up are the Vintner’s Reserve wines, that ones that started the whole dance back in 1982. They may not always be exciting, but they are true to their originator’s philosophy and their grape varieties and they generally taste real.

Will it really help sell wines from Russian River Valley or Alexander Valley if labels for wines from those appellations are required by law to state “Sonoma County” as well as the region?

The trade group Sonoma County Vintners is proposing such a law for so-called “conjunctive labeling” to the state legislature, on the model of a similar law passed in the 1980s for Napa Valley. The idea is to raise recognition for the county as a winemaking region; in other words, this law would be all about marketing. As Tom Wark eloquently points out in his post on this subject on his blog Fermentation, wineries in any of the county’s 13 distinct American Viticultural Areas (AVAs) may append the words “Sonoma County” to their regional designation if they want do, but they may also choose not to; most of them, it seems, do not. After all, labeling practices are in the hands of the Federal Alcohol and Tobacco Trade and Tax Bureau (TTB), which sets the regulations for wine labeling and geographical matters. Why should local authorities try to trump the feds and add even more rules to a complicated business?

And why would a producer in Russian River Valley or Dry Creek Valley not want to have the term “Sonoma County” added to a wine’s front label?

Sonoma County encompasses 13 growing regions (AVAs) that total about 60,300 acres of vines. Theoretically, the different official areas — “official” because they are determined and recognized by the federal government — display distinct enough characteristics to justify their existence, for example, Russian River Valley with its low-lying riverine topography and propensity to morning fog; the warmer Alexander Valley; gently rolling Chalk Hill, with its soil of volcanic ash. The implication (or hope) is that each distinct AVA contributes unique elements of geography and climate to the formation of a wine’s style and character.

“Sonoma County,” on the other hand, is such a broad category that its most legitimate function is as a generic geographic indicator, a way of saying, “This wine was made in a certain county in Northern California.” Such a condition is not necessarily pejorative, especially for inexpensive or moderately-priced wines whose grapes may be blended from several smaller AVAs, of which there are many examples. The point is that there is not an identifiable “Sonoma County” character that can be ascribed to a wine.

If, however, a producer is making prestige-level wines from smaller AVAs with the intention of reflecting the specific influence of that soil and micro-climate in the wine, then adding the term “Sonoma County” to the front label is not merely redundant but distracting. That front label is the billboard, the “Hollywood” sign of a wine bottle; it’s the field where producers state what they think is most important and immediately recognizable about their wines.

Being curious about how many wineries or producers in Sonoma County actually use the “Sonoma County” terms on the front label as well as a smaller AVA, I looked through the review sample rack and refrigerator for examples, and here’s what I came up:

Those That Do Not Mention Sonoma County on the Front Label
<>Frei Brothers Reserve Syrah 2007, Russian River Valley, Northern Sonoma. (The largely useless Northern Sonoma AVA encompasses all of Sonoma County except for the Sonoma Valley and Carneros appellations. It was created in 1985 — and amended in 1986 and 1990 — after a campaign by E & J Gallo. Frei Brothers is a Gallo brand.)

<>Terlato Pinot Noir 2007, Russian River Valley.

<>Sausal Private Reserve Zinfandel 2007, Alexander Valley.

<>Benovia Bella Una Pinot Noir 2007, Russian River Valley.

<>Dry Creek Vineyard The Mariner Meritage 2006, Dry Creek Valley. (Sonoma County stated on back label.)

<>Benziger Signaterra Three Block 2006, Sonoma Valley.

<>La Crema Pinot Noir 2008, Sonoma Coast.

<>Davis Bynum Pinot Noir 2007, Russian River Valley.

<>Louis M. Martini Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 2003, Alexander Valley. (Yeah, I know, why do I still have this wine?)

<>Respite Reichel Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon 2006, Alexander Valley.

<>Gundlach Bundschu Rhinefarm Vineyard Merlot 2005, Sonoma Valley.

<>EnRoute Les Pommiers Pinot Noir 2008, Russian River Valley.

<>Silver Oak Cabernet Sauvignon 1998, Alexander Valley. (Not a review sample, of course; I bought this at an auction. Perhaps I should drink it with tonight’s pizza.)

<>Thumbprint Cellars Westside Vineyard Chardonnay 2007, Russian River Valley.

<>Hook & Ladder “Third Alarm” Reserve Chardonnay 2003, Russian River Valley. (Why do I still have this wine, too?)

Those That Mention Sonoma County on the Front Label as Well as a Distinct Appellation
<>Murphy-Goode Merlot 2007, Alexander Valley, Sonoma County.

<>Matanzas Creek Merlot 2006, Bennett Valley, Sonoma County.

<>Rodney Strong Brothers Ridge Cabernet Sauvignon 2006, Alexander Valley, Sonoma County.

Admittedly this is an anecdotal survey with a plus/minus factor of probably 10,000 percent, but it also speaks pretty clearly; 14 wineries use the specific appellation name without adding Sonoma County, while three do. Yet according to an article by Kevin McCallum in The [Santa Rosa] Press Democrat, “Eight of the county’s nine wine and grape trade groups say they would support a law that would require wines made from local grapes to feature Sonoma County on the label.” The ninth trade group, that of Russian River Valley, is also considered a shoo-in.

What the hell, readers? I mean, I won’t even speculate on the motivations behind these bewildering votes, because I can’t fathom it.

And as I look at other wine labels of bottles clustered about me in phalanxes of rectitude, I can’t help noting that most of them to do not include a broader county designation in addition to a specific appellation. Right at hand are two bottles of wine from Heller Estate that say, “Carmel Valley, California,” but don’t mention Monterey County. Similarly, bottles of vineyard designated pinot noir from Lucienne say “Santa Lucia Highlands,” without mentioning Monterey County. Here’s an Easton Zinfandel 2006 from Fiddletown that doesn’t mention Amador County. And so on.

The exception to these examples, as I mentioned earlier, is Napa Valley, but notice that the legal requirement doesn’t insist on including the term Napa County. Yes, Napa County is also a designated AVA — it’s slightly larger than Napa Valley — and wineries could use the term if they wanted to. I’m sure you have noticed that almost no one does. I mean, who wants to be known as a producer of Napa County wines?

Map of Sonoma County AVAs from sonomainspring.com.

We ate at a popular local restaurant last night, one that probably falls into the “casual/fine dining” category. The place is well-designed and comfortable, a little clubby; there are white table-cloths and napkins; the menu is varied and fairly expensive; the wine list is good; waiters wear pin-striped shirts and white aprons. Our waiter annoyed the crap out of me by consistently addressing our table as “guys,” as in “Are you guys ready to order?” and “Do you guys need anything?” This locution was particularly annoying because our table consisted on one man (me) and five women; I mean, we weren’t a bunch of guys scarfing down Bud Lite and chicken wings in a sports bar. Restaurant owners and managers! Remember that waiters and the manner in which they relate to patrons help set the tone for the establishment!

Anyway, what I really wanted to mention though was this: I brought two bottles of wine to the restaurant, first checking online to be sure they weren’t on the wine list. These were the Morgan Garys’ Vineyard Pinot Noir 2007, Santa Lucia Highlands, and a Silver Oak Cabernet Sauvignon 1998, Alexander Valley. When I take wine to a restaurant, I always buy a bottle or two from the list, in this case a bottle of the Fritz Sauvignon Blanc 2009, Russian River Valley, and a glass of the King Estate Pinot Gris 2008, Oregon. We only drank the Morgan Pinot Noir, so I set the Silver Oak aside.

Now, here’s the kicker; I promise that after decades of dining out and frequently taking wine to restaurants, I had never heard this. When the waiter brought the check, he said, “I only charged you one corkage fee since we didn’t open the other bottle.”

Say wha’? Was I supposed to feel special that we didn’t get charged corkage for a bottle of wine that wasn’t opened? Come on, the corkage fee doesn’t start the moment you walk in the door with the bottle; it’s the opening of the bottle that results in the fee.

I mean it wasn’t a big deal, but it was startling.

You know F.K.’s Laws of Blogging, right?

1. Be honest.
2. Be fair.
3. Don’t be an asshole.

Well, honestly, I don’t want to be an asshole, but how can people be so abjectly ignorant of language, especially the language and vocabulary of their field?

There’s a recipe in the March 2010 issue of Bon Appetit, a magazine we cook from sometimes, that calls for a bag of frozen shelled edamame, “unthawed.”

Where are the freaking editors?

The word is “thaw,” past tense or predicate adjective, “thawed.”

“Unthawed” is a folk locution, a back-formation based on the mistaken notion that transforming an entity from one state to another requires “un-ing” it. Not so. Frozen is frozen; the act of unfreezing something, a TV dinner, a bag of edamame, a game hen, is “thawing.”

“Unthawing,” theoretically, would mean “freezing,” as in, “Man, it’s so cold outside that my hands are totally unthawed!”

Sheesh.

Which came first, the wine or the marketing campaign?

In my career writing about wine, I have received, along with wine, of course, the usual and the odd assortment of devices from marketing and PR people. These include corkscrews and foil cutters, little notebooks with pens, packets of spices and jars of condiments and, back in the 1990s, when this was the rage for some reason, dried-up pieces of grapevines and sacks of dirt; now that’s what terroir is all about.

Rarely, however, have I been on the receiving end of as strange a perk as I was granted last week, along with four wines with a new label, Tempra Tantrum, from Bodegas Osborne. Depicted in the whimsical image here, this alien-looking creature, reaching out a hand of friendship to the aloof feline, is a webcam with which I and my similarly lucky winewriting colleagues are encouraged to “create web videos of your wine tastings, with Tempra Tantrum as your first post!” Fat chance of that, unfortunately. The cover letter, purporting to be from vintner Rocío Alonso-Allende Osborne, a member of the sixth generation to run the family business, founded in 1772, goes on to say, “I hope he” — the webcam, which she names Toñito — “inspires many moments of self-expression and I hope you enjoy these wines which are an expression of my life.”

I always hate it when a winemaker writes that his or her wines “are an expression of my life,” because then I have to say something like, “Erk” or “Gack,” because, in this case, the Tempra Tantrum wines aren’t very good and are certainly not as good as the Solaz wines produced by Osborne at the same property, Malpica de Tajo, in the vast, flat wine region called Vino de la Tierra de Castilla, not far from Toledo. Not that the Solaz wines are great; they’re pretty rustic and forthright, but they offer a sort of bruised-knuckle integrity and individuality that these Tempra Tantrum wines — the coy name is unendurable — cannot hope to emulate.

Each of the four Tempra Tantrum blends contains 60 percent tempranillo — get the joke now? — with 40 percent of something else: merlot, shiraz (as they say), grenache and cabernet sauvignon. The first impression is of dusty, bubble-gum-ish, basic Beaujolais-like fruity blandness. I found little of the typical tempranillo character of dried red and black fruit and spice, dried flowers and orange rind. The temp/merlot blend is the most generic; the temp/cabernet blend a little drier and slightly more muscular; the temp/grenache blend a little ‘darker” and spicier and slightly more austere; the temp/shiraz blend moderately characterful. None exhibits qualities that would compel you to drink it, and all are far from displaying, as the back labels put it, “the passion, flavor, style and emotion that embodies modern Spain,” subject/verb agreement error included free of charge. Nor are the wines notably, again quoting the back label, “vibrant, plush and in a word — sexy.” Sexy, I would say, least of all.

This conjunction of mediocre wine and ardently senseless marketing too often defines the relationship between wine and consumer in today’s global situation. I receive many new cute, goofy labels every year that raise the question: Which came first, the wine or the discussions about how to name and market the wine before the grapes were even harvested (or, in some cases, purchased)? And that question leads to another: Are consumers so naive, not to say gullible, that they will actually purchase a wine based on its supposedly witty name and its promise of “passion, flavor, style and emotion,” all for $10? Or do they give a damn?

I, for one, would support a ban on the word “passion” from wine labels. I am a-weary, weary of reading squibs like, “This wine reflects my family’s passion for excellence and our passionate attachment to the land that our ancestors so passionately believed in with all their hearts and minds.” Just make the wine, Jack, and make it well and sell it at a decent price. Other than that, shut the fuck up.

The Tempra Tantrum wines are imported by Underdog Wine Merchants, Livermore, Cal. They were supplied as samples for review, along with the webcam mentioned above.

Q. You are on record as despising Twitter, Facebook and other social-networking devices, yet you recently signed up for Twitter. Que pasa?

A. I signed on to Twitter because everyone said that I should use it as a marketing tool to bring traffic to this blog. More traffic may lead to more advertising. No, wait, make that some advertising, any advertising, at least something more than Google ads, which I assume that everyone regards as annoying to the point of invisibility. Those Google ads net me all of $100 annually. Whoa, bring up that Wells-Fargo armored truck now!

Q. And has Twitter brought you more traffic?

A. Not noticeably. Of course I only have 34 followers, so I guess it will take time, you know, slowly building the Irresistible Momentum of a Force of Nature.

Q. We notice that you aren’t following anyone on Twitter. Pour quoi?

A. I tried that for a few weeks, but found the suffocating inanity intolerable. It’s amazing what intelligent, college-educated people will reveal about themselves or the trivialities they so breathlessly report. It’s like reading a Freudian treatise on the madness of crowds via telegraph.

Q. On another subject, do you accept wine samples for review?

A. Let me say this about that. The whole reviewing apparatus — wine, books, music CDs (what’s left of them), household products — depends on review samples. Rare is the publication or writer who possesses the fiduciary prowess to afford paying for the items he or she reviews. Probably 80 percent of he wines I review come as samples from wineries, producers, importers and wholesalers; some of these are sent with prior notice, some I solicit, to fit into a particular theme or post, but most just arrive at the door. Another 10 percent I encounter at trade tastings or similar events, and the remaining five percent I buy.

Q. That being the case, would you state your policy about accepting samples and reviewing the wines for this blog?

A. Of course I will. Let’s practice full disclosure. As I said in the previous entry, yes, I accept wine samples for review, but I accept them on no assumption on the part of whoever sent the sample that I will give a positive review or even any review at all. While it gives me great joy to recommend wines to my readers and share my enthusiasm with them, I am obligated, both by conscience and professional considerations, to dole out negative notices when necessary. I also reserve the right to make fun of, parody or downright deride — without being a total asshole — press releases that are badly written, deficient, vain, pompous and utterly fantastical. You would be amazed how many press releases embody all of those fatal flaws.

Q. On another subject entirely, is it true that when you were a child in Rochester N.Y., you and your older brother were a Cossack-dancing team and you performed on local television?

A. Yes.

Cool question mark image from verticalmeasures.com. Cossack-dancing kid from Koeppel Family Archives.